scholarly journals Broad supernatural punishment but not moralizing high gods precede the evolution of political complexity in Austronesia

2015 ◽  
Vol 282 (1804) ◽  
pp. 20142556 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joseph Watts ◽  
Simon J. Greenhill ◽  
Quentin D. Atkinson ◽  
Thomas E. Currie ◽  
Joseph Bulbulia ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Social Groups ◽  
Cultural Exchange ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
Functional Explanation ◽  
Human Society ◽  
Complex Societies ◽  
Political Complexity ◽  
Phylogenetic Methods ◽  
High Gods ◽  
Supernatural Punishment

Supernatural belief presents an explanatory challenge to evolutionary theorists—it is both costly and prevalent. One influential functional explanation claims that the imagined threat of supernatural punishment can suppress selfishness and enhance cooperation. Specifically, morally concerned supreme deities or ‘moralizing high gods' have been argued to reduce free-riding in large social groups, enabling believers to build the kind of complex societies that define modern humanity. Previous cross-cultural studies claiming to support the MHG hypothesis rely on correlational analyses only and do not correct for the statistical non-independence of sampled cultures. Here we use a Bayesian phylogenetic approach with a sample of 96 Austronesian cultures to test the MHG hypothesis as well as an alternative supernatural punishment hypothesis that allows punishment by a broad range of moralizing agents. We find evidence that broad supernatural punishment drives political complexity, whereas MHGs follow political complexity. We suggest that the concept of MHGs diffused as part of a suite of traits arising from cultural exchange between complex societies. Our results show the power of phylogenetic methods to address long-standing debates about the origins and functions of religion in human society.

Cultural Diversity and Critical Dietetics: A Scholarship of Cross-Cultural Engagement

2016 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 23-31
Author(s):  
Craig Alan Hassel
Keyword(s):  
Ways Of Knowing ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
Knowledge Systems ◽  
Human Society ◽  
Health Issues ◽  
Post Colonial ◽  
Cultural Engagement ◽  
Cultural Perspectives ◽  
Culturally Different ◽  
Classical Chinese Medicine

As every human society has developed its own ways of knowing nature in order to survive, dietitians can benefit from an emerging scholarship of “cross-cultural engagement” (CCE).  CCE asks dietitians to move beyond the orthodoxy of their academic training by temporarily experiencing culturally diverse knowledge systems, inhabiting different background assumptions and presuppositions of how the world works.  Although this practice may seem de- stabilizing, it allows for significant outcomes not afforded by conventional dietetics scholarship.  First, culturally different knowledge systems including those of Africa, Ayurveda, classical Chinese medicine and indigenous societies become more empathetically understood, minimizing the distortions created when forcing conformity with biomedical paradigms.  This lessens potential for erroneous interpretations.  Second, implicit background assumptions of the dietetics profession become more apparent, enabling a more critical appraisal of its underlying epistemology.  Third, new forms of post-colonial intercultural inquiry can begin to develop over time as dietetics professionals develop capacities to reframe food and health issues from different cultural perspectives.  CCE scholarship offers dietetics professionals a means to more fully appreciate knowledge assets that lie beyond professionally maintained parameters of truth, and a practice for challenging and moving boundaries of credibility.

Intelligence and Intelligibility

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
G. E. R. Lloyd
Keyword(s):  
Social Groups ◽  
Human Experience ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
Human Intelligence ◽  
Cognitive Capacities ◽  
Nature And Culture ◽  
The Cross ◽  
Intellectual Disciplines

This study investigates the tension between two conflicting intuitions, our twin recognitions: (1) that all humans share the same basic cognitive capacities; and yet (2) their actual manifestations in different individuals and groups differ appreciably. How can we reconcile our sense of what links us all as humans with our recognition of these deep differences? All humans use language and live in social groups, where we have to probe what is distinctive in the experience of humans as opposed to that of other animals and how the former may have evolved from the latter. Moreover, the languages we speak and the societies we form differ profoundly, though the conclusion that we are the prisoners of our own particular experience should and can be resisted. The study calls into question the cross-cultural viability both of many of the analytic tools we commonly use (such as the contrast between the literal and the metaphorical, between myth and rational account, and between nature and culture) and of our usual categories for organizing human experience and classifying intellectual disciplines, mathematics, religion, law, and aesthetics. The result is a robust defence of the possibilities of mutual intelligibility while recognizing both the diversity in the manifestations of human intelligence and the need to revise our assumptions in order to achieve that understanding.

The Size of Societies, Stratification, and Belief in High Gods Supportive of Human Morality

1995 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
pp. 73-77 ◽  
Author(s):  
Frans L. Roes
Keyword(s):  
Regional Differences ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
The Other ◽  
Positive Relation ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
High Gods

Two hypotheses about belief in high gods supportive of human morality were tested with data from the Ethnographic Atlas and the Standard Cross-Cultural Sample. A significant positive relation between the size of societies and such a belief is demonstrated, and this relation appears to be independent of both regional differences and differences in stratification of the societies. On the other hand, stratification itself is also significantly related with the belief in high gods supportive of human morality, but this relation could not be shown to be independent of regional differences or differences in size.

scholarly journals The Uses and Abuses of Tree Thinking in Cultural Evolution

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cara Evans ◽  
Simon J. Greenhill ◽  
Joseph Watts ◽  
Johann-Mattis List ◽  
Carlos A. Botero ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Best Practices ◽  
Cultural Evolution ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
Tree Thinking ◽  
Phylogenetic Methods ◽  
Cultural Research ◽  
Cross Cultural Research ◽  
Cultural Traits ◽  
Lines Of Evidence ◽  
Over Time

Modern phylogenetic methods are increasingly being used to address questions about macro-level patterns in cultural evolution. These methods can illuminate the unobservable histories of cultural traits and identify the evolutionary drivers of trait-change over time, but their application is not without pitfalls. Here we outline the current scope of research in cultural tree thinking, highlighting a toolkit of best practices to navigate and avoid the pitfalls and ‘abuses’ associated with their application. We emphasise two principles that support the appropriate application of phylogenetic methodologies in cross-cultural research: researchers should (1) draw on multiple lines of evidence when deciding if and which types of phylogenetic methods and models are suitable for their cross-cultural data, and (2) carefully consider how different cultural traits might have different evolutionary histories across space and time. When used appropriately phylogenetic methods can provide powerful insights into the processes of evolutionary change that have shaped the broad patterns of human history.

scholarly journals Constructing and validating a new measure of ingroup identification.

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark Rubin
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Differences ◽  
Social Groups ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
Cross Cultural Differences ◽  
Relationship Orientation ◽  
Self Construal ◽  
Ingroup Identification

In this study we constructed a scale that measures centrality, social, communal, andinterdependent identifi cation, and investigated the distinction between these four different typesof identifi cation with social groups. The general aim was to examine the psychometric propertiesof the newly designed Centrality, Social, Communal, and Interdependent Identifi cation Scale(CSCIIS) and to investigate whether differences in self-construal, relationship orientation,gender, and culture might predict each type of identifi cation. The results provided initial supportfor the validity and the reliability of the CSCIIS, revealed cross-cultural differences in ingroupidentifi cation, and supported predictions regarding the correlations between particular types ofrelationships orientation and particular types of identifi cation with social groups.

Mobile Methods and Large Screens

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nikos Papastergiadis ◽  
Amelia Barikin ◽  
Xin Gu ◽  
Scott McQuire ◽  
Audrey Yue
Keyword(s):  
Public Space ◽  
Cultural Exchange ◽  
Research Process ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
The Public ◽  
Media Technologies ◽  
Global Era ◽  
Theoretical Perspectives ◽  
The Public Sphere ◽  
Mobile Methods

This chapter details the case studies that were conducted as part of a five-year research project, which conducted the world’s first real-time cross-cultural exchange via the networking of large public screens located in Melbourne and Seoul. The project linked large screens located in Seoul and Melbourne for three media events: SMS_Origins and <Value>, HELLO, and Dance Battle. The chapter details methodological innovations of the research, which involved the reformulation of the way in which the scholar was embedded in the research and transformed according to the interactive research process. It also elucidates critical insights into the process of cultural exchange, the impact of media technologies on public space, and the transformation of the public sphere in the global era. The empirical research generates fresh insights into public interactions with large screens, providing a prototype for future cross-cultural events and offering new theoretical perspectives on the use of public space.

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