scholarly journals Not by transmission alone: the role of invention in cultural evolution

2021 ◽  
Vol 376 (1828) ◽  
Author(s):  
Susan Perry ◽  
Alecia Carter ◽  
Marco Smolla ◽  
Erol Akçay ◽  
Sabine Nöbel ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Social Learning ◽  
Cognitive Processes ◽  
Cultural Evolution ◽  
Cultural Adaptation ◽  
Theme Issue ◽  
History Of ◽  
New Ideas ◽  
Four Levels ◽  
New Research

Innovation—the combination of invention and social learning—can empower species to invade new niches via cultural adaptation. Social learning has typically been regarded as the fundamental driver for the emergence of traditions and thus culture. Consequently, invention has been relatively understudied outside the human lineage—despite being the source of new traditions. This neglect leaves basic questions unanswered: what factors promote the creation of new ideas and practices? What affects their spread or loss? We critically review the existing literature, focusing on four levels of investigation: traits (what sorts of behaviours are easiest to invent?), individuals (what factors make some individuals more likely to be inventors?), ecological contexts (what aspects of the environment make invention or transmission more likely?), and populations (what features of relationships and societies promote the rise and spread of new inventions?). We aim to inspire new research by highlighting theoretical and empirical gaps in the study of innovation, focusing primarily on inventions in non-humans. Understanding the role of invention and innovation in the history of life requires a well-developed theoretical framework (which embraces cognitive processes) and a taxonomically broad, cross-species dataset that explicitly investigates inventions and their transmission. We outline such an agenda here. This article is part of the theme issue ‘Foundations of cultural evolution’.

scholarly journals Not by transmission alone – the role of invention in cultural evolution

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Susan Perry ◽  
Alecia Carter ◽  
Marco Smolla ◽  
Erol Akcay ◽  
Sabine Nöbel ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Social Learning ◽  
Data Set ◽  
Process Understanding ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
New Ideas ◽  
Four Levels ◽  
New Research ◽  
Creativity And Innovation ◽  
Nonhuman Species

Invention and social learning have together empowered our species to inhabit virtually every part of the world. For the past fifty years, however, social learning has been regarded as the fundamental driver for the emergence of tradition and culture. As a result, innovation has been relatively understudied, outside the human lineage. This has left basic questions unanswered, such as: What factors promote the creation of new ideas and practices? And what affects whether they are spread or lost? We review the existing literature, focusing on the following four levels of investigation: traits (what sorts of behaviours are easiest to invent?), individuals (what intrinsic and contextual factors make some individuals more likely to invent new things?), populations (what features of social relationships and societies promote the rise and spread of new inventions?), and ecological contexts. We aim to inspire new research agendas by summarizing what is known and highlighting theoretical and empirical gaps in our understanding of the innovative process. Understanding the origin of humans’ noteworthy levels of creativity requires a well-developed theory of creativity and innovation as well as a large comparative data set investigating these processes in nonhuman species from a wide range of taxa.

Elaborating the role of reflection and individual differences in the study of folk-economic beliefs

2018 ◽  
Vol 41 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kevin Arceneaux
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Individual Differences ◽  
Cognitive Processes ◽  
Evolutionary History ◽  
Behavioral Responses ◽  
History Of ◽  
Economic Beliefs

AbstractIntuitions guide decision-making, and looking to the evolutionary history of humans illuminates why some behavioral responses are more intuitive than others. Yet a place remains for cognitive processes to second-guess intuitive responses – that is, to be reflective – and individual differences abound in automatic, intuitive processing as well.

scholarly journals Ernst von Leyden (1832–1910): a pioneer in making oncology a respected medical discipline

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter Voswinckel ◽  
Nils Hansson
Keyword(s):  
International Association ◽  
German Society ◽  
Scientific Discipline ◽  
Strong Impact ◽  
Medical Discipline ◽  
History Of ◽  
National Socialists ◽  
New Research ◽  
German Physician

Abstract Purpose This article presents new research on the role of the renowned German physician Ernst von Leyden (1832–1910) in the emergence of oncology as a scientific discipline. Methods The article draws on archival sources from the archive of the German Society of Haematology and primary and secondary literature. Results Leyden initiated two important events in the early history of oncology: the first international cancer conference, which took place in Heidelberg, Germany, in 1906, and the founding of the first international association for cancer research (forerunner of today's UICC) in Berlin in 1908. Unfortunately, these facts are not mentioned in the most recent accounts. Both had a strong impact on the professionalization of oncology as a discipline in its own right. Conclusion Although not of Jewish origin, von Leyden was considered by the National Socialists to be “Jewish tainted”, which had a lasting effect on his perception at home and abroad.

scholarly journals Le pietre di Ca’ Foscari: Ruskin e il Palazzo

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jeanne Clegg ◽  
Emma Sdegno
Keyword(s):  
Grand Canal ◽  
History Of ◽  
New Ideas ◽  
The Grand Canal ◽  
The University ◽  
The City

Our contribution concerns a phase in the history of the building that gives the University its name. When Ruskin came to Venice in 1845 he was horrified by the decayed state of the palaces on the Grand Canal, and by the drastic restorations in progress. In recording their features in measurements, drawings and daguerreotypes, Ca’ Foscari took priority, and his studies of its traceries constitute a unique witness. This work also helped generate new ideas on the role of shadow in architectural aesthetic, and on the characteristics of Gothic, which were to bear fruit in The Seven Lamps and The Stones of Venice. In his late guide to the city, St Mark’s Rest, Ruskin addressed «the few travellers who still care for her monuments» and offered the Venetian Republic’s laws regulating commerce as a model for modern England. Whether or not he knew of the founding of a commercial studies institute at Ca’ Foscari in 1868, he would certainly have hoped that it would teach principles of fair and just trading, as well as of respectful tourism.

Liat Steir-Livny, Remaking Holocaust Memory: Documentary Cinema by Third-Generation Survivors in Israel. Syracuse: Syracuse University Press, 2019. 376 pp.

2021 ◽  
pp. 273-275
Keyword(s):  
English Language ◽  
Documentary Films ◽  
Third Generation ◽  
Holocaust Memory ◽  
Historical Film ◽  
History Of ◽  
New Ideas ◽  
The One ◽  
Changing Attitudes

This chapter assesses Liat Steir-Livny's Remaking Holocaust Memory (2019). This book is the first comprehensive English-language study of the Israeli Third-Generation engagement with the history of the Shoah in documentary films. In analyzing “how Third-Generation documentaries provide new ideas and concepts to commemorate and preserve the memory for future generations,” Steir-Livny contrasts Third-Generation documentary films with the works of second-generation directors and explores an extensive number of films in five key areas. These key areas include the role of gender; the changing attitudes toward Germany; the use and exploration of historical film footage in Third-Generation documentary films; the function of testimonies that feature in Third-Generation documentaries “in more complex ways”; and the representation of perpetrators and bystanders in Third-Generation films. Throughout her study, Steir-Livny discusses the documentaries against the background of documentary film theories, on the one hand, and Israeli/Zionist Holocaust memory, on the other.

Value Relativism, Authoritarian Model, and World Order

1978 ◽  
Vol 3 (3) ◽  
pp. 445-454 ◽  
Author(s):  
William P. Kreml
Keyword(s):  
Intellectual History ◽  
Full Range ◽  
World Order ◽  
Human Society ◽  
Human Psychology ◽  
Psychological Dimension ◽  
New Ideas ◽  
New Research

This paper attempts to bring the consideration of some new ideas and new research in the area of psychology and politics into a perspective helpful in our quest for a better world order. The notion of value relativism, for which it pleads, is relatively new within intellectual history, and the notion of value relativism based upon differentiated human personalities is much newer still. The idea of moving beyond a passive tolerance of different peoples toward an active consideration of the role of differentiated contribution, a kind of psychological interfunctionality within the organic whole of man, should now be able to make a contribution to world order. Just as the element of human psychology has become increasingly relevant to so many intellectual considerations, so too in the quest for a more justly ordered world there is need to explore the psychological dimension in the context of the principal balances of human society. The principles of value relativism, along with an understanding of the full range of the authoritarian model, should be helpful in this quest.

scholarly journals Why developmental psychology is incomplete without comparative and cross-cultural perspectives

2016 ◽  
Vol 371 (1686) ◽  
pp. 20150071 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark Nielsen ◽  
Daniel Haun
Keyword(s):  
Social Cognition ◽  
Animal Models ◽  
Cognitive Processes ◽  
Developmental Psychology ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
Cultural Groups ◽  
Theme Issue ◽  
Cultural Perspectives ◽  
Link Type ◽  
History Of

As a discipline, developmental psychology has a long history of relying on animal models and data collected among distinct cultural groups to enrich and inform theories of the ways social and cognitive processes unfold through the lifespan. However, approaches that draw together developmental, cross-cultural and comparative perspectives remain rare. The need for such an approach is reflected in the papers by Heyes (2015 Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B 371, 20150069. ( doi:10.1098/rstb.2015.0069 )), Schmelz & Call (2015 Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B 371, 20150067. ( doi:10.1098/rstb.2015.0067 )) and Keller (2015 Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B 371, 20150070. ( doi:10.1098/rstb.2015.0070 )) in this theme issue. Here, we incorporate these papers into a review of recent research endeavours covering a range of core aspects of social cognition, including social learning, cooperation and collaboration, prosociality, and theory of mind. In so doing, we aim to highlight how input from comparative and cross-cultural empiricism has altered our perspectives of human development and, in particular, led to a deeper understanding of the evolution of the human cultural mind.

scholarly journals Identifying innovation in laboratory studies of cultural evolution: rates of retention and measures of adaptation

2016 ◽  
Vol 371 (1690) ◽  
pp. 20150193 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christine A. Caldwell ◽  
Hannah Cornish ◽  
Anne Kandler
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Change ◽  
Cultural Evolution ◽  
Cultural Adaptation ◽  
Cultural Transmission ◽  
Experimental Studies ◽  
Retention Rates ◽  
Laboratory Studies ◽  
Research Designs ◽  
Task Success

In recent years, laboratory studies of cultural evolution have become increasingly prevalent as a means of identifying and understanding the effects of cultural transmission on the form and functionality of transmitted material. The datasets generated by these studies may provide insights into the conditions encouraging, or inhibiting, high rates of innovation, as well as the effect that this has on measures of adaptive cultural change. Here we review recent experimental studies of cultural evolution with a view to elucidating the role of innovation in generating observed trends. We first consider how tasks are presented to participants, and how the corresponding conceptualization of task success is likely to influence the degree of intent underlying any deviations from perfect reproduction. We then consider the measures of interest used by the researchers to track the changes that occur as a result of transmission, and how these are likely to be affected by differing rates of retention. We conclude that considering studies of cultural evolution from the perspective of innovation provides us with valuable insights that help to clarify important differences in research designs, which have implications for the likely effects of variation in retention rates on measures of cultural adaptation.

The Donation of Zeno: St. Barnabas and the Modern History of the Cypriot Archbishop's Regalia Privileges

2015 ◽  
Vol 84 (4) ◽  
pp. 713-745
Author(s):  
Joseph P. Huffman
Keyword(s):  
Sixteenth Century ◽  
Travel Literature ◽  
Church History ◽  
Modern History ◽  
Patron Saint ◽  
Political Role ◽  
Holistic Understanding ◽  
History Of ◽  
New Research

Modern church historians have roundly accepted the ancient pedigree of imperial regalia privileges exercised by the archbishops of Cyprus, yet new research has shown that their origins are actually to be found in the mid-sixteenth century and within a decidedly western intellectual and ecclesial orbit. This article builds on such findings by documenting the modern history of these privileges and their relationship to the emerging political role of the archbishops of Cyprus as ethnarchs as well as archbishops of the Cypriot community under both Ottoman and British empires. Travelling across the boundaries of western and non-western cultures and employing a rich interdisciplinary array of evidence (chronicles, liturgy and liturgical vestments, hagiography, iconography, insignia, painting, cartography, diplomacy, and travel literature), this article presents a coherent reconstruction of the imperial regalia tradition's modern historical evolution and its profound impact on modern Cypriot church history. This study integrates the often compartmentalized English, French, Italian, German, and Greek scholarship of many subfields, producing a new holistic understanding of how the archbishop's ethnarchic aspirations could produce a spiritual culture in which St. Barnabas, the island's founding patron saint and once famous apostolic reconciler, became transformed into an ethnarchic national patriot and defender against foreign conquerors.

scholarly journals The evolution of social learning as phenotypic cue integration

2021 ◽  
Vol 376 (1828) ◽  
Author(s):  
Bram Kuijper ◽  
Olof Leimar ◽  
Peter Hammerstein ◽  
John M. McNamara ◽  
Sasha R. X. Dall
Keyword(s):  
Social Learning ◽  
Cultural Evolution ◽  
Individual Learning ◽  
Cue Integration ◽  
Bet Hedging ◽  
Epigenetic Factors ◽  
Multiple Forms ◽  
Theme Issue ◽  
Fluctuating Environments ◽  
Selective Environment

Most analyses of the origins of cultural evolution focus on when and where social learning prevails over individual learning, overlooking the fact that there are other developmental inputs that influence phenotypic fit to the selective environment. This raises the question of how the presence of other cue ‘channels’ affects the scope for social learning. Here, we present a model that considers the simultaneous evolution of (i) multiple forms of social learning (involving vertical or horizontal learning based on either prestige or conformity biases) within the broader context of other evolving inputs on phenotype determination, including (ii) heritable epigenetic factors, (iii) individual learning, (iv) environmental and cascading maternal effects, (v) conservative bet-hedging, and (vi) genetic cues. In fluctuating environments that are autocorrelated (and hence predictable), we find that social learning from members of the same generation (horizontal social learning) explains the large majority of phenotypic variation, whereas other cues are much less important. Moreover, social learning based on prestige biases typically prevails in positively autocorrelated environments, whereas conformity biases prevail in negatively autocorrelated environments. Only when environments are unpredictable or horizontal social learning is characterized by an intrinsically low information content, other cues such as conservative bet-hedging or vertical prestige biases prevail. This article is part of the theme issue ‘Foundations of cultural evolution’.

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