Symbolic inheritance systems - Jablonka & Lamb (2014)

for humans, symbols - particularly language, plays a substantial role in our evolution, The nature of communication (with self and with others) is distinct, The basic neural underpinnings may be the same as for information transmission in other animals

Signs

Signs are arbitrary. Signs are referential. Signs are conventional

Symbolic Language: More Than Signs

Parrots have poor repertoire. Sign system is rigid; each sign is a unit. The parrots don't generalise the properties of words and apply to new items The parrots don't grasp the relations between words

General Properties of Symbols

interpreted within shared cultural framework of practices within which symbols function. Meaning of symbols depends on – Relations of symbols to way culture experiences objects / actions in world – Relations of symbols to other signs in the cultural system Thus we have a "shared imagined reality"

For Humans

Words are symbols as they are part of rule-governed system of self-referential signs can transfer truth-value, emotional value and action value to sentence level can not only go from situations to words, but from word combinations to situations allow rule-bound generation of variant

Language is Exemplary

Representational - of objects, actions, events & ideas… Generative - a limited number of symbols can generate infinite array of novel messages Structured - infinite variety is structured in a limited number of ways (rules govern the arrangement of words into phrases and sentences)

Symbolic Communication as Inheritance

Shared with genetic system: - transmission of latent information Difference from genetic system - unlimited translatability into different media - focus on construction of variants vs. transmission of variants Symbolic transmission systems – typically require active instruction • e.g. we are taught mathematical principles and rules

Cultural Evolution/Symbolic Communication

Essential Darwinian ingredients - cultural innovations (variation) - cultural transmission (heredity) - differential multiplication and survival (selection) The result is cultural change – transmission is an active process the receiver actively acquires and transforms information according to their cognitive and cultural biases

Example of a Culturally Evolved System

Math is more developed, simpler now Well adapted to the brain, and makes learning easy The speed with which behavioural practices are acquired or applied - does not depend on genetic evolution

Alternative “Theories” Memes - Richard Dawkins 1982

a unit of cultural imitation, new replicators (old being genes)

The Replicator/Vehicle Distinction

A genotype/phenotype distinction “The new copy of the meme is then in a position to broadcast its phenotypic effects, with the result that further copies of itself may be made in yet other brains”. The flaw stems from the distinction that is made between replicators (memes) and their vehicles (human brains, human artefacts, and humans themselves)

The Problem for the Meme Concept

Heritable variations in behaviour and ideas (memes) are reconstructed by individuals and groups (vehicles) through learning, developmental processes that vehicles undergo result in the generation of heritable variation Variations in ideas (memes) are constructed by individuals through learning and these individuals are themselves vehicles, learning is not just copying. It is a developmental process whose outcome depends on meaning and performance. depends on factors like context, social transmission and culture

What is Being Copied?

It is the “phenotype” of the (so called) meme, i.e. the way it is expressed by an individual. This is very different to DNA replication or photocopying, whereby that being copied is differentiated from the copying process. (a scanner, the camera of a phone, or a Xerox machine all serve as different ways to copy the same page.) In contrast, the form of a “meme” depends on factors like context, social transmission and culture

What is Culture?

A (collective) symbolic and behavioral inheritance received from out of the historical/ancestral past Individuals are active agents in the perpetuation of their symbolic and behavioral inheritance

Symbolic inheritance

received ideas and understandings, both implicit and explicit, about persons, society, nature, and the metaphysical realm

The Extended Phenotype Reconceived

Organisms modify their niche, adapting their (physical) environment rather than adapting to it Their offspring can inherit the modified niche (ecological inheritance) Similarly, human offspring inherit a modified cultural niche (symbolic and behavioral inheritance)

Classical Evolutionary Psychology

Characteristics - gene-centered: culture is veneer - modularity of mind / embodied in specific neural networks - selection during Pleistocene - the behavior was adaptive; it is only in modern society that it is not May be criticised in many aspects e.g. an important aspect of cultural evolution is the extremely variable ecological and social environments that humans construct for themselves