The evolved apprentice : how evolution made humans unique / Kim Sterelny.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Sterelny, Kim, author.

Series:

Jean Nicod lectures.

The Jean Nicod lectures ; 2012

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Evolutionary psychology.

Cooperation.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (259 p.)

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Cambridge, Mass. : The MIT Press, [2012]

Language Note:

English

Summary:

Kim Sterelny develops a novel account of the speed and extent of human evolutionary divergence from the great ape stock. The book does not explain human uniqueness by positing a critical adaptive breakthrough (episodic memory; advanced theory of mind; planning and causal reasoning; language). Rather, it identifies a series of positive feedback loops between initially minor advances in social tolerance, ecological flexibility, cooperative foraging, social learning, and links the results of these feedback loops to the archaeological and anthropological record.

Contents:

Contents; Series Foreword; Preface; Chapter 1. The Challenge of Novelty; 1.1 Introduction; 1.2 The Social Intelligence Hypothesis; 1.3 Cooperative Foraging; 1.4 Cooperative Foraging and Knowledge Accumulation; 1.5 Life in a Changing World; Chapter 2. Accumulating Cognitive Capital; 2.1 A Lineage Explanation of Social Learning; 2.2 Feedback Loops; 2.3 The Apprentice Learning Model; Chapter 3. Adapted Individuals, Adapted Environments; 3.1 Behavioral Modernity; 3.2 The Symbolic Species; 3.3 Public Symbols and Social Worlds; 3.4 Preserving and Expanding Information

3.5 Niche Construction and Neanderthal Extinction Chapter 4. The Human Cooperation Syndrome; 4.1 Triggering Cooperation; 4.2 A Cooperation Complex; 4.3 The Grandmother Hypothesis; 4.4 Foragers: Ancient and Modern; 4.5 Hunting: Provisioning or Signaling?; Chapter 5. Costs and Commitments; 5.1 Free Riders; 5.2 Control and Commitment; 5.3 Commitment Mechanisms; 5.4 Signals, Investments, and Interventions; 5.5 Hunting and Commitment; 5.6 Commitment through Investment; 5.7 Primitive Trust; Chapter 6. Signals, Cooperation, and Learning; 6.1 Sperber's Dilemma; 6.2 Two Faces of Cultural Learning

6.3 Honesty Mechanisms 6.4 The Folk as Educators; Chapter 7. From Skills to Norms; 7.1 Norms and Communities; 7.2 Moral Nativism; 7.3 Self- Control, Vigilance, and Persuasion; 7.4 Reactive and Reflective Moral Response; 7.5 Moral Apprentices; 7.6 The Biological Preparation of Moral Development; 7.7 The Expansion of Cultural Learning; Chapter 8. Cooperation and Conflict; 8.1 Group Selection; 8.2 Strong Reciprocity and Human Cooperation; 8.3 Children of Strife?; 8.4 The Holocene: A World Queerer Than We Realized?; Notes; References; Index

Notes:

"A Bradford book."

Includes bibliographical references and index.

OCLC-licensed vendor bibliographic record.

ISBN:

9780262300490

0262300494

9780262302814

0262302810

OCLC:

898275117

Publisher Number:

9780262302814