Denmark

**Author(s):** Angel, H.-F., Seitz, R. &lt;br&gt;&lt;br&gt;Beliefs have a life on their own: they are born, grow, expand, and eventually may fade away and get extinct. It is relatively easy to describe beliefs and the believing processes in similar terms to living beings, and to apply to them a similar axiomatic as the evolutionary model provides: variations, selection, adaptation, and reproduction. In the current wild and accelerated state we witness the formation of new beliefs in our time: thanks to the development of new media and social networks beliefs clearly follow patterns of variation, selection and successful reproduction, but the living cycle is now often shorter and riskier. In any case, we need a better knowledge of the evolution of beliefs, both in the long run, or from a historical perspective, and in the short run, following current trends. What seems clear is that the current study of cultural evolution would greatly benefit from inputs from the new scientific study of beliefs and believing processes. The Creditions model offers opportunities to work out that link and to enrich the framework of cultural evolution.

Cultural Evolution Society 2022

The evolution of beliefs and believing as a case for cultural evolution

belief; variation; selection; formation

### Welcome to the fourth Cultural Evolution Society Conference, CES2022! 

As last year, Underline will support the online component of the conference. The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic is causing a great deal of uncertainty for all of us. Therefore, we seek to offer a hybrid format that will hopefully allow some folks to travel to Aarhus, others to meet up locally or regionally in CES hub-lets, and other yet to participate online. The field of cultural evolution is growing in size and scope; its theories, methods and applications - both academic and applied - are getting ever more robust. Do join us in what promises to be an exciting exchange of ideas and a celebration of our field.

##### ***For SoMe interaction and live tweeting please tag @CulturalEvolSoc and use #CESconf2022***


#### The CES 2022 local organising committee
* Luseadra Joy McKerracher
* Jesper Sørensen 
* Niels Nørkjær Johannsen 
* Benjamin Grant Purzycki 
* Mette Løvschal 
* Felix Riede
* Iza Romanowska 
* Karsten Olsen

Please click on the button bellow if you want to watch the videos

The field of cultural evolution is growing in size and scope; its theories, methods and applications - both academic and applied - are getting ever more robust. Do join us in what promises to be an exciting exchange of ideas and a celebration of our field.

**Author(s):** Angel, H.-F., Seitz, R. Beliefs have a life on their own: they are born, grow, expand, and eventually may fade away and get extinct. It is relatively easy to describe beliefs and the believing processes in similar terms to living beings, and to apply to them a similar axiomatic as the evolutionary model provides: variations, selection, adaptation, and reproduction. In the current wild and accelerated state we witness the formation of new beliefs in our time: thanks to the development of new media and social networks beliefs clearly follow patterns of variation, selection and successful reproduction, but the living cycle is now often shorter and riskier. In any case, we need a better knowledge of the evolution of beliefs, both in the long run, or from a historical perspective, and in the short run, following current trends. What seems clear is that the current study of cultural evolution would greatly benefit from inputs from the new scientific study of beliefs and believing processes. The Creditions model offers opportunities to work out that link and to enrich the framework of cultural evolution.

technical paper

**Author(s):** Shilton, D; Passmore, S; Savage, PE Singing is involved in the most crucial events defining social life. One important feature of music performance is its sociovocal organization, ranging from unaccompanied solo to a multi-part chorus. It was previously hypothesized that this feature is related to social organization, so that emphasis on solo singing is more common in large-scale hierarchical societies, while levelled group singing is more common in small-scale egalitarian ones.

We analyze two global song corpora: Cantometrics (5,776 coded recordings from 1,026 societies) and NHS Ethnography (4,709 coded ethnographic texts from 60 societies). We examine the prevalence of group singing, and fit multilevel models predicting sociovocal organization based on social context and measures of social complexity.

We find that in both corpora, group singing is more common overall and in most societies, and its likelihood is dependent on social context. Social complexity is associated with greater likelihood of solo singing and more leader-dominant group singing.

These results support previous proposals that music is primarily a communal phenomenon and that sociovocal organization and social complexity are functionally related.

Group singing is globally dominant, and is related to both social context and social complexity

**Author(s):** Anglada-Tort, M; Harrison, P M C; Jacoby, N Introduction: 
In most human cultures, music and speech are sustained through oral transmission. How do cognitive and motor constraints in this process shape the evolution of music? Music corpus studies have been particularly useful to characterize common and diverse features observed in human songs across cultures (Mehr et al., 2019; Savage, 2015), yet these studies fail to quantify how and why these features emerge. Alternatively, iterated learning experiments provide a powerful quantitative tool for studying how transmission biases shape the evolution of language and music. However, such experiments have traditionally been conducted in nonautomated laboratory settings, making data collection costly while limiting the ability to explore the full space of evolutionary possibilities. 
 Methods: 
Here we present the first large-scale cultural evolution study on human song, quantifying the evolution of thousands of melodies transmitted orally across participants. Our method is applicable to individuals from any cultural background and works efficiently on computers available to most participants online. We perform many variations of this paradigm, including varying the total number of notes per melody (3-12 notes), adding memory load and motor constraints in the singing task, or naturalistic singing.
 Results: 
We show that cognitive and motor constraints in oral transmission play a profound role in the emergence of melodic structure. Specifically, initially random tones develop into more structured systems that increasingly reuse and combine fewer elements, making melodies easier to learn and transmit over time. Importantly, melodic features that emerged artificially from our experiments are largely consistent with melodic universals observed cross-culturally (e.g., small intervals, discrete scales, and tonal structures). Parallel to this, we find that evolving melodies tend to align with melodic pleasantness (estimated by a separate rating experiment with Western listeners) and musical exposure (estimated by a large corpus of popular Western melodies). 
Discussion: 
Taken together, our results provide the first quantitative characterization of the rich collection of biases that oral transmission imposes on music evolution, giving us a new understanding of the emergence of musical universals and the resulting vast structural diversity of human song.

Large-scale online iterated singing experiments reveal oral transmission effects in the evolution of human song

**Author(s):** Foster, D; Mesoudi, A; Postma, E; Lamba, S Introduction: We aimed to test evolutionary theories of cooperation in the context of a real-world social dilemma: joint liability microfinance. To do so we meta-analyse predictors from microfinance studies to estimate their overall associations with loan repayment, and to assess the uncertainty and generalisability of these estimates. Methods: We pre-registered our meta-analytic protocol and hypotheses, conducted literature searches, screened studies for eligibility and assessed their risk of bias, and developed Bayesian multilevel models to estimate meta-analytic associations between loan repayment and proxies of 4 evolutionary mechanisms proposed to support cooperation: relatedness, reciprocity, partner choice, and punishment. Results: Punishment-based variables showed the strongest positive associations with loan repayment, with mixed results for other mechanisms. Estimates vary widely in their certainty, with high levels of effect heterogeneity. Conclusions: Our results provide some evidence for evolutionary mechanisms supporting cooperation in real-world contexts, and suggest there are non-generalisable findings and/or reproducibility issues in the microfinance literature.

Meta-Analysis of Predictors of Cooperation and Loan Repayment in Microfinance Groups

It has been suggested that the human species may be undergoing an evolutionary transition in individuality (ETI). I argue that the ETI model is incomplete because it ignores the role of culture in human evolution. I argue that culture is not just a major force in human evolution, but the single most dominant historically. Moreover, culture appears to hold greater adaptive potential than genetic inheritance and may be driving long-term human evolution. The evolutionary impact of culture occurs mainly through culturally organized groups, which have come to dominate human affairs in recent millennia. Moreover, the role of culture appears to be growing, increasingly bypassing genetic evolution and weakening genetic adaptive potential. Taken together, these findings suggest that human long-term gene-culture coevolution is characterized by an evolutionary transition in inheritance (from genes to culture) which entails a transition in individuality (from genetic individual to cultural group) as a consequence. I propose that human evolution is more completely characterized by an evolutionary transition in both inheritance and individuality (ETII), from the genetic evolution of individual humans to the cultural evolution of human groups. I detail predictions for the future of human evolution, and lay out an ethical strategy for research and implementation.

The role of culture in long-term human evolution

**Author(s):** Brand, C O; Smaldino, P E. Complex behaviours are said to be transmitted from one person to another via high-fidelity social learning mechanisms. However, many behaviours are too opaque to be learnt via imitation alone, and require teaching with verbal communication. Although human language facilitates the explanation of complex behaviours in precise detail, we argue that direct, literal communication is overly costly and inefficient in many cases. Instead, humans use shortcuts such as analogies that enable compression of meaning (Brand et al. 2021). In their model of tacit knowledge, Miton & Dedeo (2022) find that “a small amount of guidance, well-presented, allows students to lock-in a culturally-widespread practice”. We predict that the “well-presented guidance” relies on analogies that relate novel behaviour to familiar behaviour in the learner’s repertoire. We present a formal model in which behavioural components are formalised as nodes in a network, and analogies as shared relationships between the edge-structures of different networks. We will present preliminary work on the model and its implications for Cultural Evolutionary theory, and for the origins of language and cognition.

Analogy as a critical component for communicating complex cultural information

**Author(s):** Miton, H; DeDeo, S Introduction: A wide variety of cultural practices take the form of “tacit” knowledge, whose principles are neither obvious to an observer, nor known explicitly by experts. This poses a problem for cultural evolution: if beginners cannot spot the principles to imitate, and experts cannot say what they are doing, how can tacit knowledge pass from generation to generation? 
Approach and Methods: We present a domain-general model of “tacit teaching”, drawn from statistical physics, that shows how high-fidelity transmission of tacit knowledge is possible. It applies when the
practice’s underlying features are subject to interacting and competing constraints.
 Results: Our model predicts a tell-tale distribution of teaching outcomes, with some learners being near-perfect performers while others receiving the same instruction are disastrously bad. The evolution of tacit knowledge is also expected to be bursty, with long periods of stability interspersed with brief periods of dramatic change, and
where tacit knowledge, once lost, becomes essentially impossible to recover. 
Discussion: This general model could be applied to diverse cultural practices, as long as they can justifiably be understood as a network of constraints. This also suggest that when practices are constrained enough, it might not be necessary to evolve high-fidelity transmission mechanisms.

The Cultural Transmission of Tacit Knowledge

**Author(s):** Harrison, R. A.; Restoy, S.; van de Waal, E. Introduction: The strategies guiding human social learning have been extensively studied and seem to contribute to the cumulative culture of the human species. However, relatively few studies have focused on payoff biased social learning, which leads to the adoption of the most rewarding behaviours observed. Methods: This study examined payoff bias in both children (N=107) and adults (N=100), using an instrumental task designed to resemble natural foraging problems in various species, similar to one previously used with wild vervet monkeys. Participants watched a video demonstration in which two models repeatedly retrieved either a high or low value reward from a box by opening one of two doors, before choosing which door to open themselves. Results: Our results showed that children were significantly more likely to choose the high payoff option than the low payoff option, indicating the use of payoff biased social learning, which increased over the age range tested (four to eight years old). We did not observe a payoff bias in adults, who were equally likely to choose the high and low payoff options. Discussion: This study investigated for the first time, to our knowledge, the ontogeny of payoff biased social learning in humans, using a task well-suited for comparative research. Future research will further explore the apparent lack of payoff biased learning in adults shown here.

Children but not adults demonstrate payoff biased social learning in an instrumental task

**Author(s):** Barrera-Cruz, M; García-Rivero, D The study of lithic assemblages enables an approximated knowledge about the economic activities of past populations. Here, lithic tools from Dehesilla cave are examined alongside the remains of organic resources, such as the remains of fauna, seeds and fruits to achieve a reconstruction of the production patterns documented in the Southern Iberian Peninsula throughout the entire Neolithic period. While direct and indirect gradient analysis are carried out to allow detection of patterns between the different Neolithic periods, diversity analysis is useful to generate some information about variability of environmental exploitation strategies. Results show a significant increase in volume of the vegetable resources in the Middle Neolithic A (MNA), when the naked wheat (Triticum aestivum-durum) predominates, in addition to a differential replication of tools related to vegetal and landscape transformation activities. In conclusion, the analyses suggest a change in the subsistence patterns in the MNA (ca. 4800-4500 cal BC) in opposition to the previous Early Neolithic period, which is characterized by a mixed and more diverse economy (livestock and agriculture), such as a more diverse assemblage of lithic tools.

POPULATION ECOLOGY IN ARCHAEOLOGY: AN APPROACH TO THE NEOLITHIC OF DEHESILLA CAVE, SOUTHERN IBERIAN PENINSULA.

 The terms “culture” and “cultural group” admit several readings. A prevalent one takes them to be sortals: terms that pick out countable entities. I’ll call such countable entities sortal cultures. Sortal cultural are frequently used in policy, jurisprudence, and empirical work. These are entities usually picked out with national or ethnic labels, like “the Basque” or “the Kwakwaka’waka”. Because they facilitate counting, sortals require two criteria: one for identifying the entities at stake (a criterion of application) and another that tracks their existence over time (a criterion of identity). 

Recently, philosophers have fleshed out these criteria by analogy to the phylogenetic account of species. Identifying similarities, these authors suggest sortal cultures should be underpinned by a similar metaphysical picture: relational essentialism. This, I’ll suggest, is sensible—but doesn’t fully specify the criteria needed. Further pursuing the analogy between species and culture puts pressure on current accounts, and suggests four possible routes forward: to (i) merely use the analogy instrumentally; (ii) adopt analogize a different species concept; (iii) abandon the idea that cultures are lineages, or; (iv) adopt a “rank-free” account of culture. I’ll close by highlighting the novelty—and plausibility—of (iv), that cultures should be understood as “rank-free” entities.

Cultural Lineages and Rank Freedom

**Author(s):** Perret, Cedric ; Currie, Thomas Anthropologists & archaeologists have argued that the geographical distribution of resources and barriers to dispersal can affect that the degree of inequality, e.g. mountains may limit the possibility for subordinates to run away from despots. These ideas share parallels with models from evolutionary ecology, however formals models of this process have been relatively rare and the role of dispersal and migration as a levelling mechanism in human systems is still unclear. Here we describe a model based on the reproductive skew framework, and explore the concurrent evolution of inequality in many connected groups. We use both simulations and analytical approaches to examine the role of different factors.
Our results show that (i) cost of migration, even low, can lead to high inequality, (ii) migration reduces inequality not directly but by interacting with other processes affecting inequality and (iii ) that defining circumscribed groups requires careful consideration.
Finally, we discuss what these results suggest for real-world test of the territorial circumscription theory, and how they highlight the need for comprehensive models of the evolution of inequality and socio-political organization.

Downloads

Next from Cultural Evolution Society 2022

Group singing is globally dominant, and is related to both social context and social complexity

Similar lecture

An Archaeological Regard on the Concept of Fitness in Cultural Evolution

.css-70qvj9{display:-webkit-box;display:-webkit-flex;display:-ms-flexbox;display:flex;-webkit-align-items:center;-webkit-box-align:center;-ms-flex-align:center;align-items:center;}Downloads

Next from Cultural Evolution Society 2022

Group singing is globally dominant, and is related to both social context and social complexity

Similar lecture

An Archaeological Regard on the Concept of Fitness in Cultural Evolution

Downloads