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Cognitive Evolution I Evolutionary Perspectives On Cognition Darwin The Descent of Man The Evolution of Emotions in Animals and Men Cosmides & Tooby Evolutionary Psychology: A Primer Pinker’s The Language Instinct How The Mind Works Dunbar’s Grooming, Gossip, and The Evolution of Language Merlin Donald The Origins of the Modern Mind A Mind So Rare Michael Tomasello The Cultural Origins of Human Cognition Many Others…. Anderson’s Rational Analysis Page 1 of 21 Cognitive Evolution I Cosmides and Tooby: Evolutionary Psychology Human minds have a standard collection of reasoning and regulatory circuits that are Functionally specialized Frequently, domain-specific Modules that are analogous to organs Design by evolution Designed to solve problems faced by our huntergatherer ancestors Vision Hearing Motor Control Memory Systems Language Concept Formation and Reasoning Physical causation About plants and animals (natural kinds) About artifacts Page 2 of 21 Cognitive Evolution I Species Unique Human Behaviors Tomasello (1999, p 510) Creation and Use of Symbols Proto Languages????? Spoken and Written Language Mathematics, etc Creation and Use of Complex Tools Starting 50,000 years ago Only very basic stone tools for 1st 2 million years Creating and Participation in Complex Social Organizations and Institutions Political Organizations (From Diamond) Bands 10s to 150 before 11,000 bc Tribes 100s after 11,000 bc Chiefdoms 1,000s after 5,500 bc States >100,000 3,700 bc (Mesopotamia) approx. 500 bc (China, Mesoamerica) Page 3 of 21 Cognitive Evolution I All This Occurred In A Very Short Time Span 6 Million Years Ago: Split Between Humans and Apes Next 4 Million Years: Various Species of Australopithicines Brain size around 500cc (Ape like) Bipedal Last 2 Million Years; Genius Homo Last 50,000: Clear evidence of human culture T0 little time for the evolution to have generated big differences in ape and human cognition Find small difference that generates huge differences in behavior Page 4 of 21 Cognitive Evolution I Human Evolution Mapped Onto a Year 1 year ago: Hominid line and chimpanzee line split from a common ancestor 10 months ago: Oldest known autralopithecines 5 months ago: Oldest known habilines 4 months ago: Home erectus 22 days ago: archaic sapient humans 4 days ago: Fully modern humans less than 1 hour: modern civilization Page 5 of 21 Cognitive Evolution I What Are The Big Issues The Nature of Evolutionary Arguments Environments Random Variation Adaptive Advantages Natural Selection What Drove the Evolution of Cognition? Changes in the Environment (Jungle to Savanna) Challenges Defined by Hunter-Gatherer Life Style Within Group Social Processes Coalition Formation and Maintenance Reciprocal Altruism Child Rearing Sexual Competition Hunting Competition Between Bands Competition Between Different Species of Homo Page 6 of 21 Cognitive Evolution I What Are The Big Issues (Cont.) What Were the Major Steps Common ancestor, autralopithecines, homo erectus, ... brain size range culture social organization tools evidence for proto-languages THE BIG ISSUES: Culture Vast body of knowledge and skills, e.g. language Mechanism that enable cultural transmission Language costs, benefits intermediate steps(?) relationships between language and cognition Page 7 of 21 Cognitive Evolution I Starting Points (Pinker) Miocene Apes A Visual Animal Arboreal, Fruit Eaters Depth Perception Color Vision A World Filled With Movable Objects Savanna Environment Social Animals Cognitive Demands of Group Living (Dunbar) Coalition Formation and Maintenance Sexual Competition Reciprocal Altruism Child Rearing Protection Against Predators Foraging and Hunting Savanna Environment Page 8 of 21 Cognitive Evolution I Starting Points (Cont.) Bipedalism and The Hand Upright Posture Freeing of the hands for carrying and manipulating Thermoregulation More efficient locomotion Better vision The Hand Carrying and manipulating Tools Hunting Nutritional advantage of meat Nutritional requirements of our large brain Social consequences Driver for development of tools Page 9 of 21 Cognitive Evolution I Approximate Time-Line For The Succession Of Hominids, In Years Before Present (Donald, 1991) 5-6 million years ago: Hominid line and chimpanzee line split from a common ancestor • tool use • social organization/group size • learning by imitation(?) • precursors of language (?) 4 million years: Oldest known autralopithecines • erect posture • shared food • division of labor • nuclear family structure • larger number of children • long weaning period 2 million year ago: Oldest known habilines • as above, with crude stone-cutting tools • variable but larger brain size Page 10 of 21 Cognitive Evolution I Time Line (Continued) 1.5 million years ago: Home erectus • much larger brain • more complex social organization • hunting large animals(?) • more elaborate tools • migration out of Africa • use of fire, shelters Page 11 of 21 Cognitive Evolution I Time Line (Continued) 300,000 years ago: archaic sapient humans • second major increase in brain size • anatomy of vocal tract starts to assume modern form • tools: very similar to erectus • social organization: very similar to erectus 150 – 200,000 years ago: modern humans mitochondrial Ev Page 12 of 21 Cognitive Evolution I Time Line (Continued) 40 – 50,000 years ago: Fully modern humans Language • high-speed vocal communication system • large lexicon containing thousands of entries. Complex oral cultures • myth, religion, and social ritual • specialize, complex, multi-component tools and weapons • sewn clothing • cave painting, jewelry • modern hunter-gatherer cultures 10,000 years ago: Domestication of plants and animals More…. Page 13 of 21 Cognitive Evolution I Alternative Models of Human Evolution Linnda R. Caporael Inclusive Fitness (Evolutionary Psychology) Cosmides-Tooby, Jones Gene’s eye view of evolution (selfish genes) General Selection Theories Based on Darwinian Principles Focal trait(s) and adaptive advantage of trait(s) Donald (1991) Calvin and Brickerton (2000) Lots of others Sociality Theories Dunbar (1993) Machiavellian intelligence (Byrne & Whiten 1988) Complexities of group living and social exchange Page 14 of 21 Cognitive Evolution I Multilevel Evolutionary Theories Other levels where selection can occur (e.g. chromosomes, individuals, groups). Dual inheritance (Culture and genes) Boyd and Richardson Tomasello Page 15 of 21 Cognitive Evolution I Inclusive Fitness (Evolutionary Psychology) The “Hardliners” Sociobiology Adaptation Dawkins, Dennett, Cosmides and Tooby, Pinker, … Genes and their transmission from generation to generation, i.e. helping kin can increase fitness of a gene at the expense of the individual (Hamilton, 1964) Environment and development are secondary factors Very controversial See review of Dennett’s ‘Darwin’s dangerous idea Steven J. Gould Gene’s eye view of evolution (selfish genes) Page 16 of 21 Cognitive Evolution I Inclusive Fitness (Cont) Many Evolutionary Psychology Hypotheses Have Been Reevaluated and Questioned or Rejected Mating preferences Women as gold diggers and Men sowing their wild oats (Buss 1987) Role of culture, gender equality Scientific Explanation Verses Retelling of Well Known Cultural Stereotypes Very narrow view of genetic causation Page 17 of 21 Cognitive Evolution I Examples of Empirical Results Supporting Evolutionary Psychology Facial Expressions Color Naming Detecting Violations of Rules Probabilistic Reasoning Language Chomsky: Universal Grammer “Poverty of the simulus” Human languages have such a complex structure that they cannot be learned just from the information available to a child Page 18 of 21 Cognitive Evolution I Detecting Violations of Rules Logic and Reasoning General Content Free Mechanisms People are very bad at … Wason Selection Task IF a person goes into Boston, then that person takes the subway Boston Arlington subway cab If P, then Q Test for P(Q?) and ~Q(~P?) Huge Number of Other Examples Social Exchange (Reciprocal Altruism) Cheater detection If you take benefit B, then you must satisfy requirement R Can detect violations of If-Then rules if task is cheater detection If you are drinking beer, you must be 21 or older Beer Coke 21 or over Page 19 of 21 younger that 21 Cognitive Evolution I Probabilistic Reasoning Company suspects 2% of its employees use illicit drugs. Company institutes random drug tests Drug test is 95% accurate; that is, P[positive test| drug use] = .95 P[negative test| no drug use] = .95 Mary Jane is selected at random; her test is positive. What is probability that Mary Jane uses illicit drugs? Gerd Gigerenzer Gigerenzer, G., Todd, P. M., & the ABC Group (1999). Simple heuristics that make us smart. New York: Oxford University Press. Probabilities verses Frequencies Fast and frugal heuristics fill part of our mind's "adaptive toolbox" of decision strategies. Together, these heuristics produce a rationality which is ecological, rather than merely logical - decision making that is welladapted to specific environmental settings or domains and specific classes of problems, rather than being universally applicable to all situations and problems. Page 20 of 21 Cognitive Evolution I Mary Jane's Probability Test Says: "Positive" "Negative" Total Truth Clean Drug User Total 49 19 68 (5% of Col) (95% of Col) 931 1 (95% of Col) (5% of Col) 980 20 932 1000 (98% of Total) (2% of Total) For 1000 employees there would be 68 "positive" test results. But 49 of these "positive" tests would be false alarms and only 19 would be hits. P[Mary Jane is drug user | "positive" test] = 19/68 = .28 If company fired all employees with "positive" test results, for every 1000 employees they would fire 49 innocent people and only 19 guilty people. Page 21 of 21