Caribou shoulder-blade divination worked as a randomizing device defeating hunter confirmation bias.

Evidence

Traditionally, Naskapi hunters decided where to go to hunt using divination and believed that the shoulder bones of caribou could point the way to success. … To start the ritual, the shoulder blade was heated over hot coals in a way that caused patterns of cracks and burnt spots to form. This patterning was then read as a kind of map, which was held in a prespecified orientation. The cracking patterns were (probably) essentially random from the point of view of hunting locations, since the outcomes depended on myriad details about the bone, fire, ambient temperature, and heating process. Thus, these divination rituals may have provided a crude randomizing device that helped hunters avoid their own decision-making biases. — Joseph Henrich, The Secret of Our Success, 345

Categorization

• SEED: Superstition as adaptive randomness should be distinguished from functional illusions; a piece on how ‘irrational’ rituals can solve cognitive optimization problems.
• ADDENDUM: Directly relevant to the reader’s theme that small acts/decorums and apparent irrationality can serve adaptive functions; supports the deflationary reading of conformity-as-tool.
• SHARE: Worth sending to anyone interested in the evolutionary rationale of divination or non-rational ritual.
• XREF: connects to: Caribou hunting rewards randomization because prey learn to avoid previously successful hunting spots. — Joseph Henrich, The Secret of Our Success: How Culture…, 344; Randomizing divination practices spread specifically where rice cultivation made them adaptive — Joseph Henrich, The Secret of Our Success: How Culture…, 348

Broader Connections

• Caribou hunting rewards randomization because prey learn to avoid previously successful hunting spots. #expands (0.85) — Joseph Henrich, The Secret of Our Success, 344
• Randomizing divination practices spread specifically where rice cultivation made them adaptive #expands (0.75) — Joseph Henrich, The Secret of Our Success, 348