Culturally accumulated packages can outperform the individuals who inherit them

Evidence

Keep in mind that this is a toy example meant to illustrate how selective cultural learning can generate a cumulative evolutionary process that generates cultural packages that are smarter than their bearers. My imaginary primates are better cultural learners than any living primate except us. Nevertheless, even if I had made them worse learners, I could have achieved the same end point with a larger population or more generations. Like us (or at least me), these primates were just bumbling myopically around their daily lives. Sometimes their mistakes led to innovations, and sometimes a rare circumstance thrust an insight upon someone who was otherwise goofing off. The key is that these occasional insights and lucky errors were preferentially passed on, persisted, and were eventually recombined with other traits to create a savannah hunting package. Now consider this question: is Generation 5 smarter than Generation 0? The former has better tools and can obtain food more efficiently. Later, we will see a variety of evidence suggesting that Generation 5 may in fact be smarter than Generation 0, if “smartness” is defined as an individual’s ability to solve novel problems. — Joseph Henrich, The Secret of Our Success, 200

Categorization

• XREF: Echoes the extended-mind / scaffolding literature and connects to how individual problem-solving is culturally subsidized. — connects to: Cultural economic packages drive genetic differences even between nearby populations — Joseph Henrich, The Secret of Our Success: How Culture…, 311; Faith in cultural inheritance improves survival only in cumulative-culture species — Joseph Henrich, The Secret of Our Success: How Culture…, 358; Cultural stagnation can be reversed by choosing new norms and values — W. David Marx, Blank Space: A Cultural History of the…, 38

Broader Connections

• Faith in cultural inheritance improves survival only in cumulative-culture species #corroborates (0.86) — Joseph Henrich, The Secret of Our Success, 358
• Cultural economic packages drive genetic differences even between nearby populations #expands (0.82) — Joseph Henrich, The Secret of Our Success, 311
• Cultural stagnation can be reversed by choosing new norms and values #complicates (0.72) — W. David Marx, Blank Space, 38