TY - JOUR
T1 - Human socio-cultural evolution in light of evolutionary transitions
T2 - introduction to the theme issue
AU - Carmel, Yohay
AU - Shavit, Ayelet
AU - Lamm, Ehud
AU - Szathmáry, Eörs
PY - 2023/3/13
Y1 - 2023/3/13
N2 - Human societies are no doubt complex. They are characterized by division of labour, multiple hierarchies, intricate communication networks and transport systems. These phenomena and others have led scholars to propose that human society may be, or may become, a new hierarchical level that may dominate the individual humans within it, similar to the relations between an organism and its cells, or an ant colony and its members. Recent discussions of the possibility of this major evolutionary transition in individuality (ETI) raise interesting and controversial questions that are explored in the present issue from four different complementary perspectives. (i) The general theory of ETIs. (ii) The unique aspects of cultural evolution. (iii) The evolutionary history and pre-history of humans. (iv) Specific routes of a possible human ETI. Each perspective uses different tools provided by different disciplines: biology, anthropology, cultural evolution, systems theory, psychology, economy, linguistics and philosophy of science. Altogether, this issue provides a broad and rich application of the notion of ETI to human past, present and perhaps also future evolution. It presents important case studies, new theoretical results and novel questions for future research. This article is part of the theme issue ‘Human socio-cultural evolution in light of evolutionary transitions’.
AB - Human societies are no doubt complex. They are characterized by division of labour, multiple hierarchies, intricate communication networks and transport systems. These phenomena and others have led scholars to propose that human society may be, or may become, a new hierarchical level that may dominate the individual humans within it, similar to the relations between an organism and its cells, or an ant colony and its members. Recent discussions of the possibility of this major evolutionary transition in individuality (ETI) raise interesting and controversial questions that are explored in the present issue from four different complementary perspectives. (i) The general theory of ETIs. (ii) The unique aspects of cultural evolution. (iii) The evolutionary history and pre-history of humans. (iv) Specific routes of a possible human ETI. Each perspective uses different tools provided by different disciplines: biology, anthropology, cultural evolution, systems theory, psychology, economy, linguistics and philosophy of science. Altogether, this issue provides a broad and rich application of the notion of ETI to human past, present and perhaps also future evolution. It presents important case studies, new theoretical results and novel questions for future research. This article is part of the theme issue ‘Human socio-cultural evolution in light of evolutionary transitions’.
KW - cultural evolution
KW - evolutionary transitions in individuality
KW - human evolution
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85146544120&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1098/rstb.2021.0397
DO - 10.1098/rstb.2021.0397
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C2 - 36688397
SN - 0962-8436
VL - 378
SP - 20210397
JO - Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences
JF - Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences
IS - 1872
ER -