ASEBL Journal – Volume 10 Issue 1, January 2014
Alex Mesoudi. Cultural Evolution: How Darwinian Theory Can Explain Human
Culture and Synthesize the Social Sciences. Chicago: U Chicago P, 2011. 280 pgs.
$27.50US Paper. ISBN: 978-0226520445
Alex Mesoudi’s Cultural Evolution provides a thorough, well-organized, and
comprehensive overview of an increasingly important subject in multi-disciplinary
studies. Even genetic hardliners and those who emphasize individual character over
the influence of situation will be persuaded by the argument and evidence that culture
itself (which E.B. Tylor in 1871 characterizes as “’that complex whole which includes
knowledge, beliefs, art, law, morals, custom, and any other capabilities and habits
acquired . . .’” [Mesoudi 189]) is subject to Darwin’s model of variation, competition,
and inheritance. The book is packed with information, historical background, and
illustrations of leading research on all of the topics covered. Not to mention,
Mesoudi’s style is fluid and the book is enjoyable to read.
The text is arranged in ten chapters, and each chapter consists of sections and
subsections (thus easy to negotiate). One of the many strengths of the book is
Mesoudi’s graceful explanations of complex mathematical models provided by earlier
researchers in cultural evolution. There are thirteen graphics, each one fully explained.
There are Notes, a Bibliography, and an Index. Mesoudi is currently a reader in
anthropology at Durham University and has contributed to a number of books and
leading journals.
As Mesoudi says, “individual learning and genes cannot fully explain human
behavioral variation . . .” and so the reliance on cultural explanations (12). Mesoudi
points to the well-known example of the holistic outlook of East Asians compared
with the analytic outlook of Westerners. Granted, that is very general, so other, more
specific examples are cited. He says that B.F. Skinner, by focusing on individual
learning and conditioning ignored culture; and he goes on to say that evolutionary
psychologists (naming John Tooby and Leda Cosmides) lean more to genes and less
to culture (as Tooby and Cosmides speak of an evoked culture). Echoing Peter
Richerson and Robert Boyd (whom he cites often), the upshot is that “genes alone
cannot explain human behavioral variation” (13). In this way, genes are only
responsible for certain potentials (i.e., learning itself), but not for content (i.e., values
or beliefs). Robert Turner and Charles Whitehead, citing other studies (in their 2008
paper “How Collective Representations Can Change the Structure of the Brain”), have
made a similar argument, and that is, for example: one is not born with a talent or
even an inclination to be a musician; one becomes a musician by constant exposure
and practice.
While all of this holds truth, by the same thinking, cultural transmission (and social
learning) alone does not account for individual variation. Cannot the learning potential
of individuals vary, and is that potential not genetic? One can argue that we have
everything Mozart left because of the guided influence of his father and the
prestigious musical culture of Austria; but then, one could argue that Mozart was a
genius (constituted uniquely from his family’s genes scrambled). Others, too, who
look for a biological (i.e., genetic) explanation of morality (Richard Alexander comes
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