One look at the human body – bipedal, no claws, pitiful canines, and a long developmental period – and it is clear that humans could have only evolved from groups, not from a primal condition of solitary living. Members of other ancestral species, not even bipedal, faced the initial problems in the evolution of coordinated activity. Group-living evolved as an interface between individual and habitat (e.g., protection from predators; exploitation of large, patchy, distributed resources). Groups that formed more coordinated units to interact with the habitat (thereby benefiting component individuals) would have been relatively more persistent than less coordinated units. Both minimum and maximum constraints on group size would occur: eventually too small a group would have a higher risk of perishing; too large a group strains the carrying capacity of the environment. Because a group mediates individual contact with the environment, and the number of niches within groups is constrained by minimum group size and carrying capacity of the habitat, we expect the evolution of perceptual, affective, and cognitive processes that support the development and maintenance of group membership (Caporael et al. Reference Caporael, Dawes, Orbell and Van de Kragt1989). In short, we expect humans to have evolved to be obligately interdependent, unable to reproduce and survive to reproductive age outside a group. Few would disagree with this minimalist scenario. The point of traction is how we conceive of group structure, social motives, and cognition generally. We agree with Smaldino that more highly coordinated groups are likely to outcompete less coordinated ones, but we also emphasize that within-group pressures have the major role in evolved group-level traits, not between-group conflicts.
Anthropologists identify three categories of functional group organization among hunter-gatherer groups: hunting and gathering is typically done by workgroups, subdivisions of a band. A band undertakes domestic functions – butchering, preparing food for storage, child-rearing, and adjudicating conflict. A macroband is a seasonal gathering of bands, with a wide range of ritual, social, cognitive, and informational activities. The organizational structure is remarkably stable through time, across continents, and different habitat types. Independently, Hull (Reference Hull1988) observed similar configurations in his participant-observation research on the organization of scientific practice. He identified a “demic structure of science” consisting of small research groups, “conceptual demes,” and seasonal society meetings. Group size at these three levels was comparable – about 3 to 5, 30 to 50, and 100 to 500 individuals (cf. Dunbar Reference Dunbar1993), respectively. With the addition of the dyad, considerations of repeatedly assembled morphology, tasks, and group size motivate a model of core group configurations that form a sociocognitive selective environment. This selective environment scaffolds both MLS and cMLS approaches, providing far richer possibilities for theoretical development and elaboration consistent with Smaldino's concept of the group-level trait.
Table 1 summarizes the model of core configurations (Caporael Reference Caporael, Caporael, Griesemer and Wimsatt2014; see also Caporael Reference Caporael1997). Core configurations are associated with examples of modal tasks that scaffold the evolution and development of group-level traits (Caporael et al. Reference Caporael, Griesiemer and Wimsatt2014). The model generally posits that human mental systems should have evolved for core configurations; once evolved these can be combined, extended, and co-opted to novel tasks. Selective advantages for sociality include coordination of activity and the acquisition, transmission, and maintenance of information and knowledge.
Table 1.
Repeatedly Assembled Core Configurations
Seasonal macrodemes, composed of related demes, should be particularly active sites in human biocultural evolutionary studies. First, macrodemes are not persistent; they are intermittent over time. Second, members of groups may come and go within demes without changing the group structure and dynamics at the deme and macrodeme levels (Brewer & Caporael Reference Brewer, Caporael, Brown and Capozza2006). The situated activity of hunting, foraging, playing, and other activities at deme and macrodemes differ little from each other. However, macrodemes generate a new set of dynamics, which are largely social and psychological with downward causal consequences. These emergent abilities include distributed cognition, reduced distinctions between self and non-self, and collective and categorical identities, rather than just interpersonal and relational identities. The interpersonal relational identity within bands is complemented by an emergent collective identity at the macroband level. Collective identity in a seasonal macrodeme scaffolds exchanges of crucial information about changing conditions in more distant parts of a local ecology. Language, and its stabilization and standardization, is highly significant for describing what lies beyond the next hill. Layton and O'Hara (Reference Layton, O'Hara, Dunbar, Gamble and Gowlett2010) report that modern languages universally include the equivalent of terms such as “now,” “before,” “after,” “here,” and “far.” A lack of such not-present ecological information can lead to the loss or even partial destruction of a foraging party, which in turn can lead to the end of a band. Although that end may be the literal deaths of its members, participation in a macroband with a shared collective group identity can scaffold the absorption of surviving group members by other demes. In other words, macrodemes serve as a safety net at the band and individual levels. Furthermore, the seasonal aspect of macrodemes, combined with shared symbolic communication among demes, scaffolds the transition from foraging lifeways to settlement living.
Although we do not disagree with Smaldino that intergroup competition and conflict occur, we are skeptical about using such traits as lynchpins for the evolution of a distinctive “human nature.” It takes a great deal of within-group selection for the evolution of the kind of coordinating capacities demanded by engagement in inter-group conflict, even at the level of a minor mêlée. By the same token, intrademic, individual, and subgroup competition in various symbolic, ritual, and occasionally embodied ways, is a lively and refined sport.
One look at the human body – bipedal, no claws, pitiful canines, and a long developmental period – and it is clear that humans could have only evolved from groups, not from a primal condition of solitary living. Members of other ancestral species, not even bipedal, faced the initial problems in the evolution of coordinated activity. Group-living evolved as an interface between individual and habitat (e.g., protection from predators; exploitation of large, patchy, distributed resources). Groups that formed more coordinated units to interact with the habitat (thereby benefiting component individuals) would have been relatively more persistent than less coordinated units. Both minimum and maximum constraints on group size would occur: eventually too small a group would have a higher risk of perishing; too large a group strains the carrying capacity of the environment. Because a group mediates individual contact with the environment, and the number of niches within groups is constrained by minimum group size and carrying capacity of the habitat, we expect the evolution of perceptual, affective, and cognitive processes that support the development and maintenance of group membership (Caporael et al. Reference Caporael, Dawes, Orbell and Van de Kragt1989). In short, we expect humans to have evolved to be obligately interdependent, unable to reproduce and survive to reproductive age outside a group. Few would disagree with this minimalist scenario. The point of traction is how we conceive of group structure, social motives, and cognition generally. We agree with Smaldino that more highly coordinated groups are likely to outcompete less coordinated ones, but we also emphasize that within-group pressures have the major role in evolved group-level traits, not between-group conflicts.
Anthropologists identify three categories of functional group organization among hunter-gatherer groups: hunting and gathering is typically done by workgroups, subdivisions of a band. A band undertakes domestic functions – butchering, preparing food for storage, child-rearing, and adjudicating conflict. A macroband is a seasonal gathering of bands, with a wide range of ritual, social, cognitive, and informational activities. The organizational structure is remarkably stable through time, across continents, and different habitat types. Independently, Hull (Reference Hull1988) observed similar configurations in his participant-observation research on the organization of scientific practice. He identified a “demic structure of science” consisting of small research groups, “conceptual demes,” and seasonal society meetings. Group size at these three levels was comparable – about 3 to 5, 30 to 50, and 100 to 500 individuals (cf. Dunbar Reference Dunbar1993), respectively. With the addition of the dyad, considerations of repeatedly assembled morphology, tasks, and group size motivate a model of core group configurations that form a sociocognitive selective environment. This selective environment scaffolds both MLS and cMLS approaches, providing far richer possibilities for theoretical development and elaboration consistent with Smaldino's concept of the group-level trait.
Table 1 summarizes the model of core configurations (Caporael Reference Caporael, Caporael, Griesemer and Wimsatt2014; see also Caporael Reference Caporael1997). Core configurations are associated with examples of modal tasks that scaffold the evolution and development of group-level traits (Caporael et al. Reference Caporael, Griesiemer and Wimsatt2014). The model generally posits that human mental systems should have evolved for core configurations; once evolved these can be combined, extended, and co-opted to novel tasks. Selective advantages for sociality include coordination of activity and the acquisition, transmission, and maintenance of information and knowledge.
Repeatedly Assembled Core Configurations
The names of core configurations refer to distinctive kinds of situated activity. The term “bands” is used to refer to (idealized) hunter-gatherers; otherwise, “deme” refers to the model. Except for dyads, the group size numbers should be considered as basins of attraction. Reprinted and modified from Caporael (Reference Caporael, Caporael, Griesemer and Wimsatt2014).
Seasonal macrodemes, composed of related demes, should be particularly active sites in human biocultural evolutionary studies. First, macrodemes are not persistent; they are intermittent over time. Second, members of groups may come and go within demes without changing the group structure and dynamics at the deme and macrodeme levels (Brewer & Caporael Reference Brewer, Caporael, Brown and Capozza2006). The situated activity of hunting, foraging, playing, and other activities at deme and macrodemes differ little from each other. However, macrodemes generate a new set of dynamics, which are largely social and psychological with downward causal consequences. These emergent abilities include distributed cognition, reduced distinctions between self and non-self, and collective and categorical identities, rather than just interpersonal and relational identities. The interpersonal relational identity within bands is complemented by an emergent collective identity at the macroband level. Collective identity in a seasonal macrodeme scaffolds exchanges of crucial information about changing conditions in more distant parts of a local ecology. Language, and its stabilization and standardization, is highly significant for describing what lies beyond the next hill. Layton and O'Hara (Reference Layton, O'Hara, Dunbar, Gamble and Gowlett2010) report that modern languages universally include the equivalent of terms such as “now,” “before,” “after,” “here,” and “far.” A lack of such not-present ecological information can lead to the loss or even partial destruction of a foraging party, which in turn can lead to the end of a band. Although that end may be the literal deaths of its members, participation in a macroband with a shared collective group identity can scaffold the absorption of surviving group members by other demes. In other words, macrodemes serve as a safety net at the band and individual levels. Furthermore, the seasonal aspect of macrodemes, combined with shared symbolic communication among demes, scaffolds the transition from foraging lifeways to settlement living.
Although we do not disagree with Smaldino that intergroup competition and conflict occur, we are skeptical about using such traits as lynchpins for the evolution of a distinctive “human nature.” It takes a great deal of within-group selection for the evolution of the kind of coordinating capacities demanded by engagement in inter-group conflict, even at the level of a minor mêlée. By the same token, intrademic, individual, and subgroup competition in various symbolic, ritual, and occasionally embodied ways, is a lively and refined sport.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
We thank Emily Schultz for helping us pull chestnuts out of the fire.