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The compound interest effect: Why cultural evolution is not niche construction

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 September 2001

Eric Saidel
Affiliation:
Department of Philosophy, University of Southwestern Louisiana, Lafayette, LA 70504-3770 [email protected] www.ucs.usl.edu/~ejs4839

Abstract

Laland et al. rightly observe that the pressures affecting the evolution of a trait include the previous effects the trait has had on the environment. Ignoring this would be like ignoring the effect of compound interest: a distortion, not a simplification. However, cultural evolution is not niche construction. In niche construction one mechanism has effects over multiple paths. Cultural evolution involves the effects of several mechanisms.

Type
Brief Report
Copyright
© 2000 Cambridge University Press

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