In his new book, Wired for Culture, Mark Pagel — a professor of evolutionary biology at the University of Reading — argues that social structures and culture are vital components in human evolution. Human beings are altruistic, helpful, and cooperative in ways that other mammals are not. Pagel says our facility for culture is the key to our success as a species. Without a propensity for culture, the traits that make us stand above other mammals — in Darwinian terms — such as: consciousness, language and intelligence, would not exist.
He spoke to The Spectator about the idea of “the self” as an illusion, how most human behaviour is a form of copying, and why religions have been beneficial to humanity.
What is the thesis of your new book?
That humans invented this new kind of evolution called ideas evolution, which we pass from one generation to the next. It is held in our minds, rather than just in our genes. That is why humans have spread out around the world, conquering its many environments, adapting in ways that other animals haven’t been able to.
So human culture is more important than the idea that we are simply a survival machine for our genes?
Yes, very much so. We need to be clear — without our genes we wouldn’t be who we are. But our ability to occupy the world is down to our cultural evolution, not down to our genes.
How does your argument differ from Richard Dawkins’ argument in The Selfish Gene?
Richard and I are talking about slightly different things. The Selfish Gene is really about genetical evolution, it doesn’t talk very much about cultural evolution (although in the final chapter it brings up). The kind of altruism that I’m talking about is one only humans are capable of. No other animal does this. We’ve evolved with psychology, and the social behaviours that allowed us to cooperate with people we are not related to.
When did humans “walk out of Africa” to live in other parts of the world?
The evidence would suggest it was around 60,000 years ago. And yet there is clear evidence that there were modern humans in Australia, 50,000 years ago. So in a mere 10,000 years, we covered half the globe.
Do all human beings share some genes with Neanderthals?
The only people on earth who don’t are people of African origin. The rest of us are “mongrels”, because we hybridised with these Neanderthals, after we left Africa. The true pure-bred humans are the Africans.
Do you agree with Steven Pinker’s comment that aboriginal populations could be less biologically adapted to the demands of modern life, than populations that have lived in literate states for millennia?
Let me first say this is not a statement about intelligence or cognitive abilities. Now if there are genetic differences among those Australian aboriginal populations, what Steven Pinker has been trying to argue: is that living in large societies, there has been strong selection against anti-social behaviour. So if you live in a large society, and you are prone to violence, you are quickly going to be weeded out of that population. I think we have to treat this very carefully, and not conclude that if we are around an aboriginal person that they would be violent in any way.
You say that natural selection has made humans inherently violent, yet your book is about human cooperation, isn’t there a paradox here?
The paradox is resolved when we realise how we have evolved is by cooperating, as a way of advancing our tribal societies. Culture has been highly effective in obliging us in that ancient Darwinian legacy that we have, of survival and transparency.
How have religions benefited human culture?
My argument isn’t necessarily that religions are true, that we should be retaining them in modern societies, or even teaching them to our children. However, religious memes have helped us as tribal societies to survive and prosper. That is something that we need to take very seriously, because it could be why we have such a weakness for religion.
You also suggest that human beings are copiers; does this suggest that very few people are independent thinkers?
Yes. The nature of our intelligence has been one of entire groups of people pooling and sharing their ideas. If you ask yourself, how many ideas have I thought up that changed the course of the world? I think most of us come up short here.
You also posit that society is getting lazier in an increasing homogenous and globalized world?
One can go through life today without any understanding of the world you live in. Most of the things we need to survive are provided for you. Compare that to living 5,000 years ago. Then you had to know what food to eat, or what the predators were like. Modern societies reward us in our docility.
Currently 15 to 20 languages are disappearing in the world every year, should we be worried about this?
It is inevitable, sadly, that these languages will disappear. There is no reason to believe that different languages on earth are associated with different ways of thinking. All human beings think
the same way. Language does not determine how we think. It isn’t the case that if we lose a language, we lose some unique way of thinking. We ought to have some sadness for losing a culture,
but that doesn’t necessarily mean that we should be trying to preserve these languages, simply to preserve linguistic diversity. We should be trying to preserve human beings, and be worried
less about their languages per se.
The inner “I” or the “self” is an illusion, you state in your book, how do we consider ourselves individuals so?
Our consciousness is just another strategy that our genes have created only in us, to get us to be good at surviving and reproducing. I wish I could say I know what consciousness is for, it seems obvious to everyone. There is reason to believe that most of our decisions — the ones that we think we make — have been taken at a subconscious level, before they pop into our consciousness. I’m not saying that you don’t exist, you certainly do, but the “I” is a far more complicated thing than we ever imagined
Why has it been more conducive for human beings to live in cities rather than the countryside?
Nothing in our evolutionary history prepared us for living in large cities. But then everything about the way culture works, did prepare us. The reason we have these large societies, is that we have a psychology, or social behaviours that allows us to get along with people we’re not related to. That psychology has allowed us to scale up from the small bands and tribes that we have created. That’s why we all flock to large cities. We would not have stayed in these cities if it was not better for our survival or prosperity. In an odd sort of a way, our psychology from 150,000 years ago prepared us for this.
Wired for Culture by Mark Pagel is published by Penguin £14.99
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