Societal responses to challenges, trials, and “magic wands” at the origins of social evolution

Abstract

The article discusses the prospects and conceptual means of a new perspective on the theo­retical explanation of human origins, especially in the aspects of cognition, language, mate­rial practices, and technology. Neo-Darwinism, or synthetic theory of evolution, which com­bined the simplified concept of Darwin with population genetics, where the main role is given to random mutations and natural, mainly individual, selection, is no longer completely dominant. The Extended Evolutionary Synthesis, which combines neo-Darwinism with neo-Lamarckism and includes models of gene-cultural evolution, epigenetics, multilevel selec­tion, the Baldwin effect, inclusive heredity, cultural drive, niche construction, and phenotype plasticity, seems more promising. The relationship of these ideas to the intellectual achieve­ments and rich traditions of domestic evolutionism is shown. After a brief explanation of the interrelated concepts that make up the extended synthesis, concepts and models bor­rowed from different branches of evolutionary theory, modern macro- and micro-social knowledge, and psychology are proposed. Instrumental activity, which has received the most attention because the remains of Paleolithic technologies are the most preserved and studied in detail by archaeologists, is presented as a part of niche construction: the practical transfor­mation by our distant ancestors of the habitat available to them. The exceptional role of probes is shown and a typology of behavioral and evolutionary probes is compiled. The metaphorical name “magic wand” is used to name especially flexible and polyfunc­tional structures that provide evolutionary success to different species (like the trunk in ele­phants and the echo sounder in bats). It is shown that for hominins and sapiens the main “magic wand” was the accumulation of cultural patterns transmitted in generations, because it was through them that the other “magic wands” characteristic of our species with almost limitless development potential began to develop: language, consciousness, writing, science, philosophy, art, and an expanding range of technologies.