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The role of cultural group selection in explaining human cooperation is a hard case to prove

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 March 2016

Ruth Mace  and
Antonio S. Silva
Ruth Mace
Affiliation:
Department of Anthropology, University College London, London WC1H 0BW, United Kingdom. r.mace@ucl.ac.uk antonio.silva.09@ucl.ac.uk http://www.ucl.ac.uk/anthropology/people/academic_staff/r_mace http://www.ucl.ac.uk/anthropology/people/graduate_students/a_silva
Antonio S. Silva
Affiliation:
Department of Anthropology, University College London, London WC1H 0BW, United Kingdom. r.mace@ucl.ac.uk antonio.silva.09@ucl.ac.uk http://www.ucl.ac.uk/anthropology/people/academic_staff/r_mace http://www.ucl.ac.uk/anthropology/people/graduate_students/a_silva
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Abstract

We believe cultural group selection is an elegant theoretical framework to study the evolution of complex human behaviours, including large-scale cooperation. However, the empirical evidence on key theoretical issues – such as levels of within- and between-group variation and effects of intergroup competition – is so far patchy, with no clear case where all the relevant assumptions and predictions of cultural group selection are met, to the exclusion of other explanations.

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Type
Open Peer Commentary
Information
Behavioral and Brain Sciences , Volume 39 , 2016 , e45
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Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2016 

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