In a new study, University of Maine researchers found that culture helps
humans adapt to their environment and overcome challenges better and faster
than genetics.
After conducting an extensive review of the literature and evidence of
long-term human evolution, scientists Tim Waring and Zach Wood concluded
that humans are experiencing a "special evolutionary transition" in which
the importance of culture, such as learned knowledge, practices and skills,
is surpassing the value of genes as the primary driver of human evolution.
Culture is an under-appreciated factor in human evolution, Waring says. Like
genes, culture helps people adjust to their environment and meet the
challenges of survival and reproduction. Culture, however, does so more
effectively than genes because the transfer of knowledge is faster and more
flexible than the inheritance of genes, according to Waring and Wood.
Culture is a stronger mechanism of adaptation for a couple of reasons,
Waring says. It's faster: gene transfer occurs only once a generation, while
cultural practices can be rapidly learned and frequently updated. Culture is
also more flexible than genes: gene transfer is rigid and limited to the
genetic information of two parents, while cultural transmission is based on
flexible human learning and effectively unlimited with the ability to make
use of information from peers and experts far beyond parents. As a result,
cultural evolution is a stronger type of adaptation than old genetics.
Waring, an associate professor of social-ecological systems modeling, and
Wood, a postdoctoral research associate with the School of Biology and
Ecology, have just published their findings in a literature review in the
Proceedings of the Royal Society B, the flagship biological research journal
of The Royal Society in London.
"This research explains why humans are such a unique species. We evolve both
genetically and culturally over time, but we are slowly becoming ever more
cultural and ever less genetic," Waring says.
Culture has influenced how humans survive and evolve for millenia. According
to Waring and Wood, the combination of both culture and genes has fueled
several key adaptations in humans such as reduced aggression, cooperative
inclinations, collaborative abilities and the capacity for social learning.
Increasingly, the researchers suggest, human adaptations are steered by
culture, and require genes to accommodate.
Waring and Wood say culture is also special in one important way: it is
strongly group-oriented. Factors like conformity, social identity and shared
norms and institutions -- factors that have no genetic equivalent -- make
cultural evolution very group-oriented, according to researchers. Therefore,
competition between culturally organized groups propels adaptations such as
new cooperative norms and social systems that help groups survive better
together.
According to researchers, "culturally organized groups appear to solve
adaptive problems more readily than individuals, through the compounding
value of social learning and cultural transmission in groups." Cultural
adaptations may also occur faster in larger groups than in small ones.
With groups primarily driving culture and culture now fueling human
evolution more than genetics, Waring and Wood found that evolution itself
has become more group-oriented.
"In the very long term, we suggest that humans are evolving from individual
genetic organisms to cultural groups which function as superorganisms,
similar to ant colonies and beehives," Waring says. "The 'society as
organism' metaphor is not so metaphorical after all. This insight can help
society better understand how individuals can fit into a well-organized and
mutually beneficial system. Take the coronavirus pandemic, for example. An
effective national epidemic response program is truly a national immune
system, and we can therefore learn directly from how immune systems work to
improve our COVID response."
Reference:
Timothy M. Waring, Zachary T. Wood. Long-term gene–culture coevolution and
the human evolutionary transition. Proceedings of the Royal Society B:
Biological Sciences, 2021; 288 (1952): 20210538 DOI:
10.1098/rspb.2021.0538