Posted 27 Jun 2012 / 0
One of my chief interests is stability: I am curious about what allows for the persistence of genes, individuals, groups, species, and communities. This is a broad question and it may not have single, simple answer, but it is exciting to think that there may be ‘rules of stability’ in nature that might help us Read More
A Major Post, Articles, Coevolution, Ecological Modeling, Interactions, Mutualism, Mutualistic Networks, Pollination, System Stability
Posted 27 Jun 2012 / 0
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences “Lead poisoning and the deceptive recovery of the critically endangered California condor” Nature News “California condors face lead menace“
A Minor Post, Anthropogenic Change, Conservation Biology, Extinction
Posted 27 Jun 2012 / 0
Why Evolution is True “Did human social behavior evolve via group selection? E. O. Wilson defends that view in the NYT” Anyone who reads my posts here has learned that I find Jerry Coyne’s general tone to be really annoying and that I am predisposed to entertain group selective explanations of human behavior. But with Read More
A Minor Post, Cooperation, Group Selection, Human Evolution, Multilevel Selection
Posted 27 Jun 2012 / 0
The New York Times Opinionator “Evolution and Our Inner Conflict“
A Minor Post, Evolutionary Psychology, Human Evolution, Human Nature, Psychological Adaptation
Posted 27 Jun 2012 / 0
arXiv “Punishment can promote defection in group-structured populations” This paper points out a major problem with theoretical modeling, especially modeling that is simulation-based: tiny changes in assumptions matter. Testing just one set of assumptions takes a lot of effort, and so only through the work of multiple groups do the entire “state space” of possible Read More
A Minor Post, Punishment
Posted 27 Jun 2012 / 0
Theory, Evolution, and Games Group “Evolution of ethnocentrism in the Hammond and Axelrod model“
A Minor Post, Cooperation, Evolutionary Modeling, Game Theory, Social Networks, Web
Posted 27 Jun 2012 / 0
Theory, Evolution, and Games Group “Bifurcation of cooperation and inviscid ethnocentrism” One of the big dangers of simulation work is that it produces so much data, so it is natural to just code in some analysis algorithms that spit out digested data. But sometimes this analysis can hide interesting results!
A Minor Post, Cooperation, Evolutionary Modeling, Web
Posted 27 Jun 2012 / 0
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences “Iterated Prisoner’s Dilemma contains strategies that dominate any evolutionary opponent” An interesting digestion of this paper: Rules of Reason “Tit-for-tat no more: new insights into the origin and evolution of cooperation“
A Minor Post, Articles, Cooperation, Evolutionary Modeling, Game Theory
Posted 26 Jun 2012 / 0
On Being “Evolving a City” Fascinating stuff here about the degree to which evolutionary science serves society. Wilson’s idea of “managing the evolutionary process” is valuable, and needs to be taken up more often.
A Minor Post, Cultural Evolution, Evolution, Gene-Culture Coevolution, Human Evolution, Radio & Podcasts
Posted 26 Jun 2012 / 0
The Atlantic “‘A Perfect and Beautiful Machine’: What Darwin’s Theory of Evolution Reveals About Artificial Intelligence” I like this idea of “competence without comprehension”. I think that this could apply to a lot of our cultural practices as well as to the brilliance of evolved biological adaptations. I also appreciate the use of the “sorta” Read More
A Minor Post, Adaptation, Articles, Cognitive Ability, Evolution, Natural Selection
