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David Baker

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Typeset in Common Ground Markup Language using CGPublisher multichannel typesetting system http://www.commongroundpublishing.com/software/ On Human Evolution in History: The Case of France David Baker, Macquarie University, New South Wales, Australia

Abstract: A history of France from the fall of the Roman Empire to the French Revolution employed population theories of secular cycles, cultural evolution, and collective learning. It is a Big History project supervised by the founder of the discipline, David Christian, and it is written in collaboration with several theorists from the natural sciences. It uses population-thinking to search for broad trends that might explain historical events, the rise and fall of empires, and technological progress. It maps a trajectory of historical processes from the birth of France to the modern age, and takes the contro- versial step of attempting to predict where that trajectory may be going in the future. This may be of direct use to those who will face population pressure and environmental crises in the later twenty-first century. It challenges many prejudices the historical discipline currently holds against collaboration between the human and natural sciences, and encourages specialists to place their work in a wider context. The history itself is chronological, and follows the periods of rise and decline in France, and explains various phenomena in human development for which there is currently no clear explanation.

Keywords: Population Dynamics, Big History, Cliodynamics, France, Interdisciplinary, Cultural Evolution, Memetics, Collective Learning, Human Development, Agriculture, Industry, Darwin, Universal Darwinism, Secular Cycles, Laws of History, The Two Cultures, C.P. Snow, Ecology, Le Roy Ladurie, David Christian, Robert Boyd, Peter Richerson, Peter Turchin, Richard Dawkins, Memes, Culture, Technology, Evolution, Humanity, Demographics, Instability, Politics, Medieval, Early Modern, Malthus

HE FOLLOWING ARTICLE is a theoretical outline of the project I am currently pursuing and that I was fortunate enough to present at the recent Interdisciplinary Social Sciences conference in New Orleans. My project is a history of medieval and Tearly modern France produced in close collaboration with the natural sciences and in the genre of Big History, which is an interdisciplinary form of history that endeavours to teach and examine the history of 13.7 billion years. Big History has recently caught the interest of public figures like Bill Gates and Al Gore. The purpose of my project is to testthepopu- lation-based theories of secular cycles, memetics, and collective learning and to forge them into a model that explains the driving force behind human development. I will highlight the three theories of this model in this paper and the touch on some of things my research has revealed so far about the influence of population dynamics on French history. By andlarge the discussion here will be entirely theoretical. An empirical work will follow. The three theories I explain here aid our understanding of the impact population dynamics have on historical development. This collection of theory has come to be known by many scholars in the natural and social sciences as a form of ‘cultural evolution’.

The Theory of Secular Cycles The theory of secular cycles grows out of the idea that a change in population numbers causes a change in food prices and labour wages. The rise and fall of real wages directly impacts a

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person’s quality of life and in extreme cases even their ability to survive. Population pressure exerts a powerful influence over socio-political instability, historical events, and the ebband flow of state power.1 The dynamics are so constant that they can be identified in cycles of a few hundred years of expansion and contraction.2 It may even influence the rise and fall of empires. Like all good theories, the theory of secular cycles is at its core elegantly simple. Initially, when a population is low, there is plenty of food, a relative labour shortage, and so food prices are low and wages are high. A nation enjoys a contented, prosperous, and perhaps even steadily improving standard of living. This translates into political stability. A rebellion is seldom waged on a full stomach. As a result of these things, the population tends to grow. Eventually a population approaches its carrying capacity. There are shortages of food and an oversupply of labour. Prices rise, wages drop, and the standard of living declines. Unmit- igated by agricultural innovation or territorial expansion, this can lead to a disastrous crisis. As the crisis point is approached, the average person is paid less and has to pay ever more for the basic essentials. Famines increase in severity, the susceptibility of people to disease also increases, as does the possibility of widespread epidemics. It also increases the level of civil unrest among the masses. At the same time as the crisis point is approached, it is a veritable ‘golden age’ for the elite. Landowners pay lower wages and charge higher rents. Middling landowners are forced off their farms and land coalesces in the hands of the few. The inequality gap widens. Elite incomes grow. Contented in this golden age, they are more likely to support the government in the defence of the status quo. But the significant fact is that elite numbers and appetites grow. It makes up a period of stagnation in the common sphere and inflation of elite numbers, and has come to be known as the ‘stagflation’ period. Then the crisis point is reached. People starve, social cohesion collapses, the number of people living at subsistence level grows, grain reserves disappear, diseases ravage a malnourished landscape, there are rural and urban uprisings and, ultimately, people die. As the general population shrinks, the elites, cushioned by their status and their wealth, do not die at the same rate. The social pyramid becomes immensely top-heavy. This is called elite overproduction. These elites, numerous as they are in comparison to a dwindling population, begin to see their incomes shrink. And they do not like it. Factions form, both against the government and against each other. While the government’s tax revenues shrink due to depopulation, it is increasingly unable to quell, confront, or control these factions. As a consequence, there is a period of intense and bloody conflict. As a result, the first crisis, spurred mainly by demographic causes, is followed by a second crisis or ‘depression’ which is largely manmade. That is why a nation following initial depopulation does not immediately rebound. The social side of the equation holds recovery down, and this can last for decades. Eventually, however, a population does rebound. Elite numbers are reduced. Low numbers in the general population combined with high wages and low food prices lead to another period of expansion, peace, and stability. It does, however, come at a tremendous cost. This is the theory of secular cycles: a reconciliation of the Malthusian ideas of the French annalistes and the rival school

1 Peter Turchin, Historical Dynamics: Why States Rise and Fall, (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2003), War and Peace and War: The Life Cycles of Imperial Nations, (New York: Pi Press, 2006), with Sergey Nefedov, Secular Cycles, (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2009). 2 The average appears to be roughly 300 years for a full cycle, but depends greatly on specific conditions.

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of Marxist historical thought. The hypothesis is that these cycles influenced the rise and fall of all great powers in the history of agrarian civilisation.

Memetics In The Selfish Gene (1976) Richard Dawkins put forth the idea that not all behaviour is de- termined by genetics, but that culture also obeys an evolutionary process.3 Somewhat later on, Dawkins’ idea was taken up by Peter Richerson and Robert Boyd in Culture and the Evolutionary Process (1985).4 The claim of this theory is that culture and ideas are transmitted as variations among a population. Culture change can thus be demographically measured. A ‘meme’ is the popular term for any package of information that is transmitted between individuals in a population through social learning and imitation. The primary mechanisms of memetics are thus entirely cultural rather than biological. Nevertheless, memes are still subject to variation and selection pressures. Unfortunately, the term ‘meme’ gives the idea that they are much more concrete than they really are. However, there is a reason why I have been forced to accept ‘meme’ as a working term. It is memetically successful. It has spread, it has caught on, and it is used by an army of scholars worldwide. I use the term memetics as a result of the very process it is supposed to describe. ‘Memes’ may sound too concrete to describe the fairly fluid packages or complexes of information that constitute them. But there is no implication that hidden in the depths of our brains there is a single meme for a specific behaviour any more than there are single genes for specific behaviours.5 The theory of memetics is laid forth most effectively by Peter Richerson and Robert Boyd in their forceful and magnificently written book, Not by Genes Alone.6 It sets an agenda for an entirely new line of inquiry and quite possibly will one day be judged as one of the most significant works of the twenty-first century.7 Contrary to the cliché misconception, culture is neither nature nor nurture. It is some of both. Richerson and Boyd define ‘culture’ as information capable of affecting a subject’s behaviour that is acquired from other members of their species through teaching, imitation, and other forms of social transmission. This ‘information’ can be defined as ideas, knowledge, beliefs, values, skills, and attitudes.

3 Richard Dawkins, The Selfish Gene, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1976). 4 Robert Boyd and Peter Richerson, Culture and the Evolutionary Process, (Chicago: Chicago University Press, 1985). The dual inheritance systems being genes and culture. 5 I think W.G. Runciman makes this argument particularly well in ‘Does Culture Evolve?’ History and Theory (2005) 44, 6. 6 Although they do not call it memetics: Richerson and Boyd advocate cultural variant over meme, and their term is better, but for reasons I have just described I have done otherwise. 7 Peter Richerson and Robert Boyd, Not by Genes Alone: How Culture Transformed Human Evolution, (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2005). Many works have been written on the subject, though I believe Richerson and Boyd remain the most successful at explaining it. Richard Dawkins, by contrast, as recently as The God Delusion, (New York: Houghton Mifflin, 2006), 228 claimed Susan Blackmore, The Meme Machine, (Oxford: Oxford Uni- versity Press, 1999) held that honour. A number of other works have also been written on the subject: Stephen Shennan, Genes, Memes, and Human History: Darwinian Archaeology and Cultural Evolution, (London: Thames and Hudson, 2002), Ruth Mace, Clare J Holden, and Stephen Shennan (eds), The Evolution of Cultural Diversity: A Phylogenetic Approach, (London: UCL Press, 2005)–particularly David Bryant, Flavia Filiman, and Russell Gray, ‘Untangling Our Past: Languages, Trees, Splits and Networks’ which advocates the NeighborNet program to plot trees for both vertical and horizontal transmission for all the Indo-European languages, John Ziman (ed), Technological Innovation as an Evolutionary Process, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000), and a close runner up to Richerson, Boyd, and Black more, Stephen Shennan (ed), Pattern and Process in Cultural Evolution, (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2009), notable for its many in-depth investigations.

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Critics have accused memetics of simply applying concepts of the natural sciences to cultural studies merely as superficial metaphors.8 So let us be clear about what the theory of memetics actually claims. Cultural traits operate, spread, multiply and are selected on the basis of their frequency and benefit. That is all. Like genes in biology, memes undergoa process of variation and selection of information. There is no metaphor here. It is a fact. The only difference between memetics and genetics is the mode of transmission. In memetics information is transferred by imitation and learning. The process of imitation and learning is not a metaphor. Humans do it all the time. It just happens to function along a Darwinian algorithm. Memes are only loosely analogous to genes. Cultural transmission does not involve such faithful replication. Instead, as ideas are shared they undergo change, rather like words do in a game of ‘telephone’. Variety is not just the spice of life. Variation is the engine of evolution. Cultures hold a variety of ideas. Some ideas are more practical or more appealing, some skills are easier to learn or are better geared toward survival, some beliefs are more likely to lead to social prominence than others, and all these spread more easily from person to person. Those cultural practices that lead to early death or social stigma are less frequent or simply disappear.9 The only memes that survive are the ones that are displayed. Memes operate on an individual level to form broad cultures. Cultures themselves do not spread by group-selection. Cultures, like species, are only defined by the excess of variation between them. Thenames we assign to cultures, like taxonomy in biology, are entirely manmade labels to classify in general what is actually a myriad of subtle and ever-multiplying variations within a population. Richerson and Boyd end Not by Genes Alone by imploring scholars to devise ‘a synthetic theory of human behaviour’. The social sciences are too isolated from one another, to speak nothing of their distance from the natural sciences. Biology first-year courses include all the sub-disciplines. The social sciences all have separate first-year courses. Richerson and Boyd therefore ask why is there no ‘Homo Sapiens 1’ posing as a complete introduction to the whole problem of human behaviour.10 We must not divorce culture from biology, any more than we should segregate the natural from the social sciences.11 Many natural scientists are willing to collaborate with members of the social sciences, but many of these social scientists seem to possess an extraordinary amount of hostility and disdain for the idea. This prejudice is not only inconvenient, it is immensely damaging and costly. If the big picture of human existence is to be understood as a whole, it must be examined from all angles. In the meantime tremendous opportunities for collaboration and discovery are being lost. As Richerson and Boyd put it, ‘the gulf between the social and natural sciences continues to widen as some anthropologists, sociolo- gists, and historians adopt methods and philosophical commitments that seem to natural

8 For instance, see Joseph Fracchia and R. Lewontin, ‘Does Culture Evolve?’ History and Theory (1999) 38: 52- 78, and the resulting debate between them and W.G. Runciman in History and Theory (2005) 44, 1-13, 14-29, and 30-41, in several back and forth exchanges. Fracchia and Lewontin’s misunderstanding of what cultural evolution actually led both sides to more or less repeat the same arguments at each other.. 9 Richerson and Boyd, Not by Genes Alone, 5-12. 10 Richerson and Boyd, Not by Genes Alone, 245. 11 I can only but refer the reader to C.P. Snow’s The Two Cultures, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1959).

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scientists to abandon the basic norms of science entirely.’12 That indictment, while harsh, is not entirely undeserved. More promising are the words, ‘historians have everything to gain and nothing to lose by using appropriate evolutionary tools for their job.’13 It is hoped that the next generation of historians will in time come to realise the truth of those words.

Collective Learning As we have seen, culture evolves through the accumulation of small variations. Similarly, every invention of technology or breakthrough in practice, like in agriculture, comes from a series of small improvements contributed by a long dynasty of innovators. The single innovation of a genius might be of revolutionary magnitude and repercussions, but would have been impossible without the hundreds of tiny innovations made by the hundreds of generations that came before it. Newton said he stood on the shoulders of giants. It might be fairer to say that every ordinary man stands on the shoulders of other ordinary men–some with more than ordinary perceptiveness and absolutely extraordinary timing. Our technologies, our in- stitutions, our languages, are far too elaborate for even the most gifted of geniuses to create from scratch. Human beings have a tremendous capacity for language. We can share information with great precision, accumulating a pool of knowledge that all people may use. The knowledge an individual contributes to that pool can long survive his death. If our populations are large and well-connected enough, more information is acquired by each passing generation than is lost by the next. It can be accessed and improved upon by countless generations. This opportunity to learn collectively changes everything.14 As learning accumulates, human beings are able to exploit niches in their environment on increasing levels, which causes population numbers to increase, which in turn increases the number of people contributing to that ever-growing pool of knowledge. Human individuals are not much cleverer than chimps or Neanderthals, but as a species we ensure that nobody has to relearn everything from scratch.15 Different cultures, different languages, and isolation slow technological progress. Agr- arian civilisations brought about a greater degree of such connectivity, larger numbers of people and a new rapid pace for innovation. From 3000 BC to 0 AD the world population rose from 50 million to 250 million.16 But the growth in the carrying capacity of agriculture was sluggish while population growth was exponential, and so there was a series of miniature waves of population collapse and recovery throughout the period of agrarian civilisations–secular cycles. Not all learning was lost in each decline, so innovation accumulated in each cycle. The next expansion period brought renewed accumulation and thus gradually raised the carrying capacity. Like secular cycles and memetics, the very secret of human technological development is rooted in population-thinking. It works like this. In phases of under-population, resources are bountiful, and the population expands at an exponential rate. As the population grows,

12 Richerson and Boyd, Not by Genes Alone, 17. My Italics. 13 Richerson and Boyd, Not by Genes Alone, 248. 14 David Christian, Maps of Time: An Introduction to Big History, (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2004), 146. 15 Christian, Maps of Time, 147. 16 Christian, Maps of Time, 309.

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a pool of knowledge accumulates and people begin to innovate. Although population pressure leads to small secular cycles of growth and decline, not all learning is forgotten in the downturns. Collective learning carries on at a constant stream, slowly raising the carrying capacity and the overall population. Much depends on whether the rate of innovation keeps increasing productivity and keeps incomes ahead of the subsistence rate. If collective learning can keep producing more to keep ahead of subsistence and starvation, the population continues to grow. If not, then the population temporarily bows to population pressure. This causes socio-political instability and sometimes periods of lengthy depression, elite infighting, civil war, and susceptibility to foreign invasion. This is the stage of the most risk, where learning can actually be lost, thus reducing the carrying capacity for when growth does resume. If, however, minimal or no learning is lost in those periods of decline, the carrying capacity continues to grow regardless of whether the population is in expansion, stagflation, crisis, or depression. Gradually the population grows as a long trend, regardless of the waves of mini s-curves when the population grows too fast, hits the carrying capacity, and temporarily recoils. This is expressed by the model:

Fig. 1: The Asterisk (*) Marks a Period of Severe Population Decline where Learning is Lost

If one takes the average length of a secular cycle to be around 300 years, but allows for many variations, this graph would represent the life-cycle of the last few thousand years of an un- specified agrarian civilisation between its adoption of agriculture and the introduction of heavy industry. It is important to note that population losses in periods of decline are not equal. Some disintegrative phases can be exacerbated by plagues, famines, or extended periods of civil warfare. Furthermore, the rate of growth is not constant either, since each innovation does not exert exactly the same amount of influence on the carrying capacity. Also, the asterisk marks a hypothetical period where the population suffered a catastrophic decline and learning was forgotten on a large scale. As one can see, the subsequent cycles had to make up the difference by accumulating innovations all over again. I believe this an- omaly applies to the fall of the Western Roman Empire and the cycles that followed it. It is astounding to think that this model roughly represents the broad view of human development between the rise of agriculture and industry.

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Research Now it would be remiss of me if I did not discuss how these theories have so far been reflected in my research, however tedious that may be. So I ask you to bear with me. One, it would appear that the Roman Empire was expanding demographically after the wars of the third century AD, which Peter Turchin has asserted was the end of a previous secular depression phase. Rural settlement patterns indicate population growth in both the Eastern and Western Empires in the early fourth century and this coincides with a period of relative political stability. Archaeology reveals that the Eastern Empire continued to grow in population well past the 350s and enjoyed a fairly prosperous and stable fifth century, though elite-overproduction and inequality seemed to increase rapidly in the latter half, as the growth in the average size of landholdings and the profusion of offices and new titles seems to show. Itwas not until the demographic collapse of the Justinianic Plague in the 540s that we actually see the Eastern Empire enter a disintegrative phase. In the Western Empire, however, it would appear the recovery phase of the early fourth century was cut short for some reason. Settlement patterns indicate the population started to shrink considerably after around the 350s, well before the barbarian invasions. Economic evidence from several quantitative fronts seems to mimic this trend of demographic decline. It is also interesting to note that elites were very numerous and the inequality gap was one of the widest in human history: wider than even the gap between an average eighteenth century French peasant and the richest noblemen at Versailles. The Germanic invasions of the fifth century seem to have reduced rural populations still further, but not just through violence, which was intermittent, but the destruction of property and cropland that may well have given rise to famines. Paleopathological evidence seems to indicate a rise in disease and malnutrition in this period as well. As I have stated, the decline appears to coincide with a Tasmanian effect, with the disappearance of some technologies in the West and also the simplification of others. There appears to be some correlation between the Roman frontier and the rise of small tribal groups with high social cohesion. There also appears to be a correlation between memetic incentives in North Gaul for the adoption of a Frankish identity and cultural memes by Gallo-Roman aristocrats, to the extent that the Frankish culture was almost universal there by the end of the sixth century. The re- taining of a largely Gallo-Roman identity in South Gaul and the clear divide between Visigoth and Gallo-Roman might also have something to do with a lack of memetic incentive to adopt common cultural memes. The onrush of the Justinianic Plague seems to have heralded yet another disintegrative phase in the Merovingian West as it did in the Byzantine East. Elite overproduction, civil war, and infighting are prevalent in both regions. The Justinianic Plague may also haveex- acerbated the Tasmanian Effect in the West. It is possible the disintegrative phase reversed itself at the end of the seventh century AD and coincides with the rise of the Carolingians. It would also appear that Charlemagne himself and his son Louis the Pious actually fall at the end of this period of renewed population growth. The collapse of Charlemagne’s empire thereafter may coincide with yet another population downturn. The technological leap and growth of the European economy around the year 1000 may have been the result of a process of collective learning that had been proceeding since the Carolingian period, though interest- ingly enough the boom in economies, consumption, and population around the year 1000 appears to be a nearly worldwide trend. Then the eleventh, twelfth, and thirteenth centuries

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appear to be one of growth, relative stability, and prosperity in Western Europe. Le Roy Ladurie’s classic hypothesis about the Black Death inaugurating a period of historical decline appears to be correct on the surface, though it would seem that the population of France did not rebound from the epidemic for at least a hundred years subsequently, which Ladurie could not explain. This is where the new theory answers the problem: it was probably due to prolonged elite infighting that was provoked by the initial downturn, marking thedivide between the crisis phase which is ecological and the depression phase which is largely manmade. The years 1450-1550 were a prosperous recovery phase, but thereafter hitting yet another population lid followed by a period of intense elite infighting once again. It is as yet unclear what the bounds are of this disintegrative phase. In the coming months I hope also to investigate the impact of industrialisation on the historical patterns and secular cycles, not to mention seeing what role collective learning played in the rise of industry itself. I may also write a short epilogue on how industrialisation changed the dynamics of the post-agrarian era and perhaps even forecast the impact of demographic trends on socio-political stability that we may see later in the twenty-first century.

On Cultural Evolution I will close briefly with a word on cultural evolution. There have already been attemptsat a so-called unified theory of cultural evolution.17 These attempts answer the call of many scholars for cultural evolution’s own version of the Modern Synthesis.18 There is a general feeling that we are on the hunt for a definitive framework that ties it all together. I willnot attempt such a framework here, but will discuss some of the mechanics of cultural evolution as I see them. First, here is what seems clear about the theory. There are two tiers of human evolution. The first is genetics, which operates in the same way as for other organisms. Those genes gave humans a large capacity for imitation and communication. Those two things enabled the second tier. Culture operates under similar laws, but on a much faster scale. Cultural variations are subject to natural selection and the most beneficial variations are chosen. Unlike genes these variations can be transmitted between populations of the same generation and can be modified numerous times within that generation. Like genes theyare passed from generation to generation also and are further modified. Ultimately, culture accumulates. Population pressure compels some of this accumulation to be geared toward increasing the human ability to extract resources from the environment. This process raises the carrying capacity, which produces more people, which produces more accumulation, which in turn raises the carrying capacity. The cycle continues and grows in complexity. The second evolutionary tier of culture, a swifter form of evolution, should not come as a surprise in a Darwinian algorithm. Gradually through natural selection, not only do species become better at surviving, they become better at evolving. This follows the logic that en- hancing the rate of your improvement of your survival chances is just as naturally selected

17 W.G. Runciman, The Theory of Cultural and Social Selection, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009) and Kate Distin, Cultural Evolution, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011). 18 For instance, A. Mesoudi, A. Whiten, K. Laland, ‘Towards a Unified Science of Cultural Evolution’ Behavioural and Brain Sciences, (2006) 29: 329-383, which also puts forth a flow chart that reorganises all the social sciences to be the opposite numbers of the natural sciences, archaeology being opposite of paleobiology and so forth. I do not endorse this.

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for, since it also improves the rate of your survival. Logically, a third tier is likely to emerge where our knowledge allows us to guide the evolution of our own genes with genetic engin- eering, ethical arguments aside. If we discard the manmade concept of tiers, in a sense through a relatively short evolutionary process of about 50,000 to 250,000 years, our genes have evolved the ability to develop more rapidly and efficiently. Collective learning requires population pressure to begin raising the carrying capacity, but does not require population pressure to continue. This is because further innovation continues to raise real incomes and enhance an individual’s standard of living. The rate at which a population innovates is dependent on how large and dense the population is. The rate of innovation is also faster where communications are more efficient. Fine-tuning of innovations can be done by similar communities, but new advances require variation and contact between diverse societies.19 Those populations that are small and isolated will not innovate quickly and, if there is no population pressure, may even abandon technology. The universe is composed of webs of energy of varying complexity. Life-forms are entities that harvest energy to perpetuate their complexity, to spread it, and even increase it. Human history has been dominated by this hunt for resources. Our evolution, both genetic and cultural, has ultimately been geared toward aiding this hunt. Standard evolution can be defined as the change in the traits of a population of organisms through successive generations to sustain or increase their complexity. Human evolution can be defined as the change in traits and behaviours between populations of the same generation and through successive generations to sustain or increase their complexity. There is a useful simile that one may use to conceptualise the various layers of processes. Human evolution is like the ocean. In the deepest, darkest waters at the bottom are the slow powerful currents of genetics. Carried on top of them is the swelling tide of collective learning. Above that are the large, majestic waves of memetics and cultural transmission that rise, fall, and disappear. Carried atop all that, are the white caps and chaotic swirls of foam that represent secular cycles and historical events, quickly changing, quickly passing out of existence. It is this process with which my relatively ‘short’ 1300-year history will concern itself. Like conventional histories, I will focus on the chaos of the surface. But I shall explore how these events were shaped by the deep, tremendous force of the ocean.

19 Christian, Maps of Time, 182-184.

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References Blackmore, Susan. The Meme Machine. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999. Christian, David. Maps of Time: An Introduction to Big History. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2004. Dawkins, Richard. The God Delusion. New York: Houghton Mifflin, 2006. ______The Selfish Gene. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1976. Dennett, Daniel. Darwin’s Dangerous Idea: Evolution and the Meanings of Life. New York: Touchstone, 1996. Distin, Kate. Cultural Evolution. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011. Fracchia, Joseph and Lewontin, R. ‘Does Culture Evolve?’ History and Theory (1999) 38: 52–78. Fracchia, Joseph, Lewontin, R., and Runciman, W.G. ‘Forum: Does Culture Evolve?’ History and Theory (2005) 44, 1–13, 14–29, and 30–41. Heinrich, J., Boyd, R., and Richerson, P. ‘Five Misunderstandings about Cultural Evolution’ Human Nature (2008) 19: 119–137. Mace, Ruth, Holden, Clare J, and Shennan, Stephen. (eds). The Evolution of Cultural Diversity: A Phylogenetic Approach. London: UCL Press, 2005. McBrearty, Sally and Brooks, Alison. ‘The Revolution That Wasn’t: A New Interpretation of the Origin of Modern Human Behaviour’ Journal of Human Evolution (2000) 39: 453–563. Mesoudi, A., Whiten, A., Laland, K. ‘Towards a Unified Science of Cultural Evolution’ Behavioural and Brain Sciences (2006) 29: 329–383. Richerson, Peter and Boyd, Robert. Culture and the Evolutionary Process. Chicago: Chicago University Press, 1985. ______Not by Genes Alone: How Culture Transformed Human Evolution. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2005. Richerson, Peter, Boyd, Robert, and Bettinger, Robert. ‘Cultural Innovations and Demographic Change’ Human Biology (2009) 81: 211–235. Runciman, W.G. The Theory of Cultural and Social Selection. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009. Shennan, Stephen. Genes, Memes, and Human History: Darwinian Archaeology and Cultural Evolution. London: Thames and Hudson, 2002. ______(ed). Pattern and Process in Cultural Evolution. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2009. Snow, C.P. The Two Cultures. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1959. Tooby, J. and Cosmides, L. ‘The Psychological Foundations of Culture’ in The Adapted Mind: Evolu- tionary Psychology and the Generation of Culture. eds. J.H. Barkow, L. Cosmides, and J. Tooby. New York: Oxford University Press, 1992. Turchin, Peter. Historical Dynamics: Why States Rise and Fall. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2003. ______War and Peace and War: The Life Cycles of Imperial Nations. New York: Pi Press, 2006. Turchin, Peter and Nefedov, Sergey. Secular Cycles. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2009. Ziman, John (ed). Technological Innovation as an Evolutionary Process. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000.

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About the Author David Baker David Baker is currently a PhD candidate at Macquarie University, studying under the founder of ‘Big History’, David Christian. He is currently researching and writing a history of France that employs the population theories of Peter Turchin, Peter Richerson, Robert Boyd and David Christian himself. He specialises in medieval and early modern French history and wrote his MA thesis at the University of Calgary under two supervisors who specialised in either period. He has attended numerous cross-disciplinary seminars and is a staunch advocate of close collaboration between the human and natural sciences.

Editor Bill Cope, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, USA.

Editorial Advisory Board Patrick Baert, Cambridge University, Cambridge, UK. Norma Burgess, Syracuse University, Syracuse, USA. Bill Cope, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, USA. Peter Harvey, University of Adelaide, Adelaide, Australia. Vangelis Intzidis, University of the Aegean, Rhodes, Greece. Paul James, RMIT University, Melbourne, Australia. Mary Kalantzis, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, USA. Gerassimos Kouzelis, University of Athens, Athens, Greece. Massimo Leone, University of Turin, Turin, Italy. Alexandros-Andreas Kyrtsis, University of Athens, Athens, Greece. José Luis Ortega Martín, Universidad de Granada, Granada, Spain. Bertha Ochieng, University of Bradford, Bradford, UK. Francisco Fernandez Palomares, Universidad de Granada, Granada, Spain. Miguel A. Pereyra, Universidad de Granada, Granada, Spain. Constantine D. Skordoulis, University of Athens, Athens, Greece. Chad Turnbull, ESADE Business School, Barcelona, Spain. Chryssi Vitsilakis-Soroniatis, University of the Aegean, Rhodes, Greece.

Please visit the Journal website at http://www.SocialSciences-Journal.com for further information about the Journal or to subscribe. The Social Sciences Community This knowledge community is brought together by a shared interest in interdisciplinary practices across the social sciences, and between the social sciences and the natural sciences, applied sciences and professions. The community interacts through an innovative, annual face-to-face conference, as well as year-round virtual relationships ins a weblog, peer reviewed journal and book imprint – exploring the affordances of the new digital media. Members of this knowledge community include academics, educators, policy makers, public administrators, research practitioners and research students.

Conference Members of the Social Sciences Community meet the International Conference on Interdisciplinary Social Sciences, held annually in different locations around the world. The Conference was held at University of New Orleans, New Orleans, USA in 2011; University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK in 2010; University of Athens, Athens, Greece in 2009; Monash University Centre, Prato, Tuscany, Italy in 2008; University of Granada, Granada, Spain in 2007; and University of the Aegean, on the Island of Rhodes, Greece in 2006. In 2012, the Conference will be at Universidad Abat Oliba CEU, Barcelona, Spain.

Our community members and first time attendees come from all corners of the globe. The Conference is a site of critical reflection, both by leaders in the field and emerging scholars. It examines the nature of disciplinary practices, and the interdisciplinary practices that arise in the context of ‘real world’ applications. The Conference also interrogates what constitutes ‘science’ in a social context, and the connections between the social and other sciences. Those unable to attend the conference can opt for virtual participation in which community members may either submit a video and/or slide presentation with voiceover, or simply submit a paper for peer review and possible publication in the Journal.

Online presentations can be viewed on YouTube.

Publishing The Social Sciences Community enables members to publish through three media. First, by participating in the Social Sciences Conference, community members can enter a world of journal publication unlike the traditional academic publishing forums – a result of the responsive, non-hierarchical and constructive nature of the peer review process. The International Journal of Interdisciplinary Social Sciences provides a framework for double-blind peer review, enabling authors to publish into an academic journal of the highest standard.

The second publication medium is through a book series The Social Sciences, publishing cutting edge books in print and electronic formats. Publication proposals and manuscript submissions are welcome.

Our third major publishing medium is our news blog, constantly publishing short news updates from the Social Sciences community, as well as major developments in the social sciences. You can also join this conversation at Facebook and Twitter or subscribe to our email Newsletter.

Common Ground Publishing Journals

AGING ARTS Aging and Society: An Interdisciplinary Journal The International Journal of the Arts in Society. Website: http://AgingAndSociety.com/journal/ Website: www.Arts-Journal.com

BOOK CLIMATE CHANGE The International Journal of the Book The International Journal of Climate Change: Website: www.Book-Journal.com Impacts and Responses Website: www.Climate-Journal.com

CONSTRUCTED ENVIRONMENT DESIGN The International Journal of the Design Principles and Practices: Constructed Environment An International Journal Website: www.ConstructedEnvironment.com/journal Website: www.Design-Journal.com

DIVERSITY FOOD The International Journal of Diversity in Food Studies: An Interdisciplinary Journal Organizations, Communities and Nations Website: http://Food-Studies.com/journal/ Website: www.Diversity-Journal.com

GLOBAL STUDIES HEALTH The Global Studies Journal The International Journal of Health, Website: www.GlobalStudiesJournal.com Wellness and Society Website: www.HealthandSociety.com/journal

HUMANITIES IMAGE The International Journal of the Humanities The International Journal of the Image Website: www.Humanities-Journal.com Website: www.OntheImage.com/journal

LEARNING MANAGEMENT The International Journal of Learning. The International Journal of Knowledge, Website: www.Learning-Journal.com Culture and Change Management. Website: www.Management-Journal.com

MUSEUM RELIGION AND SPIRITUALITY The International Journal of the Inclusive Museum The International Journal of Religion and Website: www.Museum-Journal.com Spirituality in Society Website: www.Religion-Journal.com

SCIENCE IN SOCIETY SOCIAL SCIENCES The International Journal of Science in Society The International Journal of Interdisciplinary Website: www.ScienceinSocietyJournal.com Social Sciences Website: www.SocialSciences-Journal.com

SPACES AND FLOWS SPORT AND SOCIETY Spaces and Flows: An International Journal of The International Journal of Sport and Society Urban and ExtraUrban Studies Website: www.sportandsociety.com/journal Website: www.SpacesJournal.com

SUSTAINABILITY TECHNOLOGY The International Journal of Environmental, Cultural, The International Journal of Technology, Economic and Social Sustainability Knowledge and Society Website: www.Sustainability-Journal.com Website: www.Technology-Journal.com

UBIQUITOUS LEARNING UNIVERSITIES Ubiquitous Learning: An International Journal Journal of the World Universities Forum Website: www.ubi-learn.com/journal/ Website: www.Universities-Journal.com

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Click highlighted text for a new search on that item. ISSN: 1833-1882 Title: The International Journal of Interdisciplinary Social Sciences Publishing Body: Common Ground Country: Australia Status: Active Start Year: 2006 Frequency: Irregular Latest Volume: 3, 2009 Document Type: Proceedings; Academic/Scholarly Refereed: Yes Media: Print Language: Text in English Price: USD 750 combined subscription per year (Print & Online Eds.) (effective 2009) Subject: SOCIAL SCIENCES: COMPREHENSIVE WORKS Dewey #: 300 Article Index: Index Available Editor(s): Dr. Bill Cope, Mary Kalantzis URL: http://www.socialsciences-journal.com Description: Examines the nature of disciplinary practices and the interdisciplinary practices that arise in the context of 'real world' applications. Back to Top Add this item to: Request this title: Print Download E-mail I'd like to request this title. Corrections: Submit corrections to Ulrich's about this title. Publisher of this title? If yes, click GO! to contact Ulrich's about updating your title listings in the Ulrich's database. Back to Top

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