Subjective selection, super-attractors, and the origins of the cultural manifold.

Human societies everywhere develop complex cultural traditions—such as shamanism, supernatural punishment beliefs, heroic tales, dance songs, justice systems, and corporate groups—that share striking similarities. These "super-attractors" form what is called the "cultural manifold," a set of equilibrium states that hypothetically cultureless humans would eventually produce in a novel habitat. While previous explanations have emphasized individual or group benefits, this work argues that the primary driver is "subjective selection": humans produce and retain cultural variants they judge instrumentally useful for satisfying universal goals like healing illness, explaining misfortune, calming infants, and inducing cooperation. This goal-driven shaping of culture explains the convergence of complex traditions worldwide.

Study at a glance

Abstract

Human societies reliably develop complex cultural traditions with striking similarities. These "super-attractors" span the domains of magic and religion (e.g., shamanism, supernatural punishment beliefs), aesthetics (e.g., heroic tales, dance songs), and social institutions (e.g., justice, corporate groups), and collectively constitute what I call the "cultural manifold." The cultural manifold represents a set of equilibrium states of social and cultural evolution: hypothetically cultureless humans placed in a novel and empty habitat will eventually produce most or all of these complex traditions. Although the study of the super-attractors has been characterized by explanatory pluralism, particularly an emphasis on processes that favor individual- or group-level benefits, I here argue that their development is primarily underlain by a process I call "subjective selection," or the production and selective retention of variants that are evaluated as instrumentally useful for satisfying goals. Humans around the world are motivated towards similar ends, such as healing illness, explaining misfortune, calming infants, and inducing others to cooperate. As we shape, tweak, and preferentially adopt culture that appears most effective for achieving these ends, we drive the convergence of complex traditions worldwide. The predictable development of the cultural manifold reflects the capacity of humans to sculpt traditions that apparently provide them with what they want, attesting to the importance of subjective selection in shaping human culture.