Category Archives: Invited Talk

The Evolution of Comity: Ultimate Constraints on the Scale of Cooperation at the Department of Psychology, Duke University

I presented “The Evolution of Comity: Ultimate Constraints on the Scale of Cooperation” at Duke University. The most relevant papers are:

  1. Muthukrishna, M., Henrich, J. & Slingerland, E. (2021). Psychology as a Historical Science. Annual Review of Psychology, 72, 717-49. [Download] [Publisher] [Twitter]
  2. Henrich, J. & Muthukrishna, M. (2021). The Origins and Psychology of Human Cooperation. Annual Review of Psychology, 72, 207-40. [Download] [Publisher] [Twitter]

The research is also related to my forthcoming book and to a grant in collaboration with Brian Hare and Walter Sinnott-Armstrong.

Cultural Evolutionary Behavioral Science in Public Policy at Behavioural Insights Team, UK

I was invited by the Behavioural Insights Team (BIT) to speak about cultural behavioral science and its applications in public policy. I explain how, by using cultural evolution as a theory of human behavior can help some of the challenges in behavioral science in terms of long term change and contextual factors that affect whether an intervention will work. This figure from a key paper presents the history of behavioral science that has led to cultural evolutionary behavioral science as an obvious next step.

The most relevant papers are:

  1. Muthukrishna, M. (2019). Cultural Evolutionary Public Policy. Nature Human Behaviour, 4, 12-13. [Download] [Publisher]
  2. Schimmelpfennig, R. & Muthukrishna, M.  (2023). Cultural Evolutionary Behavioural Science in Public Policy. Behavioural Public Policy. [Publisher] [Download] [Twitter] [LinkedIn]

Cultural Evolutionary Behavioral Science in Public Policy at Norms and Behavioral Change (NoBeC) Talks, Center for Social Norms and Behavioral Dynamics, University of Pennsylvania

April 21, 2022: Keynote speaker at Norms and Behavioral Change (NoBeC) Talks, Center for Social Norms and Behavioral Dynamics, .

I was invited to speak in the Norms and Behavioral Change (NoBeC) Talks at the University of Pennsylvania‘s Center for Social Norms and Behavioural Dynamics. I discussed some work on cultural evolutionary behavioral science and its applications in public policy (see also cultural evolutionary public policy).

My talk begins with an overview of the problem plaguing behavioral economics – the lack of a theoretical foundation that can guide policy interventions. I introduce cultural evolution as a possible solution to bridge the theoretical gap. By using cultural evolution as a theory of human behavior, improvements can be made in policy efficiency. For example, studying how social norms change and evolve over time will provide a foundation for implementing effective policy interventions in multicultural societies.  Some of this history is captured in this figure from the paper:

Considering the historical path dependence of norms provides crucial in understanding why certain populations hold certain beliefs, like vaccine hesitancy and a distrust in healthcare systems. Identifying how people acquire cultural norms, and narrowing down the ultimate causes for behavior (through cultural distance tools like world.culturalytics.com) could provide insights into designing interventions that work.

 

Understanding cultural evolution and behavioral science can help reanalyze the literature on public policy, providing insights into why some approaches are successful while others are not. I explain how studying universal cognitive capabilities will provide a deeper understanding of norm change, and thus, improve policy design.

My thanks to the Center for Social Norms and the University of Pennsylvania for inviting me and organising the event.

Innovation and the Paradox of Diversity in the Collective Brain at the Department of Cognitive and Information Sciences, University of California Merced

I was invited to speak at University of California Merced‘s Department of Cognitive and Information Sciences as part of the Mind, Technology, and Society Invited Speaker series.

I presented a recent paper on the Paradox of Diversity in the Collective Brain. The most relevant papers are:

  1. Muthukrishna, M., Doebeli, M., Chudek, M., & Henrich, J. (2018). The Cultural Brain Hypothesis: How culture drives brain expansion, sociality, and life history. PLOS Computational Biology, 14(11): e1006504. [Download] [Supplementary] [Summary Post] [Publisher] [Twitter]
  2. Muthukrishna, M. & Henrich, J. (2016). Innovation in the Collective Brain. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 371(1690).  [Telegraph] [Scientific American] [Video] [Evonomics] [LSE Business Review] [Summary Post] [Download] [Data] [Publisher]
  3. Schimmelpfennig, R., Razek, L., Schnell, E., & Muthukrishna, M. (2021). Paradox of Diversity in the Collective Brain. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences. [Download] [Summary Post] [Publisher] [Twitter]

Innovation in the Collective Brain at the Royal Navy workshop, Royal United Services Institute

I was invited to speak at the Royal Navy workshop, hosted by the Royal United Services Institute, UK’s leading defense and security think tank. 

I discussed the evolution of innovation through collective intelligence, drawing examples from history and archaeology. I also highlighted how modern societies can benefit from past civilizations’ collective intelligence to promote progress and innovation. The papers most relevant to this talk are:

  1. Muthukrishna, M. & Henrich, J. (2016). Innovation in the Collective Brain. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 371(1690).  [Telegraph] [Scientific American] [Video] [Evonomics] [LSE Business Review] [Summary Post] [Download] [Data] [Publisher]
  2. Schimmelpfennig, R., Razek, L., Schnell, E., & Muthukrishna, M. (2021). Paradox of Diversity in the Collective Brain. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences. [Download] [Summary Post] [Publisher] [Twitter]
  3. Muthukrishna, M., Bell, A. V., Henrich, J., Curtin, C., Gedranovich, A., McInerney, J. & Thue, B. (2020). Beyond Western, Educated, Industrial, Rich, and Democratic (WEIRD) Psychology: Measuring and Mapping Scales of Cultural and Psychological Distance. Psychological Science, 31(6), 678-701. [Download] [Supplementary] [Code] [Summary Post] [Publisher] [Twitter]

It was an insightful exploration of the role of collective intelligence in human innovation in a defense context. My thanks to RUSI for inviting me and organizing the event.

Paradox of Diversity in the Collective Brain at The Emergence of Collective Knowledge and Cumulative Culture in Animals, Humans and Machines meeting at The Royal Society

I spoke at The Royal Society at meeting on “The emergence of collective knowledge and cumulative culture in animals, humans and machines”.

Robin Schimmelpfenning and I discussed our co-authored paper on the paradox of diversity in the collective brain. We discuss how the rate of innovation depends on sociality, information fidelity, and cultural trait diversity. While cultural trait diversity offers the largest potential for empowering innovation, it also brings with it potential coordination and cooperation challenges. Diversity, in other words, is both a source of innovation and divisive; a double-edge sword. We then propose using cultural evolvability as a framework for resolving this paradox. 

Our presentation was followed by a discussion session and subsequently a panel discussion chaired by Dominic Abrams.

Many thanks to Andrew Whiten, Dora Biro, Ellen Garland, and Simon Kirby for organizing the event.

Royal Society Publishing on Twitter: "New theme issue 'The emergence of collective knowledge and cumulative #culture in animals, humans and machines' edited by Andrew Whiten, @dora_biro_ @EllenGarland4 and @SimonKirby https://t.co/aAT6VAO8pv. Linked to

Cultural Evolution of Cooperation and Cognition at the Department of Psychology, Harvard University

I discussed the “Cultural Evolution of Cooperation and Cognition” at the Psychology Department at Harvard.

The paper most related to the talk is The Origins and Psychology of Human Cooperation and a preview of a book I’m currently working on “A Theory of Everyone”.

Many thanks for inviting and hosting me.

Paradox of Diversity in the Collective Brain at the Mathematics of Intelligences workshop, Institute for Pure and Applied Mathematics (IPAM), UCLA

I presented various models related to the paradox of diversity at the Institute for Pure and Applied Mathematics (IPAM), at UCLA. The most relevant papers are probably my paper on the Paradox of Diversity and on scales of cooperation.

The Future of Government Disruptive Debate at the World Bank [online]

The fifth Future of Government Disruptive Debate hosted by the World Bank tackles the issue of citizens’ trust in government. Together with a diverse group of high-profile practitioners, renowned experts, and thought leaders, I discuss how the natural state of affairs is corruption and the challenges government face in getting citizens to trust higher levels of cooperation.

My opening remarks can be found from 7:12 to 14:07 in the recording above. A rough summary of my talk can be found on my substack: https://muthukrishnalab.substack.com/p/trust-governance-and-cultural-evolution

More about the event here: https://www.worldbank.org/en/events/2021/09/22/how-will-citizens-trust-in-government-be-affected

Description:

The fifth Future of Government Disruptive Debate will tackle the issue of citizens’ trust in government. The Disruptive Debate series aims is to bring together a diverse group of high-profile practitioners, renowned experts and thought leaders to generate new knowledge and perspectives.

The issue of trust has been a frequent theme arising during the Disruptive Debate series. The panel addressed questions such as: Why is trust important for poverty reduction and shared prosperity? What is the relationship between inequality and trust? What can governments do to increase, or re-build, trust? How can citizens influence and hold governments to account? What has been the role of information, data and social media, particularly during COVID-19?

The other speakers included:

My thanks to host Raj Kumar, founding president & editor in chief of Devex and to the World Bank team.

“Cultural Evolutionary Psychology” at Human Behavior and Evolution Society (HBES) Conference 2021 [online]

I gave a plenary talk at the Human Behavior and Evolution Society (HBES) Conference on “cultural evolutionary psychology”. My talk discussed how the Cultural Brain and the Collective Brain, can unify the work done in the last decade in evolutionary psychology under a common framework.

I explained how these hypotheses shed light on our understanding of intelligence, innovation, cooperation and the “paradox of diversity”.

Considering the limitations of psychology today, I discussed ways in which we can move beyond WEIRD (Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, and Democratic) psychology in a global collaborative manner and strengthen the links between basic and applied policy research. I also discussed the importance of historical psychology.

Many thanks to Joseph Henrich for the enthusiastic introduction.

Cultural Brain Hypothesis, Collective Brains, and the Evolution of Intelligence at Dysoc Webinar Series on Human Origins and Cultural Evolution: Celebrating the 150th anniversary of the Descent of Man [online]

This year marks the 150th anniversary of Charles Darwin’s Descent of Man. As part of the celebration, the Center for the Dynamics of Social Complexity (DySoc) organized a series as Outreach for the Cultural Evolution Society: Celebrating the 150th anniversary of the The Descent of Man (http://www.dysoc.org/dom_webinars). I presented the most up-to-date version of the “Cultural Brain Hypothesis, Collective Brains, and the Evolution of Intelligence”. You can watch the talk below:

The ties that bind us at Beveridge 2.0. Symposium: Reciprocity across the life-cycle [online]

I gave a talk on “The ties that bind us” at the Beveridge 2.0. Symposium: Reciprocity across the life-cycle hosted by STICERD and the LSE School of Public Policy The talk applied the science of cooperation to the problem of the future welfare state, particularly around pensions and retirement. A corresponding paper is under review at LSE Public Policy Review.

Cooperation and the moral circle: When cooperation harms the collective good at SPSP 2021 Justice and Morality Pre-Conference [online]

I gave a talk on “Cooperation and the moral circle: When cooperation harms the collective good” as part of the SPSP 2021 Justice and Morality Pre-Conference. It’s part of some new work on the problem of the expanding moral circle as it links to cooperation, corruption, prosocial, and antisocial behavior. A related working paper is available here: https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.02.19.432029v2

“What affects our level of intelligence?” at the Diverse Intelligences Summer Institute hosted by the Templeton World Charity Foundation at the University of St Andrews, Scotland, UK.

This year’s Diverse Intelligences Summer Institute was held online due to the pandemic. I delivered a lecture over Zoom on “What affects our level of intelligence?” followed by a lively discussion with the students. The lecture discussed brain evolution, the Cultural Brain Hypothesis, collective brain, and a cultural evolutionary account of intelligence. You can watch it below:

Communication and Competition at the Learning Innovations LaBarge tree “LILA” at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, Cambridge, MA

 I ran a workshop on communication competition at the Learning Innovations Laboratory (LILA), part of Project Zero at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. The LILA group include people from industry and the military. We discussed various aspects of the science of cooperation, including how and when it fails.I also introduced some new work on the paradox of diversity and on measuring cultural distance.

One of the participants, Sue Borchardt is now making an animated series based on the talk.

Beyond WEIRD Psychology: Measuring and Mapping Scales of Cultural and Psychological Distance at Brunel University, London

I was delighted to discuss my recent paper on measuring cultural distance “Beyond WEIRD Psychology: Measuring and Mapping Scales of Cultural and Psychological Distance” at the Center for Culture and Evolution (add link to center) of Brunel University (add link to university). The center is emerging as an exciting and quickly growing hub for cultural evolutionary research.