Upcoming seminar at the CEU Cognitive Development Center: talk by Clark Barrett (UCLA department of Anthropology) TODAY, 18 of January at 5.00pm. Title: Additivism versus subtractivism: The right way to think about evolutionary psychology Venue: CEU Cognitive Development Center Hattyuhaz 1015 Budapest Hattyu u 14. level 3 (one level up from the main level) Abstract: The role of evolved mechanisms is often seen as providing constraints on more general-purpose systems that would otherwise find solutions to problems eventually, but perhaps more slowly, in the absence of the evolved constraints. On this view, evolved mechanisms are removers of flexibility rather than enablers of it: to the extent that we could remove or overcome our evolved mechanisms, we would become more and more free and flexible. Arguably, this “subtractivist” view stems from a history in psychology of seeing frame problems as the fundamental problems that cognitive and developmental mechanisms need to solve. This is true: cognitive abilities cannot evolve unless frame problems are solved. But it is a mistake to think that this is generally done first by evolving general-purpose, unconstrained mechanisms, and then adding constraints to make them more efficient. Instead, cognitive innovations are selected for because they work right away: they must solve frame problems at the moment of their appearance. In this sense, evolution is not a constrainer but an enabler, altering developmental systems so that new representations and computations occur that did not occur before. This “additivist” view in turn implies that each new evolutionary step proceeds via emergent interactions or synergies between new (potentially small) changes and pre-existing architecture. This often occurs by exploiting what was already there in new ways, much as a chef adding new ingredients to his kitchen makes possible new ways of using old ingredients. In this talk, I will explore the example of mechanisms that enable cultural transmission, and use these to illustrate the additivist view. I will argue that additivism requires revision of widely held beliefs about what evolutionary views imply for innateness, determinism, flexibility, and the ability to handle novel, “open” contents.