Developing Scaffolds in Evolution, Culture, and Cognition

by Linnda R. Caporael (Editor), James R. Griesemer (Editor), William C. Wimsatt (Editor)

Overview

Empirical and philosophical perspectives on scaffolding that highlight the role of temporal and temporary resources in development across concepts of culture, cognition, and evolution.

"Scaffolding" is a concept that is becoming widely used across disciplines. This book investigates common threads in diverse applications of scaffolding, including theoretical biology, cognitive science, social theory, science and technology studies, and human development. Despite its widespread use, the concept of scaffolding is often given short shrift; the contributors to this volume, from a range of disciplines, offer a more fully developed analysis of scaffolding that highlights the role of temporal and temporary resources in development, broadly conceived, across concepts of culture, cognition, and evolution.

The book emphasizes reproduction, repeated assembly, and entrenchment of heterogeneous relations, parts, and processes as a complement to neo-Darwinism in the developmentalist tradition of conceptualizing evolutionary change. After describing an integration of theoretical perspectives that can accommodate different levels of analysis and connect various methodologies, the book discusses multilevel organization; differences (and reciprocality) between individuals and institutions as units of analysis; and perspectives on development that span brains, careers, corporations, and cultural cycles.

Contributors
Colin Allen, Linnda R. Caporael, James Evans, Elihu M. Gerson, Simona Ginsburg, James R. Griesemer, Christophe Heintz, Eva Jablonka, Sanjay Joshi, Shu-Chen Li, Pamela Lyon, Sergio F. Martinez, Christopher J. May, Johann Peter Murmann, Stuart A. Newman, Jeffrey C. Schank, Iddo Tavory, Georg Theiner, Barbara Hoeberg Wimsatt, William C. Wimsatt

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780262314794
Publisher:	MIT Press
Publication date:	11/08/2013
Series:	Vienna Series in Theoretical Biology , #17
Sold by:	Penguin Random House Publisher Services
Format:	eBook
Pages:	440
File size:	3 MB
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Linnda R. Caporael is Professor in the Department of Science and Technology Studies at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.

James R. Griesemer is Professor in the Department of Philosophy at the University of California, Davis.

William C. Wimsatt is Professor Emeritus in the Department of Philosophy at the University of Chicago. He was awarded the 2013 David L. Hull Prize by the International Society for the History, Philosophy, and Social Studies of Biology.

James R. Griesemer is Professor in the Department of Philosophy at the University of California, Davis.

Linnda R. Caporael is Professor in the Department of Science and Technology Studies at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.

William C. Wimsatt is Professor Emeritus in the Department of Philosophy at the University of Chicago. He was awarded the 2013 David L. Hull Prize by the International Society for the History, Philosophy, and Social Studies of Biology.

Stuart Newman is Professor of Cell Biology and Anatomy at New York Medical College.

Colin Allen is Professor of Philosophy at Texas A&M University. He is the coauthor of Nature's Purposes (MIT Press, 1998), Species of Mind (MIT Press, 1997), and The Cognitive Animal (MIT Press, 2001).

Simona Ginsburg is Associate Professor in the Department of Natural Sciences, retired from the Open University of Israel.

Eva Jablonka is Professor at Tel-Aviv University. She is the coauthor of Evolution in Four Dimensions: Genetic, Epigenetic, Behavioral, and Symbolic Variation in the History of Life and the coeditor of Transformations of Lamarckism: From Subtle Fluids to Molecular Biology, both published by the MIT Press.

Table of Contents

Series Foreword ix

Preface xi

Acknowledgments xiii

Developing Scaffolds: An Introduction Linnda R. Caporael James R. Griesemer William C. Wimsatt 1

I Toward Materiality: Three Perspectives 21

1 Reproduction and the Scaffolded Development of Hybrids James R. Griesemer 23

2 Evolution, Groups, and Scaffolded Minds Linnda R. Caporael 57

3 Entrenchment and Scaffolding: An Architecture for a Theory of Cultural Change William C. Wimsatt 77

II Scope and Scale 107

4 Excitable Media in Medias Res: How Physics Scaffolds Metazoan Development and Evolution Stuart A. Newman 109

5 Communication and the Evolution of Cognition James A. Evans 125

6 Models as Scaffolds for Understanding Jeffrey C. Schank Christopher J. May Sanjay S. Joshi 147

III Generativity, Entrenchment, and Boundaries 169

7 Stress in Mind: A Stress Response Hypothesis of Cognitive Evolution Pamela Lyon 171

8 Onwards and Upwards with the Extended Mind: From Individual to Collective Epistemic Action Georg Theiner 191

9 Scaffolding on Core Cognition Christophe Heintz 209

IV Granularity and Reciprocality 229

10 Symbols as Scaffolding Colin Allen 231

11 Technological Scaffoldings for the Evolution of Culture and Cognition Sergio F. Martínez 249

12 Some Problems of Analyzing Cultural Evolution Elihu M. Gerson 265

V Reproduction and Development 283

13 Scaffolding in Economics, Management, and the Design of Technologies Johann Peter Murmann 287

14 The Reproduction of the Social: A Developmental System Approach Iddo Tavory Simona Ginsburg Eva Jablonka 307

15 Biocultural Coconstruction of Brain Plasticity across the Life Span: From Cognitive Training to Neurotransmitters Shu-Chen Li 327

16 Footholds and Handholds: Scaffolding Cognition and Career Barbara Horberg Wimsatt 343

Developing Scaffolds: An Epilogue James R. Griesemer Linnda R. Caporael William C. Wimsatt 363

Contributors 389

Index 391