Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id KAA00454 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Wed, 29 Nov 2000 10:02:00 GMT Message-ID: <A4400389479FD3118C9400508B0FF230041142@DELTA.newhouse.akzonobel.nl> From: "Gatherer, D. (Derek)" <D.Gatherer@organon.nhe.akzonobel.nl> To: "'memetics@mmu.ac.uk'" <memetics@mmu.ac.uk> Subject: new article Date: Wed, 29 Nov 2000 09:49:33 +0100 X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2650.21) Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
The transition from quantity to quality: A neglected causal mechanism in
accounting for social evolution
Robert L. Carneiro
American Museum of Natural History, New York, NY 10024
Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA, Vol. 97, Issue 23, 12926-12931, November 7, 2000
Students of social evolution are concerned not only with the general course
it has followed, but also with the mechanisms that have brought it about.
One such mechanism comes into play when the quantitative increase in some
entity, usually population, reaching a certain threshold, gives rise to a
qualitative change in the structure of a society. This mechanism, first
recognized by Hegel, was seized on by Marx and Engels. However, neither they
nor their current followers among anthropologists have made much use of it
in attempting to explain social evolution. But as this paper attempts to
show, in those few instances when the mechanism has been invoked, it has
heightened our understanding of the process of social evolution. And, it is
argued, if the mechanism were more widely applied, further understanding of
the course of evolution could be expected to result.
Available at:
http://www.pnas.org/cgi/content/abstract/97/23/12926
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