The role of oxygen in submergence-induced petiole elongation in Rumex palustris: in situ measurements of oxygen in petioles of intact plants using micro-electrodes

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Tales of Tools and Trees: Phylogenetic analysis and explanation in evolutionary archaeology

In this paper, I study the application of phylogenetic analysis in evolutionary archaeology. I show how transfer of this apparently general analytic tool is affected by salient differences in disciplinary context. One is that archaeologists, unlike many biologists, do not regard cladistics as a tool for classification, but are primarily interested in explanation. The other is that explanation is traditionally sought in terms of individual-level rather than population-level mechanisms. The latter disciplinary difference creates an ambiguity in the application and interpretation of phylogenetic analyses. Moreover, I argue that, while archaeologists have claimed that “cladistics is useful for reconstructing artefact phylogenies” (O’Brien et al. 2001), these reconstructions only contribute minimally to the explanatory research agenda of evolutionary archaeology

Tales of tools and trees : phylogenetic analysis and explanation in evolutionary archaeology

Evolutionary theory has outgrown its natural habitat. Increasingly, researchers outside biology frame their questions and results in evolutionary terms, and propose counterparts to mechanisms and entities that are central to our understanding of the organic world. This second Darwinian revolution has not escaped philosophical scrutiny. Critical reflections (e.g., Sober 1991) have focused mostly on general theories of cultural evolution, such as dual-inheritance theory (Boyd and Richerson 1985), or on general issues such as the lack of clarity and unanimity concerning the unit and level of selection. However, research in evolutionary economics, engineering and archaeology rarely mentions general frameworks such as dual-inheritance theory and only occasionally discuss the possibilities of defining suitably general evolutionary concepts. Instead, the results reported are gained by applying specific tools and techniques to problems within a particular discipline. This paper focuses on one example of these local efforts at Darwinizing culture, namely phylogenetic reconstructions of tool traditions, as recently given by evolutionary archaeologists

Does horizontal transmission invalidate cultural phylogenies?

Phylogenetic methods have recently been applied to studies of cultural evolution. However, it has been claimed that the large amount of horizontal transmission that sometimes occurs between cultural groups invalidates the use of these methods. Here, we use a natural model of linguistic evolution to simulate borrowing between languages. The results show that tree topologies constructed with Bayesian phylogenetic methods are robust to realistic levels of borrowing. Inferences about divergence dates are slightly less robust and show a tendency to underestimate dates. Our results demonstrate that realistic levels of reticulation between cultures do not invalidate a phylogenetic approach to cultural and linguistic evolution