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Instincts or gadgets? Not the debate we should be having.

Dan Sperber
Published in: The Behavioral and brain sciences (2019)
I argue, with examples, that most human cognitive skills are neither instincts nor gadgets but mechanisms shaped both by evolved dispositions and by cultural inputs. This shaping can work either through evolved skills fulfilling their function with the help of cultural skills that they contribute to shape, or through cultural skills recruiting evolved skills and adjusting to them.
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