Social dynamics

"Important essays by a leading expert in the field Trailblazing work at the scientific end of philosophy Brian Skyrms presents eighteen essays which apply adaptive dynamics (of cultural evolution and individual learning) to social theory. Altruism, spite, fairness, trust, division of labor, and signaling are treated from this perspective. Correlation is seen to be of fundamental importance. Interactions with neighbors in space, on static networks, and on co-evolving dynamics networks are investigated. Spontaneous emergence of social structure and of signaling systems are examined in the context of learning dynamics."--Back cover.

Part I: Correlation and the Social Contract -- 1: Evolution and the Social Contract -- Part II: Importance of Dynamics -- 2: Trust, Risk, and the Social Contract -- 3: Bargaining with Neighbors: Is Justice Contagious? with Jason Alexander -- 4: Stability and Explanatory Significance of Some Simple Evolutionary Models -- 5: Dynamics of Conformist Bias -- 6: Chaos and the Explanatory Significance of Equilibrium: Strange Attractors in Evolutionary Game Dynamics -- 7: Evolutionary Dynamics of Collective Action in N-person Stag Hunt Dilemmas with Jorge Pacheco, Francisco Santos and Max Souza -- 8: Learning to Take Turns : the basics, with Peter Vanderschraaf -- 9: Evolutionary Considerations in the Framing of Social Norms with Kevin J.S. Zollman -- Part III: Dynamic Networks -- 10: Learning to Network, with Robin Pemantle -- 11: with Robin Pemantle: A Dynamic Model of Social Network Formation -- 12: with Robin Pemantle: Network Formation by Reinforcement Learning: The Long and the Medium Run -- 13: with Robin Pemantle: Time to Absorption in Discounted Reinforcement Models -- Part IV: Dynamics of Signals. Introduction to part IV -- 14: with Raffaele Argiento, Robin Pemantle and Stanisla…