This article concerns how rule-following behavior might evolve, how an old evolved rule might come to be appropriated to a new context, and how simple concepts might coevolve with rule-following behavior. In particular, we consider how the transitive inferential rule-following behavior exhibited by pinyon and scrub jays might evolve in the context of a variety of the Skyrms-Lewis signaling game, then how such a rule might come to be appropriated to carry out inferences regarding stimuli different from those involved in (...) the original evolution of the rule, and how this appropriation involves a step toward the evolution of basic ordinal concepts. (shrink)

We are concerned here with how structural properties of language may come to reflect features of the world in which it evolves. As a concrete example, we will consider how a simple term language might evolve to support the principle of indifference over state descriptions in that language. The point is not that one is justified in applying the principle of indifference to state descriptions in natural language. Instead, it is that one should expect a language that has evolved in (...) the context of facilitating successful action to reflect probabilistic features of the world in which it evolved. (shrink)

Belief-revision models of knowledge describe how to update one’s degrees of belief associated with hypotheses as one considers new evidence, but they typically do not say how probabilities become associated with meaningful hypotheses in the first place. Here we consider a variety of Skyrms–Lewis signaling game (Lewis in Convention. Harvard University Press, Cambridge, 1969; Skyrms in Signals evolution, learning, & information. Oxford University Press, New York, 2010) where simple descriptive language and predictive practice and associated basic expectations coevolve. Rather than (...) assigning prior probabilities to hypotheses in a fixed language then conditioning on new evidence, the agents begin with no meaningful language or expectations then evolve to have expectations conditional on their descriptions as they evolve to have meaningful descriptions for the purpose of successful prediction. The model, then, provides a simple but concrete example of how the process of evolving a descriptive language suitable for inquiry might also provide agents with conditional expectations that reflect the type and degree of predictive success in fact afforded by their evolved predictive practice. This illustrates one way in which the traditional problem of priors may simply fail to apply to one’s model of evolving inquiry. (shrink)

This paper concerns two composite Lewis-Skyrms signaling games. Each consists in a base game that evolves a language descriptive of nature and a metagame that coevolves a language descriptive of the base game and its evolving language. The first composite game shows how a pragmatic notion of truth might coevolve with a simple descriptive language. The second shows how a pragmatic notion of probability might similarly coevolve. Each of these pragmatic notions is characterized by the particular game and role that (...) it comes to play in the game. (shrink)

Barrett and others have used Lewis-style evolutionary games to argue that we ought not to trust our scientific languages to inform us about ontology. More specifically, Barrett has shown that in some simple evolutionary contexts the best descriptive languages need not cut nature at its joints, that they may guide action as successfully as possible while simultaneously being deeply conventional. The present article expands upon Barrett’s argument, exploring the space for conventionalism in more metaphysically robust causal evolutionary models. By using (...) evolutionary prediction games, the present article examines the range of metaphysical facts in these models and shows how Barrett’s sceptical argument may be both challenged and expanded to cover these systems, resulting in a more thoroughgoing scepticism about what metaphysical conclusions may be drawn from linguistic and theoretical structure. (shrink)

We are concerned here with explaining how successful rule-following behavior might evolve and how an old evolved rule might come to be successfully used in a new context. Such rule-following behavior is illustrated in the transitive judgments of pinyon and scrub-jays (Bond et al., Anim Behav 65:479–487, 2003). We begin by considering how successful transitive rule-following behavior might evolve in the context of Skyrms–Lewis sender–receiver games (Lewis, Convention. Harvard University Press, Cambridge, 1969; Skyrms, Philos Sci 75:489–500, 2006). We then consider (...) two ways that an agent might come to use an old evolved rule in a new context. The first involves the agent evolving successful dispositions for one concrete type of experience, then associating a new type of experience with the old evolved dispositions. The second involves the agent evolving dispositions that represent a general inferential schema, then composing these dispositions with others in a way that allows the agent to make inferences concerning a new concrete type of experience. (shrink)

This paper concerns how rule-following behavior might evolve in the context of a variety of Skyrms–Lewis signaling game, how such rules might subsequently evolve to be used in new contexts, and how such appropriation allows for the composition of evolved rules. We will also consider how the composition of simpler rules to form more complex rules may be significantly more efficient than evolving the complex rules directly. And we will review an example of rule following by pinyon and scrub jays (...) as an illustration of the appropriation of a rule to a new context :142–150, 2013a; Barrett, Philos Sci, 2014). The proposal here is that the composition of rules might occur in a way that is precisely analogous to such simple appropriation. Finally, we will briefly consider how any finite truth-functional operation might evolve by the sequential appropriation of simpler rules. (shrink)

Skyrms-Lewis sender-receiver games with invention allow one to model how a simple mathematical language might be invented and become meaningful as its use coevolves with the basic arithmetic competence of primitive mathematical inquirers. Such models provide sufficient conditions for the invention and evolution of a very basic sort of arithmetic language and practice, and, in doing so, provide insight into the nature of a correspondingly basic sort of mathematical knowledge in an evolutionary context. Given traditional philosophical reflections concerning the nature (...) and preconditions of mathematical knowledge, these conditions are strikingly modest. (shrink)