STORRE

Cumulative culture has been argued to be unique to humans, however, recent evidence from nonhuman animals suggests that relatively simple cases may be possible in other species. In this thesis, I explored whether non-human primates could strategically use information in a manner that may theoretically support cumulative cultural evolution. As the emergence of cumulative culture may depend on task demands, we hypothesised that favourable learning conditions may facilitate this effect. We ...

Mussels often hybridise to form the Mytilus species complex comprised of M. edulis and M. galloprovincialis as the main species cultivated in Europe and, where their geographical distribution overlaps, the species M. trossulus. It has been suggested that M. trossulus have a weaker shell than the UK native M. edulis and hybridisation reduces farmed mussel yields and overall fitness. Here, we investigate the hypothesised link between species and shell weakness, employing multi-locus genotyping ...

The age at which children begin school, known as school starting age (SSA),has been the topic of considerable debate in contemporary times. The age of compulsory entry to schooling in many countries has persisted, unchallenged and unchanged since their establishment in early 20th century (Herbst & Strawiński, 2016). However, in research literature and the media, the question of whether children should have a later ingress to schooling has recently increased in volume. Indeed, media attention...

In her book Extended Rationality: A Hinge Epistemology (2015), Annalisa Coliva distances her positive anti-sceptical proposal from what she calls “devastating” relativist interpretations (2015: 120). She proposes two ways someone might attempt to formulate epistemic relativism from her positive view, and argues that both fail because they rely on alternative conceptions of rationality which are either “unintelligible” or “inconceivable”. In this chapter I do three things. First, I highlight p...