Skyrms Brian. The Stag Hunt and the Evolution of Social Structure

Cambridge University Press, 2003. — 166 p.Brian Skyrms, author of the successful Evolution of the Social Contract (which won the prestigious Lakatos Award), has written a sequel. The new book is a study of ideas of cooperation and collective action. The point of departure is a prototypical story found in Rousseau’s Discourse on Inequality. Rousseau contrasts hunting hare, where the risk of noncooperation is small but the reward is equally small, with hunting the stag, where maximum cooperation is required but the reward is much greater. Rational agents are pulled in one direction by considerations of risk and in another by considerations of mutual benefit.The possibility of a successful solution depends on the coevolution of cooperation and social structure. Brian Skyrms focuses on three factors that affect the emergence of such structure and the facilitation of collective action: location (interactions with neighbors), signals (transmission of information), and association (the formation of social networks). Written with all Skyrms’s characteristic clarity and verve, his intriguing book will be eagerly sought out by students and professionals in philosophy, political science, economics, sociology, and evolutionary biology.Brian Skyrms is UCI Distinguished Professor of Social Sciences, Professor of Logic and Philosophy of Science, and Professor of Economics at the University of California, Irvine.