Convergence of knowledge in a stochastic cultural evolution model with population structure, social learning and credibility biases

Abstract

Understanding how knowledge emerges and propagates within groups is crucial to explain the evolution of human populations. In this work, we introduce a mathematically oriented model that draws on individual-based approaches, inhomogeneous Markov chains and learning algorithms, such as those introduced in [F. Cucker and S. Smale, On the mathematical foundations of learning, Bull. Amer. Math. Soc. 39 (2002) 1–49; F. Cucker, S. Smale and D. X. Zhou, Modeling language evolution, Found. Comput. Math. 4 (2004) 315–343]. After deriving the model, we study some of its mathematical properties, and establish theoretical and quantitative results in a simplified case. Finally, we run numerical simulations to illustrate some properties of the model. Our main result is that, as time goes to infinity, individuals’ knowledge can converge to a common shared knowledge that was not present in the convex combination of initial individuals’ knowledge.