Human cultural diversity is vast; the range of cultural practices, beliefs, and languages that we speak is vast.

I think the driving force for cultural evolution is this desire for groups to be splitting off and separating and forming subgroups insofar as the environment will allow it. We see great cultural diversity and large numbers of cultures per unit area in regions of the world in which the environment is really rich.

What drives the separation of groups of people into subgroups is the desire to control resources. We begin with a single culture, and over time the number of individuals within that culture expands.

Mark Pagel Quotes