Note that “more likely or less costly” is a disjunction.
Which means it may be, on this article’s account, that high-status flowers are not costlier than low-status flowers, merely that they are reliably less common among high-status flower-displayers.
Of course, this also raises the possibility that this account is exactly backwards, and the only thing that makes the flowers “high-status” is the fact that high-status people display them; if high-status people started displaying bright red flowers in rotting wheelbarrows, that would shortly thereafter become a status signal. On that account, the flowers aren’t a status signal at all.
This is an empirical dispute; we can look at what happens when high-status people display low-status flowers. On the first account, we would expect the status of the people to go down (that is, third-party observers would think less well of them, keeping all other factors fixed). On the second account, we would expect the status of the flowers to go up.
(My own expectation is that we would actually find it depends on several other factors, because both accounts are woefully oversimplified, but that something like what Yvain describes is in fact going on.)
This is an empirical dispute; we can look at what happens when high-status people display low-status flowers. On the first account, we would expect the status of the people to go down (that is, third-party observers would think less well of them, keeping all other factors fixed). On the second account, we would expect the status of the flowers to go up.
It can be even more complicated than that (previously mentioned on Lesswrong here).
Note that “more likely or less costly” is a disjunction.
Which means it may be, on this article’s account, that high-status flowers are not costlier than low-status flowers, merely that they are reliably less common among high-status flower-displayers.
Of course, this also raises the possibility that this account is exactly backwards, and the only thing that makes the flowers “high-status” is the fact that high-status people display them; if high-status people started displaying bright red flowers in rotting wheelbarrows, that would shortly thereafter become a status signal. On that account, the flowers aren’t a status signal at all.
This is an empirical dispute; we can look at what happens when high-status people display low-status flowers. On the first account, we would expect the status of the people to go down (that is, third-party observers would think less well of them, keeping all other factors fixed). On the second account, we would expect the status of the flowers to go up.
(My own expectation is that we would actually find it depends on several other factors, because both accounts are woefully oversimplified, but that something like what Yvain describes is in fact going on.)
It can be even more complicated than that (previously mentioned on Lesswrong here).
Yup. As I said, my own expectation is that it depends on several other factors.