On 25 July 2014 12:48, 'Chris de Morsella' via Everything List < [email protected]> wrote:
> ------------------------------ > *From:* LizR <[email protected]> > *To:* [email protected] > *Sent:* Thursday, July 24, 2014 4:49 PM > *Subject:* Re: Atheist > > On 25 July 2014 11:27, meekerdb <[email protected]> wrote: > > And in any case 'natural selection' would just be replaced by 'cultural > selection' - which is natural. > > > >>What is 'cultural selection' ? > > An ape figures out how to insert a palm frond down into a termite nest and > is able to harvest a bonanza of good termite protein... soon other apes in > the vicinity begin mimicking the original "creative" ape... with some of > them learning how to perform this new neat trick (others ignoring it and > still others failing to master the new skill)... in time -- if compelling > enough -- the idea spreads throughout the larger grouping of culturally > inter-acting apes and many of the members of the larger inter-acting group > learn the new valuable technique.... mother apes (who have mastered the > termite feeding learned behavior) begin teaching their own offspring this > new valuable survival skill. After some generations the culturally learned > technique is firmly established in this particular ape sub-culture, while > remaining absent in other ape sub-cultures of the same species that have > not been exposed to this new cultural evolution. > A successful *cultural innovation* will spread (or conversely fail to > propagate) in a similar manner (through a different modality of course) as > biologically encoded evolution. > > Good ideas -- i.e. those with high survival fitness -- will tend to spread > through an interacting group of individuals in a given culture, who are in > fairly close contact with each other. > I agree that this would have been useful in a situation like that. Do you think this is still happening in Western culture? A lot of memes appear to not have any specific survival value, although some are undoubtedly useful. But the vast majority seem to just be what happens to be fashionable at the moment - which is often the result of the whole meme thing having been hijacked to benefit a few individuals. > Sometimes bad ideas will spread, but it is rarer. > > I can think of a few which have negative reproductive / survival value but have nevertheless spread, especially religious ones. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
