Ralph Dumain > As for Lamarckism and cultural evolution, I'm wary of such > metaphorical thinking. Lewontin's response is unclear. More on this later.
^^^^^^^^ CB: I don't think it's used as a metaphor. Culture is a major adaptive mechanism for the human species, it is extra-somatic, but it functions like somatic changes. It is not in our genes, but it can be adaptive the same way that a gene that is selected for is adaptive. A cultural invention in one generation or "acquired" by one generation can be inherited , culturally, by the next generation. ^^^^^^^^ > > Another aside: In 1975, I attended a guest lecture by Lewontic on > heritability, as part of a course on scientific racism. > > > At 02:51 PM 3/29/2010, c b wrote: > >I finally found my letter exchange with Lewontin as reported to this > >list in December 2005. Will look for the articles discussed. > > > >Charles > > > >http://lists.econ.utah.edu/pipermail/marxism-thaxis/2005-December/019560.html > > > >Marxism-Thaxis] Response from Lewontin > >Charles Brown cbrown at michiganlegal.org > >Mon Dec 12 14:54:34 MST 2005 > > > >Previous message: [Marxism-Thaxis] Logical Empiricism (reformatted) > >Next message: [Marxism-Thaxis] Jean-Baptiste Lamarck > >Messages sorted by: [ date ] [ thread ] [ subject ] [ author ] > > > >-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- > > > >Back in October I sent a fax ( my email didn't get through to him) to > >Richard Lewontin with interjection comments on his article New York Review . > >He sent me a letter back. I called him and asked him if I could send his > >letter to the list. He said ok. I'll copy my original note to him below. > > > >Dear Mr. Brown: > > > >Thanks very much for your thoughtful comments on the recent article in The > >New York Review. I was particularly struck by your point that culture, if > >modeled on an evolutionary process, definitely has a Lamarckian inheritance. > >What is not always appreciated by scientists is that once one has a > >Lamarckian form of inheritance, the strictness of Mendel's Laws no longer > >applies, of course, and almost anything is possible. A very interesting book > >showing the implications of forms of passage from one individual to another > >without any particular fixed rule of inheritance is the book on cultural > >inheritance by Feldman and Cavalli. What they show is that the moment you > >get away form strict genetic segregation and allow an arbitrary probability > >of the passage of a trait from one individual to another, the whole question > >of selection fades. Let us say, a trait can spread not because it is > >selected but because the rule of transmission strongly favors it. If > >everybody who ever heard a particular word that had been invented now used > >it ,it would spread very rapidly through the population, even though it > >could not be said to have some particular selective advantage. In a sense, > >the distinction between the rules of inheritance and the rules of selection > >disappear once one allows a free possibility for transmission rate. > > > >I am delighted that you read the article so critically and that you saw one > >of the most important points about cultural inheritance. > > > >Thanks again for having written me. > > > >Yours sincerely, > > > >R.C. Lewontin > > > _______________________________________________ > Marxism-Thaxis mailing list > Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu > To change your options or unsubscribe go to: > http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis > _______________________________________________ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
