Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id WAA10706 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Thu, 14 Mar 2002 22:18:24 GMT X-Originating-IP: [62.31.23.74] User-Agent: Microsoft-Outlook-Express-Macintosh-Edition/5.0.3 Date: Thu, 14 Mar 2002 22:09:39 +0000 Subject: Re: memetics-digest V1 #994 From: Steve Drew <srdrew_1@hotmail.com> To: <memetics@mmu.ac.uk> Message-ID: <B8B6CE70.323%srdrew_1@hotmail.com> In-Reply-To: <200203130337.DAA06683@alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk> Content-type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit X-OriginalArrivalTime: 14 Mar 2002 22:12:00.0871 (UTC) FILETIME=[43AF9F70:01C1CBA5] Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
on 3/13/02 3:37 AM, memetics-digest at fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk wrote:
> Date: Tue, 12 Mar 2002 10:54:59 -0000
> From: Vincent Campbell <v.p.campbell@stir.ac.uk>
> Subject: RE: Study suggests love conquered all
>
> <Another point is that, given the geography of the
>> world, if we are an amalgam of various independent, but similar strands of
>> Homonids, one could expect some type of isolated example thet did not
>> manage
>> to amalgamate particularly given the relatively short evolutionary time
>> span.>
>>
> [skip to bottom to get to my point :-)]
>
> I think you're right here. I saw a programme a while back about the
> indigenous peoples of a group of islands off India, where the natives (who
> are somewhat dying out) are not Asian, but African in appearance, and
> initial DNA testing on some of the people suggested extraordinarily old
> roots. I can't remember the name now... Adamandan islands, or something
> like that.
I'd forgotton about that programme. I think it was called 'The Search for
Eden'. They are not dying out as such but they are slowly interacting with
the Indians and Shri Lankans. IIRC, the idea was to test the many centres
theory of human evolution, though i never did understand how you can
differentiate between many centred evolution and out of Africa by this
method.
>
> I think a major problem, and one that is surely insurmountable, is
> that conflict doesn't fossilize. In pre-monumental societies/ pre-city
> societies, there's not much archaeological evidence that survives (e.g. the
> lack of ancient boats, that must have existed to get people to places like
> Australia 10s of thousands of years ago), and not a great deal of fossil
> evidence either. I've said this before haven't I.....
This is what i was on about with Jeremy, re the Aboriginal cave paintings.
The image circa 40,000 BP was of a boat.
>
> The only thing that appears, so far, is that only one group appears
> to have survived:_exactly how_seems to me to be inordinantly difficult to
> determine.
>
> There was that other programme (a Horizon programme) that presented
> the find of Caral in South America as a major problem for the dominant
> thesis that city-based civilisations emerged out of conflict and war.
> Caral, it suggested, appeared to be a 'mother' civilisation, one that was a
> middle stage between the hunter-gatherer societies, and the highly developed
> civilisations of the likes of Sumer, Eygpt or Teotichuan (spelling?).
> Unlike these others, for example, there have been no finds of metal
> tools/weapons, no militaristic images in wall carvings etc. etc. The
> current view is that Caral emerged out of trade, not conflict, and thus that
> the paradigm of civilisation being born of warfare is possibly wrong.
Or possibly that there was more than one road to civilisation.
>
> Whether_war_is a cultural phenomena or not, aggression and
> territoriality seem to me to be natural phenomena. So arguing that war is
> cultural, does not mean that we can remove aggression and territoriality by
> social means alone- although we can perhaps redirect them into other less
> anti-social areas, like sport. If we all agree to have serotonin shots, or
> to get our children screened for aggression genes then maybe, but I don't
> see many people agreeing to that.
Sport and non violence? you jest, at least in the UK. Even the curling
looked a bit vicious in places. Anyone for Rollerball? :-)
>
> My Point (finally, shout the gallery): 'War' might be a memetic
> behaviour, 'Agression' and 'Territoriality' are not. Similarly 'Peace'
> might be memetic, but close co-existence with others in our species is not
> (we're clearly more like chimps/gorillas, who live socially, than
> orangutangs, who don't).
I think i can go with this aproach.
>
> Vincent
Regards
Steve
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