Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id UAA14430 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Fri, 2 Jun 2000 20:04:50 +0100 From: Robin Faichney <robin@faichney.demon.co.uk> Organization: Reborn Technology To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk Subject: RE: Jabbering ! Date: Fri, 2 Jun 2000 19:46:12 +0100 X-Mailer: KMail [version 1.0.21] Content-Type: text/plain References: <2D1C159B783DD211808A006008062D31017458A1@inchna.stir.ac.uk> Message-Id: <00060220013501.00647@faichney> Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
On Fri, 02 Jun 2000, Vincent Campbell wrote:
>Fair enough, I think that's pretty clear.
>
>I'll have to think about that, and get back to you. It still doesn't seem
>right to me, as I still think there are quantitative and qualitative
>differences between human culture and other organisms' communicative
>behaviours, distinct enough to not warrant calling other organisms
>behaviours cultural.
A definition of culture that fits perfectly with memetics, though it
might not satisfy your "cultural intuitions" (intuitions about culture,
derived from culture) is very simple: imitation of behaviour. To fill
that out a little: species that are both social, and sufficiently
intelligent, can learn cooperatively -- what one individual learns
directly from experience can be passed on to others so that they get
the benefit without having to go through the experience. This "body
of knowledge" constitutes the culture, and this is obviously more
efficient than being restricted to individual learning, in which case
the wheel is reinvented many, many times.
Of course, human culture has a very substantial content that was not
exactly learned -- the products of the imagination, for instance -- and
there are plenty other differences from the culture of any other species
too. But on this definition, these are all cultures, and I don't see any
particular problem with this definition. On the contrary, it has
the advantage of being quite simple and clear. And there are plenty
of differences between us and other species, so there's no need to
add culture to the list.
-- Robin Faichney===============================This was distributed via the memetics list associated with the Journal of Memetics - Evolutionary Models of Information Transmission For information about the journal and the list (e.g. unsubscribing) see: http://www.cpm.mmu.ac.uk/jom-emit
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