Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id UAA20449 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Sat, 3 Jun 2000 20:26:59 +0100 Message-ID: <3939153D.BE311C20@mediaone.net> Date: Sat, 03 Jun 2000 15:25:02 +0100 From: Chuck <cpalson@mediaone.net> X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.72 [en] (WinNT; I) X-Accept-Language: en To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk Subject: Re: Jabbering ! References: <200006031856.OAA17244@mail6.lig.bellsouth.net> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
"Joe E. Dees" wrote:
>
> > > But those differences constitute culture. When a mother lion
> > > teaches her cub to stalk prey, she is passing down the same
> > > wheel passed down for countless millennia. I cannot consider this
> > > cultural transmission, but rather species-specific childrearing.
> > > Thousands of different human languages where in each case the
> > > meaning-being relations between words and referents are arbitrary
> > > and by mutual convention rather than being either genetically or
> > > environmentally mandated, a great number of complex and ever-
> > > changing technologies, and both scientific theories to explain how
> > > they - and we - work, and pure abstractions applicable to any
> > > referent, such as mathematics and logic; NOW we're talking
> > > culture(s)!
> >
> > Joe - I wonder if we can really say there is a hard and fast distinction. Perhaps
> > it would be better to have an instinctual/learned continuum. Or perhaps culture
> > should only be defined as those aspects of behavior that are ammenable to free
> > variation. For example, given an identical environment and population density,
> > two isolated cultures can be counted on to be remarkably similar because the
> > human brain calculates pretty well the necessary behavior for inhabiting a
> > particular environment. So in a sense, a good deal of the behaviors that are in
> > fact learned are preordained by the human brain that will do the identical
> > calculations in identical environments. (hope that isn't too abstract - I can
> > give examples if needed)
> >
> Well, human languages are not universal, but you've noted that.
> Sometimes the type of task required is common in all tokens of an
> environmental type inhabited, but the method is not. Seaside
> cultures fish, but some fish with bait and hook, some with net,
> some with fishtrap, some with spear, some with bow and arrow, etc.
Joe - These kinds of observations about fishing - or whatever mode of exploitation of
nature - come from an anthropological tradition that had no notion of evolution and the
conservation of energy. They were perfectly happy to note differences without
questioning why because they revelled in the notion that cultures could infinitely vary
without any apparent reason. So they almost never investigated the actual natural
conditions.
But the fishing alternatives you mention are quite different, and although there is no
data on it that I know of, I would bet a lot that a society that uses nets over, say,
bait and hook, has primarily large amounts of smallish fish that are easily caught in
nets. I would think that nets are pretty easy to invent independently in different
societies - as are hooks. A society that uses hooks and bait, on the other hand, can
catch large fish that are in the environment, and the total amount of protein available
from that one fish makes it worth the wait - as opposed to whatever small fish are
available. The point is, where protein intake relative to the energy needed to use a
particular technolgy is known, the evidence shows that the most efficient alternatives
are used.
One example is worms and other small yukies as opposed to large animals.
Anthropologists have told us for years that food tastes are simply "culturally
determined" - which meant arbitrary. But the more we know about which cultures prefer
what, the more we understand that the emotional preferences (disgusting vs. tasty) are
built on environmental possibilities. Those that eat the little yuckies do so because
there are no large animals. Those that eat the biggies and disdain the little yuckies
have chosen the former because it requires less energy. Seems obvious, but most
anthropologists never bothered to even think about it because of their ideological
biases.
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