Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id KAA18369 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Wed, 21 Feb 2001 10:16:21 GMT Message-ID: <2D1C159B783DD211808A006008062D3101745C9A@inchna.stir.ac.uk> From: Vincent Campbell <v.p.campbell@stir.ac.uk> To: "'memetics@mmu.ac.uk'" <memetics@mmu.ac.uk> Subject: RE: Lesser genes than expected Date: Wed, 21 Feb 2001 10:15:45 -0000 X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2650.21) Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
<But I have a few comments on my own...
> " Whatever specific language we are brought up speaking and that in turn
> arguably shapes our thinking. "
> Mayby it was not your intention, but like you wrote it, it seems to me you
> make some kind of hiërachial system for languages here.
> It sounds to me, that you brought up with English are better off than
> someone
> else and that ' thinking in English ' gives a better result...
> Maybe I am in the wrong here, I am probably, but I got a odd feeling about
> this....>
>
I don't see a hierarchy of languages as structurally speaking most
languages ancient or modern are equivalently complex. It's just that
language is a clear indicator of cultural influence, and a key factor in
questions of identity (e.g. ethnic, religious and/or national identities).
So it's not necessarily that a particular language shapes a person's
thinking processes, with the possibility that some languages may be more
beneficial than others, but socially through identification with and
differentiation from others, it contributes to self-perception. Just
sitting here thinking about it, although the pressures on language survival
are multiple, it is interesting that so many of the world's languages are
dying out at the present time...
<You want to leave some room for behavioural characteristics that
may have
> genetic bases, like mate selecteion.
> Here IMO you don 't count in the possibility that mate selection in some
> cases has nothing to do with genetic bases at all.
> In some countries marriages are based on a mutual agreement between
> two families. The son of one marries the daughter of the other. Period !!
> Genes has nothing to do with this. Here memes of a cultural nature deter-
> mines which genes get inherited by the progeny.
> And I wonder in how many cases this a common practice in our oh so
> free Western world !?>
>
Arranged marriages happen a lot in the UK. Indeed recent reports
have the controversial subject of first cousin marriages amongst Pakistani
muslim communities in the UK, because the small UK pakistani population base
has already seeing heightened risk of birth defects and susceptibility to
illnesses amongst children born to that ethnic group. Interestingly, in
Britain the rate of first cousin marriage amongst this community is far
higher than in Pakistan itself, where it is a tolerated and relatively
common practice.
Evolutionary psychologists would surely argue that specific cultural
practices around marriage do relate at some level to environmental
circumstances. I believe it's somewhere in Tibet where two brothers will
marry the same woman in some village communities, for example (or is two
sisters marry the same man? I can't remember which way round it is).
The basis of mate selection is genetic, the specifics in any given
case are cultural, and dare one say it, even idiosyncratic.
Vincent
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