Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id JAA06262 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Sun, 23 Dec 2001 09:45:53 GMT Message-ID: <000d01c18b96$d21f33a0$02a4bed4@default> From: "Kenneth Van Oost" <Kenneth.Van.Oost@village.uunet.be> To: "memetics" <memetics@mmu.ac.uk> Subject: Fw: Religious Thought and Lamarckism Date: Sun, 23 Dec 2001 10:46:41 +0100 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 5.00.2314.1300 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.00.2314.1300 Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
> > ----- Original Message -----
> > From: Wade Smith <wade_smith@harvard.edu>
> >
> > Hi Wade,
> > I wrote, You wrote,
> >
> > > > Lamarck's theory is misrepresented and misinterpreted.
> > > It's not a misunderstanding to remark that lamarckianism has no
> > > place in evolution. Culture _is_ lamarckian, and I would say
> > > that Lamarck was simply one person to notice the trends of
> > > cultural patterns, sheerly luckily getting his name attached to
> > > 'change due to need'.
> >
> > Perhaps not in biological evolution, yet !
> > I just merely want to point out that Lamarckism does already has a place
> > in evolution ! Maybe with not that much impact as its Dawinian opponent
> > have, but like I said, the American society/ politics/ ideology/... is
> more
> > Lamarckian orientated than for instance Europe.
> > Don 't you think that this does have important implications as well for
> the
> > community itself as for ' evolution ' as such !?
> >
> > Don 't you think that the much broader religious fixation about creation
> > which runs loose in the US, and already affects the ways how education
> > must be conducted, does not affect " cultural evolution " !?
> > ( If I understood it correctly, major efforts were and are in progress
to
> > get
> > the creatonists- view into the class- rooms).
> > And if it does, don 't you than not think that such changed ways can
> > influence ' brain- making- gene- cells ' up to such a level that the
bio-
> > logical signifiers change accordingly !?
> >
> > It would take a while, accordingly to the Darwinian paradigm, and I
> > don 't say that will be the reason why the US differs from Europe in
that
> > respect, but IMO, socio- political ideas based upon Lamarckism exist,
> > do have influence upon how people behave and do change in that context,
> > maybe, people biologically and, maybe, those changed cultural vibes do
> > affect their offspring .
> > And, again IMO, as Salice did point out in her remarks about the archi-
> > tecture- thread, maybe there is no Lamarckian ' need ' for culture, but
> > you never know what people are up to !
> >
> > Their ' need ' to change the evolution of the American culture can be
> > inducted by Darwinian ways of selection, varation and mutation, but
> > that raises a major question, why should the natural evolution of things
> > ' select ' trends in thinking, education and behavior which don 't end
up
> !?
> > Yeah, to spread more memes and kill off better the ones which are
sitting
> > in their way, I understand... well like Bush always says, God bless
> America
> > !
> > He knows damn good why, I suppose !?
> >
> > Regards,
> >
> > Kenneth
> >
> > > Of course Dawkins and Darwin noticed these things culturally.
> > > Culture is all about needs and wants. Evolution is about fit.
> > > That we see confluence between these two processes is
> > > understandable. Culture is one of the things evolution has
> > > selected for us.
> > >
> > > But there was never and never will be any lamarckian _need_ for
> > > culture. The peoples with it, however, spread more and killed
> > > better.
> > >
> >
> >
>
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