[extropy-chat] Re: John C. Wright finds god

[Natasha Vita-More]

At 02:32 PM 10/16/04 +0100, you wrote:
>Natasha Vita-More wrote:
>
>"Society is one thing, culture is another.  Society may want to
>view women as dumb so that it can foster the vicious cycle of male
>dominance, but culture does not see it that way.  Culture works as a
>catalyst to make social changes"
>
>I'm confused by this.
>
>I understood 'culture' to be a *product* of 'society', and i don't see how 
>they can be at odds in the way described.

They are not at "odds."  An apple is an apple and a pear is pear. This does 
make them at odds with one another.   Society is the relationship between 
people and common interests of people, and that can be as broad as sharing 
chromosomes or individualized as preference in cuisine.

Culture the development of intellectual and creative activity and the 
products of such activity.  It is also the patterns of behavior endemic to 
certain communities and reflects the ideas and ideals of that community.

>I do agree that there is no typical product of 'culture' as a whole, 
>mainly because there is such a huge variety in our (i mean western) 
>society. In fact, i think it's all but meaningless. There is no coherent 
>culture, only sub-cultures.

There are cultures, such as the scientific world and the arts 
world.   There are also subcultures which are groups that grow out of these 
cultures and form their own hubs of beliefs, style and products.

>Society produces many different cultural groups, some of them with wildly 
>different bases and behaviours. What, culturally, do a woman who lives in, 
>say, Salt Lake City and one who lives in New York City have in common 
>(assuming they are both stereotypical inhabitants of those places)?

The Internet.  And a whole lot more.  Remember we do live in the 21st 
century and the person in Salt Lake City might have business in New 
York.  The two women could also wear Tom Ford designs, or practice 
yoga.  Or they might even be transhumanists.

>The culture of one may well include catalysts for social change, but i 
>very much doubt if the other would.

Culture is indeed a driver of social change.  The art culture is a very 
important driver of social change.  You can takes these apart and say that 
it is the economics of art that is the real driver of social change or the 
applied technology used in the art.  The world is a very large system full 
of all sorts of connections and interrelationships that are very connected 
so you can look at it from many perspectives.


>Btw, I've never been to either place, so my examples may be bad ones (if 
>so, blame TV!), but i'm sure you know what i'm getting at.

Not really, but I enjoyed your response.

Best,
Natasha


Natasha Vita-More
http://www.natasha.cc
----------
President, Extropy Institute  http://www.extropy.org
Founder, Transhumanist Arts & Culture  http://www.transhumanist.biz
http://www.transhuman.org
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