[ExI] Cephalization, proles--Where is government going?

[Stefano Vaj]

On 9 May 2011 22:49, Samantha Atkins <sjatkins at mac.com> wrote:
> Did I say anything about one being the best? No.  I just made the obvious
> observation that some cultures are less likely to produce good outcomes as
> others.  Do you deny this is true?  Are all darwinian competitors equally
> competent for the challenges of their environment?  No.  But mechanisms to
> sort cultures do not have to rely only on darwinian wait and see.

Of course, cultures and systems are the product of human choice, not
of any "waiting and seeing", same as mutations, breeding and drift for
biological traits. Darwinian mechanisms are what select them ex post.

> I wasn't talking about forcing a culture but rather carefully picking one's
> culture and being picky enough to not grant all cultures equal respect.

Relativism, unless in some weird politically-correct version thereof,
does not imply "equivalence" (on which measure?). On the contrary, it
implies that your value judgments cannot be based but on your own
culture, which is by definition "special" for any of us. Only, one
should not be surprised that the same goes for others.

> Some cultures are known non-starters for the world we currently live in.

For those which are, what is really the problem? In fact, there are
more people frightened by China than by the Amish...

-- 
Stefano Vaj