I don’t want to search for it at the moment, but I remember Margulis (or a female author with the same thesis) was brought up by evolutionary biologists[1] as an example of the system working. (i.e. someone has controversial thesis that is ignored, but gathers up evidence for it and it gets accepted).
It was in a response to Ben Stein’s Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed movie that tried to argue that biology is dogmatically attached to Darwinian evolution, tolerating no deviation from the “party line”. The author used the Margulis thesis to show that, no, if you have evidence for a controversial view in biology, it will get the attention it’s due, so you should work on finding that evidence rather than whining that you’re being shut out, as the Intelligent Design proponents do.
[1] I’d prefer to just say “evolutionist” to distinguish the sides here, but that always sparks a side-debate.
If Margulis is an example of the system working (she had a good idea and it was accepted) cultural evolution is an example of it not working (a simple and basic idea remains down-trodden for many decades).
Downtrodden: “for some reason I haven’t fully fathomed, this most promising frontier of scientific research has attracted very few people and very little effort.”—Ed Wilson.
Simple: see the dictionary.
Basic: cultural evolution is fundamental to understanding cultural change—just as evolution is fundamental to understanding organic change.
Dual inheritance theory is not at all simple or basic when one tries to actually think about it beyond a “yeah, this occurs” level. It involves a lot of math, much of which is generally more abstract and subtle than the math used in standard population genetics. It also isn’t clear that DIT is able to make testable predictions in its current form that aren’t either standard results in population genetics or ideas that would be simple consequences of informal thinking anyways. It might be fair to say that this is a set of ideas which should have more attention than they have gotten. But calling dual inheritance theory either simple or basic just doesn’t reflect the actual state of the theory.
In short, humans have two unique hereditary systems. One is the genetic system that transfers biological information from biological parent to offspring in the form of genes and chromosomes. The other is the extragenetic system that transfers cultural information from speaker to listener, from writer to reader, from performer to spectator, and forms our cultural heritage.
Monroe Strickberger, Evolution (1996)
Evolutionary theory is not simple, of course—but “evolutionary theory applies to human culture too” is only seven words.
I don’t want to search for it at the moment, but I remember Margulis (or a female author with the same thesis) was brought up by evolutionary biologists[1] as an example of the system working. (i.e. someone has controversial thesis that is ignored, but gathers up evidence for it and it gets accepted).
It was in a response to Ben Stein’s Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed movie that tried to argue that biology is dogmatically attached to Darwinian evolution, tolerating no deviation from the “party line”. The author used the Margulis thesis to show that, no, if you have evidence for a controversial view in biology, it will get the attention it’s due, so you should work on finding that evidence rather than whining that you’re being shut out, as the Intelligent Design proponents do.
[1] I’d prefer to just say “evolutionist” to distinguish the sides here, but that always sparks a side-debate.
That hasn’t worked too well for cultural evolution so far—and that isn’t that difficult to understand.
I’m not sure I follow this. Can you expand on what you mean?
If Margulis is an example of the system working (she had a good idea and it was accepted) cultural evolution is an example of it not working (a simple and basic idea remains down-trodden for many decades).
What do you mean by cultural evolution and what do you mean by the idea being simple and basic?
Cultural evolution: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dual_inheritance_theory
Downtrodden: “for some reason I haven’t fully fathomed, this most promising frontier of scientific research has attracted very few people and very little effort.”—Ed Wilson.
Simple: see the dictionary.
Basic: cultural evolution is fundamental to understanding cultural change—just as evolution is fundamental to understanding organic change.
Dual inheritance theory is not at all simple or basic when one tries to actually think about it beyond a “yeah, this occurs” level. It involves a lot of math, much of which is generally more abstract and subtle than the math used in standard population genetics. It also isn’t clear that DIT is able to make testable predictions in its current form that aren’t either standard results in population genetics or ideas that would be simple consequences of informal thinking anyways. It might be fair to say that this is a set of ideas which should have more attention than they have gotten. But calling dual inheritance theory either simple or basic just doesn’t reflect the actual state of the theory.
The basic idea is simple:
Monroe Strickberger, Evolution (1996)
Evolutionary theory is not simple, of course—but “evolutionary theory applies to human culture too” is only seven words.