The Danger of Culture and Science as the Solution

This phenomenon of having a memory for the race, of having an accumulated knowledge passable from one generation to another, was new in the world. But it had a disease in it. It was possible to pass on mistaken ideas. It was possible to pass on ideas which were not profitable for the race. The race has ideas, which were not profitable for the race. The race has ideas, but there are not necessarily profitable.

So there came a time in which the ideas, although accumulated very slowly, were all accumulations not only of practical and useful things, but great accumulations of all types of prejudices, and strange and odd beliefs.

Then a way of avoidign the disease was discovered. This is to doubt that what is being passed from the past is in fact true, and to try to find out ab initiio, again from experience, what the situation is, rather than trusting the experience of the past in the form in which it is passed down. And that is what science is: the result of the discovery that it is worthwhile rechecking by new direct experience, and not necessarily trusting the race experience from the past.

Notes:

Science is the cure for erroneous memes that enter our culture.

Folksonomies: science memetics culture

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/law, govt and politics/legal issues/legislation (0.400646)

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What Is Science?

Books, Brochures, and Chapters>Book Chapter: Feynman, Richard (1969), What Is Science?, The Physics Teacher, Vol 9, pp 313-320, American Association of Physics Teachers, Retrieved on 2010-11-13

Triples

03 JAN 2011

Culture as an Evolutionary Strategy, It's Danger, and Sci...

The Evolution of Culture > Cause and Effect > The Danger of Culture and Science as the Solution
Before the study of Memetics, Feynman provides a succinct description of culture as memes, and then later, he describes the danger of culture, erroneous memes, the cure for which is science.

Folksonomies: enlightenment science memetics