Define culture as anything that we hominids can learn
and suppose that one significant function of culture is it’s impact upon biology,
then we can readily spread learning out along the spectrum from
that which supports biology – positive culture – to
that which hinders biology – negative culture – with
a large body of subject matter in the middle which has little immediate impact upon biology aside from its consumption of time.
In parallel with the notion of a gene – a minimum unit of biological inheritance –
we might recognize the notion of a meme – a minimum unit of cultural inheritance.
In parallel with the notion of a gene pool, we might recognize the notion of a meme pool.
In parallel with the notion of lethal gene’s, we might recognize the notion of lethal memes
(Materials we can study and behaviors we can learn that will kill us....)
In parallel with the notion of gene splicing, we might recognize the notion of meme splicing
(and consider that meme splicing just might be easier than gene splicing - maybe much easier...).
A modern, imaginative, intelligent person has access to cultures from around this planet from a variety of times and might consider picking and choosing – cutting and splicing – to modulate their meme set to better fit what they are discovering themselves to be.
In a matter of speaking, a person’s culture serves as their software.
One fundamental aspect of our cultural software might be thought of as an operating system in as much as it guides us in 1) the care and feeding of the beast that bears us about in it’s head, or 2) the maintenance and repair of our earth landing vehicle (ELV),
and ....
Another aspect of our cultural software package might be thought of
as our SUI –
our Social User Interface - that aspect of ourselves which is involved with – and frequently lost in - local language and customs, socialization and manners, rank and standing, ...
It has been suggested that one of the major challenges of the 21 st century will be integrating across and cooperating between realms of different culture. Certainly we have already seen in recent times many examples of the consequences of cross-cultural misunderstanding. Demographics in California indicate that there is no majority ethnic group in this state anymore. One way of dealing with cross-cultural variation and stress is to secure one’s grounding in biology. Studies in the cultivation of TaiChi Chuan and QiGong are superb ways of grounding oneself in one’s biology....