Читать книгу Mechanisms of cultural evolution - Victor Efremenko - Страница 14

It is time to define the concept of the term «Culture». You can find many definitions of the phenomenon of culture, which are given by people from different points of view. All these definitions are based on attempts to grasp the common in different types of cultural manifestations.

Another approach is based on defining a culture in terms of how it is inherited. The most convincing is the definition of the remarkable cultural scientist Yu. Lotman:

«Culture is a collection of genetically non-inherited information in the field of human behavior. Art is part of culture along with science.»

The term «mentality» comes from the Latin «mind, thinking, way of thinking, mental disposition», meaning a general mental attitude, a relatively holistic set of thoughts, beliefs, skills that creates a picture of the world in the head. Mentality is both a characteristic of the type of thinking (consciousness) and the subconscious activity of the brain.

A prerequisite for evolution in populations or societies is natural selection. In the cultural evolution of a person, adaptations consist in changing the mentality, which changes (adapts) a person’s behavior in such a way as to adapt it to external conditions, including the social environment.

But cultural adaptations do not arise at birth, but during life with the development of the mind. Since these mental adaptations are not inherited through genes, the question arises as to how they are passed on to subsequent generations. What replicators help this process take place? This issue will be discussed later.