The dirty secret of memetics is this – memetics can and usually does trump genetics.
I will explain this shortly. National and racial myths of all types would be amusing if they didn’t lead to either loss of life or loss of potential, human potential, and human productivity. All civilization, West and East, North and South, depends on correct understanding of how fragile the project of civilization is, how dependent on the inspirations on other unlike people and the few, very few, among one’s own people who seem to carry things for others.
And on the other hand, on the practical mass of ordinary folk, with ordinary concerns, who keep things running.
Thus lies the death of afrocentricm and eurocentricism alike. In a world in which massive amounts of information (though not necessarily knowledge per se, or wisdom) are available at the touch of a finger, partisan communalist lies, however well intentioned (or not) become more transparent. History is more complex, and civilization has more dependency points and contributing factors, than most want to admit.
The achievements, both good and bad, of all civilizations should be acknowledged. Neither should be minimized. The glories and accomplishments of the West are multiple. Honestly any idiot can see that running water good civic infrastructure and bridges that do not collapse, not to mention the ability to get things done without absurd amounts of Baksheesh are positive contributions to human welfare. The idea of exceptionalism, however, becomes idiotic when one looks at the history of all races involved in human civilization on a very long time-frame. Everyone has been an illiterate raw fat chewing savage living in squat like huts, however one wishes to glorify and romanticize things.
Someone who grasps the history involved, and is willing to recite such facts, will typically be hated by others. Not that I’d wish to inspire ire and hate, a bit of politeness is a good thing. Sometimes.
I use the term race in it’s older pre-late 19th century usage. Races are lineages that include a genetic and cultural component, when they used to speak of a Gaelic race, an Irish race, a Saxon race, a Hausa Race, and so on, as imprecise as this is it’s closer to the truth than what people speak of now. Even when Race Realists speak of scientific race, they conflate, emotively, other matters on top.
For a Hausa to be proud of the accomplishments of Somalis is idiotic, they are not his people.
For a German to be proud of the achievements of Greeks is idiotic, they are not his people.
To appreciate and feel a feeling of kinship for nations and races that are close to one’s own in origin is one thing, and to appreciate the accomplishments of races and nations not similar to you, takes a finer mind.
Everyone has their reasons. Everyone has their excuses, often they are quite good.
Nanos gigantium humeris insidentes – We are dwarfs standing on the shoulders of giants, this phrase is often misunderstood by people who should know better. That some today see further than those in the past, push further boundaries, pushes their intellectual pursuits across further horizons by standing on and absorbing the knowledge and works of their forbearers, who exactly these past giants were should not be forgotten or obscured.
Nor should the giants of some be appropriated by others.
There is the problem of humility, the unwillingness to admit humble origins. If many of my ancestors sat half naked in the dirt in front of sub equatorial grass huts with bones stuck through their noses trading folk nostrums back and forth while nervously looking over their shoulders for coastal raiders and slavers, I should not claim they were kings.
Unless, of course, they were.
If those kings in question were grass clad spear hurling raiders of the savannah who were more glorified tribal thugs than anything else – or in turn, animal skin clad, sea reaving thugs and rapists who spent half the year freezing half drunk in their halls, and the other half relieving their tedium by pillaging costal monasteries and relieving nuns of their honor and lives, then let’s not claim that the wonders of Egypt or Rome were their immediate heritage, except by wholesale theft and invasion of course.
Of course bastardy is universal in human history so doubtlessly many are there who have the seed of kings in them and know it not.
Lest we get too uppity about this let it not be forgotten that often the seed of kings and lords was passed through rape, and no one should be proud of that.
Memetics is the science of ideas and how they are transmitted in an organic genetic like manner, more covertly it is a black science far older than many suspect on how to manipulate ideas and idea clusters through the manipulation of language. Operative memetics is the plaything of intelligence agencies, propaganda bureaus, marketing and PR firms, sorcerers and black magicians, poets, and snake oil salesmen.
The dirty secret of memetics is this – memetics can and usually does trump genetics.
Those who know this are able to make use of it to their advantage.
Of course, this being the case, lying about it is advantageous – it gives you an edge over the schmucks who truly, fully, believe the biological determinist line.
People are often incapable of seeing subtle matters, by this I am not saying that Biology has no role in influencing human behavior – it clearly does.
By this I mean simply you can make anyone into almost anything, within generous limits, by pushing the right buttons in their minds and souls. Many people make what’s typically a rather self serving assumption; that intellectual and cultural giftedness and talent are exclusively genetic and hereditary.
Nothing can be further from the truth; you can take any population and make them into a race of philosopher poets, mathematician warriors, mercenary rapists, peaceful monks, matriarchal consensual villagers, or anything.
You can do this simply through the power of ideas and language, by inspiring the dreams of peoples, molding what they covet, what their ideas are, what they worship and what they fear. There will always eventually be hard limits, obviously diminutive pygmies and nordic ice giants will face certain physical limitations when it comes to certain activities, these limitations will mold their culture.
Though the only real evidence for genetic causes in population level cognitive capacities is by inference, statistical in nature: and even here the evidence is inconclusive, there has been no genetic smoking gun found, it’s not improbable that some genetic and hereditary influences exist.
For example testosterone levels affect behavior radically, even on very minute levels of variance. So populations with higher or lower average serum testosterone levels (which can be affected by diet possibly climate and traditional modes of living) will probably exhibit significant behavior differences when it comes to matters like impulse control, intercine violence, and so on.
The point, however, is that genetic legacies are heavily affected by culture, diet, customary activities, religious rites regularly or irregularly followed, a host of matters.
The genetics follows the memetics in many important cases. Let’s not be partisan idiots, of course this isn’t an absolute hard and fast rule, but it applies more times than not.
Those often most fervently disagreeing often have agendas of their own and know damn well how activity and thought affects their bodies and minds, and their capacities.
If they didn’t dancers, writers, artists, scientists, and soldiers would not engage in regular exercises to awaken or unlock capacities of their minds and bodies.