Re:The surprising anthropology of group identity
by thaumasiotes on Friday May 25, 2018 @07:03PM
(#17158866)
> You could have quite elaborate and effective medical procedures, for example, and no one has a clue how they work.
This isn't a hypothetical; it is the norm for humans. Most obviously, traditional methods of food preparation often coincidentally ensure that the food is digestible and not poisonous, where the most obvious way of preparing the food would be missing one or both of those properties.
Re:The surprising anthropology of group identity
by ASalazarMX on Friday May 25, 2018 @07:58PM
(#17159180)
> Whereas chimps will usually only copy something if they completely see how doing that action will produce this desirable outcome, human infants will copy whole sequences of actions even though they haven’t a clue what the value is of the thing that they’re copying.
Might be because human children are better at socializing. http://sciencenetlinks.com/science-news/science-updates/apes...
Re:The surprising anthropology of group identity
by oceanghost on Friday May 25, 2018 @07:22PM
(#17158981)
Google Cargo Cults.
You could have quite elaborate and effective medical procedures, for example, and no one has a clue how they work. It could be that rituals also become widespread as a byproduct. If we’re the kind of species that will copy all kinds of causally opaque behaviors, then that would help explain why we get the profusion of ritual behaviors as well as instrumental behaviors that we don’t understand.
Seems like a profound observation.