Quote: I'm not going to get into discussions about whether Bloom's ideas are "hard science" or not, because to me the ideas are just explorations of something that is true (that the transition from genes to memes makes cultures in some ways analogous to organisms) and whether any one branc...

In the December, 2002 "New Scientist" magazine there is a review of a new book by James Trefil, Weidenfeld and Nicholson, titled Cassell's Laws of Nature. Roy Herbert's review ends with the following paragraph: A bonus is that he has taken time to add an introduction on science and the sci...

I know I've been one of the "negative sounders", but in fact, I did get a lot out of the book. Lucifer Principle has become a great anchor for discussing cultural issues. From another forum:Quote:Bloom points out that charity is such an insult to some cultures, that in some it requires the...

Quote:I could easily come up with a slightly moderated version of "The Lucifer Principle" which I would be prepared to assent to (e.g. that most people are capable in the right social context of extreme violence, and this could reasonably be said to be an enduring innate human characterist...

I'm about half-way through "At Home" and still excited by it. The approach reminds me in principle of the clarity that Dawkins brought to evolutionary theory with the concept of the extended phenotype and selfish gene. Of course genes do what they do and bodies do what they do, and factual...

You bet your bippy!

Quote:If you think that no serious scientist is dogmatic then you really do have something to learn from Bloom.I don't deny that I have a LOT to learn from Bloom. However, the slur I objected to was not direct to one scientist, or academic institution, but against the entire active, vibrant, growing...

Quote:"The Group Selection Squad" whose efforts precipitated radical re-evaluations of neo-Darwinist dogma See, this is the shit that destroys Bloom's credibility for me. Dogma? Dogma is not an appropriate term to use nor brush to paint the serious scientists helping us understand our worl...

Bloom devotes a chapter to the way Arab children are raised, and the possible correlation between their child rearing practices and adult violence. Michael Thompson, co-author of Raising Cain: Protecting the Emotional Life of Boys (details in "recommendations" section) and Best Friends, Wo...

The Complexity of CooperationAxelrod, The Evolution of Cooperation, is another outstanding work that illuminates much of the world around us. A series of contests were run, with computer programs playing "Prisoners' Dilemma" against one another. Prisoners' Dilemma, for anyone unfamiliar wi...