> an article by Richard Lewontin in which
> Lewontin declares that "the tb bacillus does NOT cause TB - i.e., that
> it 'causes' tb only under specific social conditios. TB then, as Miles
> says of blue eyes, is an emergent property.
The day I start arguing with Dick Lewontin will never arrive, I hope. The guy is a giant. I'm with him on TB; I don't know about blue eyes, but then I am not a geneticist, and don't even play one on TV.
The TB parallel with language probably isn't a bad one. I suspect -- without any evidence at all -- that language (like TB) wouldn't have emerged, and couldn't be sustained, without a certain social basis.
But TB also requires the bacillus, right? And language in our sense may require some rather specific anatomy too.
> I still think that Miles and Michael Smith should explore ways at
> arriving at some sort of shared formulation of their argument on this
> genenral issue.
Oh I don't think we're a million miles apart. I do think we're coming at it from different angles.
As for "emergent property", I have no idea what that means; have never been able to figure it out; and if I've ever used the term, I was so drunk I don't remember.
--
Michael Smith mjs at smithbowen.net http://stopmebeforeivoteagain.org