The term and concept of "culture" has many usages either in the academic environment, business or vernacular settings. I would like to propose a definition by which culture becomes a Social Operating System. You cannot have culture without at least thinking about a group of people. And this Social Operating System (SOS) becomes a framework where interactions are considered, executed, measured, etc. Social interactions can be one of four different basic types: mutualism, altruism, egoism and punishment.
In mutualism, there are at least two subject how benefit from a given interaction. In altruism, one benefits to the expense of the other -who is willing to help-. In egoism, one benefit to the cost of the other -as an imposition-. In punishment, one subject, according to the SOS needs to pay back for some kind of fault.
Culture is built from the biological needs and functioning of the human animal as a "bottom-up process". The basic operations and interactions grow slowly to build "superior" and external representations mainly by the usage of language. When the environment is stable, culture evolves very slowly -to the detriment of liberals and the anxiety of conservatives-. Sometimes the environment changes drastically, and the SOS has to produce a new version (SOS 2.0, for example).
Change has to be measured against a given SOS. There are two types of changes. First, an upgrade. In this kind of change culture evolves within in its visible rules and tends to be well accepted my many. The second type of change is a control process. In this type of change, as a top-down vision of society, someone pretends to impose a new SOS within a group. As people cannot control other people, these type of changes tend to create a lot of social conflict.
Culture is built from the biological needs and functioning of the human animal as a "bottom-up process". The basic operations and interactions grow slowly to build "superior" and external representations mainly by the usage of language. When the environment is stable, culture evolves very slowly -to the detriment of liberals and the anxiety of conservatives-. Sometimes the environment changes drastically, and the SOS has to produce a new version (SOS 2.0, for example).
Change has to be measured against a given SOS. There are two types of changes. First, an upgrade. In this kind of change culture evolves within in its visible rules and tends to be well accepted my many. The second type of change is a control process. In this type of change, as a top-down vision of society, someone pretends to impose a new SOS within a group. As people cannot control other people, these type of changes tend to create a lot of social conflict.
Change needs to be measured, always, against a given SOS. The question is whether people
can understand what this SOS really is (culture, that is)
Mexico City
Rainy season of 2019
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