Extrasomatic information coded in words, works, and behavioral models

From Contexts of Optimal Growth in Childhood by Mihaly Csikszentmahlyi, Daedulus, Volume 122, No. 1, Winter 1993.

As the importance of cultural values increases, our attitudes about children are bound to become more complex. When only biological evolution is at stake, the issues are quite simple: those individuals whose genes spread relatively more frequently in the succeeding generations are the most "successful." The prolific inherit the earth. But to the degree that culture makes us self-reflective, and the quality of life gains in importance relative to its sheer quantity, reproductive success begins to be defined in terms of the values our children learn, the skills they acquire, the happiness they experience throughout their lives. It is no longer enough to scatter one's genes into the future; it becomes important to project one's meme's as well. Reproductive success is not simply a matter of passing on chemical information coded on chromosomes, but involves transmitting extrasomatic information coded in words, works, and behavioral models.

Here is a slide from one of our TTMD presentations on reading which points out the coincidence of the development of reading and writing with the shift from settled agriculture to mercantile/urbanized economic systems circa 5-6,000 years ago. Csikszentmahlyi's observation would hold similarly true: the shift from settled agriculture to mercantile/urbanized economic systems would also mark some material changes in the nature of culture (capacity to mediate disputes differently arising from close quarters living, increased need for trust, etc.).

These observations together perhaps highlight why readers are so passionate about books and why there is so much energy invested in the quality of books to which children are exposed in schools and libraries. People wish to protect their children from bad literary seeds. Without couching it in extrasomatic terms, there is an instinctive recognition of the existential importance of books.

The fact that we poorly comprehend which values are core contributors to our culture's successes does not diminish the passion with which we seek to defend those values. Reflexive conservativism is not necessarily wrong (if we are successful then some elements of our cultural values must be differentially beneficial) but also not necessarily well informed (because we don't know which of those values make the most difference.)