pjeby comments on The Meditation on Curiosity - Less Wrong

36 Post author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 06 October 2007 12:26AM

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Comment author: pjeby 03 February 2010 07:33:55PM *  3 points [-]

In fairness, the "left hand" thing has to do with toilet hygiene pre-toilet paper, so at one time it had actual health implications.

That's why I brought it up - it's in the category of "reality-based behavior norms enforcement", which has much greater initial selection pressure (or support) than non-reality-based behavior norms enforcement.

Animals without language are capable of behavioral norms enforcement, even learned norms enforcement. It's not parsimonious to presume that religion-like beliefs would not evolve as a subset of speech-behavior norms enforcement, in turn as a subset of general behavior norms enforcement.

[Edit: removed "enfrorcement" typo]

Comment author: Cyan 03 February 2010 07:47:20PM 0 points [-]

I guess I was just pointing out that it seemed to be in a different category ("reality-based behavior norms enforcement" is as good a name as any) than the other examples.