3 ms·
One of my theories is that this (or similar virus-like mechanism) is how some memories are transferred to offspring. The reasons are: * Prodigies which happen
by tokipin 6y ago
One of my theories is that this (or similar virus-like mechanism) is how some memories are transferred to offspring. The reasons are:
* Prodigies which happen to be good in a field related to what their parents are good at. Often the wording used indicates a memory-like reason. For example, finding the rules of chess "familiar."
* Embeddings in machine learning, which allow encoding of high-dimensional information in a low-dimensional space. This would imply that humans have a somewhat-shared embedding space at some "layers". It's interesting to wonder how similar this space would be across various animals, as it would effectively be an evolved language.
* Other more subtle things, like the "cultural memory" of a society.
One question would be what types of time scales these memories survive across. Maybe some forms of instinct are deep memories that have been directly encoded in DNA.
- plutonorm 6y agoI had to scroll a long way for an intelligent contribution! https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/prehistoric-viruses-and-the-function-of-the-brain/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/prehistoric-virus... I also wonder if and to what extent this information can transfer between individuals? I'm reminded of the Jungian collective unconscious. You're going to think I'm a kook now, but, there's also a panspermia angle on this. Big ifs here, but. If panspermia is true. If evolution on earth is tied to evolution of life in the wider universe via transfer of genetic material. Then it could be possible that the code in which memories (or a learned manifold, encoding useful generalisation) are encoded is compatible with life here today. You could conceivably get not just morphological/physiological changes in terrestrial organisms through viral horizontal gene transfer, but also transfer of cognitive strategy via the same mechanism. X-files kinda stuff. All kind of unlikely, but an interesting possibility.
- type0 6y agoBut that would imply that evolution was "directed", which I think is proven that it's not. The role of viruses in evolution is almost mainstream now, it is much more likely that virus was just a method for ancient extinct organisms to exchange genes, sort of proto-sex, and not anything else outlandish.
- plutonorm 6y agoWhy would it imply that? > The role of viruses in evolution is almost mainstream now, it is much more likely that virus was just a method for ancient extinct organisms to exchange genes Of course it is. You seem to be arguing with a straw man.
- eightails 6y ago> Prodigies which happen to be good in a field related to what their parents are good at. Often the wording used indicates a memory-like reason. For example, finding the rules of chess "familiar." I think this could be equally well explained through 'nurture' rather than 'nature'. If a child's parents are skilled at chess and play it often, the child is going to be exposed to it at a much earlier age and for more often than a child of non-chess-players, making it more 'familiar' and 'intuitive'. To be honest I'm not super familiar with the research in this area but my sense was that there's some amount of experimental evidence for both genetic and environmental factors playing a part together, rather than just one or the other. It's very interesting though -- might have to go do some reading.
- dannyw 6y agoIt would be interesting to see whether this kind of relationship has been seen where parents were separated (eg died).