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COMMENT BOOKS & ARTS

NE UROSCIENCE

The messy biological basis of culture


Adrian Woolfson heralds Antonio Damasio’s bold argument that emotions define us.

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n attempts to define what makes us the human “cultural mind”, such as social

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uniquely human, emotions and feelings behaviour and cooperation, back to the non-
are often marginalized. These deeply human biology of unicellular organisms
ingrained, often irrational aspects of our present at the inception of life. Bacteria
behaviour seem destined to be the poor do not sit up at night to contemplate the
cousins of the rational cognitive functions nature of their existence, and are unable to
that enable the formulation of mathematical calculate the trajectories of distant planets.
theorems or operatic scores. In his bold and Nevertheless, they are in full command of an
important book The Strange Order of Things, impressive repertoire of social behaviours.
neuroscientist Antonio Damasio argues that For example, when nutrients are scarce,
in underestimating the contributions of such bacteria eschew their hermit-like lives and
‘lower-level’ brain phenomena to ‘higher- clump together. They can also align into
level’ cognitive functions, science might defensive palisades that can confer resistance
have been missing out on some important to antibiotics.
biology. Similarly, neuroscience’s emphasis Some of these genetically specified
on the origins of language as a shaper of cul- collective behaviours, Damasio argues, may
ture might have eclipsed the role of feelings. be perceived as the precursors of “moral
Damasio suggests that our hard-wired attitude”. For instance, bacteria are able
drives, urges, compulsions, impulses and to identify kin through the nature of the
automatic responses, such as hunger, molecules they synthesize, and seem to
desire and pain, originate from “subjec- snub “cheaters” that breach social norms.
tive experiences of the momentary state of According to Damasio, such behaviours,
homeo­stasis” — that is, the body’s routine, which provide a basis for social group
humdrum regulation of its visceral function. formation and the emergence of coopera-
He argues that there is an organic dialogue Streptomyces coelicoflavus bacteria (false colour). tive behaviours, formed the basis for primi-
between this biological process and the tive cognition that was later elaborated to
feelings that arise from our continuous scru- tissues in the body contribute incrementally generate conscious minds.
tiny of it. That diverse penumbra of feelings to the mind’s function. Damasio’s vision offers Although compelling and refreshingly
and impulses, in turn, continuously infuses a new and specific incarnation of the thesis of original, Damasio’s thesis would have
conscious thought and, ultimately, drives unified body and mind. benefited from a more detailed exposition
human behaviour. The implications are fascinating. They of the scientific evidence supporting his
Human nature is thus distilled from a suggest, for example, that organisms without assertions. The lack of substantial discussion
delicate and protracted negotiation between complex neural structures might possess of supporting literature is a significant
the beating drums of instinct, shaped by feelings, and even rudimentary minds. weakness. As a result, the text reads more
core biological functions, and the attempts Damasio, incidentally, dates the origin of like a nineteenth-century philosophical
of conscious minds to negotiate culturally feelings to the emergence of the first nerv- treatise than a contemporary study.
appropriate outcomes of its mandates. These ous systems, around 600 million years ago. Still, The Strange Order of Things addresses
negotiations are prone to failure, causing And at a time when artificial intelli- several important questions. One of the more
dissonance. Damasio theorizes that this gence and machine learning are rapidly compelling consequences of Damasio’s
generates the profusion of contradictions advancing and seem poised to disrupt organic linkage of mental processes to the
that both define humans as a species and human hegemony, Damasio robustly chal- properties of biological hardware is that
emerge in our cultural artefacts — from the lenges a belief cherished by transhumanists, tinkering — such as the use of artificial
first stone tools to the Taj Mahal. who aspire to augment human capacities amino acids and other synthetic-biology
Damasio, by unseat- artificially. That belief is that the myriad technologies — might have unforeseen con-
ing the mind from its aspects of human nature can be captured in sequences. Indeed, if Damasio is correct, the
elevated throne within their entirety and formalized in the notation precise nature of the substrate that facilitates
the brain, delivers an of substrate-independent algorithms. the performance of biological ‘computing
onslaught on one of A computer program such as Google’s machines’ will crucially determine their
the core dogmas of AlphaZero can currently master the total- ability to generate mental phenomena. We
conventional neuro- ity of chess history in around four hours: certainly couldn’t expect putative extraterres-
science. In his view, the time it takes, approximately, to drive trial life forms, which might have evolved by
mind is distributed — from New York City to Washington DC. way of unfamiliar biological chemistries and
for instance, to distant But, if Damasio is correct, a computer lack- structures, to experience feelings and mental
anatomical regions The Strange Order ing the benefits of biological hardware will processes in the same way that we do. ■
such as the peripheral of Things: Life,
Feeling, and the
never experience the subjective sensation
neural networks that Making of Cultures of satisfaction that accompanies a human Adrian Woolfson is the author of Life
control organ func- ANTONIO DAMASIO grandmaster’s victory. Without Genes.
tion. Thus, different Pantheon: 2018. Damasio traces core components of e-mail: adrianwoolfson@yahoo.com

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