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Conformist Thinking Can Doom Civilization

Submitted by LiveScience Staff

posted: 25 June 2009 05:49 pm ET

Conformist thinking may cause the demise of societies and cultures, a couple of big thinkers say. By emulating and imitating the majority, innovation is stifled, the thinking goes.

Researchers Hal Whitehead and Pete Richerson argue that while learning from others can propel a culture (why invent what you can steal), too much of that approach can spell doom.

Other researchers have argued similarly, writes Dan Jones at Nature.com. But what sets the idea of Whitehead and Richerson apart is the notion that big change, such as a rapid shift in climate, is when nonconformist thinking is most needed. The Maya around the 8th century and Norse settlers in Greenland a millennia ago are examples, they say.

View Web Link Read full story at Nature

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