Society, Social System and Culture

I like it.

I have begun working on this and have once again stuck on the first part where I have to provide some kind of a definition for Free Culture that I can refer to in the rest of the article.

Then I remembered that we already talked about it and search to find this thread. I think what I mentioned in the original post here may still stand. I've actually came up with some kind of a definition in this article alone, before looking for this thread, that I am not yet very satisfied with:

I would define a culture as a set of human behaviors, activities and expressions as part of a process of creating and creations as its outcome.

Well I think this is just another way of saying that culture are social interactions and their outcome. But mentioning specifically things like human behavior, activities and expressions (terms often used in definitions of culture) a question is being posed in my mind if those alone can be seen as part of "culture". I mean, not all human activities result in a creation, right? So do activities that aren't resulting in a creation (but otherwise some other kind of consequence) can this still fit the definition of culture?

I somehow think it does actually because it still roughly fits the description of social interaction, but I'm not sure and since I have you, why not let your opinion in so I don't contemplate on this alone. :-) So, what do you think?

Thanks
Daniel

I'll have a try at a definition.

(1) All thoughts, feelings, learned behaviors and choices not to behave in certain ways, shared by a group (society), but not by all (healthy) individuals.

(2) The products, especially information, of (1).

I think that your definition is on the right track, but I'm not sure about feelings. It's another thing hard to define put in a definition of something that is also hard to define.

Also, what do you mean by "choices not to behave in certain ways" as well as "shared by a group (society), but not by all (healthy)"? I'm a bit confused. :-\

As for the products of it, information definitely is the big part of it, but in my opinion not the biggest. You have functional information which is software and unfunctional information like stories, eps and essays. And you also have non-information content (at least non-directly) such as paintings and music. (Indirectly they may transfer information, but in a whole different way).

I have drafted something and put it in a wiki for review of anyone who is interested in commenting and suggesting changes before it's done.

In case anyone makes a significant contribution to the article he/she will get credit. Sole credit is not what I'm looking for. I just want to get this message out effectively and I want to start with a discussion opening quality article.

So here is the link:

http://www.libervis.com/wiwimod+index.page+FreeCultureSoftware.htm

Don't mind the current title. It can be changed later to something better.

Your definition of information is too narrow. Paintings and music are information too.

choices not to behave in certain ways = moral codes, often put into laws against things, but also things like fasting and abstaining. These are all absences of behaviors.

not shared by all healthy individuals = for example, the ability to walk could be considered a learned behavior, and not everyone can walk, but it would be crazy to consider it part of a culture! Everyone who is healthy can walk...

I see..

Well, I would generally agree with that definition. However I think it could be put a bit simpler so it is simpler to understand.

Does your definition fit the "social interactions and their outcome" form?

Maybe the problem of that general definition is that it would actually include the ability to walk since that is an outcome of social interaction (learning).

What I'm actually looking for is a definition that I can easily put in a context of society and social system and then identify characteristics that it has to have in order to be a free culture.

Not everything that is part of a culture can be called a social interaction, unless you take a really broad definition of social interaction. Maybe it is helpful to split culture into a few things that are easier to define.

A culture consists of:
(1) a system of beliefs, ethics, morality, etc
(2) communication methods, protocols, etc
(3) solutions to common problems (one culture uses knife and fork, the other uses chopsticks, both things are different solutions to the same problem)
(4) aesthetics
(5) more?
(6) the outcomes of all of the above in (inter)action

Now, it's easy to define a free culture:
(1) freedom of thought, freedom of religion, etc
(2) freedom of speech, four freedoms, etc
(3) freedom to do things the way you like to do them, right to privacy
(4) freedom for artists
(5) ???
(6) all of the above, and availability of a (virtual) place to take part in the culture

You're probably right. It seems it's pretty hard to define culture by using just a few words like I'd want to although what you say could maybe be incorporated into a sentence that could make some sense.

However, even if culture cannot be defined as just "social interactions" it seems that (and your definition seems to comply with that) it very much depends on those social interactions even if they themselves aren't wholy part of the culture.

I mean you said:

This interaction ought to be a social interaction. So it is like an enabled that doesn't essentially have to be part of what it enables (heh, like an oxygen enabling fire).

If seen like this, then we can easily still say that a Free Culture is one that has social system set up in such a way to enable those social interactions to happen freely because without them, culture is stiffled.

Seems you helped me get it a bit clearer. :-) What do you think?

Thanks
Daniel

Not only social interactions, although those are probably the most important. An important point to be made is that a culture cannot grow without social interactions, because then nobody can join it or even know about it if they didn't already. That way, a culture will die with those whose culture it is.