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The Cognitive Closure of Civilizations

  • Is an age defined by the questions it asks or by the answers it provides?
  • Intelligence is measured by the questions you ask not by the answers you find.
  • Answers to most questions are trivial. A civilization/age may never find the answer to a question because it is not capable of looking in the right place.
  • This cognitive closure defines the limits of what a mind can understand (of the questions it can answer).
  • There is also a cognitive closure for civilizations: there is a limit to what a civilization can know.
  • The set of all answerable questions constitutes the cognitive closure of a civilization/age. For example, ancient civilizations believed in fate.
  • Every civilization/age interprets a new idea in its own way. The same concept can turn into very different memes in different places at different times.
Proof-edited by Alexander Altaras