Discussion Forum—A Way with Words, a fun radio show and podcast about language

Language vs. genes, similarities & differences. The interesting point here is that biological evolution is constrained and relatively predictable. In contrast, cultural evolution has a much wider range of possible variance in the rate of its change. On the one hand, societies can rapidly transform their suite of culture-defining traits in one to two generations (e.g., the conversion of the Roman elite to Christianity in the late 4th century), but on the other hand they can maintain their coherence over long periods of time and not vary from a core template (e.g., the persistence of Jewish identity over 2,500 years).