In nature, change is automatic. Charles Darwin’s theory of natural selection explained how species adapt without intention.

Random genetic mutations create variation, and the environment filters out the unfit. Over long periods, life improves itself simply because weaker traits die off.

Psychologist Liane Gabora from the University of British Columbia says culture does not work this way. Writing in Psychology Today she says: “Culture does not face the problem Darwin’s theory of natural selection was designed to solve.”

Darwin’s problem was clear. In biology, traits gained during life are not inherited. A giraffe cannot stretch its neck and pass that length to its offspring. Culture is different because it freely shares acquired traits.

As Gabora notes: “If someone invents a better way to make a pot, that improvement spreads immediately.” The first potter who attached a handle to a cup made that handle available to everyone. There is no waiting for generations of natural selection to spread it.

She also explains that living organisms have a genetic instruction system that replicates itself. Culture has no such mechanism. “Cultural change is guided not by a self-replicating code but by memory, creativity, and communication,” Gabora writes. Ideas live only because people remember, share, and choose them.

This means culture is not self-correcting. Harmful ideas can survive for centuries, while useful ones can be forgotten. Social progress, therefore, cannot be left to time or chance. It requires conscious judgment and collective decision-making.