Some insight here.

I have spent a sizable portion of my time in developing nations.

There are deep rooted cultural differences that sometimes are counterintuitive to westerners.

One of the great strengths of some memetic frameworks is the easy and rapid adoption of processes and technologies that lower effort or raise efficiency.

As a result these cultures are also subject to rapid change on many fronts, and may become unrecognizable in just a few decades. These dynamic cultures thrive in name only, since they are not really the same memetic creature after a scant few generations.

As a note in the margin, the aforementioned, production oriented cultures often have a history of large scale wars, conquest and often colonization. War is a strong filter for valuing efficiency over other considerations.

Other memetic frameworks endure by virtue of valuing tradition and communal experience with past generations. These cultures change slowly, as their value structures resist change. This type of memetic symbiant has other kinds of value to humanity that are not measured in GDP or other economic metrics.

As an example, let me describe a common scenario that I have personally experienced multiple times:

Happening upon a person apparently having difficulty with a task, I show them a “better” way that stems from my cultural experiences. Usually, they are receptive and enthusiastic about the “new” way, which they themselves demonstrate as “better”.

Later, I may happen upon the same person doing the same task, in the “old” way. When I ask them why, they say something along the lines of “because it’s the way my father and his father did it”.

At first, I found this vexing. Now I understand that in these cultures, doing it in the “new” way was a fundamentally distinct action, which removed the meaning from the task. The original method was valued because it was communing with their family and heritage. The new method was effective but lacked a sense of meaning, effectively making it a hollow act in some way that I will probably never understand even though I can see.

Only when productivity is a goal unto itself is “progress” intrinsically valued. Not all cultures value productivity in the same way. In some cultures, being able to do something difficult at high proficiency is much more valued than being able to achieve the same outcome using a different method with much greater productivity.

This is visible in nearly all cultures in sport. Sport is typified by rules that make a trivial task difficult, and useful innovations using technology are typically frowned upon.

The skill of the difficult task is valued for its difficulty, as well as its ties to tradition and the way it is woven into the memetic tapestry.

As an oversimplified and caricatured example: Someone who can harvest a dozen animals in a day with a sling is a great hunter and respected provider. His brother that can do that in half an hour with his 22 rifle is a slacker who doesn’t respect his ancestors or the spirits of the forest.

I’m not trying to say that these cultures are retrograde or immune to progress. Rather they are not perpetually looking for new and better solutions with the same enthusiasm that some people might expect, and the innovators within their communities may encounter a degree of social friction that many people might find counterintuitive.

Adoption of new processes in these cultures often springs up but reverts to its prior state when even a minor friction to continuing adoption is encountered. The benefits often need to meet a surprisingly high bar for an innovation to be sticky.