Culture is a marker of the trajectory of human flight. It encircles the track on which human behavior marks its inception, development and, of course, long-term evolution. And the moment we parachute a human inside the circle, it gets us a culture person. That person invariably shares his mental software with his fellow social beings who happen to be a part of the same culture circle.
So, what does that entail?
It means, more often than not, similar beliefs about the supernatural, similar ideas about the natural and very similar ideas about how to live.
For instance, most people in Kashmir take noon chai. Why? Is this a coincidence? Hardly so!
Similarly, most believe in a nontheistic idea of God. Again, is this a coincidence? Majority have a similar political opinion! Coincidence?
Inferring from the above, it's safe to say that if I have to predict a person I can do that by just having enough information about his cultural moorings, and that should enable me, to a reasonable degree of probability, to know that person, for example how that person is going to react to something.
Now, you might ask, then what about the mystery of the individual man? Does that even exist? Given what we have learnt just now, not necessarily! I mean, of course, people are different among different cultures, but within the circle of a particular culture a human being can be highly predictable.
So what's the point exactly of what has been described above? It is simply that if we aren't mindful we will just be clones of the culture, having no creativity, no individual initiative, and absolutely no differentiation. We are no more than specimens within breeds of cats responding to stimuli, living lives of reactions.
