Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id AAA04511 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Thu, 3 Feb 2000 00:36:43 GMT Message-Id: <200002030035.TAA09051@mail2.lig.bellsouth.net> From: "Joe E. Dees" <joedees@bellsouth.net> To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk Date: Wed, 2 Feb 2000 18:38:29 -0600 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Subject: Re: More on what memes are made of In-reply-to: <00020211181001.00359@faichney> X-mailer: Pegasus Mail for Win32 (v3.12b) Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
From: Robin Faichney <robin@faichney.demon.co.uk>
Organization: Reborn Technology
To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
Subject: Re: More on what memes are made of
Date sent: Wed, 2 Feb 2000 11:05:45 +0000
Send reply to: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
> On Wed, 02 Feb 2000, Joe E. Dees wrote:
> >From: Robin Faichney <robin@faichney.demon.co.uk>
> >
> >> It occurred to me that what I'm trying to say about physical information, genes
> >> and memes could perhaps be made clearer by a little additional explanation on a
> >> particular point.
> >>
> >> Some time ago I came to the conclusion that the trajectory of an arrow, for
> >> instance, is just as real as the arrow itself. The trajectory is not
> >> "substantial", but it is a pattern based in the material world, and if we
> >> examine the arrow as closely as we can, down to the atomic and subatomic
> >> levels, we find that in fact it's not very "substantial" either. We are, due
> >> to evolution, somewhat better equipped to handle arrows than trajectories
> >> (though in fact we're quite amazingly good at dealing with the latter -- watch
> >> any ball game, or better still, play it, while mindful of trajectory plotting). But
> >> that's no reason to view the arrow as "more real".
> >>
> >We're dealing in the macro realm, not the quantum, and therefore
> >zen emptiness and the buddhist doctrine of the absence of inherent
> >reality does not apply.
>
> Any zen teacher who knows little or nothing of QM would find that a *very*
> strange claim. As I do myself, though perhaps for different reasons. If you're
> refering to my examination of the arrow, that's hardly central to the argument.
> From what you say below, you seem to agree that the trajectory is just as real
> as the arrow, which is the point I'm trying to make there. So what's your
> problem?
>
Zen teachers make more than a few strange claims themselves.
You seem to be attempting to lay the groundwork for a
reductionistic substitution of the trajectory alone for the (arrow +
trajectory) system by asserting some sort of arrow unreality; that
won't work. If you deny the word "real" any referent, you deny the
word "unreal" any referent as well, since they are mutually defining
correlative opposite terms; at that point, any mention of either real
or unreal degenerates into meaninglessness, for you will have
deprived both words of any significance. But let us be more
specific; an arrow can exist absent a trajectory, but a trajectory
cannot exist absent an arrow or other object; trajectory is a
(sometimes) property of the arrow, arising from the effect of gravity
and air resistence upon the kinetic energy imparted to the arrow,
something the arrow can do without (the potential energy in an
arrow in a stretched bow does not entail that it is going anywhere
absent release, when potential becomes kinetic). The trajectory is
dependent upon the arrow for its existence, but not the other way
around. All around, it looks like a bad analogy to me.
>
> >> Encoded physical information, as in genes and memes, is much more like the
> >> trajectory, than the arrow. Or think of the relationship between two arrows as
> >> they lie in the quiver, waiting to be used. There is the distance between
> >> them, the direction, and their relative orientation -- one might unfortunately
> >> be head-up, ready to cut the archer's hand as she reaches for it. I see no
> >> reason to view this relationship as any less real than the arrows. Then
> >> consider the way this relationship changes over time as the person at whose
> >> waist it hangs jogs along a forest track from one target to the next. Seems to
> >> me that the relationship has a trajectory that is no less real than any of the
> >> physical objects involved.
> >>
> >Who can separate the dancer from the dance? William Blake
> >Or vice versa? Joe Dees
>
> Are you agreeing here, or disagreeing? Or neither?
>
I'm saying that neither can be separated from the other and perused alone.
An object with different properties will have a different trajectory even when
the same energy is imparted to it.
>
> >> The encoding of genes in DNA is due to the relationship between the DNA
> >> molecule and the remainder of the cell in which it is carried, because it is
> >> due to the interactions between DNA and cellular mechanisms that we get the
> >> "genetically determined" development of the organism. Genes are not simple
> >> physical objects, or parts of one, but elements of the relationships between
> >> these things. Simple physical objects, from the formal stance, embody the
> >> information that is their own description. That information is all we know of
> >> them, though there obviously must be "something out there" on which it is
> >> based. Genes, as *encoded* physical information, are just as real, but are not
> >> simple (unencoded) physical objects. They exist in the relationships between
> >> such things, as these develop over time. And memes are ontologically very
> >> similar, though their "lifecycle" is quite different.
> >>
> >When a map becomes coextensive with the teritory, it ceases to
> >be a map, as it does when it represents the territory not one whit;
> >identity and nonrelationality are the two abstract ideal correlative
> >absolutes which may be asymptotically approached, but never
> >achieved, in any relation. The relations are no less but no more
> >real than the relata (the things related), and neither is reduceable
> >(reductionable?) to the other without distortion and destruction.
>
> You seem to be agreeing with me here, but I'm not sure. Maybe you just prefer
> fancier language than I do. In verbiage veritas?
>
Philosophical language is very specific, refusing to sacrifice
precision for either concision or simplicity. I suggested that you
read Fred Dretske"s KNOWLEDGE AND THE FLOW OF
INFORMATION, a suggestion that you dismissed out of hand and
book unperused in the least. Do not blame me for your lack of
understanding of even the proper and established terms in which to
frame such a discussion, or your interlociters for being more than a
little confused by your own idiosyncratic definitions.
>
> >> Hope that helps! I'll think about incorporating it, or something to the same
> >> effect, in the essay. (And I hope it gives the lie to accusations of
> >> reductionism.)
> >>
> >See above.
>
> See above.
>
I did, but I do not think you did.
> --
> Robin Faichney
>
>
> This was distributed via the memetics list associated with the
> Journal of Memetics - Evolutionary Models of Information Transmission
> For information about the journal and the list (e.g. unsubscribing)
> see: http://www.cpm.mmu.ac.uk/jom-emit
>
>
===============================================================
This was distributed via the memetics list associated with the
Journal of Memetics - Evolutionary Models of Information Transmission
For information about the journal and the list (e.g. unsubscribing)
see: http://www.cpm.mmu.ac.uk/jom-emit
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