Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id HAA09373 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Thu, 17 Feb 2000 07:10:40 GMT X-Sender: rrecchia@mail.clarityconnect.com X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Light Version 1.5.2 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk From: Raymond Recchia <rrecchia@mail.clarityconnect.com> Subject: Re: What are memes made of? Date: Thu, 17 Feb 2000 02:09:31 -0500 Message-ID: <1261351125-3263976@smtp.clarityconnect.com> Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
At 09:00 PM 02/15/00 -0600, you wrote:
Joe Dees wrote
>Memes involve intention and signification, and as such are
>restricted to creation/mutation within and transmission/reception
>between self-consciously aware beings. The presence of self-
>conscious awareness a matter of the necessary quantity of
>neurons, axons and synapses being intertwined by sufficient
>complexity to breach the Godelian threshhold and permit self-
>referentiality. We have as of yet failed to find any bird which can
>pass the mirror test (regarding an image of themselves in a mirror
>with an anomalous dab of paint daubed on the nose/beak, and
>touching their own snout rather than the one in the mirror), which
>distinguishes between the understanding that the image is of
>themselves and the erroneous assumption that such a reflected
>image is one of a conspecific (another member of the same
>species) (SOCIAL COGNITION AND THE ACQUISITION OF SELF
>by Lewis and Brooks-Gunn). As of yet, only humans and the great
>apes (gorillas, chimpanzees, orangutans and bonobos) have
>passed such a test.
I'm not sure that all human behaviors I classify as memes would fit this
definition. By way of example I would offer the personal spacing differences
between cultures. In many Islamic countries people stand closer to each other
than people in many Western nations. For most of us personal
spacing is a behavior that we don't even think about and we
wouldn't become aware that it was something that required thinking about
unless we suddenly found ourselves in the midst of the other culture.
Never-the-less personal spacing appears to be a culturally transmitted
behavior. To my thinking personal spacing is a meme. It is something
that can be studied as a self-replicating phenomenon. The bird song
example is similar to the personal spacing example. Both involve
self-replication of behavior or thinking patterns.
Self-awareness could be an important phenomenon in the study of human
memes. There may be a lot that can be said about the differences between memes
that require self-awareness and those that don't. But insisting on
self-awareness strays from Dawkin's central theme of selfish yet unaware
self-replicating entities.
Raymond Recchia
*DISCLAIMER* Lawyer and former mammalian physiologist only.
No philosophy degree. *DISCLAIMER*
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