Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id MAA10058 (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 12:40:25 GMT Subject: Re: What are memes made of? Date: Thu, 17 Feb 2000 07:39:13 -0500 x-sender: wsmith1@camail2.harvard.edu x-mailer: Claris Emailer 2.0v3, Claritas Est Veritas From: "Wade T.Smith" <wade_smith@harvard.edu> To: "Memetics Discussion List" <memetics@mmu.ac.uk> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" Message-ID: <20000217124452.AAA6651@camail2.harvard.edu@[205.240.180.155]> Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
Raymond Recchia made this comment not too long ago --
>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.
And such insistence begins to beg it's own non-parsimoniousness, perhaps,
especially if, (as I agree with the contention), cultural evolution is
only the perceived and thus pattern-inflicted result of a process, that
it is in all ways a behavioral adaptation, and that a 'meme' that
requires a 'difference' between entities that need self-awareness and
those that don't is no thing at all, but a catagory of behavioral states,
and, um, possibly somewhat useless to either discover or study, like
Dennett's incorrect calculator- the algorithm that didn't work, and thus,
while part of evolution, is not available at this point for us to study
at all.
- Wade
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