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From: Wade T.Smith <wade_smith@harvard.edu>
>The scientist needs
>to be, first and foremost, a person without memes. The scientific method
>is a structure designed to mightily eliminate any effects of the observer.
Science may operate outside of memetics, but scientists remain susceptible to
memes.
A completely unbiased and meme-free scientist would surpass all previous
enlightened masters, and would probably be completely ignored.
>Is memetics a scientific method to study culture? IMHO, it should be.
The "should be" meme is powerful. Memetics does not constitute a separate
scientific method, because there is only one scientific method. But memetics
does constitute a practical field of science.
>Because the meme is that mechanism in the mind that goes, "No, no, _this_
>is what I mean, not that."
There may be a particular meme for "No, no, _this_ is what I mean, not that" but
it is not *the* meme. It is only one of many.
>That this sort of explanatory communication can take place unconsciously
>_and_ consciously, well, I accept that. But it is memetic to impart, not
>simply to import.
It is as rhetorical to invoke solipsism as it is to imbue communication with
definitions masquerading as explanations.
Cheers,
--J. R.
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