Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id VAA07347 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Sun, 7 May 2000 21:00:42 +0100 From: "Richard Brodie" <richard@brodietech.com> To: <memetics@mmu.ac.uk> Subject: Central questions of memetics Date: Sun, 7 May 2000 12:58:39 -0700 Message-ID: <NBBBIIDKHCMGAIPMFFPJKEHFEMAA.richard@brodietech.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 (Normal) X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook IMO, Build 9.0.2416 (9.0.2911.0) Importance: Normal X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.00.2919.6600 In-Reply-To: <39157E2C.E0EB3A97@mediaone.net> Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
Chuck Palson wrote:
<<the answers to most of the questions people within memetics ask can be
found in several different fields already - such as linguistics (especially
psycholinguistics), journalism (try Columbia Journalism Review for lots of
interesting and current stuff), literary criticism (some of Kenneth Burke is
interesting for this), and etymology.>>
What do you think the questions of memetics are, and what are the answers
provided by the experimental results in these other fields? I think there is
a lot of theorizing (in memetics too) but very little in the way of
verifiable answers.
I think some of the central questions of memetics are:
- what makes some ideas spread more successfully than others?
- how does culture evolve, given the model of Darwinian selection of memes?
- What methods can we use to shape the future of culture, given what we know
about human psychology and what we learn about packaging ideas so they
spread well?
<<What these fields lack is the desire on the
part of people in memetics to make strong value judgments about the nature
of memes - that they are harmful "viruses". Characterizing memes in this way
appears to me to be value judgments disguised with a veneer of science; I
have never, for example, seen anyone define why these viruses are bad.>>
Memetics is not at all about value judgments. I'm not sure what led you to
that conclusion (reading Internet mailing lists?). Dawkins is notably
anti-religious in his calling religion a "virus of the mind," but in my book
of the same name you should recall that I do explore the possibility that
beneficial mind viruses can be created and give as an example what Werner
Erhard attempted to do with his "Hunger Project" (regardless of whether or
not you believe his underlying intentions were good).
Richard Brodie richard@brodietech.com http://www.memecentral.com
===============================================================
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 archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Sun May 07 2000 - 21:00:56 BST