Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id QAA10224 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Mon, 8 May 2000 16:15:23 +0100 Message-ID: <3916944A.98949465@mediaone.net> Date: Mon, 08 May 2000 11:17:46 +0100 From: Chuck Palson <cpalson@mediaone.net> X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.72 [en] (WinNT; I) X-Accept-Language: en To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk Subject: Re: Central questions of memetics References: <NBBBIIDKHCMGAIPMFFPJIEHOEMAA.richard@brodietech.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
Richard Brodie wrote:
> Chuck Palson wrote:
>
> <<I don't see how positing memes as having a life of their
> own helps out - or could. So if you think so, maybe you can clarify why the
> concept of memes would help.>>
>
> You're not the first to shoot down the philosophical biases of the notable
> writers in the field. Many have taken issue with Blackmore's Buddhist
> leanings (although if you really believe memes spread chiefly because they
> are useful then you should be the first to believe that Buddhism must be
> among the world's most useful ideas, with over 300 million adherents, almost
> a third as useful as the Super Bowl)
Yes -- when you get any belief structure that is widespread, it's because it's
useful. As I keep saying, religions only change as a way to adapt behavior
(really, the body of law that governs behavior) to the new conditions introduced
by the technology or economic arrangements. I know next to nothing about
buddism, so I can't comment on that, but I know that Christianity has changed
through the years (See"The History of God" by Karen Armstrong).
> and Dawkins's anti-religious bias. Both
> Dawkins and Blackmore, however, make some very valuable theoretical points
> in their writings. Dawkins named the meme,for which you can love or hate
> him, and generated good controversy with his essay "viruses of the mind."
Is this readily available on the net?
>
> Blackmore has some very interesting theory about coevolution of the brain
> and culture. Many of the criticisms of her book are answered in my earlier
> book, but if The Meme Machine is your intro to memetics then you may not
> have that advantage.
>
I would appreciate it if you could cut and paste something from that book as an
example of how you answer some of these criticisms.
>
> I appreciate your honesty in the repeated use of "as far as I can see."
That is elementary scientific humility without which science is impossible.
> The
> concept of differential survival of replicators is a difficult and
> unintuitive one. The spread of Darwin's theory has suffered at the hands of
> the "argument from personal incredulity" for 150 years and still does. One
> reason I think memes spread is because they fit in with people's existing
> belief systems.
yes, of course. But carry that further. Give me ANY belief system and I will
show you how it has material consequences. I'm quite serious. Give me anything,
and I'll demonstrate it.
> That's why Grandpa doesn't use the Internet even though it
> might be useful for eliminating repetitive behaviors and so on.
It might be relevant here to say that Granpa DOES use the internet now. Now he
does new repetitive behaviors - like writing e-mails all the time about things
that interest him -- and are useful. The reason Granpa does it is because he has
a lot of time to learn computers now, and it is, after all, useful to
communicate across distances despite what poor Ms. Blackmore feels about it :).
> People have
> been coming to me weekly since Virus of the Mind was published with similar
> questions and arguments (see question #3 in the Memetics FAQ at
> www.memecentral.com/index.htm#FAQ ).
>
I will check this out.
>
> As for journalism being a science, I am not familiar with any scientific
> experiments that have been done in the field and, as would I'm sure many
> other subscribers to this list, would love to hear about them.
Experiments in the lab sense are usually of very limited value for stuff like
this. Studying it from a historical perspective, however, provides natural
experiments. Let's say you are interested in why X event currently exists. Go
back to the moment it appears and look at the ENTIRE context and that will give
you if not the answer immediately, a strong clue. Then you check it out with
other evidence -- like it's differential appearance on the current scene -- and
look again at the context to check out the original hypothesis gained from
looking back at the moment of it's appearance. That can sometimes not work
because it's current meaning may have chnaged to fit new circumstances, but you
can correct for that also by trying to find out where it morphed. History is a
vastly underused source of experiments. It is that way because historians are
charged primarily with establishing the myths that justify current ways of doing
things. But history is in one sense just a series of experiments - some work,
some don't.
In reference to my observation that interviews with well known people are now
entirely scripted by the interviewee, it's quite simple. Try to get someone
famous to interview, and chances are that a lawyer will show up who is a
specialist at setting the terms of the interview - it's a whole field of
specialization. That's fact. It's also a fact that it only came in about ten
years ago. That is around the time when the number of media outlets increased
tremendously, and that's the reason the interviewee can call the tune -- they
can simply go to another outlet if they don't like the terms of the contract.
You can test this out by simply refusing to see the lawyer in charge (or
interview people who have done so). Is that scientific enough for you? I don't
know how or if you could make a lab experiment out of it, but I don't think it's
really necessary because it agrees with a lot that we know about human behavior.
By the way, that is the kind of information you can find in the Columbia
Journalism Review among others AND lots of stuff that comes out of the Annenberg
School.
> When you say
> that the reasons are "well known"---well, so is Santa Claus. That doesn't
> make it science.
I agree. I should have said, well known among reliable observers of the field.
> Having been a journalist myself I judge the field to be
> extraordinarily unscientific.
>
You'de have to explain that with examples. At any rate, I partially agree. There
are journalists and journalists. Most just seek out "the story" with instinct.
Others can tell you the rules and they do exist. I have been tracking the media
for decades now, and I know a lot of the rules because I have tested them over
time.
> ===============================================================
> 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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