Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id TAA16272 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Fri, 19 May 2000 19:58:02 +0100 Message-ID: <000b01bfc1c7$adb47240$d801bed4@default> From: "Kenneth Van Oost" <Kenneth.Van.Oost@village.uunet.be> To: "memetics" <memetics@mmu.ac.uk> References: <Pine.OSF.4.21.0005141147410.4070-100000@holmes.umd.edu> Subject: Re: Central questions of memetics / Lawrence 1 Date: Fri, 19 May 2000 21:19:46 +0200 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 5.00.2314.1300 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.00.2314.1300 Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
----- Original Message -----
From: Lawrence H. de Bivort <debivort@umd5.umd.edu>
To: <memetics@mmu.ac.uk>
Sent: Sunday, May 14, 2000 5:50 PM
Subject: Re: Central questions of memetics
> On Sat, 13 May 2000, Kenneth Van Oost wrote:
>
> >I am maybe rightly just an individualist because there were far too few
> >words
> >said to point my place as a subject. My parents died when I was a young
> >boy, therefor many words which must have been spoken out to build up my
> >identity have been lost. I' ve developped over against the world I live
in
> >an insufficient " identity ". Sock colour is of no importance to me, I
>
> Do you think this lack of parentally-given identity leaves you without a
> sufficient sense of identity, or has it allowed you to create a strong
> identity that now provides you with more relevance to the world than you
> would have had from a parentally-given identity? Or?
>
> Can a person create their own memes for themselves, if their meme-space is
> not filled by others?
<< Lawrence, here are the answers. Hope they were worth waiting for !
First, the lack of parentally-given identity leaves me as far as I know,
not with an unsufficient sense of identity, I know who I am !
But, I do experience the ' feeling ' that I have to do more than others.
People with parents had models to go by with, they had opportunities
to imitate, I had less examples. I had to find my way by trying and
error, and by doing so, what really worked for me, I kept !
Still now, my wife says to me that I am a very headstrong, but the
more I think about, the more it seems to me, that the way I do things
is just ' my ' way to accomplish things. In that sense I have a very
sufficient sense of identity, I am not saying that I have a true identity,
but I think the one I have is more ' mine '.
Let me explain.
When my parents died, memes of puberty were in an instant wiped
out by memes of adulthood. Over night, the whole environment in
which memes of puberty propagated themselves was changed,
memes of adulthood had to ' react ' quickly, not simply mutate
or transform themselves, but fast without precedence.
I had at that time no real models, that is I had no understanding
what an adult life really was, so my mind in order to let survive
the organism, provided me with some understanding, that is
what the mind knew best and to my opinion that is ' instinct '.
In that respect, I don't think Darwinian evolution can't really
help me here answering my questions, she's to slow !
I do possess characteristics of my parents, anyway people say
that, genetically anyway, but I think I have more of them memetically.
In order to survive, my mind had to drop back on epigenetic rules/
on semantic impresses which are maybe tied down to the fact I
belong to the humanspecies in general, that is I plunge myself into
the collective conscience in order to retrieve models in order to
survive, but I don't buy that easily. I was a kid, my mind had to ' react '
very fast, the most nearby source of information were the slumbering
memes of what I memetically inherited from my parents. (That is why
I find the question of the neurological representations very important.)
To conclude this first part, I think that the Lamarckian evolution, that
is the inheritage of aquired characteristics is more appropriate here.
I think, to state my opinion she has nothing to do with the genotype
but all with the mind.
How !? Well, I strongly believe that we inherit not only our parents
their genes but also, partly their thoughts_ that is in a sense what they
believed in, their morality, their ethics.
In that respect, parts of my parentally-given identity build up were lost,
but somehow I ' knew ' that I have to stay out of trouble. I have lost
somehow the protection of the group I belonged to, but I have build up
my own protection against the hazzards of life.
That is, the day my parents died, not only mine environment changed,
but also the perspective wherein the outside world saw me. I was, for
the meme-sake a dropout:- the lineage of the social memeplex of child,
young boy, young man, become engaged, marriage, children,...was
broken down in an instant.
What came in its place, is partly ' instinct ' ,that is what I in a
Lamarckian
way, then memetically inherited from my parents and partly the result of
trying and error.
Still now, I don't want anyone or anything to represent me, I know what
is best for me, if I am wrong, it is my fault, I live by the rules of
self-res-
ponsibility and what I call ' a laboriously indifference ' towards today
problems which people seems to have.
Lawrence, don't hesitate to write back. Some parts may be unclear, or
need more focus...
We will have that concersation.
End of part one.
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