RE: Mini case study of memetic mutation

From: Richard Brodie (richard@brodietech.com)
Date: Fri 08 Nov 2002 - 01:05:07 GMT

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    You need to talk about mental information to distinguish memes from other replicators. Memes are those replicators that replicate through the effect they have on our minds, and thereby our behavior.

    Richard Brodie www.memecentral.com

    -----Original Message----- From: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk [mailto:fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk]On Behalf Of Bill Spight Sent: Thursday, November 7, 2002 7:53 AM To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk Subject: Re: Mini case study of memetic mutation

    Dear Richard,

    > So you're saying that all memes are mental information, but not all mental
    > information is an idea?

    Information is another dicey concept. Even in science, it means different things in communaction theory, in physics, and in biology, and there are more than 3 definitions, too. ;-) In a sense, anything that can be described can be said to have mental information. I think we need to be more precise.

    I have held the idea that memes are neither internal nor external, neither mental nor behavioral, but protean, taking on different forms. I am beginning to think that it is better to conceive of memes as structures. According to one sense of information, a structure is information. Then if memes are structures, they are information. I see no need to talk about mental information. :-)

    Best,

    Bill

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    =============================================================== 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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