Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id OAA01137 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Tue, 30 May 2000 14:56:53 +0100 Message-ID: <393381E5.2E285BED@mediaone.net> Date: Tue, 30 May 2000 09:55:02 +0100 From: chuck <cpalson@mediaone.net> X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.72 [en] (WinNT; I) X-Accept-Language: en To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk Subject: Re: Cui bono, Chuck? References: <392D46A0.928A1C7B@mediaone.net> <00052621145200.00626@faichney> <3932DB91.8A7B87F3@mediaone.net> <000f01bfc9e7$8e1914e0$392484d8@default> 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
Anne Hansen wrote:
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "chuck" <cpalson@mediaone.net>
> To: <memetics@mmu.ac.uk>
> Sent: Tuesday, 30 May 2000 5:05
> Subject: Re: Cui bono, Chuck?
>
> >
> >
> > > You are simply repeating what one of your heroes, Richard Dawkins, says
> on the
> > subject. Unfortunately for you, when Dawkins gets into the cultural
> realm, he,
> > simply has no idea what he is talking about because he insists on either
> not
> > examining the actual data available or, if he does, on lying about it.
> >
> > I am dead serious when I say that the man is inexcusably ignorant on the
> subject
> > of culture.
>
> Hi, this has been a interesting discussion, and I appreciate the
> view of Dawkins, even as a lover of his writing.
> I
>
> For example, in The Selfish Gene, he assures us that cultures vary
> > wildly for what he judges to be no valid reasons. He chooses the worst
> examples
> > of anthropological explanations of cultural variation to illustrate his
> point.
> > Then he uses two ethnographic examples to to illustrate the range of such
> > inexplicable variation: the Ik of Uganda and the Arapish of the Pacific.
> If the
> > poor doctor had taken the trouble to actually read Turnbull's work on the
> > former, he would have discovered that their "utter selfishness" is not
> > inexplicable variation in culture, but a result of a years long brutal
> famine, a
> > fact that Turnbull makes abundantly clear and that no one disputes. Did
> Dawkins
> > even bother to read Turnbull first before making his sweeping
> pronouncement?
> > Whether he did or he didn't is not important; he is quite simply a fraud
> on the
> > subject of culture.
> >
> > His use of the Arapish is equally ignorant. The author of the ethnpography
> on
> > the Arapish was Margaret Mead, and it has been proven beyond a doubt and
> > accepted by the entire anthropological community that Mead was lying about
> her
> > data to support her ideological biases (see the work of australian
> > anthropologist Derek Freeman). Although Dawkins can be excused for not
> knowing
> > about this at the time (Freeman's expose was published later), I know of
> no
> > corection ever issued by Dawkins -- evidently because it suits his
> purposes.
> >
> > So Dawkins, the inventor of the meme concept, is by any ordinary measure a
> very
> > poor scholar on the subject of culture, and he has managed to reproduce
> the same
> > poor quality of observation and scholarship in his followers. No wonder he
> > praises Blackmore, a person who claims that fax machines and computer
> operating
> > systems answer no needs -- (in other words, they are "useless"). Ignorance
> > begets ignorance, a common disease propogated on many campuses by
> professors
> > anxious to keep their positions by manufacturing opaque documents based on
> their
> > prejudices. In fact, one might say that the very existence of memetics
> proves
> > that useless memes do exist, a direct contradiction to my notion that
> culture
> > is of practical value. But of course in the perverse culture of academia,
> it has
> > only furthered his reputation in some circles, so it is of practical
> value,
> > albeit perversely so.
>
> Speaking of literature written over the last half century on Culture do
> you know of any good web links (Favourite Authors) on the subject??
> Searches bring up many links but I want sites where I am going to learn
> effectively.
>
> Thanks Anne...
I don't know anything up on the web on the subject, and I doubt if there is. I
suggest that you start by reading the sociologist Max Weber's stuff on the
development of the protestant ethic - in its original. Keep in mind that he was
wrong on one major aspect: he assumes that the protestant ethic came first and
created capitalism. In fact, there was a dialectic relationship between the
developing economy and the emerging protestant ethic. He took his position,
however, specifically to counter the Marxist approach. But from a cultural
perspective, his work is excellent in showing how the culture developing to
accomodate capitalism was a practical effort to develop the conceptual tools
necessary to live in a capitalist society.
>
>
> > Now one would hope that besides reading extensively on scientific method,
> you
> > actually have read the previous literature written over the last half
> century on
> > the subject of culture. After all, a scientist is expected to work with
> data in
> > a field, not just pronounce about principles by which others should work
> with
> > data in the field -- as you seem to prefer to do. It is quite clear from
> your
> > comments that you have so far not seriously studied anything much on the
> subject
> > of culture, so until you have some actual scholarship with which to make
> > pronouncements about culture, you should not mindlessly imitate Dawkins
> > obviously uninformed nonsense on the subject.
> >
> > If, after a few years of absorbing the considerable literature on the
> subject,
> > you still do not understand why "What's of use to you, as an individual,
> is of
> > absolutely no evolutionary significance whatsoever" is another
> Dawkins-like
> > pronouncement, I will be glad to explain it to you. Till then, try not to
> merely
> > imitate Dawkins' poor scholarship, and just do the hard work necessary to
> master
> > a field.
> >
> > >
> > > --
> > > Robin Faichney
> > >
> > > ===============================================================
> > > 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
> >
>
> ===============================================================
> 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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