From: Wade T. Smith (wade.t.smith@verizon.net)
Date: Wed 12 Mar 2003 - 05:58:45 GMT
On Tuesday, March 11, 2003, at 10:33 PM, Keith wrote:
> Memes in brains are memory. My vivid recollections of Yosemite
> National
> Park are memory too, but not a meme. Why? Because I can't pass on a
> memory of this class in a meaningful way. Now, my memory of how to
> make
> and use a David and Goliath sling are memes. Why? Because I can
> teach a
> ten year old how to make and use a sling. It is a minor part of our
> culture passed on to a relatively small number of the next
> generation. (Because you have to be out in the country to deal with
> the
> wild rocks when kids are learning and most kids are city dwellers now.)
Keith, I know you don't want to converse with me, but, honestly, this
paragraph of yours is as clear an example as I've ever seen of the
performance model in action and in decision and in definition.
Things that cannot be performed are not memes, as _you say_ in your
fourth sentence. All you have to do is get that damn word 'meme' out of
the brain and put it in the world, where you've _just said_ it is, and
all will be wild rocks in the city.
Your use of 'pass on' is quite simply a weak and unwilling way of
saying 'perform', but, honestly, what an audience perceives is never
total, and there is nothing getting 'passed on', there are only
performances that might be somehow apprehended and somehow remembered
and possibly used in another performance.
Memories and performances are connected, but separate, as your
paragraph clearly states.
- Wade
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