Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id LAA08429 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Wed, 7 Jun 2000 11:28:57 +0100 Message-ID: <2D1C159B783DD211808A006008062D31017458B2@inchna.stir.ac.uk> From: Vincent Campbell <v.p.campbell@stir.ac.uk> To: "'memetics@mmu.ac.uk'" <memetics@mmu.ac.uk> Subject: RE: Criticisms of Blackmore's approach Date: Wed, 7 Jun 2000 11:26:53 +0100 X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2650.21) Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
I do think there's a problem with focusing solely on behavioural imitation,
particularly when in the contemporary environment so much of our information
comes to us in ways which do not, generally, invite imitation.
We have ideas, for example, of things like the 'couch potato', where
excessive media exposure leads to a near vegatative state, or of being
explicitly told by programmes 'do not try this at home' (e.g. Guiness World
Records, Wrestling, and I have a particular memory of Patrick Duffy as a man
who could breathe underwater in 'The Man From Atlantis'). Now all of these
warnings imply that people are likely to copy what they see- particularly
children (although research shows that kids aren't as gullible as many like
to think e.g. David Buckingham's work), but how often does it actually
happen?
When kids 'copy' behaviours they do so in the same way that they copy adult
behaviours they observe- generally as a form of play. Of course, this is
still imitation, but a particular form of it.
Indeed, even when cases emerge of people apparently copying films or TV
shows or whatever, outside of the censorship lobby, people normally assume
some inadequacy on the part of that person. The murderer who copies a
horror film isn't, again except by the censorship lobby, usually regarded as
having been a person of perfectly sound mind before exposure to whatever
supposedly triggered tehir behaviour. Note here also that when people use
religious texts, like the Bible, to explain their crimes they are normally
dismissed as psychotic, but swap the new testament for Abel Ferrara or
Tarantion films and suddenly it's the media's fault.
Such cases though are a miniscule fraction of the audience exposed to media
content which most of us, most of the time don't imitate in any behavioural
manner (in a direct sense). I think we need to include the notion of the
ideational element of memes, that memes aren't only about behaviours that
are spread through populations, but ideas/concepts/beliefs. Here imitation
isn't the core factor but reproduction, as in 'Did you see that awful racist
on Ricki Lake denying that the Holocaust happened?', hence holocaust denial,
as a concept, spreads, despite most of its carriers being contemptuous of
the concept.
Sure, when you're talking about interpersonal communication, imitation is a
core factor, but it doesn't seem IMHO to be appropriate in the media
context.
Vincent
> ----------
> From: Robin Faichney
> Reply To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
> Sent: Tuesday, June 6, 2000 6:36 pm
> To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
> Subject: Re: Criticisms of Blackmore's approach
>
> On Tue, 06 Jun 2000, Diana Stevenson wrote:
> >Recently Richard Brodie wrote:
> >
> ><<Beyond that, imitation is only a small part of memetics, one that
> >Blackmore
> >focuses on and has been criticized for. I think many of the interesting
> ways
> >memes spread cannot be classified as imitation, but rather teaching and
> >learning or even unwitting conditioning.>
> >
> >Does anyone on the list know of any published criticism of Blackmore's
> focus
> >on imitation only, or any idea of where in the list archives I can find
> this
> >discussion? It would be useful for me to have some sources for this.
>
> Can't help there. It's the first I've heard of such criticism. But I'll
> take
> this opportunity to reply to Richard's point, as I missed it first time
> around,
> and I'm one of those who emphasise imitation.
>
> I don't think anyone is saying that memes only spread by actual imitation
> of
> behaviour, but imitation is very important, because it is so basic.
>
> What we are talking about is the replication of behavioural patterns, or
> of
> their counterparts in the brain, depending on which of the two main
> schools
> of memetics you belong to. Because, as yet, the only actual evidence we
> have for brain-stored patterns is in behaviour, that's what we have to
> look
> at, either way. I don't see how anyone could argue with the fact that
> direct imitation of actual behaviour is the most direct way in which a
> meme
> could replicate. One person does something, another observes, and then
> does the same thing, though they'd never done it before. What could be
> more simple? Absolutely nothing. So: imitation is the most direct means
> of memetic transmission.
>
> So what are the other means? I'd suggest, all the ways we communicate
> with each other, from speech and writing to the fine arts. And sure, much
> more memetic transmission happens through these channels these days than
> via direct imitation. But: how did these channels get up-and-running?
> This
> is a boot-strapping question: how do people learn to communicate in these
> relatively sophisticated ways, if not from other people? Of course, they
> *do* learn from other people, but via less sophisticated channels, and the
> least sophisticated of all, upon which all others are based, is simple
> imitation. It's so basic, even premature babies do it! (According to
> studies
> the details of which I don't have to hand just now.)
>
> That's why it's hardly possible to over-emphasise imitation in memetics.
>
> --
> 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
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