Re: DS syndrome

From: Scott Chase (ecphoric@hotmail.com)
Date: Wed 21 May 2003 - 22:36:40 GMT

  • Next message: joedees@bellsouth.net: "Re: DS syndrome"

    >From: joedees@bellsouth.net
    >Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
    >To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
    >Subject: Re: DS syndrome
    >Date: Wed, 21 May 2003 12:08:44 -0500
    >
    > >
    > >
    > >
    > >
    > > >From: "Wade T. Smith" <wade.t.smith@verizon.net>
    > > >Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
    > > >To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
    > > >Subject: Re: DS syndrome
    > > >Date: Wed, 21 May 2003 07:30:35 -0400
    > > >
    > > >
    > > >On Wednesday, May 21, 2003, at 01:13 AM, Joe wrote:
    > > >
    > > >>If a person dogmatically insists that 2 + 2 = 5, it is a duty of
    > > >>knowledgeable others, not a fault of theirs, to point out that they
    > > >>really = 4, lest the mathematically deficient believe and spread the
    > > >>fallacious meme. That's the way selection works.
    > > >
    > > >As Richard would be wont to point out, the correctness of a thing in
    > > >no way determines its probability of selection or distribution.
    > > >
    > > You are correct, but probably, in the present context, selected
    > > against.
    > >
    > > When a group has, in general, a predisposing bias in favor of an
    > > alluring concept, they will likely tend to select against criticism of
    > > this concept, regardless of the correctness of their cherished belief.
    > >
    >Here Scott is wrong. Memetics has hopes of being a science.
    >Correctness is indeed selected for in this field, by the Verification
    >Principle and peer review.
    >
    Yet where's the your attempt at incorrectness of the field being selected against via the Popperian falsification principle with its associated process of conjecture and refutation? Sounds more like people seeking to confirm their predisposed biases in favor of the idea versus trying to approach it critically (philosophizing with a hammer) and seeing what remains.

    Has the existence of memes been verified? You'll probably assert that somehow fMRI studies and other imaging techniques verify memes, yet all you wind up doing is embedding your cherished notion of the meme within the garb of legitimate neuroscientific work.

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