From: joedees@bellsouth.net
Date: Mon 02 Jun 2003 - 08:09:02 GMT
From: joedees@bellsouth.net
To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk, fmb-
majordomo@mmu.ac.uk
Date sent: Mon, 2 Jun 2003 02:55:57 -0500
Subject: Re: _Religion Explained_ by Pascal Boyer
Send reply to: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
> > At 05:29 PM 01/06/03 -0700, you wrote:
> > > > From: Gudmundur Ingi Markusson <gudmundurim@yahoo.com>
> > > >
> > > > As Boyer is very interested in the transmission of concepts,
> > > > esp.
> > >religious concepts, his ideas are certainly relevant to memetics.
> > >Nevertheless, note how he introduces memes only to dismiss them
> > >shortly afterwards. He does that with reference to Dan Sperber, on
> > >not dissimilar grounds as Sperber himself does in "Darwinizing
> > >Culture" (Aunger ed. 2000); in brief, concepts are not replicated
> > >but recreated.
> > > >
> > > > gudmundur
> > >
> > >To understand a concept is indeed to recreate it in our minds.
> > >This is how ordinary discourse operates. You say something on your
> > >mind, and in the process of understanding it, I recreate the
> > >concept in my mind. Memetics is the study of those concepts (or
> > >behaviors, etc.) that *don't* depend on understanding to jump from
> > >mind to mind.
> >
> > For the life of me can't see why you warp the extremely simple
> > definition of a meme (element of culture, replicating information)
> > into such a twisted shape.
> >
> > I don't mind a bit if you want to split up memes into sub classes
> > some of which don't require understanding because that is certainly
> > true. Take Jabberwocky as an example. Lots and lots of people learn
> > the poem without having the slightest understanding of why they
> > should shun The frumious Bandersnatch.
> >
> > http://www.jabberwocky.com/carroll/jabber/jabberwocky.html
> >
> > Does that make Jaberwocky a meme where Sam Magee
> >
> > http://members.aol.com/pokey271/camp/campfires/mcgee.html
> >
> > is not? Neither one of them is plausible.
> >
> > >If you're a Scientologist, you
> > >believe L. Ron Hubbard is a deity, not because it's reasonable and
> > >you've come to understand it, but because everyone you hang out
> > >with believes it, and you swallow the concept whole, so to speak,
> > >rather than breaking it down and reconstructing it according to
> > >reason.
> > >
> > >There is a place for replication, but it's limited. We cannot
> > >claim that all concepts are memes.
> >
> > Certainly not. Just the ones that are copied from mind to
> > mind. Successful memes exist in a lot of minds.
> >
> > To give another example, some people understand the rule for
> > multiplying by nine as multiplying by (10 - 1) Others just apply
> > the rule of one less than the number being multiplied by nine and
> > the sum of the two digits adding up to nine. Is this a meme in
> > people who don't understand and not a meme in people who do
> > understand why it works? In a person who does not understand the
> > rule, and figures it out, is the method no longer a meme?
> >
> > Keith Henson
> >
> I think that we can properly consider widely distributed laws, rules,
> maxims, slogans, parables, fables, analogues, metaphors, similes,
> hermeneutics, paradigms, theories, formulas, parameters, schematics,
> blueprints, designs, definitions, heueristics, and other more or less
> formal holistic representations/characterizations or analytic rules of
> thumb, that is, those abstractions that are more specific or more
> general than readily perceived concrete reality, to be memes or memeplexes > > >
> =============================================================== > 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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