From: joedees@bellsouth.net
Date: Mon 30 Jun 2003 - 20:18:26 GMT
From: "Van oost Kenneth"
<kennethvanoost@belgacom.net>
To: <memetics@mmu.ac.uk>
Subject: Re: Encoding:- (was Re: Cultural Imperialism as
Idea & Meme)
Date sent: Mon, 30 Jun 2003 21:47:26 +0200
Send reply to: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
> Joe wrote,
> > If memes ARE the actions, instead of
> > being ENCODED by them, then small action changes should reflect into
> > small memetic changes, and large action changes should translate
> > into large memetic changes. But this is manifestly NOT the case.
> > Speaking, writing, signing and showing, although they are widely
> > divergent performances, can communicate the selfsame meme, while the
> > change of a single gesture, letter, or phoneme can completely alter,
> > and even reverse, the communicated meme.
>
> < It doesn 't matter really if the meaning/ or the communicated memes
> are altered, the writing itself/ the signing/ the showing/ the
> speaking of itself is important, that IS the action ! That is what
> elicit the venue...writing stuff down in a 1000 and more ways, signing
> up, showing stuff, speaking of stuff_ what kind of stuff it is, is of
> no importance to the venue.
>
> But, there are feedback loops within the venue and between venue
> and the individuals within it !
> That is IMO, what you talk about, you talk about the ' what about '_
> this gives meaning and context and evolution of the specific venue and
> thus in the end of culture.
>
> But it is NOT the marker of the action/ performance itself. That is '
> writing stuff down ' _ what/ with what/ who did/ why/ where and how is
> of ' another level of communication '. The marker is the top of the
> pyramid, context and meaning are its building blocks_ a top- down
> process. The evoluion of culture is a ' bottom- up- feedback-to- the-
> venue ' process and this results each time and over and over again
> into an anew parameter of any specific venue at the top, what thus
> results into an anew performance eliciting an anew expected
> performance from its audience ! A question of who is the hare and who
> is the turtle....
>
A person could go to a library to write and be writing a scientific
treatise, a suicide note, a love letter, or a pornographic poem, just as
the same person could do on a sunlit grassy hillside. WHAT is being
written, the MESSAGE that is being ENCODED, is the meme. Once
one learns how to speak or write, and memorizes a sufficient
vocabulary, an indefinite number of memes may be communicated via
the common code. Memetics is an irreduceably SEMANTIC enterprize,
inextricably intertwined with signification. Memes have individual
communicable MEANINGS; otherwise they could not compete with one
another for replication in a cognitive environment, for they would be
indistinguishable.
>
> Regards,
>
> Kenneth
>
>
>
> ===============================================================
> 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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