From: Scott Chase (ecphoric@hotmail.com)
Date: Mon 08 Sep 2003 - 23:56:32 GMT
>From: Jeff Drabble <jedra@inhb.co.nz>
>Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
>To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
>Subject: Re: I find it sad yet hilarious...
>Date: Tue, 09 Sep 2003 10:22:14 +1200
>
>On Mon, 8 Sep 2003 14:32:57 -0700, you:
>
> >
> >I joined this mailing list about a week ago, hoping to first listen in on
> >and then eventually join in discussions surrounding the concept of memes
>and
> >the development on memetics. My problem with your posts is not the
>politics
> >of them, but the vague and undeveloped ways in which you relate your
> >interpretation of current issues to memetics. You do use words like
> >"memebot" and "memeplex" in some of your posts, and while I think new
> >vocabulary is super-fun, I also think you should at very least spend some
> >time with each of your posts relating what makes it relevant to this
>mailing
> >list. The concept that ideas spread is not new to memetics, and if people
> >post every article which contains in it something about the spread of a
> >particular idea or the development of an idea, or the definition of an
>idea,
> >etc., then this list will be innundated with links to articles and peices
>of
> >articles.
>
>I also subscribed about a week ago and was about to unsubscribe for
>these very reasons. I often look forward to a television show coming
>that purports to further our understanding of some scientific issue
>and am usually very disappointed by the hollow, surface-scratching,
>results-rather-than-causes presentations which emerge (doesn't stop me
>watching in hope for the odd gem, though).
>
>As I started to read what was posted to this list I was rapidly
>getting the feeling that the same thing was happening here. I'll now
>stay a little longer to see what emerges. So far, people just seem to
>be taking positions, which, to me, is as far as you can get from
>scientific discovery and the propagation of ideas from the results of
>that discovery.
>
>There should be a lot more questions and fewer people who are adamant
>that their take is the real deal. In my experience finding the answer
>to a question opens up ten more, equally perplexing and interesting
>questions. Those who just dish out the "answers" are as close-minded
>as those who grasp at religion to steady their anxiety about the world
>and their place in it.
>
>
This is an informal discussion list. Formal articles are submitted to the
memetics journal associated with this list. That's where you can find more
academic treatments of the topic.
The traffic level on this list ebbs and flows. It can get heavy at times.
There are people coming at it from different perspectives. I don't know that
anyone's viewpoint on memetics is "all that", though they might think so. I
prefer to remain agnostic on memes *per se*.
Though social contagion, contemporary legend and rumor are interesting
topics for me as of late, I still find the genetic and viral analogue
positions of *memeticists* questionable. I also have issues with memetics
that overlaps with the internalist/externalist debate, such as what can
memetics offer that supercedes or at least augments the work of memory
researchers (internalists) and anthropologists (externalists)?
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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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