From: Chris Taylor (christ@ebi.ac.uk)
Date: Thu 05 May 2005 - 13:38:49 GMT
Bang on -- nice extension.
But to perhaps argue against myself (not really, this is a macro vs.
micro thing), I'd also consider that taken on a 'meme by meme' basis
(whatever that might mean) this actually isn't any different than the
orchid. Selection favours that which suits, and free will is an illusion :)
Cheers, Chris.
Scott Chase wrote:
>
> --- Chris Taylor <christ@ebi.ac.uk> wrote:
>
>
>>There is of course deception across the board, but
>>what do we _mean_
>>exactly? An on-the-fly decision to deceive rather
>>than the ability to
>>deceive at all would seem to be an additional
>>criteion to apply,
>>otherwise mimicry and crypsis (visual, scent or
>>call-based) can be
>>included for a start; as could deception in mating
>>rituals such as
>>(iirc) the hanging fly's nuptual gift of a wrapped
>>(in a leaf, again
>>iirc) food morsel -- sometimes the wrap has _no gift
>>in it_ but by the
>>time the female unwraps (the lack of) it, the male
>>has had his wicked way...
>>
>>I think there has to be some notion of a choice, or
>>at least a
>>theoretical option to be dishonest, that is beyond
>>even being
>>classifiable as epigenetic (in the sense of
>>emergent, cf. all the
>>hawk-dove game stuff). That means that one can only
>>'deceive' in the
>>sense that (I assume) we mean it here if one can do
>>that on the fly (as
>>oppo to _by_ a fly :D ), which means that memes are
>>a _prerequisite_.
>>Ergo not much below primates should be doing this
>>stuff period.
>>
>>There is another related thing here -- I saw a prog
>>a while ago that
>>showed a troop of chimps that were almost
>>exclusively wary of water
>>(they swim like bricks), but the ageing alpha male
>>was keeping the
>>hugely physically superior beta (a real thug of a
>>chimp) from ascending
>>by regularly going tromping up and down a local
>>shallow stream ("OMG he
>>must be a supersimian!"). Another form of deception
>>(i.e. a sin of
>>omission [of explanation that it is no big deal]
>>rather than
>>commission). Just for interest...
>>
>
> Could we ask "What would Nicolo do?" Sure an orchid
> can deceive a wasp with its overall wasp-like form,
> but does the orchid have a "theory of mind" or does
> the wasp have a semblance of mind that can be deceived
> like possible in primates like humans and possibly
> chimps? The orchid has genes that have a theory of
> form as so-called hypotheses of how to look have been
> rejected in the past (paging Popper). The wasp has an
> innate theory of form as in looking for a female and
> the orchid tricks it by mimicking the look of a female
> wasp. The wasps also has a theory of how the female
> smell and the orchid deceptively produces pheromones.
> But this deception is not socially based. Could it be
> termed "Machiavellian"? The orchid has evolved via
> selection to exploit certain innate wasp behvioral
> quirks, but humans can assume that other humans will
> behave in certain ways because they extrapolte from
> their own behavior and that of others in the past and
> attribute psychological features (like having a mind"
> to others). Maybe chimps do this too. So we are taking
> bout different types of deception here. The scarlet
> kingsnake that mimics the coral snake isn't doing the
> same thing as the crafty and cunning Janus faced
> politician that deceives their voters, because it is
> known how voters will tend to act when certain
> propaganda is presented and crucial information is
> withheld.
>
>
>
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> Find restaurants, movies, travel and more fun for the weekend. Check it out!
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>
>
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>
-- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Chris Taylor (christ@ebi.ac.uk) HUPO PSI: GPS -- psidev.sf.net ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ =============================================================== 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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