Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id MAA07203 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Thu, 13 Jul 2000 12:28:50 +0100 Message-ID: <2D1C159B783DD211808A006008062D3101745919@inchna.stir.ac.uk> From: Vincent Campbell <v.p.campbell@stir.ac.uk> To: "'memetics@mmu.ac.uk'" <memetics@mmu.ac.uk> Subject: RE: point of memetic saturation Date: Thu, 13 Jul 2000 12:26:55 +0100 X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2650.21) Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
I was going to say something along the lines of linearity and status, but I
decided not to, and I can't remember why now.
I think there is an extent to which things like writing, portrait painting,
photography, and now camcorders etc. etc. provide ample opportunities, in
the developed world at least, for even relatively poor people to have memes
preserved.
What's interesting also is that, like genes, memes aren't really concerned
about the individual hosts, merely that they continue to be passed on. So
social historians examining family photographs, for example, won't get very
much in the way of information about specific people, but will get quite a
lot from photos of hundreds/thousands of people. Information like, what
social events were deemed worthy of capturing on film (birthdays, weddings
etc.), how people dressed etc. etc. So cultural memes may get through, if
not information about particular individuals, and exactly the same goes on
in terms of paleoarchaeology- artefacts rarely tell investigators exactly
who someone was, but does give away clue as to status etc.
It is quite interesting that many ancient technologies continue to baffle
modern engineers and builders. There's a couple of TV series about such
things (called 'Mysteries of Lost Empires' and an earlier BBC series called
'Secrets of Lost Empires'), where modern engineers test ancient
technological achievements (e.g. Caesar's troops building a bridge across
the Rhine in a very short time, Archimedes' Claw, or trying reproduce feats
such as how Eygptians got obelisks standing)- mostly with limited success.
IMHO the extent to which ritual technologies, if we can call them that,
extended in pre-modern societies must be memetic in nature. Whether it be
pyramids in Eygpt, huge earth mounds built by the Mississippians, the Nazca
lines, Borabadur, Ankhor Wat, Stonehenge etc. etc., the amount of time
effort and labour that went into such constructions seem an awful lot of
bother for people mostly engaged in subsistence living.
Once the memeplexes that supported such behaviours began to be replaced by
new ones, the particular technologies that the memeplexes supported began to
disappear. Only now, within a new scientific/analytical framework are we
beginning to understand just how sophisticated some of that knowledge
actually was.
Vincent
> ----------
> From: Kenneth Van Oost
> Reply To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
> Sent: Wednesday, July 12, 2000 8:25 pm
> To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
> Subject: Re: point of memetic saturation
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Vincent Campbell <v.p.campbell@stir.ac.uk>
> To: <memetics@mmu.ac.uk>
> Sent: Monday, July 10, 2000 2:17 PM
> Subject: RE: point of memetic saturation
>
>
> > Thanks for these comments. I'd not thought about Eco's book as about
> > memetic before, very intersting. I shall go back and read it now (I
> studied
> > it as an undergraduate but was notoriously bad at finishing the
> novels/plays
> > I was supposed to read- I was too busy buying philosophy books).
> >
> > Very interesting point about artefacts found with or near burials. It's
> as
> > if the meaning of that person is invested in the symbolic value of their
> > artefacts rather than something intrinsic of themselves. There's
> evidently
> > something memetic about the incease in size of funeral monuments in the
> > ancient world, from simple burials, up to the pyramids.
>
> << True ! But, now where is the meaning of the person gone to these days
> !?
> Our funeral rituals are quit simple, a picture upon the grave, a little
> vase, here
> and there what flowers,...even we cremate our dead.
> Is the symbolic value of the dead somehow lost !?
> What about the memes of these persons !? Yes, we do have opportunities to
> remain those memes in books, on computerdisc, photos etc, but anyhow,
> these
> are exceptions, not all our relatives finds a place in a book. If you are
> a
> writer, ok, but where is all the symbolic value gone of the common people,
> ....in our memories !?
>
> Vincent, simple burials, up to the pyramids,...
> Would you agree a lineair process is going here !?
> Is the following line the same process !?
>
> _a straight stick, a bow, a crossbow, a flashlight, a flare, V1-V2 bombs,
> Apollo 11 and up to a spacecraft on its mission to Mars. The form of all
> this things is quit the same, just the technology used is different.
>
> The increase in size of funeral monuments can also be seen as a lineair
> process of status_simple burial (a hole in the ground) for the homeless,
> a$
> pyramid for the pfarao !?
>
> Which memes propagated, technological ones, or those of the burial- rites,
> or those how to build- a - pyramid- memes or memes accordingly how we
> think about our dead !?
>
> regards,
>
> Kenneth
>
> (I am, because we are )
>
>
>
> ===============================================================
> 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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