Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id VAA29981 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Sun, 17 Sep 2000 21:08:32 +0100 Message-Id: <200009172009.QAA03567@mail1.lig.bellsouth.net> From: "Joe E. Dees" <joedees@bellsouth.net> To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk Date: Sun, 17 Sep 2000 15:10:51 -0500 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Subject: Re: memetics and knowledge In-reply-to: <20000917140026.A2429@reborntechnology.co.uk> References: <200009162002.QAA18143@mail3.lig.bellsouth.net>; from joedees@bellsouth.net on Sat, Sep 16, 2000 at 03:07:37PM -0500 X-mailer: Pegasus Mail for Win32 (v3.01b) Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
Date sent: Sun, 17 Sep 2000 14:00:26 +0100
From: Robin Faichney <robin@reborntechnology.co.uk>
To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
Subject: Re: memetics and knowledge
Send reply to: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
> On Sat, Sep 16, 2000 at 03:07:37PM -0500, Joe E. Dees wrote:
> >
> > > In a message I've deleted, Joe said something like:
> > >
> > > If you can't say it, you don't know it.
> > >
> > Saying it does not mean that the other person automatically gets it
> > (some people just aren't too bright), just that (s)he in principle can
> > (that it semantically adheres to the state or process of affairs being
> > described).
>
> Surely, for the traditional concept of knowledge, whether the other
> person gets it is irrelevant? Unless this is some kind of mystificatory
> backtrack? :-)
>
"If you can't say it, you don't know it" doesn't entail that for you to
have said it, another person must 'get' it.
>
> > > This is simply wrong, but it opens up an interesting topic: the distinction
> > > between memetic and non-memetic knowledge.
> > >
> > > Intellectual knowledge is not the only sort -- there is also experiential
> > > knowledge, that gained through experience, rather than verbally or via
> > > other media, from books, parents, teachers and friends.
> > >
> > Experience is the primordial source for all that verbal and written
> > and other media knowledge passed on.
>
> Yup. So?
>
> > > Now, there is obviously a large overlap between intellectual and
> > > experiential knowledge, in that much of what we learn through direct
> > > experience we can verbalise and pass on to others, and much of what we
> > > learn from others, we could have learned through experience.
> > >
> > Bingo. Perhaps all. But that is the crux of the contention.
>
> Indeed.
>
> > > But there remains a residue of experiential knowledge that is not
> > > communicable. Can you ride a bicycle? Could you teach someone else
> > > to do so using only words, so that the first time they mounted one,
> > > they could display the same level of skill as yourself?
> > >
> > See below, before you prejudge what I can and cannot verbally do.
> > >
> > > Obviously not. We are talking about motor skills here, which can be
> > > learned only through experience. And to say that this is not knowledge
> > > is mere semantic quibbling. If I can swing an axe through, say, 135
> > > degrees, the head travelling perhaps a couple of metres, to split a log,
> > > hitting it within a centimetre of the point I was aiming at, then I know
> > > how to use that axe! (At least, in the log-splitting context. I could
> > > actually do that, a few years ago, but I'm sadly out of practice now.)
> > >
> > If you described to me the series of interconnected motions you
> > performed in order to do this, I could most likely learn to do it
> > myself, but even if I couldn't, you could still describe it, at least
> > much better than someone who does not possess, i.e. has not
> > learned, the skill.
>
> Of course I could describe it. The question is whether it's possible
> to communicate *all* of that knowledge, or, as I say, you would always
> require some practice, to achieve the same skill level, because some of
> the knowledge is incommunicable.
>
One can completely communicate the multiplication tables, but it
would still take practice to commit it to memory, just like riding a
bicycle. Somatic knowlege is just another form of knowledge,
stored in (a different part of) the brain.
>
> > > But, to sum up, some knowledge is non-intellectual, and non-memetic,
> > > and our memetic theorising, and general intellectualization as well,
> > > will be sadly lacking, if we forget that. I'd go so far as to say that
> > > it's the ground upon which everything else is built. Unless it's based
> > > upon, and ultimately returns to, actual experience, it's sheer hot air.
> > >
> > How To Ride A Bike:
> > Get on the bike with one foor remaining on the ground and the
> > other one on a pedal, with you hands hpldong the handgrips. Push
> > off with the ground foot while pushing forward and down with the
> > pedal foot, then balance your body on the before-behind vertical
> > plane as you steer forward (by keeping the handgrips equidistant
> > from you) and pushing the pedals with both feet (they will describe
> > circular paths). If you need to turn, pull the handgrip on the side
> > you need to turn towards closer to your body (the other will move
> > farther away) as you bank your body into the turn. To stop, either
> > squeeze the handbrake (on some models) or pedal backwards to
> > engage the footbrake( on others).
> > See? It is easy to tell someone how to ride a bike (which is
> > different that making them immediately able to do so).
>
> You just conceded my point, Joe. Glad you agree.
>
> Just to put this in context: I'm saying that mystical "knowledge" is
> like that, in that experience is absolutely essential, though verbal
> hints, tips, and nudges in the right direction are of course possible,
> and probably even necessary in most cases.
>
My point was (reread above) that if you can't say it, then you don't
know it. Being able to say it is quite different from being able to
guarantee that an other will understand it; an other may not even
understand simple sentences composed of monosyllabic words.
There is a dialectic involved here concerning the perspective one
adopts with reference to an object, of either perception or
conception. In the hermeneutic dialectic between appropriation
and distanciation, there is a "sweet spot" where the explication (or
the explicitation - the making explicit of) the object by the observer
is maximized. If one ventures closer (too much appropriation), one
may both affect the object of one's observation by means of that
observation to an unacceptably distorting degree, and miss the
forest for the trees. If one retreats farther (to much distanciation),
one becomes so estranged from the object that one cannot even
make out the forest clearly. The "sweet spot" does not allow
complete communication of qualic experience as it is experienced,
since the symbolic map cannot be the referential territory, but it
does permit of the maximum possible combination of precision,
concision, comprehensiveness and comprehensibility for the map -
to - territory relation. The physics analogue to this dialectic is
Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle. One can never say anything
completely in the sense that the saying can never be never
identical to the said, but possesses the relationship of 'aboutness',
or reference, in relation to it (to think that they can be equated is to
commit a category error), but if one truly knows, one can always
say to a significant and meaningful degree.
> --
> Robin Faichney
>
> ===============================================================
> 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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