Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id RAA25103 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Wed, 18 Oct 2000 17:07:40 +0100 Date: Wed, 18 Oct 2000 09:05:12 -0700 (Pacific Daylight Time) From: TJ Olney <market@cc.wwu.edu> To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk Subject: Thank you Wendy In-Reply-To: <B6132441.5198%bbenzon@mindspring.com> Message-ID: <Pine.WNT.4.21.0010180904270.142-100000@c157775-a.frndl1.wa.home.com> X-X-Sender: market@[140.160.80.17] Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
Thank you! We (they) needed that.
I often get the impression that this list is a pub discussion with winning
and losing "points" the more important aspect.
Over time different fields become populated with more intelligent people all
searching for an intellectual niche to inhabit. We seem to become more
rather than less resistant to ideas that others have thought and that
parallel our own. In fact, the closer the idea, the more threatening it is.
There is not much academic reward for the grand synthesis. (There might
however be financial and personal reward, as one's audience is dramatically
increased.)
Many different fields have grappled with the same issues as memetics, but
have expressed the issues and phenomena in a slightly differnt context or
with a different vocabulary. I recently stumbled across a book written in
the 50's in a library discard sale. It deals with social contagion and
without using the memetic vocabulary, grapples with the same phenomena. While
the memetic point of view can add to the work, it is still that, a point of
view about the evolution and spread of ideas. I personally find it very sad
and frustrating because it is a potentially illuminating point of view
without the "scientific rigor" that will get it accepted as a mainstream
point of view. I find it amusing, however, that many proponents of memetics
can't/won't acknowledge that science and rigor can both be viewed memetic
constructs.
If you've missed my (much) earlier comments on Gregory Bateson and
epistemology, you can either find them in the archive or I could forward them
to you. He and his daughter Catherine Bateson wrote some brilliant stuff
about the necessary tautology of explanation. Mathematics implicitly
acknowledges it when we posit axioms and then assume that they are "true".
Others on the list have alluded to it when they seek agreement as to the
ontology of memetics.
TJ Olney
-- -- TJ Olney market@cc.wwu.edu Not all those who wander are lost. -- http://mp3.musicmatch.com/artists/artists.cgi?id=113&display=1=============================================================== 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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