RE: Message From Sue Blackmore on her Hair

From: Scott Chase (hemidactylus@my-deja.com)
Date: Thu Dec 14 2000 - 21:14:53 GMT

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Date: Thu, 14 Dec 2000 13:14:53 -0800
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From: "Scott Chase" <hemidactylus@my-deja.com>
To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
Subject: RE: Message From Sue Blackmore on her Hair
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    >From: Vincent Campbell <v.p.campbell@stir.ac.uk>
    >To: "'memetics@mmu.ac.uk'" <memetics@mmu.ac.uk>
    >Subject: RE: Message From Sue Blackmore on her Hair
    >Date: Thu, 14 Dec 2000 13:11:22 -0000
    >Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
    >
    >Thanks Paul for passing this on, and thanks to Sue for the background.
    >
    >I'm sorry if it seemed a rather personal comment, it's just that one piece
    >of published research I've done was on pseudo-science documentaries, e.g.
    >about the Loch Ness Monster and alien abductions. I did a textual analysis
    >of a sample of programmes including Susan's Horizon programme about alien
    >abductions, and the Everyman programme about alien abductions on which Susan
    >also appeared. So Susan's screen image, if you like, was in my mind when
    >watching the other night. If anyone's interested, although it's not really
    >list- relevant, the book it's in is coming out in the next couple of weeks:-
    >
    >John Izod and Richard Kilborn with Matthew Hibberd (eds), From Grierson to
    >the Docu-Soap (Luton, University of Luton Press: 2000) ISBN 1 86020 577 1
    >
    >My argument basically says that such programmes show that the notion of
    >documentary as a scientific medium, which many have quite seriously claimed
    >it to be, is inaccurate. I also reference some of Susan's work on theories
    >of why people believe in the paranormal.
    >
    >
    Considering my interest in Jung, I hould be more familiar with parapsychology than I am. I have a couple of Sheldrake's books, where there are some apparent resonances with Jung's notions. I notice that Blackmore's name comes up in one of the appendices from Sheldrake's _A New Science of Life_. Did she do a lot of work trying to unravel the popular ideas of morphic resonannce and formative causation?

    In Jungian circles I have run across the story of the supposed hundredth monkey phenomenon. I heard vague articulations of this here and there, but only recently became aware on the debunking of this monkey business:

    http://www.csicop.org/si/9605/monkey.html

    http://www.context.org/ICLIB/IC09/Myers.htm

    http://www.skepdic.com/monkey.html

    http://nhne.com/articles/sahundrethmonkey.html

    I'd like to familiarize myself with the story and its debunking to store away in my arsenal for later use, but like anything else, it's easier said than done.

    I find Sheldrake interesting, though I don't buy into hiss hyperextension of morphic resonance. I'm still smitten by morphogenetic fields, but I realize that Sheldrake merely co-opted this conceptual tool and it in no way depends on Sheldrake's views. Hopefully anyone setting out to debunk Sheldrake's ideas on morphic resonace and formative causation is careful enough to separate Sheldrake from the morphogenetic fields. I notice people attributing this concept to Sheldrake, which gets me a little irked.

    I just bought Dawkins's _Unweaving the Rainbow_, which I had read quite a while back when I checked it from the library. Dawkins talks a little about Jung, not in a very flattering manner IIRC. But, he later says something to the effect that there are primordial images and that one could consider this collection or ancestral endowment shaped by natural selection a collective unconscious if this term weren't tainted by Jung's usage. Right under Dawkins's nose here would be Semon's mneme and engrams, which Jung made some comparisons to with his archetypes/primordial images and collective unconscious.

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