Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id VAA21122 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Thu, 15 Mar 2001 21:05:49 GMT From: <joedees@bellsouth.net> To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk Date: Thu, 15 Mar 2001 15:08:29 -0600 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Subject: Re: Toggling nature's auto-erase Message-ID: <3AB0DAED.33.6217BF@localhost> In-reply-to: <20010315160611.B632@reborntechnology.co.uk> References: <2D1C159B783DD211808A006008062D3101745CD7@inchna.stir.ac.uk>; from v.p.campbell@stir.ac.uk on Thu, Mar 15, 2001 at 12:24:02PM -0000 X-mailer: Pegasus Mail for Win32 (v3.12c) Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
On 15 Mar 2001, at 16:06, Robin Faichney wrote:
> On Thu, Mar 15, 2001 at 12:24:02PM -0000, Vincent Campbell wrote: >
> >> Wade T.Smith wrote: > >> - to the point of which I have declared,
> manifesto-like, "To a > life > > >> without memes!" which, to me, is a
> utopian and ideal state... > > > <You might be surprised to learn
> that Sue Blackmore and I are in > complete > > agreement with you on
> that. Of course, we equate memelessness with > > Enlightenment, which
> you probably don't. But then, what does that tell > > us, other than
> that your concept of Enlightenment differs from ours?> > > > > > Call
> me a memebot if you like, but I'm suspicious of this kind of > view
> for a few reasons, which I'll pose as questions. > > First, is it
> really possible to be meme-free, and be a person > capable of social
> interaction? In other words does not being free of memes > does that
> not meme foregoing social interaction, which is inherently shaped > by
> the culture in which one lives?
>
> Here's where Wade and I might diverge (but very possibly not). My
> ideal state is not one in which my brain contains no encoded memes.
> It is one in which I cling to and/or identify with none of the memes
> in my mind. In other words, I don't "believe in" anything whatsoever.
> There are only working hypotheses. This brain is still full of memes,
> but none of them are particularly mine, and all have to prove their
> worth in purely practical terms. (I don't claim to have reached that
> exalted state yet, but I think I'm getting there, if slowly.)
>
Brodie's Level 3 begins there, then goes on to state that one
should choose in what to believe, regardless of its truth, based
upon its usefulness to oneself, and continue to believe it only so
long as it is useful. I have not achieved that ability to believe my
own lies when I know that what I'm telling to myself are
pragmatically chosen lies, nor do I wish to achieve such a
hypocritical condition. Once one begins lying to oneself, and
begins to accept that lying to oneself for selfish social, political or
economic reasons is OK, it becomes shamefully (or shamelessly)
easy to lie to others, a Nietszchean observation concerning a basic
principle underlying the proliferation of ridiculously irrational beliefs
and belief systems, literal christianity chief among them.
>
> > Second, do people really mean they want to be meme-free, or only
> > free of those memes they don't like? For example, Blackmore talks a
> > lot about freeing oneself from memes whilst implicitly indicating
> > her support for buhhdism memes. Isn't that actually contradictory?
>
> I'm not sure Blackmore and I share a buddhism+memetics position that
> goes much deeper than the headline statements in my previous message.
> But Buddhists commonly realise the contradiction in saying one should
> not cling to anything, then clinging to Buddhism. The remedy is that
> one should be willing to let Buddhism go, ie hold it merely as a
> working hypothesis, as long as it works. This is not a "faith" as
> that's commonly conceived. Quite the reverse, in fact.
>
The meme of combining meaningless parts in various
configurations to create a plethora of meaningful wholes, the basic
ur-meme, extracted from the perceptual gestalt and applied to
augmented action/perception and human communication, underlies
the machine principle of technology, the phonemic principle of
language, and the phonetic principle of text, and it is not one that
anyone who is recognizeably human can do without. I do agree
that provisional entertainment of a memeset as valid in the absence
of contrafactual evidence is OK, so long as one does not end one's
seeking because one has deluded oneself into the belief that one
has found the absolute and certain answer(s); this error grounds
the tendency for true believers to cease questioning, and serves as
a protective insulation enwrapping many dogmemes.
>
> > Third, the whole notion of freeing oneself from memes implies that
> > memes are universally malevolent, that they do harm to people, but
> > is this really the case? (I know this is a well worn area, but I
> > think if people are stating the aim to be meme-free, they need to
> > demonstrate this.)
>
> I aim to be free of memes in the sense that they have no undue power
> over me, not in the sense that there are none in my mind. In fact, I
> almost concur with Dennett when he suggests that my mind is a memetic
> virtual machine (software) supported by genetically designed wetware.
> Which implies that without memes, there is no mind.
>
Without memes, a mind would be both incomprehensible to itself
and unrelatable to both its environment other minds. Without
minds (their environment), there can be no memes. The container
is logically prior to the contained, however, empirically, they
coevolved. Some memes are virulents, some are symbionts. One
should neither keep the baby shriveling in the bathwater in one's
lavatory, nor throw them both out, but keep the baby, dry it
carefully and well, and discard the bathwater. In other words, one
is better served by critically evaluating memetic assimilation
candidates, and doing a wheat-and-chaff on them.
>
> > I think the only option is to critically examine everything we
> > think we believe and know, and to do so continually, and to treat
> > challenges to our beliefs and knowledge with due consideration.
> > This does not mean that we won't be subject to memes, but some of
> > them may have positive social and personal consequences. I don't
> > see how anyone would actually benefit personally or socially from
> > being completely meme-free.
>
> Rationality is great as far as it goes, but don't forget the value of
> the emotions and spontaneity. My form of meme-freedom, unlike your's,
> is positively beneficial in emotional/psychological terms. (Much
> psychological "baggage" is in the form of beliefs, for instance that
> I'm not worth much, or that I've been unjustly treated, etc, etc) To
> test everything using the intellect is just not possible, but to
> become aware of and then let go of all kinds of beliefs is highly
> doable, though it takes time.
>
It is self-contradictory to even attempt to formulate a logical
argument against rationality.
>
> > I suppose my arguments rest on the value of social interaction.
> > It's quite clear that we are a social species, and isolationism of
> > any kind would seem to me to deny an essential aspect of human
> > existence. If being part of a social system means being subject to
> > memes then I'd rather have that.
>
> I'm sure you're a highly sociable person, Vincent, but as I hope
> I've explained, there's no contradiction whatsoever between that and
> meme-freedom.
>
Actually, language, gestural, spoken, sung, drawn and written, is
as memetically propagated as is technology. We could neither
communicate nor cooperate without them, nor could we preserve
our species in most places on this sphere. However, if we make
the distinction between formemes and content (semantic,
significance, meaning) memes, the latter are arbitrary and by
mutual convention, and any particular ones could be done without
and alternatives substituted; not so the former, without which we
could neither entertain nor employ any of the latter at all.
> --
> Robin Faichney
> Get your Meta-Information from http://www.ii01.org
> (CAUTION: contains philosophy, may cause heads to spin)
>
> ===============================================================
> This was distributed via the memetics list associated with the
> Journal of Memetics - Evolutionary Models of Information Transmission
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> 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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