Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id OAA07190 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Tue, 27 Mar 2001 14:40:45 +0100 Message-ID: <3AC097A3.6CAB527B@bioinf.man.ac.uk> Date: Tue, 27 Mar 2001 14:37:39 +0100 From: Chris Taylor <Christopher.Taylor@man.ac.uk> Organization: University of Manchester X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.76 [en] (Windows NT 5.0; U) X-Accept-Language: en To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk Subject: Re: The Demise of a Meme References: <20010326190342.AAA27691@camailp.harvard.edu@[128.103.125.215]> <20010327101930.C581@reborntechnology.co.uk> <3AC065AB.3C6E4077@bioinf.man.ac.uk> <20010327113610.A1417@reborntechnology.co.uk> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
> > [1] I use the term differently (to some) because I don't *require*
> > interpersonal transfer to define a meme, I like to think of it more as a
> > word like 'organism'.
> This reminds me of something on the list a little while back that I didn't
> agree with -- it went a little too far regarding inclusiveness -- but
> I don't know if that was your's or not. Maybe if you said a little more?
I think that was me (therefore I think that I was me)(?)(sorry).
Anyway...
If you 'decompose' a mind, the pieces will be memes, just as if you
decompose an ecosystem, the players will be organisms. This is still by
analogy rather than a direct parallel in all senses, but it captures the
essential nature of it. I personally find a mind much easier to evolve
by increasing the complexity of the meme ecology than by developing some
sort of mind-thing (which requires one to posit a hopeful monster style
macromutation, whereas the meme ecology version makes it fairly
straightforward to move from anything that can learn, by degrees, to
us).
Actually I do have one little extra for really good free association
(~hybridisation, ~recombination etc.) I think I heard reported that we
have a class of cortical neurons which crosswire the others to a degree
unobserved in other primates. There is though free association of a
lower wattage in other species - have you ever seen the footage of a
load of barbary apes trying to get into a watermelon? They play (f.a.)
to find a way.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Chris Taylor (chris@bioinf.man.ac.uk)
http://bioinf.man.ac.uk/ »people»chris
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
===============================================================
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 archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Tue Mar 27 2001 - 14:43:18 BST