Re: What/Who selects memes?

From: Kenneth Van Oost (Kenneth.Van.Oost@village.uunet.be)
Date: Sat Oct 06 2001 - 20:25:30 BST

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    From: "Kenneth Van Oost" <Kenneth.Van.Oost@village.uunet.be>
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    Subject: Re: What/Who selects memes?
    Date: Sat, 6 Oct 2001 21:25:30 +0200
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    ----- Original Message -----
    From: salice <salice@gmx.net>
    To: <memetics@mmu.ac.uk>
    > > Where culture comes from may not, also,
    > > have changed at all in that time.
    >
    > Is it really that important where it came from? I'm more interested
    > in what evolutionary purpose it has. I mean every other human feature
    > is explained as to have a function which lets the individual survive
    > and spread its dna in the end, so why is culture seen different from
    > that? Is there any scientific proof that it has or has no
    > evolutionary purpose?

    Hi Salice,

    Sorry for not yet sending the article, my problems seems not yet finished...

    But, I hope this gets throught somehow,...

    IMO culture does not have any purpose than to be the approiate vehicle
    to propagate its specific memes.
    The only purpose I see of any culture is to spread " cultural " memes, that
    are ideas, thoughts, values, moralistic considerations, ethics and
    aesthetics.
    You may say, each cultural block, whatever that might be, " lives " its
    own life along its own dilated lineages.
    And in that way, cultures will, can and must differ, because any possible
    environmental difference between 2 or more changes the outcome of any
    meme....

    Regards,

    Kenneth

    ( I am, because we are) hoping my e- mail works.....

    > > Are supermodels the ultimate in feminine aesthetic at all?
    >
    > There's no ultimate in aesthetics. Aesthetics differ between
    > cultures. Fat men are regarded to be sexy in Japan for instance,
    > while in our culture there are a lot of fat people who just get more
    > and more fat BECAUSE it's culturally considered to be unaesthetic
    > while people in Japan don't develop these kind of eating disorders or
    > eating addictions.
    >
    > > Cultural
    > > appreciation of women certainly fluctuates, but I'm not at all sure
    > > supermodels are dropping progeny left and right.
    >
    > They sure have influence on people. Why do people do diets these
    > days and would they have done it in Rubens times?
    >
    > ===============================================================
    > 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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