Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id TAA09220 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-bounces@mmu.ac.uk); Mon, 8 Oct 2001 19:30:18 +0100 From: "salice" <salice@gmx.net> To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk Date: Mon, 8 Oct 2001 20:22:51 +0000 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Subject: Re: Genes are Memes In-reply-to: <007e01c14f5b$d892c480$1324f4d8@teddace> Message-Id: <E15qf6L-00073D-00@dryctnath.mmu.ac.uk> Sender: fmb-bounces@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
> This is what happens when you argue logically from a false premise. If we
> assume that minds are reducible to brains, then memes are no different from
> any other material object. If memes can exist in brains and books, then why
> not planets and stars?
Hm, this was not my point. Memes can be found in the behavior of
planets and stars.
> This is materialist mysticism. There's no mind in the brain. The brain is
> composed of neurons and synapses, not thoughts and feelings.
These are different levels of abstractions. Thoughts and feelings are
neurons, synapses and energy flowing between them. To make human
thinking and research easy, humans abstract.
That doesn't mean if we ABSTRACT neurons,synapses and so on as
thoughts, emotions and mind that they both don't exist in the brain!
> To find
> anything other than chemicals in the brain is to engage in a kind of
> mystical projection.
Well your mail arrives here also only as a sequence of bits but i
also find words in it, because i can ABSTRACT which you kind of don't
understand as it seems. So let your mail be mystical projection,
i can read it because i can abstract.
> That memes exist in minds in no way suggests that they
> exist in brains.
If a meme exists in the mind and the mind exists in the brain then
the meme also exists in the brain.
If you don't agree, you either think that the mind is not in the
brain or you don't believe in logic.
> The same goes for books and other media. There are no memes or words or
> information contained in books.
Oh? That's new.
> Books are made of paper, glue, and ink.
> That's it. "Words" are merely our *interpretation* of the shapes of ink we
> see on the page. So, too, there are no words in the air, only soundwaves.
> No words in our ears, only drumbeats. No words in our brains, only
> electrochemical reactions. Words exist in the mind and nowhere else. Same
> for memes.
You seem to be even more materialistic than i am. But you forget the
different levels of abstraction.
> > We live in a memetic world. Reality is a collection of and
> > a connection between memes.
> Seems like you've got a thing for memes. They're the explanation for
> everything, the answer to every question. You've been taken for a ride on
> the "meme" meme.
It is one view on things. But i think that this view should be
correct and today meme-theory is full of meme-rules, "selfish memes"
and other crap.
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