Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id RAA04559 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Tue, 6 Nov 2001 17:49:42 GMT Message-ID: <001401c166ea$c8417d00$8f24f4d8@teddace> From: "Dace" <edace@earthlink.net> To: <memetics@mmu.ac.uk> Subject: Re: Study shows brain can learn without really trying Date: Tue, 6 Nov 2001 09:45:08 -0800 Content-Type: multipart/alternative; boundary="----=_NextPart_000_0011_01C166A7.B8F7BE60" X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 5.50.4133.2400 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.50.4133.2400 Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
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Chris,
> > Do you really think steps 1 and 4 are essentially the same as steps 2
and 3?
> > Of course there's no self involved in steps 2 and 3. But these only
follow
> > automatically. There's nothing automatic about steps 1 and 4. The
message
> > would never have been created without an individual to have thought of
it,
> > and it can't be understood except by a person who reads it. Only when I
> > write it and you read it is it a "message." Otherwise it's just blind,
> > electronic impulses. Transmission of electronic impulses requires no
self.
> > Transmission of ideas and memes does. In fact, a meme is an idea that
takes
> > on its own self-existence.
>
> Does the self need to be more than just a stucture built of memes for
> this to work? (I'd say no because amongst other things I like the irony
> involved - as if a library became self aware and started deciding which
> books successfully got in - cue the ecosystem metaphors).
Memes aren't *memes* except to the extent that they take place in the
context of minds. A meme is an idea that takes on a life of its own, much
like a cell that becomes cancerous. An idea isn't like an electronic signal
that gets automatically processed. It has to be *interpreted.* There's no
physics of interpretation. It's not something that proceeds mechanically
and lends itself to mathematical description. Outside the context of mind,
there's no such thing as thought or message or meme. An idea could never
take on its own life if it weren't already part of a larger living system. Memes
are embedded in human consciousness, which emerges in the context of
animal consciousness, itself a product of simple, unicellular sentience.
Life, at all levels, is self-creative. This is the fundamental meaning of
evolution. It's what Darwin was getting at with his creative materialism, so
at odds with the cold mechanism of post-Weismannian theory. The species
are born not built. We emerge from the muck of mother (matter) nature, not
the sterile equations of a cartesian god. Unfortunately, Darwin's jewel has
since been obscured by a different kind of muck.
When you start with life as opposed to abstract principle, things begin to
make sense. From the universal self-existence of time to the local
self-existence of bacteria to the mental self-existence of humanity (and the
memetic ecosystems we call "the world") life is self-generative and
evolutionary.
Ted
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