Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id RAA28845 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Mon, 19 Nov 2001 17:05:14 GMT Message-ID: <2D1C159B783DD211808A006008062D3102A6D133@inchna.stir.ac.uk> From: Vincent Campbell <v.p.campbell@stir.ac.uk> To: "'memetics@mmu.ac.uk'" <memetics@mmu.ac.uk> Subject: RE: Study shows brain can learn without really trying Date: Mon, 19 Nov 2001 16:40:56 -0000 X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2650.21) Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
<That an individual with greater than average mental reflectivity is
more
> likely to succeed doesn't mean that cultivating mental self-awareness is
> "all we have to do to be successful." You planted that notion and then
> imagined you'd found it there. This is not something you do on purpose.
> In the fog of your unconscious it replicates without your knowledge or
> permission. It's the "let's twist what was said into nonsense and then
> ridicule
> it" meme. In the abstract we might call it "ridiculization." But it's
> not abstract.
> It's real. As real and alive as our species mind and its largely
> unconscious
> individuations.>
>
This was your original comment-
<It gives a competitive edge among intensely social animals like
> > primates. While it does nothing for survival of the group as a
whole,
> > reflexive consciousness determines which members of the group are
> > more likely to reproduce. It's among primates that the terrain of
> > competition begins to shift from environmental to social. The
successful
> > > ones are those who are aware of themselves as minds and not just as
> > > bodies.>
>
Rather than accuse of me deliberate misreading, conscious or otherwise, can
you not see in the wording here the explicility absoluteness 'reflexive
consciousness determines...', and 'the successful ones are...'?
Now, if you didn't mean to express this in such absolute terms, then fair
enough, but I was going on what you wrote.
<Your mind provides the ecology within which memes succeed or fail.
This
> one succeeds because it appeals to your desire to believe that what you
> oppose is nonsensical. It appeals, not to logic, but to ego. Our job is
> to root
> out these opportunistic, freelance memes. To be fully human is to
> determine
> which memes are selected instead of letting them self-select in our dark,
> dingy basement. The potential for freedom in the self-aware mind is
> undermined by memes that specialize in exploiting our prejudices.>
>
You should be careful about assuming that people disagreeing with
you are suffering from this, and you are somehow immune. Do you not think
that perhaps that you are subject to the Sheldrakian memes that you espouse?
You have after all, been shown to have selectively misread at least two
pieces you referred to, and have rejected all oppositional comments
expressed about Sheldrake's ideas.
>> I think the 'radical departure' argument is the
>> mistake, because there is no precedent for it in any other part
of nature.
<What's radical about humans is that our existence as individuals is
based on
> our minds instead of our bodies. The cultural world we inhabit is a
> product of
> our consciousness. We've generated a universe.>
>
Well as in post 1, our capacity to know the minds of other organisms
is highly limited, and may always be so, so to assume this is unique to us
is a leap in the dark.
<The emergence of mental self-existence from the hominid mind has
two natural
> precedents: the big bang and the origin of life. Rather than merely
> sharing
> in universal existence, every organism is a little universe unto itself,
> with its
> own existence. If the big bang unleashed universal self-existence, then
> life is local self-existence, and humanity is mental self-existence.>
>
hmm.....
> > Evolution occurs slowly, gradually (with blips for major natural
> > disasters and so on), what we do know about forerunners and close
> > relatives of humans, like neanderthals, is that they were extremely well
>
> > adapted to their ecological niches.
>
<Evolution can proceed rapidly or slowly. Much of what we are
arises
> spontaneously, without reference to environment. (See Gould).>
>
Random mutation occurs but in evolutionary terms is still subject to
environmental pressures- only those random changes that are adaptive
survive, in the long run. The debate about the rate of evolutionary change
continues apace, I personally favour the gradualist approach, but I do
acknowledge the possiblity of rapid changes in times of major environmental
change.
>> <A radio signal has no need for consciousness, either at the
point of
>> transmission or reception. But life is habitual, not
automatic...>
>> What do you mean by habitual and habit?
<Habit is based on memory. Automation is based on timeless,
mathematical
> principles. The difference between life and machine is memory and
> eternity.>
>
Habit, in nature, is based upon the accumulation of adaptive
behaviours over time. Corals on the Great Barrier Reef all release eggs and
sperm at the same time within a 3-4 day period at the same time each year-
millions and millions of coral all within the same period of time, clear
evidence of the millions of years corals have been evolving, and the
adaptive benefits of doing this at the same time as other corals so your
eggs don't all get eaten. Do corals have memories, or are they merely
following an encoded programme in their neural tissue (I don't even know if
corals have brains, so to speak) itself a product of evolution?
Vincent
>
>
>
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