Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id UAA00880 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Tue, 29 Jan 2002 20:37:16 GMT X-Sender: unicorn@pop.greenepa.net Message-Id: <p04320400b87c9f86142b@[192.168.2.3]> In-Reply-To: <200201290458.g0T4w6r13979@terri.harvard.edu> References: <200201290458.g0T4w6r13979@terri.harvard.edu> Date: Tue, 29 Jan 2002 15:31:57 -0500 To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk From: "Francesca S. Alcorn" <unicorn@greenepa.net> Subject: Re: Meme bonding Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" ; format="flowed" Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
Wade said:
>Well, from the external stance, there ain't no memes running around
>inside our heads, it's all a sort of managed chaos, which, sometimes,
>culture and environment willing, will behave as a meme. What actually
>makes these connections and prompts this behavior, is, well, where
>creativity comes from. Memes are a special class of creativity- creations
>that fit into a culture with enough connective recognition to be
>replicated. But then, culture is connective recognition.
Well yes, I get your point, but it's not going to stop me from
thinking about this. And I don't believe it is chaotic, not for a
second. If we are going to attempt to understand the neural
correlates of these things we have to start somewhere. Who knows, we
might just come up with something which *does* make it possible to
quantify this. Certainly we will *not* if no one ever makes the
attempt.
I think that there *are* external representations of internal thought
processes. For instance the Dewey Decimal System is used to organize
books in a library. Doesn't the way that books are categorized
reflect the way that we categorize ideas in our minds? And in turn,
it influences the way we categorize our ideas mentally - a sort of
meme of organization passed on from one generation to the next -
reflecting "classical" thought. One wonders how the Library of
Congress classification system might not influence successive
generations of scholars. And certainly fields like evolutionary
psychology and ethology challenge a system of classification which
assumed a distinction which is no longer there.
And what is connective recognition anyway?
Even Plato's ideal forms which you were talking about earlier are a
reflection of a neural process, not an thing. Plato made the mistake
of thinking that because he had observed a thought process inside his
head it somehow represented something "out there".
frankie
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