Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id UAA00921 (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 20:58:58 GMT Date: Tue, 29 Jan 2002 15:52:56 -0500 Subject: Re: Meme bonding Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII; format=flowed From: Wade Smith <wade_smith@harvard.edu> To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit In-Reply-To: <p04320400b87c9f86142b@[192.168.2.3]> Message-Id: <2BD8F85A-14FA-11D6-A3CC-003065A0F24C@harvard.edu> X-Mailer: Apple Mail (2.480) Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
On Tuesday, January 29, 2002, at 03:31 , Francesca S. Alcorn wrote:
> And I don't believe it is chaotic, not for a second.
I don't either, which is why I said 'managed chaos'- perhaps not
micro-managed enough....
> 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.
And I'm not saying (nor is the external stance) that such
investigation is not needed or pointful. (We're just saying that
what will be found ain't gonna be memes.) Yes, the brain has
processes that definitely can be quantified and analyzed, and
many of them might be involved in cultural concerns, whereas we
can say with certainty that many are involved with language, and
perception, and development, and mechanics, and memories, et
alia. The external stance is just saying that culture is a way
we've evolved to use these processes, and memes are the products
of these processes, not the processes themselves, since the
processes themselves are genetically evolved and comparable to
many processes found in creatures like worms, and guppies, and
birds....
> And what is connective recognition anyway?
A quick comment, unfortunately. More rightly perhaps is
'connected recognitions'- culture is a series of recognitions,
among connected perceivers, but it is also a connected set of
recognizable actions and artefacts and behaviors (those meme
things we are working on).
Anyway, as many would surely tell you, I'm a great fan of the
adjectived descriptor.
> Even Plato's ideal forms which you were talking about earlier
That was probably not I, as I'm a dedicated aristotelian.
- Wade
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