Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id QAA02834 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Wed, 30 Jan 2002 16:08:06 GMT X-Originating-IP: [137.110.248.206] From: "Grant Callaghan" <grantc4@hotmail.com> To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk Subject: Re: necessity of mental memes Date: Wed, 30 Jan 2002 08:02:11 -0800 Content-Type: text/plain; format=flowed Message-ID: <LAW2-F63ObMxfQmeXbT000126d7@hotmail.com> X-OriginalArrivalTime: 30 Jan 2002 16:02:11.0959 (UTC) FILETIME=[7A4D1870:01C1A9A7] Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
> >
> >>All velocity involves change, but not all change has to be a velocity
> >>change; IOW, not all change is positional. The idea is a meme; it's
> >>referent is not, and furthermore, it's referent is real.
> >> >
> >True. We have many tools to describe change, one of which is "time."
>Now
> >matter how we describe it change continues to occur with or without our
> >understanding of it. But what we call it influences how we see it and
> >shapes what we believe about it. That's an internal matter.
> >
>It would not matter if we called it pfloug or tzorip, if what we as a
>language community meant when we said the term was indeed the referent of
>the term 'change' which we presently use.
> >
Actually, it might even be better to use such words as pfloug or tzorip.
They don't bring with them the baggage of all the past uses of the words we
normally choose. The only problem with that is it would make them harder to
understand unless they were fully explained each time.
We had an earthquake here a few years ago and a friend of mine in Taiwan
sent me an email asking how I felt. I told him, "I was shaken but not
stirred." That statement carried echoes of numerous James Bond movies and
descriptions of emotions in literature and news stories. So does every use
of familiar words. We are "stirred" by music and we are "shaken" by events.
The picture my friend got from my words included all of that and more.
Harold Robbins points out that what he calls his reactions to things affects
how he remembers them and feels about them afterwards. If he says he was
"bothered" by something, it remains in his mind as a bothersome thing. If
he says he was devastated by it, he remembers it that way. So the words we
use do alter our perceptions of the world and how we react to it
emotionally. A word without a past is a good fit for a new idea. Metaphor
has a tendency to distort and confuse as well as enlighten.
Grant
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