Re: Words and Memes

From: Grant Callaghan (grantc4@hotmail.com)
Date: Thu Feb 14 2002 - 00:52:40 GMT

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From: "Grant Callaghan" <grantc4@hotmail.com>
To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
Subject: Re: Words and Memes
Date: Wed, 13 Feb 2002 16:52:40 -0800
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    >
    >At the smallest unit, genes are base-pairs. If you buy into the essence of
    >a meme being information, then information is measured in bits, 8 bits to
    >the byte. Which makes Watt's meme "separate condenser" 18 bytes or 144
    >bits.
    >
    >You could argue that you need millions of bytes of background technoloy for
    >this meme to be applied, but the exact same thing can be said about some
    >gene where the actions of tens of thousands of other genes are required for
    >it to be expressed.
    >
    >Keith Henson

    If you're talking eight-bit bytes, you're talking about computers. DNA is
    divided into three base pairs per unit and each unit codes for an amino acid
    according to Matt Ridley in his book Genome. The principle is the same but
    the way of dividing up the bits is different from the way it's done in the
    computer field. There are 20 amino acids that make up an alphabet of units
    that can be used to produce any number of products including proteins and
    enzymes. I understand the computer much better than I understand the cell,
    so I'll concede ahead of time I may be wrong, as I've already been wrong on
    this subject once today. ;-)>

    Grant

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