Message-Id: <199706110047.UAA12740@brickbat9.mindspring.com>
Date: Tue, 10 Jun 1997 20:51:06 -0500
To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
From: bbenzon@mindspring.com (Bill Benzon)
Subject: social feedback etc.
Timothy Perper says:
>2.) Amplification and feedback. ALL RIGHT! GOOD STUFF!! Jumping in at
>the deep end, Dave, we can analogize memes not to these Platonic thingies
>but to information-bearing packets circulating in a social system. It now
>follows that the behavior of the system (which we assume has an energy
>source that lets it make more memes, or people for that matter), depends on
>how its feedback loops are built.
Yes. This is the sort of stuff we need.
When I look at the interaction of African-American and European-American
music in the 20th century I really really want to talk about amplification.
You know...certain memes arose in New Orleans after the turn of the century
and were amplified in the cultural system until it became saturated with
them in the late 30s, at which point the system simply drifted until new
memes (out of Memphis & other places) were introduced in the mid 50s and
were in turn amplified, etc.
What conceptual work has to be done so I can make such statements in a
meaningful way? And how do I get quantitative data which will give me some
clues about the nature of the system?
William L. Benzon 201.217.1010
708 Jersey Ave. Apt. 2A bbenzon@mindspring.com
Jersey City, NJ 07302 USA http://www.newsavanna.com/wlb/
===============================================================
This was distributed via the memetics list associated with the
Journal of Memetics - Evolutionary Models of Information Transmission
For information about the journal and the list (e.g. unsubscribing)
see: http://www.cpm.mmu.ac.uk/jom-emit