Message-Id: <199708120031.TAA04006@mailhost.onramp.net>
Subject: Re: A Drosophila for cultural evolution
Date: Mon, 11 Aug 97 19:32:55 -0000
From: Mark Mills <mmmills@OnRamp.NET>
To: memetics list <memetics@mmu.ac.uk>
>The answer to life, the universe, and everything is- Toilet training.
>
>
>
>Stop laughing.
>
>There is ample anthropological and ethnographic data, there is a clear
>primate evolutionary path, there is a clear pan-cultural incidence, and
>it is even experimentally testable.
Wade,
I think it an excellent area for memetic study. I've been saying that
memes and scatalogical object were probably intertwined. Toilet training
as currently practiced certainly seems to involve something of memetics,
regardless of what definition one uses.
Of course, we are confronted with the usual question...where is the meme?
Is it the dung? the diaper? the words one's parents use to convey a need
for bodily control? the memory of toilet training? the brain pattern
controlling relevant bodily functions? the instinct to acquire control
of the bowels?
Mark
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