From: <MemeLab@aol.com>
Date: Mon, 12 Apr 1999 13:44:07 EDT
Subject: Re: selfishness, buddhism, and memetics
To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
In a message dated 4/12/99 12:14:04 PM Central Daylight Time, MemeLab@aol.com
writes:
<< But there is a very real and basic
template of selfishness, an innately emerging pattern of thinking and
acting,
underlying both the realities and delusions that people may have about their
"selves". >>
To make this furthermore clear, I do not think that we are born "tabula rasa"
awaiting to be infected by the respective memes which will determine if we
have a "self" or if we will have "no self". I think that the self is an
innate stance that we take toward the world both in our behavior and in our
communication - and it wouldn't surprise me if other animals may reflect that
as well. I don't think that it is necessarily a strictly human or humanizing
thing. Memes that correspond to that reality will tend to have that
advantage over ones that deny it, though the competition is not a total loss
for the self-denying memes as the existence of Zen Buddhism and other
religious imperatives toward, self-obliterating, self-denying or
self-sacrificing have demonstrated.
-Jake
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