From: "Chris Lofting" <ddiamond@ozemail.com.au>
To: <memetics@mmu.ac.uk>
Subject: Re: Dawkins' Mutation Test for Replicators
Date: Mon, 30 Aug 1999 06:13:53 +1000
-----Original Message-----
From: Wade T.Smith <wade_smith@harvard.edu>
To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk <memetics@mmu.ac.uk>
Date: Monday, 30 August 1999 5:49
Subject: Re: Dawkins' Mutation Test for Replicators
>>Thus you do not write-off these areas since understanding their structure
>>can aid in understanding memetic processes, surely that is what you want
to
>>do?
>
>Ah.... Belief systems are of course memetic processes, or can be
>subjected to memetic processes. Yes.
>
>But, I must call you to stop when you ask us to use the conclusions of
>these belief systems as methodological imperatives.
>
>The placebo effect is almost entirely a memetic phenomenon, but
>homeopathy is only a marketing technique to sell distilled water, and we
>_can_ study this marketing technique, but we have to call the distilled
>water 'distilled water'.
>
Umm.. the language used within the discipline, the particular lexicon,
contains patterns that are of interest in that their sound, their rhythm
could serve as carrier waves for messages; as in advertising, I get you
feeling good with a popular song and then use the emotional resonance this
can cause to allow my message to pass through your filtering systems; to get
through walls use waves.
To understand the mechanisms behind homeopathy you need to get a feel for
the lexicon and the rhythms that go with it -- this can give you a clue to
how people become believers; NLP emphasises getting people into light
trances to get the message across; this is not something 'new' and for
memetics it is an important area to review and thus my stress on not writing
these sorts of thing off; they are metaphors for describing
object/relationship patterns and as such analysis of homeopathy etc etc can
go to revealing interesting properties useful for understanding memetics.
best,
Chris.
===============================================================
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