From: "Aaron Agassi" <agassi@erols.com>
To: <memetics@mmu.ac.uk>
Subject: RE: i-memes and m-memes
Date: Thu, 2 Sep 1999 04:09:23 -0400
In-Reply-To: <2CDFE2C8F598D21197C800C04F911B2034936C@DELTA.newhouse.akzonobel.nl>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk [mailto:fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk]On Behalf
> Of Gatherer, D. (Derek)
> Sent: Thursday, September 02, 1999 3:05 AM
> To: 'memetics@mmu.ac.uk'
> Subject: RE: i-memes and m-memes
>
>
> Derek:
> >But part of my thesis is
> > that there
> > >are _no_ internal memes, so proving that would make me at least half
> > >entirely wrong.
> >
> > Depends what you mean by "internal memes", though, doesn't it? What do
> > you think of the examples I gave of the relevance of the brain to
> > memetic explanations?
>
> Aaron:
> "Internal memes"? How about just calling them *thoughts*?
>
> Derek:
> No, for 2 reasons:
> a) because, then my thesis would be "there are no thoughts"
Why so?
> b) because there is a (fairly) precise definition of the Dawkins
> B meme as a
> replicating unit of brain information (perhaps) associated with some
> externally observable behaviour or other cultural artefact. That
> isn't just
> a thought.
It's still a thought! All thoughts are brain information. And deciding what
is a smallest unit, is yet another question. Some thoughts, possibly all,
replicate within the brain. Are they different in quality that replicate? I
see no reason to so assume. Thus those thoughts that replicate inside the
brain may be deemed memetically successful, at least within the brain. The
distinction, if any, is first of all one of happenstance.
The same goes for behavioral manifestation, or degree there of.
>
> ===============================================================
> This was distributed via the memetics list associated with the
> Journal of Memetics - Evolutionary Models of Information Transmission
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> see: http://www.cpm.mmu.ac.uk/jom-emit
>
===============================================================
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