Date: Sat, 04 Sep 1999 12:19:18 -0700
From: Bill Spight <bspight@pacbell.net>
To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
Subject: Re: i-memes and m-memes
Dear Aaron:
Aaron:
Are memes only social information or truisms? No, because an impression once derived from Nature is transmissible. Why is it only a meme in second generation? Are there potential memes in the mind of the originator? Are there potential potential memes in Nature? You see the problem that is solved only if all is memetic.
Bill:
Well, all phenomena are grist for the memetic mill. So we could call them memetic, in a broad sense.
I agree that transmission is not necessary for something to be a meme. Just as a gene need not be transmitted to be a gene. OTOH, if we wish to operationalize the concept, we might as well require transmission, either before or after formation. (A mutation {new form} might not be transmitted once it has taken shape, but it was transmitted before.) What is lost?
An obvious objection is that if transmission is required for something to be a meme, how can we tell that something is a meme before it is transmitted? Answer: we can't, but so what?
Bill:
<<
differences between how we confront natural and cultural phenomena.
>>
Aaron:
And what is that supposed distinction?
Bill:
In this context, cultural phenomena involve human-human interaction. (That's a rudimentary distinction.)
Culture has been defined in many ways, not all of which agree in detail. As I have mentioned before, Weber focuses on the question of human purpose. In those terms, time is natural; clock time is cultural.
Bill:
<<
Some believe that the mind is highly modular (the Swiss Army knife model). I think that there is a good bit of exaptation, that is, that skills evolved in one area are applied to others.
>>
Aaron:
But if the same skill is applied to the same task in either case, then what is the difference in kind?
Bill:
With exaptation, the skill is applied to a different task. Since it is the same skill, there is no difference.
However, much research in the last generation has shown that many cognitive skills depend upon context and content. Ideally, that might not be so, but that's how it is. At the same time, I think that the modularity of cognitive skills is often overstated.
Aaron:
Meaning is derived from nature
Bill:
That is a modern Western meme.
Aaron:
Even Nature may be said to transmit.
Bill:
That is so. However, there is no small value in limiting the domain of discourse.
Best wishes,
Bill
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