Why use the term 'memes'? Why not simply say: 'unquestioned beliefs'?
Edwina
----- Original Message -----
From: Helmut Raulien
To: [email protected]
Cc: John Collier ; [email protected] ; Peirce-L
Sent: Wednesday, October 21, 2015 2:24 PM
Subject: Aw: Re: Re: Open axiomatic frameworks (was: [PEIRCE-L] A Second-Best
Morality)
Dear Edwina and All,
the binary sets I had mentioned all base on the binary set: Information
transfer via sub-/unconscious structure elements versus via conscious structure
elements. To say it in Peircean terms (as Stephen Rose has claimed): The first
three methods of fixating belief (authority, tenacity, a-priori) all need
subconscious structure: An authority is only sure, as long as the authority is
not questioned. Tenacity only is effective, as long as the tenacious one does
not have to answer the question, why he/she is so tenacious. A-priori only
works for sure as long it is not analyzed either. An analysis of the
subconscious structure elements makes them conscious, and thus puts an end to
them. Then there remains the scientific method. Then there probably will be the
case, that not everybody in the society agrees with the now conscious, and
therefore negotiable elements, so the society may cease to be a system, lose
its structure, fall apart into many systems, like political parties. But then
there is still (hopefully) democracy, a system with the structure installed:
The agreement that it is possible to disagree and still work together. About
memes I really would say, that people swallow them. But they make sick, can
even make a whole society sick. I think all this is better explained by the
sociologist Pierre Bourdieu. To semiotize all this sociological stuff is a
challenge, I think. Maybe memes would be a word for unquestioned habits of ways
of thinking? Algorhithms including subconscious or for-granted-taken premises,
turned into immediate objects? Virus-like immediate objects with a surface that
only fits to the representamen "This is relevant and true", and to the
interpretant "copy and spread"?
Best,
Helmut
"Edwina Taborsky" <[email protected]> wrote:
Right - they are 'very much like that of solid material particles'. That's
what I mean by saying that they are not semiosic. What are you supposed to do
with them? Swallow them?
And I would say that of course meaning is part of their essence - otherwise,
what is the point of their existence? What is being transmitted if not meaning?
Edwina
----- Original Message -----
From: John Collier
To: Edwina Taborsky ; Helmut Raulien
Cc: [email protected] ; Peirce-L
Sent: Tuesday, October 20, 2015 3:46 PM
Subject: RE: Re: Open axiomatic frameworks (was: [PEIRCE-L] A Second-Best
Morality)
My understanding of Dawkins’ notion of meme is that it is specifically not
anything more than a causal entity, passed on by repetition through receptive
channels common to the transmitter and receiver. Meaning is not a part of their
transmitability, though we can assign meaning to them, and often do, but this
is an overlay, and not part of their essence as transmitable units. I think
there are problems with making sense of their transmitability, not to mention
of their identity conditions, but it seems to me that their “not being
semiosic” is beside the point. Dawkins sees their dynamics as very much like
that of solid material particles.
John Collier
Professor Emeritus, UKZN
http://web.ncf.ca/collier
From: Edwina Taborsky [mailto:[email protected]]
Sent: October 20, 2015 9:36 PM
To: Helmut Raulien
Cc: [email protected]; Peirce-L
Subject: Re: Re: Open axiomatic frameworks (was: [PEIRCE-L] A Second-Best
Morality)
Helmut - I'm against the very notion of 'memes' because they are
non-semiosic. They are akin to solid material particles - and the cognitive
process does not swallow solid material particles. It transforms them within
the semiosic process. Again, memes are non-semiosic and not amenable to
semiosis; you swallow them.
I don't get your binary sets of
Meme-vs - rational belief
Diffusion - vs -narrative
Diffusion is a process; narrative is a 'thing'.
Meme is a 'thing'; a rational belief is a conclusion arrived at via reason.
Edwina
----- Original Message -----
From: Helmut Raulien
To: [email protected]
Cc: [email protected] ; Peirce-L
Sent: Tuesday, October 20, 2015 1:10 PM
Subject: Aw: Re: Open axiomatic frameworks (was: [PEIRCE-L] A Second-Best
Morality)
Supplement:
Sorry that I always add supplements, but now there is something about
diffusion I want tio add: A crystal of potassium permanganate diffuses in water
and turns it pink, but in oil it does not. A meme or an idea diffuses only when
it is put into a proper social environment, that is a social system with a
structure that allows the idea to diffuse (and copy itself). That is why I
think, that the diffusion concept is not wrong, but neither complete.
Clark, Edwina, Stephen, List,
I do not see, that there is an either-or, regarding memes and rational
beliefs, or diffusion versus narratives, or subconscious versus conscious
structure-elements. I think, that there is both, and that it always is good to
make the subconscious conscious, that is, to uncover memes to see where they
come from. Many of them are myths, that is lies- and these lies may have been
told deliberately, or they may have come up by a social systems own dynamics,
as any system intends to reinforce itself. Anyway, to make the subconscious
conscious is the way of psychoanalysis, and I do not see, what is so wrong
about it, fundamentally. Of course, it is bad to have a wrong analysis, and
Freud probably was wrong in many places (eg., that a child is
polymorph-pervert). But I think, it is very good to replace a diffusion with a
narrative- if the narrative is telling the truth, and if this can be made sure.
Can it? By scientific method?
Best,
Helmut
"Clark Goble" <[email protected]>
On Oct 19, 2015, at 1:25 PM, Edwina Taborsky <[email protected]> wrote:
Clark - I prefer not to think of Jung. You wrote:
"the sorts of things structuralism dealt with in treating the mind as
literature were correct."
I'm not sure what you mean by the above.
In most ways psychoanalysis is treating the mind (especially dreams) as
if they were a literary work to be interpreted with the various ways literature
was interpreted. That’s why even though Jung, Freud and company aren’t
typically taken seriously in science they still are in literature departments.
The way a person interprets literature simply is quite different from say
what goes on in contemporary psychology or cognitive science.
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