Re: virus: barnowl@rain.org: Memetics debates

David Leeper (dleeper@sm1.gte.net)
Sat, 26 Oct 1996 07:42:19 -0500


barnowl@rain.org wrote:

> Now to say we are not even masters of our own mind is yet
> another such blow, and understandably engenders hostility.

Wait a minute. I think this is backwards.

In olden days everything was because God wanted it that way, or demons
tricked us into swaying
from Gods plan. We were just puppets.

Even at the beginning of this century, psychology described people with
terms like Oedipus
Complex or Shadow Archtype, which are parts of the body of theory of
psychology, not part of
the body of the person being talked about.

Today with genes and memes an individual has, for the first time in
history, encapsulated
within himself his own tools of reason and creation.

There's a Calvin Cline commercial with a message similar to your posting.
"Scientests say
genes make me the way I am, I say I make me the way I am!" I always talk
back to the TV
saying, "You're genes _are_ you." Not all of you, there's memes too, but
you get the idea.

-- 
David Leeper
Homo Deus
http://home1.gte.net/dleeper/index.htm