Re: virus: Re: virus-digest V1 #115

XYZ Customer Support (xyz@starlink.com)
Wed, 18 Dec 1996 22:08:15 -0700


> From: Ken Pantheists <kenpan@axionet.com>

> XYZ:
> > I am studying quantum mechanics right now, so that is how I can
> > tell you don't understand that either. Stop reading these pop-
> > science books and get the real thing! I never equated the
> > scientific method with reasonable or even logical. It is a method
> > that gives results whereas your "useful method" doesn't.

> With all due respect, I find myself simply skimming over your post and
> not really paying attention to you. Which is a pity because you sound
> like you are probably a bright person.

Hehehe! Sounds like you aren't paying attention to anybody.

> You have started a thread with the opinion that memetics is not a worth
> while pursuit. That's kind of like walking into a cocktail party and
> telling everyone there alcoholics.

> "Prove me wrong! you're all drinking aren't you??"

That isn't the definition of an alcoholic.

> This discussion list focusses on a specialized area of theory-- It is
> part scientific theory and part aesthetic theory (although in my mind I
> see it as an aesthetic theory)--

What part is scientific?

> We have terms that explain how people use information and how
> information uses people.

That is called dogma.

> You are an excellent memetic subject.

Prove that by infecting me with a meme that will be to your
benefit. Use one of the several principles that are pointed out
in articles about meme propagation and see if any of them can
ever possibly apply to me.

> from the quote above I can see that you have distinction memes for pop
> science and real science.

Call it whatever you want, that doesn't make it reality. That just
makes it calling it whatever you want.

> Can you explain where you got those distinctions?
>Upon whose criteria did you learn them?

It isn't "who", it is "what". That "what" is logical thinking.

> When you encounter something new, how long does it take for the
> distinction to kick in?

What makes you think that something new has to "kick in"? That
would be the definition for gullibleness and I am not gullible.

> These are rhetorical questions, you don't HAVE to answer them on the
> list. But if you ask yourself these things *poof* you're doing
> memetics-- whether you want to or not ;)

That sounds like magical thinking to me...*poof* I am now not doing memetics!