Re: virus: Level 3 and more on Autocatalytic sets.

Dave Pape (davepape@dial.pipex.com)
Thu, 5 Jun 1997 22:29:03 +0100 (BST)


At 13:55 05/06/97 +0000, Chitren Nursinghdass wrote:
>Hi Dave,
>
>it's really a pleasure exchanging memes with you.

Until we disagree! Ha ha ha... Cheers though! :)

>>>Yep, it you want real analogy, it's like culture when a stranger or group
>>>of strangers come to a land. there's an exchange of memes, and hence
>>>a new, vaster culture emerges. Memesets are like memes.
>>
>>Ha: and memes like memesets. This is my memetics argument for "be tolerant
>>and nice towards people of other cultures" views... that declining to put
>>people down because of their geogrphical point of origin leads to more
>>parallelism in terms of global memetic processing, which leads to a more
>>"imaginative" species.
>
>Big memesets like small memeset that are like the big memeset. Sounds like
>the love meme, no ?
>
>And in fact "that are like" could be just the same as "like/love"

Why do you think people like people that they are like? My theory is,
because you get an easier meshing of memes, producing more consistent
metamemes ("new" ideas). So it's more productive, on a kinf od short term
basis. Even better though, is all this stuff about being able to hold
alien-to-you memes in your memecology, and see what they produce... gives
you yet more flexibility... you have to be more thoughtful though...

>Apparently then that's what I see : with time you get different forms of
control
>(I won't use the word higher here because of the connotations). But there
>are symbiotic links as well (a vertical hierarchy).

All associative links... kind of feel symbiotic to me... tickling meme A
tickles associated meme B, which tickles A again... I'm trickling this point
back into the self-tightening autocatalytics argument again, sorry (deep and
slippery basin of attraction).

>But when the newer form
>understands how the older form has prevailed, then the newer form can act the
>same and hence maybe find more efficient ways than the older forms for
>replication.

This is like memes looking at other memes separated from them in TIME, in
contrast to what happens when many heads think together: memes look at other
memes separated from them by SPACE. The effect's the same: more flexibility
in how those memes explore the space of possible ideas...

>This certainly sounds scary to my body itself. But it makes sense
>in my memeset. Then there's a kind of takeover. And if that's how it works,
>then that's how it will be.
>
>Then if the older form of control is no more in control, then you can use the
>word "higher" in the sense that there seem to be more units of the newer form
>than the lower form.

Ah: more highly active. I... see...

>Incidentally, on numbers alone, you could say that insects are better or
>bacteria
>or virii.

I wouldn't say any were better. Presumably they've all evolved to deal with
their inherited ecological niches... "better"'s one of those value
judgements that only really holds currency within a mind. So... when I'm
being thoughtful, I try not to make too many of them...

Dave Pape
==========================================================================
I am ready.

Phonecalls: 0118 9583727 Phights: 20 Armadale Court
Westcote Road
Reading RG30 2DF