> At 18:20 09/12/96 -0800, you wrote:
>
> >WHERE THERE'S SMOKE...
>
> [Deletia]
>
> >...Those carefully engineered images
> >presented on our TV screens tell our reptilian brains that Coke is the
> >brand of the leader of the pack, who has all the power, the freedom, the
> >girls...
> >
> >But we are smarter than that, aren't we? We are intelligent enough to
> >view a TV commercial and then decide for ourselves what to buy...aren't
> >we? ... Can't responsible people think for
> >themselves, and responsible parents guide their children, despite the
> >nightly memetic irradiation?
> >
> >I would like to believe that we can think for ourselves. And yet, the
> >statistics show us that as a group we are sheep. Although from my point
> >of view I see myself taking in information, sorting through it, and
> >making my own choices, when we have a thousand of us or a million or
> >five billion, we behave predictably as a result of the advertisers'
> >influence.
>
> Richard, I disagree with your claim that sometimes we human beings can
> "think for ourselves" and that sometimes "we are sheep". In saying that you
> yourself can appraise and reject memes connected with advertising or "moral
> decadence" but that others can't, you take a narrow view of memes' influence
> on your decisions.
>
> I don't believe in free will. What I feel as "new ideas" and "decisions" are
> memes/ideas associating and competing in my brain. All my thoughts, even
> those I used to think were "original", can be explained by memetic/cognitive
> interactions like:-
I hope you don't have this meme then [I do!]:
"If I have no free will, then I am completely, totally irrational."
Since I "happen" [sic] to abhor the conclusion, I deny the premise.
[CLIP]
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/ Towards the conversion of data into information....
/
/ Kenneth Boyd
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