Certainly. But not to 95% of the population. Why? Because an independant
reality ensures that any system (genes, memes) that are not consistent
with it will do poorly or go extinct. They may not be completely
erradicated (due to a myriad of probabilistic factors), but they will
never dominate, either. Your statement sounds an awful lot like "using
an exception to prove a rule", and it also doesn't address the essence
of the preceeding statement; that, whether an independant reality
/supports/ a "suicide" meme, or whether an independant reality
/supresses/ a "suicide" meme, there is, nevertheless, an independant
reality, and it is by virtue of the particular qualities of /our/
shared independant reality, that allowed memetics, rather than some
other system, based on some other hypothetical reality, to emerge and
do their thing inside your mind and mine.
>>As with /all/ emergent phenomenon, memes are, in the end, /completely/
>>dependant
>>on the heirarchies of systems preceeding them, from cognition, through
>>neural
>>systems, down through self-replicating cell chemistry, to sub-atomic
>>processes
>>and, ultimately, the very nature of objective reality from which the
>>fabric of
>>our existence is manifest. A meme's efficacy (its ability to survive in
>>a host
>>or propagate) will therefore correlate with objective reality; it can
>>never be
>>independant of it.
>
>I think (a) I agree with this description and (b) it doesn't say
>anything useful.
>>
>>I can't see myself contributing further to this thread. Unless someone
>>has a rebuttal that isn't logically inconsistent, a counter-proof that
>>isn't self-referential, self refuting or semantically imprecise, then
>>I'd love to see it die an ignoble death :-)
>
>A rebuttal of WHAT? You guys are saying you have some definitions of
>existence, consciousness, and reality that are irrefutable and
>self-evident.
No. The assertion was that the very concept of existence, as a fact,
/trancends/ definition, not the other way around. It cannot be
/defined/, itself. It is a fundamental axiom, beyond refutation, that
is used /in/ definitions. I believe this point was made on no fewer
than five seperate instances in this thread.
>Well isn't that nice. And excuse me if I get on with my
>life and ignore your little cult of consistency. Consistency has gotten
>me into more trouble...
Ahhhh.... I see, now. A spontaneously instanced (independantly learned)
aversion meme ;-) Hmmm... I'd sure hate to think the ideas put forth in
your book are inconsistent ???
Richard, I still can't bring myself to beleive you're not yanking my
chain. Maybe you're doing imperical measurements on the acceptance
threshold of an "internally inconsistent idea set" meme in a selected
Net population ...?
Cheers!
Dan (yep, that's me!) Plante
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The Metasystem Transition History of the "Dan Plante" System
initial conditions = data (conception)
control of data = information (conception to puberty)
control of information = knowledge (puberty to marriage)
control of knowledge = wisdom (marriage to divorce)
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