Re: virus: Autocatalytic Idea System Examples

Dave Pape (davepape@dial.pipex.com)
Wed, 4 Jun 1997 23:00:57 +0100 (BST)


At 22:03 02/06/97 -0700, Tim Rhodes wrote:

>On Sun, 1 Jun 1997, Dave Pape wrote:
>
>> Aha! Over-stressing either of the strategies can cause sub-optimal
>> processing! I AM Hegelian-synthesis-man. Tim's stagnation is what I
>> described as never reaching a decision... maybe... maybe Tim disagrees...
>> sorry Tim, I'm just a wanker, ignore me, I'm hateful, I know. Sorry.
>
>Yes you are. You've been a bad boy, Dave, and you must be spanked.

Consider my cheeks dented in a big, pink hand shape.

>And you're right, too. But I would offer that by bumping the system every
>time it jells (autocatalyzes), sending it into another basin of
>attraction, then another and another and so on, it may be possible, over
>time, to autocatalyze a meta-system emerged from the set of autocatalytic
>basins.

I agree! Harmony and peace. This bumping from basin to basin is what lots of
lateral thinking tools are meant to do, and is the effect you get from
thinking about a problem with other people: their memes differ from yours
(they must, they represent a lifetime's different experience) and that means
the basins of attraction the group memetic process settles into, change and
buffet around. Simulating a parallel search through ideas-space (several
searches, overlapping, done over time) and thus more likelihood of hitting
deeper basins.

>(Whew, I didn't know I had that much jargon in me!)

And it's all MY MEMES! (Well, some of it. And yeh, okay, those are
recombinants of other people's...)

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

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