From: Walter Watts (wlwatts@cox.net)
Date: Fri Jul 26 2002 - 10:41:52 MDT
Anthony wrote:
> On 25 Jul 2002 at 12:53, Jonathan Davis wrote:
>
> > > Has anyone noticed that academics think memes are are stupid
> > > idea? Has Dawkins?
> >
> > Perhaps you could give us a few examples?
>
> Ask any academic familiar with the idea. Memes are part of Dawkins' popular
> literature. "Unto
> Others" is a good book of scientific quality in this area. Of course, it
> doesn't cover memes, since
> that isn't a scientifically validated concept.
>
> > I would also like to see
> > some reasons why you (or these 'authorities') think memes are stupid
> > idea?
>
> Me? I like the meme idea - I like ideas.
> Funny how you dismiss academics by calling them "academics". Does a scholar
> who doesn't
> agree with a widely sold and easily digestable idea no longer a scholar?
>
> > It would cheer me to hear that 'academics' thought memes are a stupid
> > idea. These are after all probably the same people who believe in
> > transgressing the Boundaries towards a Transformative Hermeneutics of
> > Quantum Gravity.
>
> How strange.
>
> How is it Dawkins thinks that scientists can talk about sociological,
> political, philosophical and
> psychological ideas - outside of their own expertise - whereas social
> scientists and artists cannot
> discuss scientific ideas outside of their fields? What gives scientists the
> ability to do this?
Sometimes arrogance, sometimes superior knowledge. That's what CoV is for. To
straighten it out-- ;-'>
You can see neuronal readiness-to-fire potentials on an oscilloscope. You can't
quite make out internally mapped mental-image "memes" in the same manner. Yet.
Walter
>
>
> This is why "meme" is not a respected idea - the popular scientist (Dawkins)
> is speculating
> outside of his own field, just as the pomos do theirs.
>
> At least, this is how many academics (or "academics"?) see it.
>
> Personally, I think it is good for both "sides" to makes such speculations
> and be informed by the
> other "side" - just as the pomos are and just as Dawkins and his enthusiatic
> followers should be.
>
> The humanities and th sciences must come together. The split between them is
> dangerous. Our
> understanding must be holisitic. The idea is to bring the sciences and the
> arts/social sciences
> back together again, into a dialogue, where they can learn from each other.
> The urgency of this
> is evidenced by the fact that no member of the US congress has an
> postgraduate scientific
> qualification - yet, many of the science issues they have to deal with
> require PhD level
> understanding. How can they legislate? They don't. They rely on their crude
> moralities.
>
> The failures to unite this gap between scientific, low-level, explanations
> and high level
> humanities explanations has problematic political implications. This is
> evidenced postmodern
> theories as discussed, or by the common notion that nation-states are
> separable, not part of a
> unified biosphere, which leads to disastrous policies regarding pollution
> control.
>
> Walpurgis
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
> -------------
>
> http://www.noumenal.net/exiles
>
> Under the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act, the government police and
> other authorities can, with out
> a court order, demand that phone companies, internet service providers and
> postal operators hand over
> detailed information on individuals such as their name and address, phone
> calls made and received, source
> and destination of emails, the identity of websites visited and mobile phone
> location data, which is capable
> of revealing the user's whereabouts at any given time and is accurate to
> within a few hundred metres.
>
> http://www.guardian.co.uk/humanrights/story/0,7369,731074,00.html
>
> http://www.faxyourMP.com
-- Walter Watts Tulsa Network Solutions, Inc. "No one gets to see the Wizard! Not nobody! Not no how!"
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