Re: virus: Corporations are religions

Bryan Wheelock (wheelock@mindspring.com)
Thu, 04 Mar 1999 13:12:11 -0600 

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. I'm in the
>process of conducting a little test to see which Subject: title has the most
>effect, so please excuse me for trying to force anyone to read my garbage
>three times by manipulating and rewriting of the subject title for "optimal
>memetic impact". For those interested in the results thus far:
>
>Memetic Journal list: HUMOUR: Memetics out of control ---> 4 responses.
>Favourable.
>Extropian list: ECON: Are we ready for hyper-economy ---> ZERO responses (=
>transhumans eat less)
>Virus list: Corporations are religions (where humour does appear to be
>appreciated by those who "get it" and effective in stimulating carpal-jerk
>responses regardless) ---> time will tell.

Great idea, actually testing to see what works. I like it!!!
>

>the next 5 years reading biographies of those people who obviously had a
>great "memetic effect" on those around them. Churchill, Hitler and Stalin
>come to mind. I'm not that sure that the US President of the time had
>manic-depression, syphilis or drug addiction issues (or combos thereof)that
>their followers had to live with.
I am curious, what have you learned from this. Were you trying to devlope a model of the mental processes of these charismatic leaders.
>
>Of all the stuff I've watched and read, a movie of Jim Jones and his suicide
>gang in South America had the most profound impact .. possibly as big as The
>Relevant Chapter. It became clear to me that if he could have such
>tremendous power over so many so-called humans, it had to be a reflection on
>his natural <hardwired> abilities rather than purely the stupidity of his
>"flock". Some mental illnesses provide one with these natural abilities, as
>does cocaine (but 15 minutes is not enough time to get any real convincing
>done).

I have been on this list for about a month. It seems that most of the time people want to post about theories. It reminds me of the few MENSA meetings that I have been to. A bunch of smart people more concerned with proving their intelligence than actually doing anything.

Your post is one of the first that I have seen of someone actually practicing the idea of memes. I have posted to Virus several times about this but nothing seems to change.

I would love to hear about what you have learned about the charisma in you studies so that maybe together we could model it and use it to get more of what
we want of life.

Bryan

P.S. what was the name of the Jim Jones movies that you saw. I'd love to see it.
On that topic there is a Documentary created in the 60's about the evangelical movement in the U.S. of the preachers revealed a lot of the techniques used to induce the crowd into speaking in tonques, fainting and all kinds of other cools stuff. The documentary is called Marjoe. 

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Content-Type: text/html; charset="us-ascii" . I'm in the
>process of conducting a little test to see which Subject: title has the most
>effect, so please excuse me for trying to force anyone to read my garbage
>three times by manipulating and rewriting of the subject title for "optimal
>memetic impact".  For those interested in the results thus far:
>
>Memetic Journal list:  HUMOUR: Memetics out of control    ---> 4 responses.
>Favourable.
>Extropian list:  ECON: Are we ready for hyper-economy ---> ZERO responses (=
>transhumans eat less)
>Virus list:  Corporations are religions (where humour does appear to be
>appreciated by those who "get it" and effective in stimulating carpal-jerk
>responses regardless)  ---> time will tell.

Great idea, actually testing to see what works. I like it!!!
>

>the next 5 years reading biographies of those people who obviously had a
>great "memetic effect" on those around them. Churchill, Hitler and Stalin
>come to mind. I'm not that sure that the US President of the time had
>manic-depression, syphilis or drug addiction issues (or combos thereof)that
>their followers had to live with.
I am curious, what have you learned from this. Were you trying to devlope a model of the mental processes of these charismatic leaders.
>
>Of all the stuff I've watched and read, a movie of Jim Jones and his suicide
>gang in South America had the most profound impact .. possibly as big as The
>Relevant Chapter.  It became clear to me that if he could have such
>tremendous power over so many so-called humans, it had to be a reflection on
>his natural <hardwired> abilities rather than purely the stupidity of his
>"flock".  Some mental illnesses provide one with these natural abilities, as
>does cocaine (but 15 minutes is not enough time to get any real convincing
>done).

I have been on this list for about a month. It seems that most of the time people want to post about theories. It reminds me of the few MENSA meetings that I have been to. A bunch of smart people more concerned with proving their intelligence than actually doing anything.

Your post is one of the first that I have seen of someone actually practicing the idea of memes. I have posted to Virus several times about this but nothing seems to change.

I would love to hear about what you have learned about the charisma in you  studies so that maybe together we could model it and use it to get more of what we want of life.

Bryan

P.S. what was the name of the Jim Jones movies that you saw. I'd love to see it.
On that topic there is a Documentary created in the 60's about the evangelical movement in the U.S. of the preachers revealed a lot of the techniques used to induce the crowd into speaking in tonques, fainting and all kinds of other cools stuff. The documentary is called Marjoe.
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