RE: virus: Memetical Axioms
Robin Faichney (r.j.faichney@stir.ac.uk)
Tue, 23 Sep 1997 09:45:48 +0100
> From: David McFadzean[SMTP:david@lucifer.com]
>
> At 11:02 AM 9/22/97 +0100, Robin Faichney wrote:
>
> >I think you answered yourself there, David. Sure, the genes
> >have no direct affect, but we host the particular memes we do,
> >in large part, due to genetically-controlled factors. What
> >this comes down to, basically, is: do genes affect behaviour?
> >To which the answer is, I think, unequivocally, yes.
>
> Of course. But why stop at genes? We are not solely memetic and
> genetic creatures, we are also chemical creatures and physical
> creatures, so you can't talk about human behaviour without
> talking about chemistry and physics, right?
>
Whatever you look at, you leave something out of the picture.
You can't focus on everything at once. So what you choose
to look at is a matter of pragmatics. For some purposes,
memes alone will do, while for others they won't. I translate
what Eva said (and I hope she'll correct me if I've gotten it
wrong) as: for many important purposes, consideration of
memes alone will not suffice, but consideration of memes
plus genes will. What's genetically inherited forms a highly
significant part of the landscape in which memes survive,
or fail to do so.
> >Typical computer hardware is a Universal Turing Machine:
> >it can do any info processing task for which a program
> >can be written. Brains are not like that.
>
> I meant only that computers depend on the hardware to run
> programs, but you don't normally consider that when talking
> on the level of operating systems.
>
And what I meant was: you can get away with that to a
greater extent with computers than with brains (and it
*is* a matter of degree) because computers are
general info processing machines, while brains are
highly specialised. You could perhaps put it this
way: neural substrate != neutral substrate. :-) On a
level playing field, you'd only ever have to look at
memes, but this field's not level.
It can also be argued that there is no clear software/
hardware division in brains, as there is in computers,
but I'll leave that for another day. :-)
Robin