virus: remove
Francis Ciarrocchi (metrosection@hotmail.com)
Thu, 15 Oct 1998 06:49:03 PDT
>From owner-virus@lucifer.com Wed Oct 14 20:55:55 1998
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>Message-ID: <001701bdf7f0$3949ee00$2aa1bfce@lil--elvis>
>From: "Tim Rhodes" <proftim@speakeasy.org>
>To: "Church of Virus" <virus@lucifer.com>
>Subject: Re: virus: More virian propositions
>Date: Wed, 14 Oct 1998 20:57:42 -0700
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>Eric wrote:
>
>>Really? Why is it, then, that field guides to birds can record bird
songs
>>accuratly? My parents possess a 20 year old record of bird songs
which is
>>every bit as useful now as it was then -- Robins still sound like
Robins,
>>and it don't even matter where you live!
>>
>>I think you're trying to bullshit me, Tim.
>
>I'm getting so tired of arguments from incredulity here at CoV. I
can't
>help it if you're ignorant. ("We are all born ignorant, but he who
remains
>ignorant has only himself to blame.")
>
>You could have looked this up on your own, a simple search for
"birdsongs
>and memes" would have done it. But since you can't be bothered to
doubt
>yourself or do a lttle research on a topic you're talking about, this
is
>from a new paper to the Journal of Memetics by Susan Blackmore titled
>_Imitation and the definition of a meme_ which can be found at:
>http://www.cpm.mmu.ac.uk/jom-emit/1998/vol2/blackmore_s.html
>
> "5.1 Vocal imitation in birds and dolphins
>
>"There is no doubt that there are examples of vocal imitation in birds
and
>cetaceans. Song birds have been treated as a special case since
research on
>imitation first began a hundred years ago (Bonner, 1980; Delius, 1989;
>Thorndike, 1898; Whiten and Ham, 1992). This is partly because
imitation in
>birds is generally confined to sounds, and to rather specific kinds of
sound
>at that (with the possible exception of parrots who may be able to
imitate
>simple gestures). Many songbirds have long traditions. The young learn
what
>to sing by imitating their parents or neighbours. In chaffinches, for
>example, the nestling may hear its father sing long before it is
capable of
>singing itself. A few months later it begins to make a wide variety of
>sounds, gradually narrowing down to the song it heard as a chick.
>Experiments show that there is a critical period for learning and that
the
>bird has to hear its own song and match it to the remembered song it is
>imitating. Hand-raised birds can learn songs from tape recorders and
adopted
>birds sing songs more like their adopted, not biological, parents."
>
>Now, should you rethink your premises about memes a little? Or is that
just
>more bullshit on my part?
>
>-Prof. Tim
>
>
>
>
>
>
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