Philosophy Now Forum

I am not claiming they are the same, but that they belong to the same form, like the ears and the trunk of an elephant, or intention and intension (De Wit, 1982). And only by definition and for the sake of argument, for I distance from the concept for reasons mentioned, a meme is an idea. So similar things that are not memes, for example, are intuitions.

I wonder what the first meme was? What was its content? Most likely it had something to do with being human. Perhaps the first meme's content was something like Descartes' assertion, "I think therefore I am". Or maybe it just had to do with survival.

There are gene pools. We must have meme pools also. It is likely that homo sapiens won out over Neanderthals because the former had a larger, more extensive gene pool, as well as a meme pool. Perhaps we can say the same about why one culture expands while others languor, because the meme pool of some are less robust, less varied and diversified.

I thing that is why the communist system of governance virtually collapsed in favor of liberal democracy, because the former's meme pool wasn't up to scratch or competitive enough. Communism's meme pool was a closed one; so no wonder it didn't survive, because of its inability or unwillingness to mutate like liberal democracy has done.

The end justifies the the memes.

A disappointing response - they do not even share the same etymology. Changing one letter does not mean words are related; the relationship between the signified and the signifier is completely arbitrary.
Beer; bier, gun;gin, bin;ban, veracity;voracity. You can find links between such words but they are purely imaginative and poetic, not to be taken seriously.

Are you saying that all ideas are memes, and that things that are not ideas, as such are not memes? If so, then why are you choosing to call them memes, and not 'ideas'?

The first meme appeared in a book by Dawkins called "The Selfish Gene".

One doesn't have to pretend too be so dense.

Dawkins did give it its name. But he just identified and gave a name to a phenomenon that had been happing for millenniums. Similarly, the gene in name only came in the early part of the 20th century, though it too was around millenniums ago.

Many things have been named after being around for a long time, like, for instance, civilization. And where would civilization be without genes and memes.

Without genes we'd not be around but without 'memes' we'd still have an idea. Its a nonsense idea made-up on the spur of a thought by a biologist.

If you are interested in actually making a case for them rather than the stuff you're saying so far then try Dennett, although, much as I like him, I'm pretty amazed he's gone for this nonsense as well. As no-one has, or will in my opinion, find this 'unit' of transmission of cultural ideas in any way, shape or form that would reflect the function or actual existence of the gene.

I thought a meme was an idea. But a meme is more than an idea. The meme makes an idea a shared value, a common attribution.

An idea on its own doesn't have the transmission capability. It needs to be 'packaged' as a unit for imitation, like a meme. It works similar to a gene in that it goes around like a unit with codes. As a meme makes it rounds it mutates and distributes it codes like a gene does.

Perhaps for want of a better name that cultural unit of imitation is called a meme.

I suggest that what the meme represents eventually gets embedded in our genes, meaning that these cultural units become part of our DNA.

If so then I suggest you have absolutely no idea of the meaning of the term "gene" nor the part it plays in the Theory of Evolution. Look-up the terms "phenotype" and "genotype" and see how they interact.

No, its you who are dense. Before Dawkins there were no memes. I meant that literally. The creation of the concept is the origin of the phenomenon when you are dealing with purely abstract notions.
Asking what was the first 'meme' is stupid..

Genes have a material reality, and are not the same case.
Civilisation is literally based on life around the 'civitas' - the town. There was no civilisation before towns which have a material reality.

You really haven't got a bloody clue about the meaning of either gene or meme if you think you can make this statement.
Just clueless.

If you think this has any meaning, then describe HOW this process takes place!
State where is the meme 'code' stored, how is it transmitted, and how does it mutate!
Then try to tell us what is the point calling ideas, memes in the first place!

When you fail in this task you will then realise what crap the whole idea is.
What is important about ideas, is the intellectual process involved in their evolution which Memetics never properly addresses.
Humans are reduced to social dupes; reduced to selective agents whose choices are of no importance.

Whilst I admire Dawkins and Dennett for their role in promoting atheism, their attempt to replace it with this pseudoscience is ridiculous.

For a better understanding of reality, it is important to compare, differentiate or integrate intuitions by studying their keywords. I am saying that all ideas are memes, and so are all facts, if they are confirmed, even dependently, which is confusing and the reason I normally never have used or will use the word. I am only here to debunk it.

All I can say is what a bunch of shitty genes on this forum who can't use their imagination or stretch the bounds of inquisition and speculation. It's like talking to a bunch of floating logs in a swimming pools. Get the image.

I would rather die than continue with you punks.

Streching the bounds is one thing Spike but fantasy is another. I did say I 'suggest you' or did I misunderstand you and you were not acually suggesting that ideas can be encoded into DNA? It was just a metaphor for ideas can become 'part' of us? Or something like that.
Would you really!? I doubt it.

WHy have you chosen to call all ideas meme?
If you are serious then you are clearly making a redundancy.

Glad to see you go. It's clear enough that you have failed to match up to your own expectations. If you can't support your views by using your imagination and stretching the bounds of speculation then you have only your personal contradictions for everyone to see and laugh at.

I'm sure you will be more happy talking to "a bunch of logs in a (?) swimming pools", they don't ask difficult questions that you fail to answer.
I'm sure you are capable of dropping a few off each morning to listen to your capitalist indoctrinated view point.