Darwin's meme: or the origin of culture by means of natural selection
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- fate_0
No, Dawkin simply attempts to characterize the nature of memes, not the validity of them.
You can not honestly study a particular meme, because people are fickle, most are even sure what they believe in. You can assess the validity of certain claims, but in the end, the interpretation is subjective. I can give you evidence to the contrary all day long of a Christian God, but your own volition compells you to deny certain other truths.
- fate_0
* edit: "most areN'T even sure what they believe in."
- flagellum0
My issue is with Dawkins strict Materialistic Reductionist position. He tries to reduce every belief down to matter/genetics. And for the reasons that Scrutin and McGrath and even Gould and others have demonstrated, he's marching to the beat of his own drummer and moves forward without empirical support.
- flagellum0
Not true fate, deeply religious people turn away from faith all the time and in the same way, people adamantly opposed to faith, end up embracing it til their deaths.
Mimio - science should not have boundaries, this I agree with. We should follow the evidence wherever it leads. Even if the evidence points towards explanations which lie outside the realm of Methodological Naturalism.
- yarsrevenge0
hey fate... I reread your entire original post... my bad for taking it out of context...
... my post was mainly directed to the many ive seen post here over and over again where I feel people like to find a scapegoat to life's problems when they don't truly understand the true nature of said problems.
... again... my bad on the post.
- fate_0
Then I'd agree with you discipler, you can't reduce it to purely genetic/biological terms. That's my major point of contention with the uncommonDescent article. But like I said, the analogy to a virus/dna should only be that, an analogy for base understanding of the nature of a meme.
- fate_0
"Not true fate, deeply religious people turn away from faith all the time and in the same way, people adamantly opposed to faith, end up embracing it til their deaths. "
Uh, this is exactly what I said, people aren't sure what they believe in. I could quote myself as saying just that.
- flagellum0
Make no mistake, I do not deny the notion that there is predestination and that decisions people make are ultimately fore-ordained, but these principles cannot be reduced genetics, much like human consciousness cannot be reduced matter, even though there is a physical aparatus which chanels this consciousness.
- flagellum0
Oh, i misread your post.
- lowimpakt0
Make no mistake, I do not deny the notion that there is predestination and that decisions people make are ultimately fore-ordained, but these principles cannot be reduced genetics, much like human consciousness cannot be reduced matter, even though there is a physical aparatus which chanels this consciousness.
flagellum
(Jan 31 06, 09:54)
-------------------------you sound like you've had one to many magic mushrooms.
first world problems
- lowimpakt0
too many.
- Brookoioioi0
"it fails to address why there are so many competitors among religions, if they are competing for the truth. Shouldn’t the false ones have fallen by the wayside, like refuted theories in science, as Scrutin noted?"
There are different religions because of geographical separation, and there are obvious reasons why false religions are spared the same fate as false science theories, science uses EVIDENCE as NATURAL SELECTION, whereas religion cannot be proved right or wrong, so natural selection for religious memes is purely arbitrary, based on the whims of the population.
"If we are going to go on empirical evidence on this specific issue, the weight would fall on the notion that there truly is an external creator who transforms lives and thus keeps faith prosperous in generations to come."
How Does a apparent flaw in theory A, automatically make theory B right? What independent evidence is there for a creator? Will we be seeing anything in any scientific journals any time soon? Arguments like this do very little for your credibility.
- fate_0
Exactly brook, the nature of a religious meme, or any meme in all honesty, is subjective interpretation of reality, or put simply, "faith". That's why you have to study the nature, the effects, the propogation of a meme, but it's silly to examine them empirically because you still have the "true believers" who will believe what they want.
Flying spaghetti monster is an excellent satire of this.
- flagellum0
I like Phillip Johnson's perspective:
"In this reductionist world ideas are not good or bad, ugly or beautiful. They differ only in "infectivity," which is the capacity to induce brains to copy them. The notion that the poetry of Keats is "sublime" is itself merely a meme which increases copying by brains whose governing memes have produced a taste for things with a reputation for sublimity. Bad poems or ideas are as likely to be successful in this sense as good ones--indeed, "good" and "bad" are meaningless terms for a memetic reductionist. Dawkins himself insists that some of the most effective replicators are "viruses of the mind," meaning religions (especially Christianity), which he despises. The only criterion of success for a meme or a gene is frequency of reproduction.
Why would poets and artists--or any group of thinking people who value the mind--be attracted to a philosophy that is so tailor-made to encourage murderous barbarians? And why should they believe that gene/meme reductionism has any foundation in fact? The ultimate irony is that this philosophy implies that Darwinism itself is just another meme, competing in the infectivity sweepstakes by attaching itself to that seductive word "science." Dawkins ceaselessly urges us to be rational, but be does so in the name of a philosophy that implies that no such thing as rationality exists because our thoughts are at the mercy of our genes and memes."
- Mimio0
Make no mistake, I do not deny the notion that there is predestination and that decisions people make are ultimately fore-ordained, but these principles cannot be reduced genetics, much like human consciousness cannot be reduced matter, even though there is a physical aparatus which chanels this consciousness.
flagellum
(Jan 31 06, 09:54)Holy crap, Am I actually reading this?
- lowimpakt0
Holy crap, Am I actually reading this?
Mimio
(Jan 31 06, 10:02)
----------------------------Noncesense
- flagellum0
But Brooke, there is no empirical evidence for Dawkin's brand of religious memes. You have nothing but hand-waving assumptions. It's pure speculation. So, you are call the kettle black, here.
Secondly, there is empirical evidence which supports religion. Take for instance the historical facts surrounding the resurrection of Christ.
Independant evidence for a Creator? Let's see:
1. DNA - digital specified information at the core of life.
2. The fine tuning of the cosmological constants.
3. The abrupt influx of biological information in the abrupt appearance of animal phyla sans antecedants.
4. The human conscience and it's inability to be reduced to matter.
I'm afraid this data is already making it's way into scientific journals (happy to link it for you). It's time to wake up and let go of old ideas, Brook.
- fate_0
Discipler, I would absolutely agree with Johnson's perspective. I'd take the critical approach to everything, even empirical science. Always take the road of the skeptic.
The problem is when memes are spread to unwilling "hosts" as it were by those who believe in them, those who try to further their agenda through society and politics. That's my big problem with Religion, and that's most people's problem with religion. Manifestation of that particular meme usually sucks. And then we get into conservative v. liberal debates, censorship, abortion, etc. etc.
- flagellum0
What's your difficulty, mimio?
- fate_0
Basically, let people believe what they want, as long as it doesn't effect me.