ROG RESPONDS TO KENNETH AND LIANE
Thanks for the link. Liane's site was interesting and fairly well balanced
overall. I wish the links on her site were still active.
KENNETH:
Imitation is indeed a very difficult process but like the memetisist I am, I
wish to say, that still in the field of memetics we ain 't certain of
imitation
is that important.
If you have read, the Meme Machine by Susan Blackmore like you cited you
did, you will have noticed there is somewhat a contradiction in her story.
ROG:
Yep, I did read it as cited. lol.
KENNETH:
I quote Liane Gabora www.chass.utoronto.ca/epc/srb/srb/moreonmemes.html
"The dramatic increase in brain size began two and a half million years
ago. It is here that hopes of pulling off the ' imitation drives culture '
thesis takes a nosedive.
Blackmore correctly notes that the archeological record reveals a sudden
' increase ' in tool variety at this time. She does not seem to be aware
that this contradicts the thesis of her book. That is, if imitation were the
bottleneck to culture, then prior to the
origin of culture there would have been variation everywhere, and the onset
of imita-
tion would have funneled this variation in a few of the most useful
directions. To bolster the thesis that imitation is the cultural bottleneck
with
archeological evidence, Blackmore would have had to find a period of time
where tool
variety sharply ' decreased .'"
To my knowledge there is no such period found.
The evidence Blackmore cites is in fact consistent with the thesis that
creativity was the bottleneck to culture.
ROG:
Although her overall web page was good and fairly well balanced, this
particular paragraph is kinda silly. It is like saying the advent of copying
machines should have ushered in a period of us just copying that ONE really
good THING over and over and over. The truth is that ability to copy leads
not to less variety, but to more. Look at writing, printing, the internet,
fax machines ,etc. With the advent of copying, especially imperfect copying,
I would absolutely not anticipate seeing less variety.
Liane admits she is biased on the topic to support her pet idea of
creativity. I guess I fail to see where the two conflict. In fact I believe
they complement each other. Evolution requires 1)selection, 2)variation and
3)duplication. Liane seems to only want to stress the 2nd aspect and downplay
the other two. Blackmore stresses all three, but highlights the difficulty
of accomplishing the task of copying.
I believe that copying and creativity are both necessary for progress, and
that it is the interaction of the two that is critical. One is dynamic, the
other is static. One explores the new, the other allows us to latch onto the
proven (through the 3rd aspect of selection). Together they establish a
self-reinforcing feedback loop.
Rog
PS -- And my pet theory is that it is self-amplifying feedback loops that
lead to the emergence of steadily increasing levels of complexity. But that's
another issue.
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