tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5956838.post1034238093461292048..comments2023-11-22T01:14:54.298-08:00Comments on amor mundi: Memetics Re-Invents the Wheel of Rhetoric, and Then Breaks ItDale Carricohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02811055279887722298noreply@blogger.comBlogger11125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5956838.post-66909615619974271912013-10-28T11:55:25.766-07:002013-10-28T11:55:25.766-07:00I regard both of those discourses as radically red...I regard both of those discourses as radically reductionist to no useful purpose, and usually -- I'm sorry to say -- as reactionary scientisms. Evopsycho, especially, seems to rationalize a slew of ugly racist and patriarchal prejudices in people who otherwise regard themselves as paragons of objectivity and virtue. I can't say that Peter Singer's and comparable efforts at a more progressive deployment of the discourse impresses me much either. That said, I don't think the phrase "politically correct" ever clarifies anything. I believe that term originated in the recognition of multiculturalist academics and activists that intersectional histories and institutions of oppression implicate every political position in violation a priori and hence that no hands are clean and hence all efforts at reconciliation will be fraught -- this yields an attitude of modest witnessing rather than the self-righteousness usually caricatured by reactionaries who regard calls for tolerance or listening as unbearably tyrannical for whatever fucked up reason. I can't claim to be a fan of Pinker, which is not to say that I disagree with everything he says. I will resist my temperamental inclination to read closely your rhetorical invocation of a "fertile marriage" to frame this comment. This reply sounds very grumpy, but it's not, really -- I spent a late night grading papers, you'll have to forgive me. Dale Carricohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02811055279887722298noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5956838.post-43826276220380083092013-10-28T03:36:39.750-07:002013-10-28T03:36:39.750-07:00Though memetics and evopsych looks as though it wo...Though memetics and evopsych looks as though it would be a fertile marriage, many on the evopsych team aren't having it. Pinker is the most vocal critic, arguing against the whole cultural evolution field in his 2012 "false allure" article - and in many other places. Politics may be involved: memetics treats human differences while evopsych treats human similarities. The latter is politically correct, while the former is not.<br />Tim Tylerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06623536372084468307noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5956838.post-37197744979210913692013-10-27T11:01:51.217-07:002013-10-27T11:01:51.217-07:00Memetics is selling something all right.Memetics is selling something all right.Dale Carricohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02811055279887722298noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5956838.post-7246464441251286532013-10-27T06:06:56.619-07:002013-10-27T06:06:56.619-07:00The memetics vocabulary doesn't seem "clu...The memetics vocabulary doesn't seem "clumsier" to me. One of the main selling points of memetics is that it has the neatest terminology of any of the modern theories of cultural evolution. Its main competitor in academia seems to be "cultural variant". However, use of such terminology apparently stunts thinking about topics such as memetic engineering, memetic algorithms, memetic hitchhiking, memetic linkage, phylomemetics, meme therapy and the meme's eye view.<br />Tim Tylerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06623536372084468307noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5956838.post-86706833595564545412013-08-03T06:57:37.154-07:002013-08-03T06:57:37.154-07:00Okay, that's my next song, right there.
Would...Okay, that's my next song, right there.<br /><br />Would that be too kruel, er, I mean, cruel?Robert Grosshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04675709393098627869noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5956838.post-14776040067558778342013-07-31T12:13:12.293-07:002013-07-31T12:13:12.293-07:00So painful.So painful.Dale Carricohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02811055279887722298noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5956838.post-38053354774004069142013-07-31T11:33:49.984-07:002013-07-31T11:33:49.984-07:00> evo-psych. . . is a staunchly-defended artic...> evo-psych. . . is a staunchly-defended article of<br />> faith among, e.g., the LessWrongians. . .<br /><br />Real-world uses of evolutionary psychology.<br /><br />http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Talk:LessWrong<br />-------------<br />Luke Muehlhauser is a world class jerk<br /><br />I ca[aught] the following LW post from another S[pace]B[attles]<br />thread on LW (well worth reading, including a litt[le] discussion about the<br />ridiculously overrated Yvain). Luke Muehlhauser wrote:<br />"So I broke up with Alice over a long conversation that included an<br />hour-long primer on evolutionary psychology in which I explained<br />how natural selection had built me to be attracted to certain features<br />that she lacked. I thought she would appreciate this because she<br />had previously expressed admiration for detailed honesty. Now I realize<br />that there's hardly a more damaging way to break up with someone.<br />She asked that I kindly never speak to her again, and I can't blame her."<br />What the actual fuck?<br /><br />--Baloney Detection (talk) 16:41, 30 July 2013 (UTC)<br />=======<br /><br />This reminds me of a similarly-clueless conversation between<br />a nerd and his girlfriend in _The Social Network_.<br /><br />;-><br />jimfhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04975754342950063440noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5956838.post-21929277835099936102013-07-31T11:09:20.036-07:002013-07-31T11:09:20.036-07:00Just so, but the earlier sense (senseless though i...Just so, but the earlier sense (senseless though it is) still prevails among Very Serious Futurologists.Dale Carricohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02811055279887722298noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5956838.post-62128597889511453712013-07-31T11:03:10.394-07:002013-07-31T11:03:10.394-07:00The word meme now refers to a picture with a silly...The word meme now refers to a picture with a silly caption distributed on the internet.jollyspaniardhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10999141103840765243noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5956838.post-40300682374657986402013-07-31T10:36:46.475-07:002013-07-31T10:36:46.475-07:00Yeah I was adding a line about that to the post pr...Yeah I was adding a line about that to the post probably at the very moment you were penning this comment -- I couldn't agree more.Dale Carricohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02811055279887722298noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5956838.post-62105782598035903932013-07-31T10:30:33.639-07:002013-07-31T10:30:33.639-07:00> [A]part from the pseudo-provocative pep of th...> [A]part from the pseudo-provocative pep of the initial neologism<br />> itself memetics adds the idiocy of a reductive mis-analogization<br />> of signification to a biology itself already idiotically reductively<br />> mis-analogized to computer programming via the pieties of<br />> cybernetics/information science.<br /><br />Also, use of the word (coined by Richard Dawkins in his<br />1976 _The Selfish Gene_, after all) signals an affiliation<br />with the evo-psych crowd, which is part of the contemporary<br />futurist/>Hist/singularitarian identity<br />(and indeed, is a staunchly-defended article of faith among,<br />e.g., the LessWrongians -- if you're an evo-psych skeptic,<br />you're just a muddle-headed hippie who has fallen victim to<br />the SSSM [Standard Social Science Model], or some such thing.)<br /><br />There's a lot of entertaining sniping about evolutionary psychology<br />on P. Z. Myers' blog Pharyngula. He ever dares to go<br />mano a mano with Steven Pinker.<br />http://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2013/07/28/tackling-pinkers-defense-of-evolutionary-psychology/<br />jimfhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04975754342950063440noreply@blogger.com