A while ago I read Parker J. Palmer’s 2014 book Healing The Heart Of Democracy, a book about political strife and incivility in America, much like my 2012 book, The Nutcase Across The Street. I bought it because it speaks to my interests.
Part of his proposed solution to our partisan problems consists of learning to let our hearts “break open” rather than “break apart.” This is poorly explained, but I think he means that after having our hearts broken we are then able to empathize with others, including those whose hearts are broken over issues we don’t care about or would prefer to be settled in ways they would not. This is the main theme running through the whole book. Another part of his solution consists of learning to connect with others outside of our immediate circles of friends, learning not to fear strangers – especially those of different races, socio-economic classes, etc. Simply living in an urban area where one has to negotiate a path through crowds can help one develop the habit of respecting others and Palmer also suggests numerous other ways this might be done formally and informally. He claims connecting with others also has the added benefit of making us less dependent on centralized power for our needs, making us less vulnerable to manipulation and fascism. He claims individualism leads to despotism because when people no longer need others, they stop caring and are easily divided by those that would overpower and subdue us. Most of this makes sense to me, but in my experience the only way to keep the peace sometimes is for people to separate. Rather than trying to push everyone into working together or living where there are crowds, people should be able to escape and live as they want without interference. Individualism may lead to despotism, but it seems to me much more likely for the lack of individualism to lead to despotism. One cannot rule alone (or else I’d already be doing it) without widespread allegiance to a system – allegiance that could not exist if more people were more independent. Other proposals include leading by example to change hearts rather than change the law, seeking consensus rather than majority (or plurality), respecting the rights of minorities, respecting the democratic process, and respecting the constitutional system of checks and balances to slow down change to the point that society can safely absorb it. He wants us to “live in the tension” of never having any issue permanently settled. He seems unaware that the main problems with our current political situation are that we cannot agree on what is constitutional, what is democratic, and which minority rights to respect. Do we respect the reproductive rights of the mother? Or the right-to-life of the baby? Do we have greater respect for a president elected by the states through the Electoral College or for a congress elected by much smaller (and often gerrymandered) districts? Did Bush commit an unconstitutional act by ordering troops into Iraq? Did Obama commit an unconstitutional act by signing the ACA? The problem is not that we can’t settle our disagreements; the problem is that we can’t even agree on the process to go about settling our disagreements. In my book, I propose that we talk more to each other in order to eventually reach an agreement on these issues. Palmer expects us to live at peace without ever reaching an agreement. My solution may very well be too impractical and idealistic, but Palmer’s solution is no solution at all! Overall, it is a very interesting book packed with numerous nuggets to think over. I have already pointed out above why I think it is incomplete, but his ideas could still be an important first step to get us to negotiate honestly. It also gives an important historical perspective to our connection with strangers that most people (including myself) seem to lack. The book is actually about much more than politics. It is about getting along, socialization, intimacy, and communication. I give it at least four stars.
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I discovered Sylvia Engdahl on the Independent Authors Network. She writes the Children Of The Star trilogy, made up of three books (This Star Shall Abide, Beyond The Tomorrow Mountains, The Doors Of The Universe) previously published traditionally.
Children Of The Star might be the best novel I’ve read since Foundation’s Edge by Isaac Asimov. It is my new favorite. It is similar in many respects. There is a mysterious and reclusive group (the scholars) subtly guiding society. There is mention of telepathy. There are secrets that must never be told or else they would endanger the survival of the entire human race. There are secrets inside of secrets inside of other secrets wrapped around and twisted through still other secrets. Everybody has secrets they aren’t telling the others. It goes much further than sociology and political science. The book is heavy on spirituality. The main character, Noren, learns through his heartbreaks the meaning of faith in a way I would not have even understood myself just six years ago. There are also moral dilemmas on every other page, such as when and when not to interfere in the affairs of other cultures, reminiscent of the prime directive from Star Trek. The only thing I can say against the book is that at times it seemed to drag just a bit while Noren thought through every possible facet of an issue before making a decision. The book is more philosophy than action. At the same time, this additional detail really helped me to identify with the character and feel everything he went through. In the end, it becomes worth it. Engdahl also makes excellent use of foreshadowing. A while ago I read the 2003 book Finding God Where You Least Expect Him by John Fischer. It is about the current state of Christian culture.
Fischer argues that Christians have too much isolated themselves in fear of “the world” when they should be engaging it, not only to expose evil, but also to expose good. God is everywhere and in everything, not only in “Christian” music and “Christian” books. Worse, most Christians have ceded their authority to discern right and wrong to the professional clergy, accepting much of what they say uncritically. This is why so many are against the Harry Potter series but haven’t read it. They edit out swearing and nudity in movies while leaving in suggestive or violent themes. Meanwhile they miss clearly biblical themes in secular movies and complain when a “Christian music” artist doesn’t mention Jesus enough in his/her songs. He further argues that American Christians in general have unbiblical attitudes against the physical world (which God created and said was good), especially the human body and basic human psychology (including negative feelings of any kind). By ignoring the bad, they lose the opportunity to learn of an even greater good, such as redemption. By withdrawing from the world, the Godly influence they could have had is gone. Could it be that the reason our public schools have so many problems is that whenever possible, Christian parents remove themselves and their Christian kids to send them to Christian schools, which also draw away Christian teachers from the public school system? Instead of keeping quiet, maybe we should keep reaching out. I bought this book in the hope that I would understand how certain political ideas are spread enough so that I might sabotage some of them and spread some of my own ideas. Unfortunately, very little in the way of marketing advice can be found in these pages. Written in 2005 by David Kupelian, The Marketing Of Evil is more about what he considers evil than about how evil is marketed. He covers topics such as the ineptitude of our educational system, fraud in the Kinsey Report, the long-term effects of no-fault divorce policies on society, and tax evasion in abortion clinics.
Throughout the book, he also bemoans marketing techniques that appeal to our subconscious emotions, claiming that such techniques treat people like animals without souls and breed attitudes of contempt for human dignity. He forgets that such techniques could not work if humans were purely rational agents and that marketers would not use these techniques if there were known a better way to sell products. The truth is that in many ways humans are like other animals and appeals to reason often do not work. The way to fight evil being marketed is not to complain about the marketing techniques, but to market good, and market it better than the competition markets evil. Any ideas? Vance Packard wrote The Hidden Persuaders in 1957 about the new marketing techniques being used at that time. Based mostly upon Freudianism, motivation research (or MR) was used to understand the subconscious minds of the prospective customers and was supposed to be more accurate than using surveys. At that time, marketers were dealing with multiple problems. Customers were irrational and dishonest. What they claimed they would do in the abstract did not always translate into a purchase when put in an actual buying situation. Customers also tended to be content with what they had and products from many competing brands were virtually indistinguishable. Those companies that used MR survived.
The book gives numerous examples of seemingly irrational behavior by customers, Freudian explanations, marketing “hooks”, successful case studies, motivation research techniques, and mentions some demographic trivia. What this book does not do is explain in detail how to analyze the data gleaned from various MR techniques. It is also explained how the same principles used on customers are applied to voters and employees. One company who used MR marketing successfully was having difficulty selling steam shovels. They emphasized the amazing feats these machines could do and in pictures showed their steam shovels from a distance as mighty machines, but not enough contractors were buying. Finally, they discovered the reason was that many of the employees felt overshadowed and threatened by the machines doing all the work and so discouraged their bosses from buying them. When the steam shovel company made new graphics showing a view from behind the operator’s head and a new slogan emphasizing what the operator could do by using the machine, resistance to the steam shovels vanished and sales rose. The product never changed, only the way it was presented. The book also touches upon some of the ethical issues surrounding this form of market research. It is warned that a campaign was underway to convince people to replace old appliances that had become obsolete, even if they still worked perfectly fine. This form of thinking still seems to be widespread today. Other forms of thinking that were widespread then seem to have gone away. Today people are wary of being manipulated and become upset when they find out they have been. In the late fifties, however, people tended to be more upset about not being manipulated enough to like being manipulated. It makes me wonder whatever happened to MR and depth marketing. Certainly there are still examples of it being used today, but it seems by no means dominant. Most commercials are still poorly done. Many candidates still cannot seem to make themselves likable. No mention of it is made in the 1981 marketing book Positioning. Perhaps it went out of style when Freudianism went out of style, but if Freudianism was so wrong, how was it able to produce measurable increases in sales? This I do not know. Written by Ian Stewart and Jack Cohen, The Collapse Of Chaos is a critique on the direction science is heading. They contrast the pros and cons of reductionism and wholism, and then present a new paradigm: contextualism. In reductionism, things are understood by breaking them into fundamental units. Too much reductionism makes the prediction of emergent phenomena prohibitively complicated. In wholism, things are understood as a unique whole. Too much wholism makes every instance of a phenomenon unique, preventing any deeper understanding to make predictions with. In contextualism, things are understood by how they relate to other things.
Another theme running through the book is that nobody really knows how to measure complexity and simplicity. Newton’s equation of the gravitational force may be simpler than Kepler’s set of data describing the orbits of the planets, which in turn may be simpler than Ptolemy’s circles, but Newton’s equation (F=Gm1m2/d^2) is only an approximation. Multiple gravitating bodies, friction, air resistance, relativistic effects, and quantum effects all conspire against it. The underlying phenomena that give rise to the behaviors described by Newton are actually very complicated (the quantum wave function of every particle interacting with the quantum wave function of every other particle in the universe, including exotic virtual particles), even though they may in turn be explained by even simpler laws on a more fundamental level. This is the essence of chaos theory. Simple equations, given enough iterations, can yield immensely complex and even fractal results, while immensely complex equations can yield rather simple and boring results. Below is an excerpt from page 8 illustrating how bad humans are at determining true complexity. “The ordinary city-dweller finds the jungle complex and incomprehensible but is entirely comfortable when surrounded by the ordered simplicities of New York, such as department stores, subways, taxicabs, drug-dealers, and muggers. The jungle-dweller is baffled by New York but is entirely at home with the snakes and the spiders in the nice, simple jungle…An apparent complexity that might actually be simple is the fact that most holly bushes have spiky leaves only near the bottom…Now, isn’t it clever of the trees to save on the cost of making spikes and concentrate their efforts at the bottom, where animals might eat the leaves? How incredibly complex nature is! Except, of course, that we don’t know whether it does cost the plant anything to make spikes. It may be harder to make all the leaves the same than it is to make them different, just as it’s harder to make a flat piece of ground (all at the same level) than a sloping one…” Other topics of interest in The Collapse Of Chaos include interesting takes on entropy, the anthropic principle, the selfish gene principle, and the possibility that for some mathematical truths, the shortest possible proof is billions of times longer than the final statement. This book could very well turn your worldview inside out. The subtitle says it all: how the human brain defies replication, medication, and explanation. The Undiscovered Mind, written by John Horgan, chronicles in detail the failures of psychology to understand, diagnose, or treat much of anything in an objective, empirical sense. Horgan claims that Prozac has not been shown to be better than a placebo, Freudian psychoanalysis – to the extent that it has any common meaning between analysts – makes problems worse if anything, and that enthusiasts of artificial intelligence have no idea what cognition is. Horgan suggests that each individual may be so altered by miniscule events as to make everyone so unique that general principles of human nature will be forever elusive.
Published in 1999, The Undiscovered Mind casts a pessimistic light on all progress in what is arguably the most important field of science. While it may on occasion go too far in this respect, it can still be useful in highlighting the blind radical loyalty to various questionable theories of genetic psychology, neuroscience, psychoanalysis, phrenology, lobotomy, and others by many in the scientific community. If you like the book, you may also be interested in Horgan’s other book The End Of Science. In it, he explores the possibility that we are very close to knowing all that can be known, and how science will change in its focus. This book, Hierarchy In The Forest by Christopher Boehm, asks the question of human nature: are humans fundamentally hierarchical or egalitarian? After explaining, in detail, the political structures of chimpanzees, bonobos, gorillas, and hunter-gatherer bands of humans in both ancient and modern times, the conclusion is reached that since humans have strong submission and intimidation instincts, humans are fundamentally hierarchical, and that any examples of egalitarian societies are due to the populace as a whole keeping down the “alpha-males” by an extended alliance of sorts.
The book runs a bit longer than necessary to get the point across, and yet still does nothing to answer potential criticism. Still, it is a must-read for all political theorists and philosophers wishing to understand human nature from an evolutionary perspective. Other topics covered include the role of gossip in society, the effects of food storage on societal structure, how sociology derives from biology, and the difference between tribes and bands. The book is not overly technical, although at times it can become a bit dry. We live in an overcommunicated society, so claim Al Ries and Jack Trout, authors of the 1981 book Positioning (see more recent edition here). Because humans have finite minds and a subconscious screening system to weed out unimportant data, one cannot remember every brand for every product and make a rational choice of the best one. Because of this, advertising is becoming less and less effective, causing businesses to advertise in greater volumes to compensate. This in turn only adds to the cluttered landscape of ideas, worsening the problem.
The authors start by saying that whoever is first in an industry, will stay there and no amount of advertising will be able to knock them into second place. It is wasted money if the population can absorb no more unconnected information. The key word here is “unconnected”. Humans can absorb more information if it relates somehow to a framework of knowledge they already know. That is why one must position their company or product relative to that of one’s best known competitor. For example, 7up, rather than having its great taste being advertised, competing directly against other soft drinks, was advertised instead as the “uncola”. It was positioned as an alternative to the most popular soft drinks Coke and Pepsi. The authors also criticize the common act of line extension. When a brand, such as Xerox, becomes known for one product, such as copiers, the population begins to equate the product and the brand. All copiers become known as Xerox machines, whether they are or not. Then, when Xerox decides to line extend into the world of computers, while still using the Xerox brand, potential customers get confused. With all the wealth of information poured into the brain on a daily basis, most of it almost subconsciously, one cannot usually remember later when they hear the word “Xerox” whether that word means a computer or a copier. Xerox computers never did well. Incidentally, it is mentioned in this book that there are rare cases in which line extension can work, such as when one’s product is sold by representatives, or when there is no competition. Also, if the “mental distance” between the products is large enough, such as Cadillac selling dog food, the interference is minimal. Finding a new use for the same product to appeal to a different customer base is also okay (to a point), and is called reverse line extension. When taken too far, however, the company slips into “the everybody trap”. By trying to be everything to everybody, the image of a company becomes too complex and murky to appeal to anybody. Another trap is the “no-name trap”. Only companies that are already well known can get away with using initials. With mere initials, it is more difficult to remember what the company does and distinguish it from other abbreviations encountered in life. These concepts and others are covered in this book and the authors explain everything by using numerous real-world examples. It is a great book. The book, of course, was written in the eighties and things may have changed slightly since then. Today, it seems that branding is all the rage. Even so, in my experience people care little about brands and usually have no idea what they are buying. People are interested in products. Also, we are still overcommunicated and can absorb no more information unless it is positioned against what we already know. I realized this myself from personal experience before I even read this book. This is why species are grouped into genera, families, orders, classes, phyla, and kingdoms, rather than simply being listed alphabetically or in order of discovery. It makes them much easier to remember. I do have some objections to some of the specific details of exactly how the human mind ignores advertising in this book, even though I find nothing wrong with the authors’ final conclusions. In the beginning, the authors seem to indicate that people remember primarily the first and dominant in a category because it is first and dominant, not being able to remember others very well – but to know which was first and dominant, one would have to know something of the others initially to compare. Many of the companies I remember were never dominant, nor were they first in their field. Rather, they were first in my mind only. Which names are first to stick in the mind of a child that has just learned the language is an almost random thing. Although I can name a few motel chains, I couldn’t begin to guess which is dominant or which (if any) was the first. The mental framework can be built on a characteristic other than dominance, such as price, service, geography, or even the phonetics of the name or slogan (often this is all one can go on). Because of this, not everyone will remember the same motel chains when asked how many he/she can think of. I just don’t think people think that way. To show what I mean, I take an example from the book. The authors declared that in car rentals Hertz was first, Avis was second, and National was third. To position themselves against Hertz and be noticed, Avis ran the slogan: “We try harder.” The problem is that until I read this book I did not know who or what was dominant in car rentals, I thought Hertz was a repair shop (due to its poor commercials) named after a unit of frequency, I got Avis and Avon confused with each other, I had never heard of National, and the only car rental company I could name was Enterprise. I have never had to rent a car, but the Enterprise commercials I have seen since my youth, and they were the only ones to stick in my mind. To me, Enterprise was first (I used to be a trekkie). The “we try harder” slogan of Avis would have meant nothing to me had I ever heard it (and I probably haven’t heard it considering when this book was written). Another objection I have is to the reasoning behind the advice not to use initials until the company is well known, even if the full name is messy and long. Sometimes, initials are enough. I learned that AT&T was a telephone company easily, but I still don’t know what AT&T stands for. When a company lasts for more than one generation and has already switched to initials, as AT&T has, it essentially starts over with the next generation with initials only. Considering the ease at which AT&T, TWA, HP, GM, GE, and others are remembered by those that were not even born when they were still using full names, it would seem that even a brand new company could get away with using initials. In fact, if a company is already using a full name, it may be better to stay that way, so as not to cause confusion. How have you tried to cut through the noise by positioning your brand/product/service against others? These are only a few of the books I have read in my (way out) life:
The Story Of Psychology by Morton Hunt goes through the history of different approaches to studying the mind from Plato to phrenology to gestaltism. Sophie’s World by Jostein Gaarder is an overview of the works of all the major philosophers including Socrates, Berkeley, and Kant. It is told in a fiction thriller format wherein Sophie’s teacher explains philosophy to her while mysterious things happen. Mere Christianity by C. S. Lewis touches upon Lewis’s theories of the nature of the trinity and other interesting things. The Evolution Of God by Robert Wright first goes through (his contested version of) the history of religious thoughts and how the human conception of God has changed over time. He then proposes the true existence of an impersonal force for moral development as an emergent phenomenon of globalism that he submits as a compromise between atheism and theism. How To Lie With Statistics by Darrell Huff details how salesmen, politicians, and others can present truthful data in very misleading ways. For example, some use correlation to imply causation. I read this when I was very young and I can’t stop seeing examples of this almost daily. How We Know What Isn’t So by Thomas Gilovich goes beyond misleading presentations of data and touches upon psychological biases common to most humans. The Great Political Theories (volumes one and two) by Michael Curtis contains excerpts and summaries of every major political theory and manifesto, such as Plato’s Republic and Hitler’s Mein Kampf. Taking The Quantum Leap by Fred Alan Wolf is a simply-worded, illustrated introduction to quantum mechanics. No They Can’t by John Stossel puts in an eloquent, easy-to-grasp, and fact-supported way the libertarian worldview. The Metaphysical Club by Louis Menand focuses on the lives and theories of (mostly) American philosophers during the nineteenth century and on how much of it was designed to reduce conflict in the wake of the civil war. It also tangentially touches on some interesting different approaches to doing science. On Second Thought by Wray Herbert details several cognition “shortcuts” human brains make in making perceptions. What is interesting is that not only are those afraid of heights more careful around heights, but they actually perceive those heights as higher than others do. Culture Matters edited by Lawrence E. Harrison and Samuel P. Huntington is a collection of essays on how cultural values affect economic development in different societies. Understanding Media by Marshall McLuhan is about how the types of media common in a society affect the “sense ratios” of the people and therefore their approach to life. For example some people care nothing about hearing swear words spoken verbally, but put them into print and they freak out. Other people are the opposite. Create Your Own Economy by Tyler Cowen touches on many seemingly unrelated subjects, but what I got out of it is how we are all partly autistic and the internet is making us more so by changing our “sense ratios” – though he does not use this term. On Being Certain by Robert Burton is very pessimistic of intuition, presenting cases where the brain can be tricked. Blink by Malcolm Gladwell is very optimistic of intuition, presenting cases where the subconscious makes split-second evaluations that later turn out to be right, even when we never know why. The Physics Of Star Trek by Lawrence M. Krauss is a great introduction to physics. It explains wormholes, warp drive, and why the “transporter” will probably always be impossible. Jesus Among Other Gods by Ravi Zacharias details several ways that Jesus was completely unique as the founder of a religion. Darwin’s Black Box by Michael Behe details several examples of “irreducible complexities” found in Earth life that could not possibly have evolved gradually without killing the organism and therefore must have been introduced fully-formed by an “intelligent designer.” The Case For Christ by Lee Strobel details the corroborating and other evidence to support the accounts of the gospels. Challenging The Verdict by Earl Doherty picks apart the arguments made in The Case For Christ and submits alternative theories and also claims Jesus never existed. Not A Conspiracy Theory by Donald Gutstein is not worth much except as a list of who gives the money to promote libertarian or neoconservative causes. He gives progressives a free pass. The Political Brain by Drew Westen misleadingly supports the case that liberals appeal to the intellect and conservatives the emotions while suggesting that liberals will do better politically if they refuse to have a dialogue and instead resort to accusing conservatives of having secret, nasty motives. Wrongly Convicted by Saundra Westervelt and John Humphrys gives specific cases where justice went awry and suggests numerous measures that can be made for reform. Soft Power by Joseph S. Nye Jr. explains the value for nations of cultivating a positive image in the world. 1421 by Gavin Menzies cites overwhelming evidence that the Chinese visited the coasts of North America and South America long before the Portuguese and Spanish. If lightning had not struck the Chinese capitol and started a fire two years later, we would all be speaking Chinese today. When In The Course Of Human Events by Charles Adams makes the case that the Confederacy was (mostly) in the right and the Union was waaaaaay out of line. It also makes the case that the civil war was about much more than slavery and this has been ignored or even covered up ever since. How The Irish Saved Civilization by Thomas Cahill chronicles the fall of Rome and how literacy and learning was kept alive only in monasteries, many of them founded by Irish missionaries across Europe. Union, Nation, Or Empire by David C. Hendrickson is really good. The subtitle says it all: The American Debate Over Foreign Relations 1789-1941. Attitudes towards American relations with the world are compared and contrasted with attitudes towards relations between the states. The author makes the case that the USA should lead the world in joining together since we have had more practice in keeping multiple states in harmony and have learned from our mistakes. Mapping Human History by Steve Olson shows how closely related the human species is and makes the case that “race” is very nearly nonexistent. It also covers prehistoric migrations. Reinventing Knowledge by Ian F. McNeely and Lisa Wolverton details the different institutions and artifacts that information has been stored on and disseminated through to the next generation in different cultures and through history, such as how the first colleges and museums arose and evolved. As it turns out, I’m not the only one who has written about living stuffed animals. J. S. Skye already has five books out featuring Flurry, a magically-animated teddy bear cub whose vanity (and bad luck) get him into all sorts of adorable trouble. Book descriptions of later episodes have him travelling back in time and fighting evil pandas. This is what caught my attention. The first episode is The Christmas Wish, and this is the one I read.
It is not elves, but living teddy bears that make toys at the North Pole for Christopher Kringle (who hates being called Santa). Every so often, he brings a new one to life. The bears live much as humans, getting married, living in heated houses, and eating (recreationally – they have no need of organic calories). They can even produce tears when sad. The first episode explains Flurry’s origins, his moving from the North Pole, and his meeting many friends. The book is very sweet and the Flurry character is totally adorable. He gets so excited to go shopping that he runs out of the house without the list – but at least remembers to go back to hug his mother. He experiences many of the same sort of child-adult misunderstandings that my character Nathaniel does, and this gets him into trouble. Even the way his internal thoughts were described reminds me of my work. I liked it. Skye definitely captured the feeling of childhood and more than a little bit of the magic of Christmas. I love cute stories about children, but cute stories about living stuffed animals from the north pole just might be better. As the series progresses, Flurry the teddy bear encounters Christmas magic, sword fights, and discovers his destiny. A great fantasy story. Darwinizing CultureDarwinizing Culture, published in 2000, is a collection of essays written by both opponents and proponents of the memetic paradigm compiled by Robert Aunger. It gets somewhat technical in parts and is generally not for the casual reader. In this book, serious questions are raised about the validity and predictive power of the memetic paradigm. Some of the points raised are: Since the information in meaning is not thermodynamic in nature, but rather context-based, how is one to measure it without using one’s own subjective mind? Is it really possible to break down all meaning into fundamental quanta? Since the definitions of words are made up of other words, each with their own definitions, isn’t meaning self-referential? Since unlike genes, memes are not passed directly from one person to another but rather recreated in the mind of the receiver based upon assumptions about the causes of the behavior of the sender, might unique differences in each individual prevent the transmission of any contextual information in any objective sense? Might it then be better to measure the spread of observable behaviors instead? Is it possible that in some cases memes can blend to form hybrid memes, making independent measurement impossible and the concept of quanta of meaning an illusion? This book is highly informative and well-balanced. Theories of psychology and how the first memes might have arisen are also discussed. Overall, it is a great book. Virus of the MindIn Virus Of The Mind, author Richard Brodie explains in smooth, well-written, laymen’s terms what memes are and all about memetics. This is the perfect book for the beginner who is interested in memes but doesn’t know exactly what they are. Types of memes are discussed, such as strategies, associations, and distinctions. So are how memes are used today in religion, politics, and business. Methods of getting one’s message noticed are explained, such as using trigger-words such as mission and danger. After reading this book, the memetic worldview will become clear and exciting. Below is an excerpt from page 16: “The fourth concept necessary to understanding mind viruses is the new science of evolutionary psychology. This field examines the biases and mechanisms of our minds that evolved to support our survival and reproduction. Some of these biases take the form of psychological buttons that can be pushed to penetrate our mental defenses. I called this part of the book ‘Crisis of the Mind’ rather than simply ‘Introduction’ because the former pushes more buttons: it attracts more attention and more people will read it. I called this book Virus of the Mind rather than Introduction to Memetics for the same reason.” Thought ContagionWritten by Aaron Lynch, Thought Contagion is a book packed full of hypothetical examples of memetic effects. If Richard Brodie’s book Virus Of The Mind wasn’t enough for you, Thought Contagion will show by example how memes are expected to work. Below is an excerpt from page 124 wherein Lynch explains one theory as to why more women than men attend church:
“Most Christian propagation advantages work fairly symmetrically between the sexes. Yet Christianity has achieved greater prevalence and intensity among women than among men in North America, suggesting that at least some of its contagion works differently for each sex. “Traditional social science might look for sex differences in emotional receptivity or critical thinking to explain the differences in religiosity. Memetics can suggest entirely new principles behind the religious gender gap. “Gender-skewed proselytism during mating offers one memetic explanation. Religious homogamy memes can lead both sexes to proselytize opposite sex unbelievers in order to make them ‘eligible’. Yet men might do so more assertively than women, at least traditionally, resulting in more conversions of women than men.” Critics of memetics have raised objections to this book, claiming memetics is long on theories but short on proof, the meme mixtures in society are so complex that memetics can be used to argue for the exact opposite of many observed cultural behaviors, and alternative theories exist to explain this same phenomenon above. However, memetic effects must have at least some influence over culture. This book is not meant to be a definitive declaration of how things work, but merely an exercise in thinking memetically. This book introduces memetics to the public; it is not a scientific journal. |
AuthorMy name is Dan. I am an author, artist, explorer, and contemplator of subjects large and small. Archives
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