re: #533 Hhar

Excellent, Salamantis, you just demonstrated my point: you are claiming that a unit exists which you cannot empirically define nor separate from a non-meme.

Not true; I empirically define a meme as a unit of information that can reside in human brains and replicate between them via communication and observation, and I further separated memes (as words) from that which the memes describe (such as actual giraffes, as opposed to the weord ‘giraffe’).

Note: I didn’t bring up giraffe’s necks, nor “gratuitously switched topic”. You brought up giraffe’s necks after I said :”If you claim that there are memes, then they need to be separated from non-memes, but as soon as a person communicates which bits are non-memes, alas, they become memes. Behold: the theory that destroys itself: everything and anything in a culture can be a meme. How incredibly useful.” Nothing in there about giraffes or necks, and your reply again evaded the point: you can neither empirically define what the “unit” is (as distinct from the memeplex), nor distinguish meme from non-meme in a clutural artifact. But you are sure it exists! Why, dawkins has said so! And Dennett! And whatever….jumpin. Think for yourself for bloody once. The obvious is staring you in the face.

No, I brought up giraffe necks in order to illustrate a point; it was you who substituted lines from poems, in an attempt to obfuscate my point. And that point is that words and phrases like ‘giraffe neck’ are memes, while actually giraffe necks are NOT memes - and thus I demonstrated the distinguishing that you spuriously claimed that I was incapable of demonstrating. I also stated that the first four notes of Beethoven’s 5th Symphony constituted a widespread meme quite eclipsing the spread of the memeplex comprising the symphony itself. And if you had read the two personally authored articles I linked from my own website, you would not be falsly claiming that I have not been thinking about these matters for myself, and for a long time.

If there is anything else completely off topic you want to talk about, go for it. Don’t forget to down ding me!

LOL! Bad opinion! Bad opinion! MUST Punish!

I downding what in my view deserves it. Being wrong deserves it. And you have been wrong about many things, as I have amply and abundantly demonstrated. Not that you’d ever admit it. You’re not that big a person, im my opinion. Let’s see if you can prove me wrong about that.