tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2197051945822486684.post1219692530184029928..comments2024-03-29T18:17:34.956+11:00Comments on Thinking Out Aloud: Lee Harris’s failed defence of traditionLorenzohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00305933404442191098noreply@blogger.comBlogger15125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2197051945822486684.post-12706940921857540372010-07-10T08:12:29.095+10:002010-07-10T08:12:29.095+10:00I read the Selfish Gene. At the time I thought tha...I read the Selfish Gene. At the time I thought that Memes were the great. The basic idea of the book was that evolution doesn't take place at the level of the species, but at the level of the gene. It is not the survival of species but the continued existence and replication of genes.<br /><br />The idea of memes was that they are like genes -- they are replicated, the survive or don't survive over the years, they mutate, and they affect how people behave in a way similar to how genes affect the physical characteristics and behavior of biological species.<br /><br />It sounds good, but I wasn't clear about how this analogy works.<br /><br />What are the species? Are Christianity or Islam or Judaism species with memes, like belief in god or opposition to same sex relations? Or are the species people: Christians, Jews, Muslims, each with their memes, sometimes the same ones?<br /><br />I think the latter is more correct. But this leads to the second issue.<br /><br />It is clear that memes replicate. An idea like, martyrdom get replicated in different ways, medieval Lives of Saints, renaissance art, posters on the walls of Gaza, CNN news about a successful suicide bombing. But whereas genes are passed to a person by his parents and remain the same throughout his life, a person is exposed to different memes during his life. What does that mean about the analogy?<br /><br />This also leads to the third issue.<br /><br />What is it that determines the survivability of memes? Genes Survive by being passed on by an animal or plant to an offspring. But what is it that causes a noxious idea like opposition to same sex relationships to survive for centuries?<br /><br />Fourth, We can see that part of what helps memes survive is that they evolve like genes. Even the negative attitude toward gays adapted. Now gays are tolerated but gay marriage isn't. Religions evolved too. But It's still not clear to me.<br /><br />I think memes are a good way to think about ideas, but they don't seem to work well enough to explain them completely.<br /><br />The relevant thing with memes, like regular evolution, is that it strips the process of survival of ideas from any moral context. So conservatives really shouldn't want to use it.<br /><br />But I think people who oppose gays will latch onto anything, scientific or religious or social to justify themselves. In arguments like that I often have to explain to people that something like homosexuality can't be 'against the laws of evolution'. (I'm not gay myself, but it is an issue I argue with people about).<br /><br />Still, it is interesting to think of the attitude toward gays and tradition in general in terms of evolution and survival. so I'm happy you brought this up.Michanoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2197051945822486684.post-8347498936127705982010-07-10T08:03:38.004+10:002010-07-10T08:03:38.004+10:00Back in 1995 or so I read the Selfish Gene. at the...Back in 1995 or so I read the Selfish Gene. at the time i thought that Memes were the greatest thing since sliced bread. The basic idea of the book was that biological evolution doesn't take place at the level of the species, but at the level of the gene. It is not the survival of species but the continued existence and replication of genes that make up species.<br /><br />The idea of memes was that they are like genes -- they are replicated, the survive or don't survive over the years, they mutate, and they affect how people behave in a way similar to how genes affect the physical characteristics and behavior of biological species.<br /><br />Up to this point it sounds good, but then things become less clear to me about how this analogy works.<br /><br />1) What is the species? are Christianity or Islam or Judaism species with different memes, like belief in god or opposition to same sex relations? Or are the species people; Christians, Jews and Muslims, each with their own memes, but sometimes the same ones?<br /><br />I think the latter is more correct. But this leads to the second issue.<br /><br />2) It is clear that memes replicate. An idea like, say, martyrdom get replicated in infinite ways, from medieval Lives of Saints and renaissance art, to posters on the walls of Gaza and CNN news about a successful suicide bombing. But whereas genes are passed to person by his parents and remain the same throughout his life (except mutations), a person is exposed to different memes that become part of him throughout his life. What does that mean about the analogy?<br /><br />It also leads to the third issue:<br /><br />3) What is it that determines the survivability of memes? Genes Survive by being passed on by an animal or plant to an offspring. But what is it that causes a noxious idea like opposition to same sex relationships to survive for centuries? Is it because of human psychology or sociology? <br /><br />4) We can see that part of what helps memes survive is that they evolve like genes. Even the attitude toward gays adapted, so now gays are tolerated by gay marriage isn't. Antisemitism evolved many times, and so did Judaism, Christianity and Islam. But this still doesn't solve the problem for me.<br /><br />I think memes are a good way to think about ideas and how they replicate and evolve, but they don't seem to work well enough to explain them completely.<br /><br />The relevant thing with memes, like regular evolution, is that it strips the process of survival of ideas from any moral context. So conservatives really shouldn't want to use it.<br /><br />But I think people who oppose gays will latch onto anything, scientific or religious or social to justify themselves. In arguments like that I often have to explain to people that something like homosexuality can't be 'against the laws of evolution'. (I'm not gay myself, but it is an issue I argue with people about).<br /><br />Still, it is interesting to think of the attitude toward gays and tradition in general in terms of evolution and survival. so I'm happy you brought this up. I haven't thought about them since the late 90s.Michanoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2197051945822486684.post-18704665762185541232010-07-09T08:14:22.851+10:002010-07-09T08:14:22.851+10:00One extremely important historical fact that needs...One extremely important historical fact that needs a lot more discursive oxygen, is that monotheistic religions do not have the patent on marriage and never have.<br /><br />Indeed, humanity's oldest unbroken concept of marriage involves one man and more than one woman. I haven't see too many conservatives taking to the streets demanding the legalizing the grand tradition of polygamy, though.<br /><br />Christians, for example, barely mentioned marriage for the first 500 years. Why would they bother? Christ was returning next weekend, so there was no time for hiring wedding singers, and choosing flowers. Secondly, marriages involved all that exchanging of bodily fluids, and other yucky stuff they hated. <br /><br />When the Christians worked out that God was stroppier than they presumed, and would not be returning until they given their ways much more than a spring clean, only then did they even notice marriage.<br /><br />Fortunately, for the Christians, the Romans had been marrying for quite some time, so the Christians had a high-end off-the-rack product, they could rent or lease. While they eschewed bespoke marriage, let alone couture, they did choose the finest of Roman <i>pret a porter</i> marriage products; <i>univira.</i> <br /><br />Sure, over time, the Christians, added did some stitching and patching, but never enough to justify patenting marriage as a new invention, over which they had monopoly use for eternity.Peter Pattonnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2197051945822486684.post-7718878438472920652010-07-09T07:51:13.611+10:002010-07-09T07:51:13.611+10:00Micha
If my post was ambiguous, I agree with you ...Micha<br /><br />If my post was ambiguous, I agree with you 100%.<br /><br />In general, I do not like the word/concept "meme." The way it us used on blogs, it means little more than "something a journalist wrote about Julia Gillard in yesterday's newspaper." <br /><br />But in the context here, I hope the word is more apt and powerful.<br /><br />What I hoped to distinguish was the <i>process</i> by which a tradition came to still flourish in 2010 - whether it be male/female marriage or shaking hands - and that tradition's <i>appropriateness</i> and/or <i>utility</i> today.<br /><br />To continue the biological metaphor, if all trees in the forest are dying or being felled by timber companies, maybe we should start thinking about supplementing our current diet of tree leaves, climb down from the canopy, and check out the verdant grasses yonder. <br /><br />Of course, it is here the meme concept itself reaches the limits of its usefulness. As far as I know, genes do not have consciousness. Is there a parliament, which genes can lobby? :)<br /><br />I will also go away and think a bit more on whether conservatives could rely on the meme analogy to rely on the continuation of:<br /><br />1. Marriage being something, which the legislature should even be defining.<br /><br />2. Maintaining the restriction of that definition to one man and one woman.<br /><br />One immediate hole I can see, is that the legislature is not where the real action of memetic selection takes place. <br /><br /><br />The legislature becomes either a prize giver to the memetic victors, or deliberately intrudes on a habitat, where other memes appear to be flourishing. It does so in order to expand the dying habitat of its own favored memes - to which it awarded the prize of legislative entrenchment long ago - or to destroy the habitat, which sustains a flourishing and growing population deemed (rationally or not) a threat to its favored meme.Peter Pattonnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2197051945822486684.post-73970484412413049642010-07-09T02:00:15.956+10:002010-07-09T02:00:15.956+10:00The idea of memes was a psychological/sociological...The idea of memes was a psychological/sociological/mental analogy to genes. So saying that certain ideas, i.e. tradition, was able to survive because is developed certain phenotypes (? - it's been a while), is no different than saying that a certain animal or plant had a certain phenotype that helped it survive. the animal might be a virus or bacteria. It doesn't really say anything good or bad about any tradition except that it is good at surviving, so going against it might be risky.<br /><br /><br />But you might also go beyond memes and argue that traditions survive because they offer something to humans that is of some value.<br /><br />Or you can take a humanistic approach and say that you have to respect the fact that tradition is valued by people.<br /><br />In any case, it's one thing not to reject tradition completely and it's another not to critically examine it.Michanoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2197051945822486684.post-5704909462375676222010-07-07T20:45:00.281+10:002010-07-07T20:45:00.281+10:00Persistence has some value: it indicates that the ...Persistence has some value: it indicates that the tradition is picking up something (or more than one thing) that, in some sense, works. But that is hardly the end of the matter, as you imply.Lorenzohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00305933404442191098noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2197051945822486684.post-22271761077692342462010-07-07T19:55:24.550+10:002010-07-07T19:55:24.550+10:00I often see "tradition" as memetic succe...I often see "tradition" as memetic success. There are all sorts of new approaches starting everyday. Those which survive a long period of time we call "tradition." That memetic success is a reason to accord the <i>notion</i> of tradition a great deal of respect, but not enough for any <i>particular</i> tradition.Peter Pattonnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2197051945822486684.post-29303966335161171162010-07-07T15:01:51.783+10:002010-07-07T15:01:51.783+10:00The "insult of equality" is always very ...The "insult of equality" is always very keenly felt by the bigoted mindset, because the point is that one is "defending" "moral decency" from people who are "outside" (or at least lesser members of) the moral community. So to have them regarded as equals is insulting.Lorenzohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00305933404442191098noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2197051945822486684.post-13277017089859053212010-07-07T00:29:44.509+10:002010-07-07T00:29:44.509+10:00The good news is that religions had no choice but ...The good news is that religions had no choice but to adapt to the changing values, and to become relatively more tolerant toward gays then before. But the way they were able to do it was with a "hate the sin, love the sinner"attitude, which turned the issue of same sex marriage into a major principle for them, since it means not only tolerating gays but accepting them as equals.Michanoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2197051945822486684.post-65750746729560562382010-07-06T11:58:58.365+10:002010-07-06T11:58:58.365+10:00I agreed with Micha’s post right up to the last se...I agreed with Micha’s post right up to the last sentence. Gays should not be treated as equals; they should be recognised as equals. Equal members of the human race. Being human is to be part of a very diverse group with a huge variety of sub-groups and with all sub-groups being equal members of the same species. Equality and equivalence are not the same though. If you aspire to a Nobel Prize statistics show you should be a part of the Jewish group; for respect in the artistic or intellectual field common sense says you would be better off in the Gay group then the any fundamentalist religious group. As a human being VS Ramachandran is my equal but in no way am I equivalent as a scientist, intellectual or in my ability share my knowledge in such a lucid and entertaining manner. <br />So the problem is why is it that my sub-sub-group admires such another group, while others turn to hatred.<br />Davidentechhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12411294761069789524noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2197051945822486684.post-84830476544129725122010-07-06T10:18:52.011+10:002010-07-06T10:18:52.011+10:00Anonymous: social science studies suffer the diffi...Anonymous: social science studies suffer the difficulty of studying agents (so needing volunteers, etc). The first study uses matched samples, which is one way around the problem, while the second follows normal patterns for longitudinal studies. In other words, they are fairly typical of the wider field.<br /><br />Micha: To follow on from what you have to say, at bottom is the issue is about contested humanity. If GLBTI (gay lesbian bisexual transgender intersex) folk are simply people, then they are entitled to equal protection of the laws. It is only by explicitly or surreptiously contesting their humanity that the contrary argument works (as we can see in <a href="http://www.ewtn.com/library/curia/cdfhomol.htm" rel="nofollow">Vatican statements</a> on the subject). Unfortunately, due to the sex and gender issues of monotheism, that is the traditional position in Western and Islamic societies (and the incumbent legal position in formerly Western-ruled societies). Due to Leninism's massive social conformity issues, it is also the incumbent position in post-Leninist societies.Lorenzohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00305933404442191098noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2197051945822486684.post-43561675903865530262010-07-06T08:37:23.005+10:002010-07-06T08:37:23.005+10:00I liked your post, particularly for its willingnes...I liked your post, particularly for its willingness to engage the arguments, but I just wanted to say that the linked studies about the children of lesbian couples don't seem very scientific (unrepresentative samples, etc.).Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2197051945822486684.post-20273868850316081772010-07-06T01:41:03.968+10:002010-07-06T01:41:03.968+10:00The tradition argument seems to be:
1) Tradition ...The tradition argument seems to be:<br /><br />1) Tradition (monotheistic tradition in effect) is opposed to same sex marriage.<br /><br />2) Tradition is important because it is the basis of civilization.<br /><br />The second has an implicit more disgusting claim that has been used by Orson Scot Card -- same sex marriage is a threat to civilization. That's a dangerous claim.<br /><br />Counter argument:<br /><br />Even if we accept that tradition has importance, they are certainly not beyond criticism. after all, traditions have changed significantly as society changed.<br /><br />Alternative tradition argument:<br /><br />A religious person can claim that as a matter of faith he or she follows certain traditions, which include objection to same sex marriage. Since it is a matter of religious belief the possibility of flexibility with the adherence to the tradition is limited. (This is the hardest on religious gays). <br /><br />Counter arguments:<br /><br />1) Religions have shown an impressive ability to adapt to changing social mores. <br /><br />2) It is one's individual right to faithfully follow a religious tradition which rejects same sex marriage, but it's something completely different to try to impose these beliefs on society as a whole.<br /><br />Reply of the adherents of tradition:<br /><br />We must oppose same sex marriage even for people who do not share our religious beliefs, because we view same sex marriage as a threat to the fabric of our society and of society as a whole.<br /><br />Answer: an impasse. There is no way to go from here except back to the basic humanistic argument -- gays should be treated as equals.Michanoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2197051945822486684.post-81562666261336610342010-07-04T15:08:33.374+10:002010-07-04T15:08:33.374+10:00Quite :)
I didn't even get into the question ...Quite :)<br /><br />I didn't even get into the question of traditions which are functional but still abhorrent (such as "honour" killings, which have the grim logic of keeping the production of children controlled and within the lineage).Lorenzohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00305933404442191098noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2197051945822486684.post-59043464622894352042010-07-04T13:12:07.899+10:002010-07-04T13:12:07.899+10:00I sometimes wonder how often tradition is simple m...I sometimes wonder how often tradition is simple manure gone hard with age.<br />Davidentechhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12411294761069789524noreply@blogger.com