The Memetic Superorganism Project

 

This text is a writing experiment comprising a body of open notes. The project is an attempt to bring the discussion of Memetics, Superorganisms and their interrelationship closer to the main stream. These observations are presented as an evolving perspective and are offered for examination. The content will be updated periodically in an effort to reflect ongoing analysis and observations.

Memetic Superorganism Hypothesis

All biological, ideological and social systems exist to serve the primary purpose of consolidating and directing energy in order to dominate the resources within a given environment. They are therefore subject to the same set of natural laws which fulfill a primary purpose. This primary purpose is the engine that drives evolution as expressed by the equation below.

P = C/E

Where:

P = Power

C = Control

E = Energy

As stated above, the “Power Equation” describes the primary function of all natural-living processes. The sum of this equation has produced what is herein referred to as a Memetic Superorganism.

Predictions of the Memetic Superorganism Hypothesis

Prediction One:

The Memetic Superorganism will be proven to be not just an abstract concept, but rather a tangible, living entity.

Prediction Two:

Adherence to the Power Equation is constant across all living organisms and may hold implications regarding some ‘nonliving’ systems.

Prediction Three:

Humanity will become more aware of our relationship to the Memetic Superorganism.  Rather than allowing ourselves to be exploited by it, we will be free to domesticate the organism and hopefully employ it to further the common good.

The Concept Expanded

As biological, ideological and social systems evolve, their complexity increases, but dependence on the above “Power Equation” remains unchanged. The Memetic Superorganism is the pinnacle of this process as it is the most highly evolved expression of the Power Equation. In other words, all systems composed by mankind are part of a larger superorganism, the function of which is to serve the Power Equation.  No matter the level of complexity or perception, all organisms are simply going about balancing the same Power Equation.  Through analysis of the evolutionary process, any activity of all organisms may be shown to be strictly a function of the Power Equation. Because they too are living, all Memetic Superorganisms will likewise be found to behave as biological organisms with regard to the Power Equation.

The Challenge of the Memetic Superorganism Project

The Memetic Superorganism Project was created to further define and understand this evolutionary phenomenon and to cite examples in an effort to gain a more complete understanding of the influence that the Memetic Superorganism has on society. It has been observed that individuals are not fully aware of the role we play within Memetic Superorganisms, nor do we understand our participation/function in feeding the Power Equation. The growing set of observations within this project will serve to improve our understanding of the nature of Memetic Superorganisms and our relationship to them.

A secondary task of the Memetic Superorganism project is to determine the proper taxonomy of the Memetic Superorganism using standard taxonomy principles. This classification will help to generate a frame of reference for the scientific community, within which to more effectively study the Memetic Superorganisms in our environment. The goal of this classification is to develop a methodology for analyzing and predicting behavior of Memetic Superorganisms.

Perhaps the most significant challenge of the Memetic Superorganism project is the goal to present the findings and observations in everyday terms. This is due to the assertion that it is after all the average person that is most affected by the influence of the Memetic Superorganism; likewise, it is the average person upon which the Memetic Superorganism most depends for its existence.

Memetic Superorganism Project Charter

The Memetic Superorganism strives to present information in an easily accessible format.

Definitions

The Power Equation- P = C/E

Where P = Power, C = Control and E = Energy

Resources- Resources are energy, either stored as potential energy, energy that must be cultivated or energy that is readily available.

The Force of Nature- Living organisms are compelled to reach the greatest level of domination over the resources in a given environment. This process requires power and in turn provides ever more control over energy. The Force of Nature is the force that compels all life.

Memetic- Related to or having the characteristics of a meme.

Meme- A mental gene; a set of thoughts or beliefs that compose a system of thought or world view, possessing the ability to be replicated and to a degree, passed on to another entity.

Superorganism- An organism composed of many lesser or individual constituent organisms. For the purposes of this project, it is related to the Complex Adaptive System or CAS. (see, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Complex_adaptive_system), also (see, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_structure), (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cybernetics). The difference is that Memetic Superorganisms metabolize energy and are self propagating. In this way, they are alive like humans are.

Ideological Organism- A combination of terms describing a Memetic Superorganism.

Metasystem- A system or structure that exists beyond the systems or structures upon which it depends. The Metasystem also establishes a degree of control over its constituent systems. The concept is related to complexity theory.

Meta Perspective- Taking the view that there are structures beyond the more obvious systems with which we interact. The Meta Perspective view is necessary to gain understanding of the relationship and influence that Memetic Superorganisms have with humanity and their impact on natural world.

Limiting Belief System- A set or system of beliefs, held by an individual, that preclude the individual from accepting or comprehending facts or information that contradicts their beliefs.

Brief Examples of Memetic Superorganisms

1.    Political parties

2.    Religions

3.    World views

4.    Ideologies are Memetic Superorganisms, particularly those ideologies that contain the suffix “ism”, i.e. fundamentalism.

5.    Belief Systems

Future Project Features

Alpha Taxonomy of a Memetic Superorganism

Collaboration posts

Memetic Superorganism Project blog

Essays exploring the nature of the Memetic Superorganism

Storyboard

Multimedia projects

 

Essay Topics

The Force of Nature

The Body of The Memetic Superorganism

How to Identify a Memetic Superorganism in the Wild

The Importance of Self -Preservation Ideology

What Makes a Good Meme?

Meme Mapping

Survival: The Ultimate Purpose

The Perception and Quality of Survival (overcoming X opposition)

Memetic Superorganism Immune System and Immune Response

Molecular Systematics and the Memetic Superorganism

Hope and Fear: The Extremes of Human Energy Expression aka Prime Movers

Money = Promise to Exchange Energy

If You Travel Down the Food Chain from the Sun

The Illusion of Control

Fractal Nature of Memetic Superorganism

The Petri Dish and the Earth

Anthropomorphic/Egocentricity and the Evolution of the Memetic Superorganism

Brilliant Minds Trapped Within a Limiting Belief System

Democratization of Energy

The Death of a Memetic Superorganism – Toxic Ideas, when the reality on the ground flies in the face of the memes

Spiritual Maturity Within The Memetic Superorganism

 

Essay One

So What Is a Memetic Superorganism and Why Should I Care?

By L.E. Nielson

The goal of this essay is to introduce the concept of the Memetic Superorganism to the reader in basic terms. A common mistake made when trying to conceptualize the Memetic Superorganism is to think of it as an abstract concept or form. The Memetic Superorganism is however, best understood when thought of as a concrete and tangible life form, just like any other biological life form. One might ask, “If it's concrete and tangible, why can't I see or touch it?” The Memetic Superorganism’s tangible nature will be explained within this essay.

Because the Memetic Superorganism is governed by the same fundamental rules that govern biology, its behavior and methods are essentially the same as biological forms. One principle governing this process is that as life forms evolve, they take advantage of emerging biological infrastructures within the environment that have been built by the previous generations of organisms. This development constructs a new medium where upon life continues its slow and steady progress toward inevitably more complex forms.

A principle of biological evolution is that organisms possessing faster genetic mutation speeds gain adaptive advantages over the competition. Two or more organisms vying for the same resources frequently find themselves in direct conflict.  For example, a hungry mouse eyeing a piece of cheese for its dinner, may have to deal with a much larger and equally hungry rat. More often than not, the rat will win. Occasionally though, there will be a mouse just big and fast enough to beat the rat. Suppose the mouse could adapt more rapidly to its environment through the evolutionary principle of generational genetic mutation, the species of mouse may soon be as big as or bigger than its competitor, the rat. At this point, the new larger species of 'supermouse' might overtake the rat’s position within the environment and thus gain the advantage in the ongoing fight for resources.  It may well be that the mouse overcame the rat in other ways and there are many more examples that may be cited.  However, it is sufficient to say that over time, this process is exactly what has happened to countless species in varying environments and habitats within the biosphere.

It is the position of the Memetic Superorganism Hypothesis that under the parameters of the Power Equation, the force of nature is inherently striving toward faster generational mutation speeds. This is driven by the inter-species competition for limited resources in a given environment and the Memetic Superorganism possesses the fastest generational mutation speed of all. The medium of information storage and exchange differs between biology and ideology, but the essential functions of the information itself remains fairly constant. With biological information storage, mutation and exchange occurs in the medium of genes. With ideological information storage, mutation and exchange occurs in the medium of memes.

The Memetic Superorganism was born when evolution reached a point at which the information exchange through ideas became more efficient than through biology alone. Information exchange had reached a threshold by way of memory capacity, language and other forms of communication.  Through this new medium the critical information was replicated at a much faster pace. At its core, the critical information is an ever improving algorithm for balancing the Power Equation.  Evolution was looking for speed and made its leap from the biological to the ideological. At that moment a new medium for evolution and life was formed. It is important to reiterate the point that a gene is to an organism as a meme is to a superorganism. Ergo, the genetic biological organism is the precursor to memetic ideological superorganism. It is equally important to point out that the primary drive of the natural process is greater adaptive speed with which to balance the Power Equation.

The argument in steps:

1.     Organism X and organism Y compete for resources in the same environment

2.     Organism X has genes that mutate or adapt more quickly than organism Y

3.     Successive generations of organism X handily dominate the environment

4.     Organism Y can no longer compete for resources and eventually becomes extinct

5.     The decisive adaptive advantage for organism X is greater generational mutation speed

By using the structure of encoding genetic information in the DNA of the organism, and allowing for communication of that information across generations, the force of nature is employing a feedback loop. As with any communication loop, sometimes there is distortion in the process. In the case of genes, this distortion is known as mutation. Occasionally the distortion is advantageous and leads to a breakthrough in efficiency. This is evolution. This simplistic description of evolution is intended to conform with the charter of the Memetic Superorganism Project.

The next section in the argument:

6.     Eventually, evolution reached a point where the organism possessed a powerful enough brain to assist with adaptive speed, thus accelerating the replication process

7.     Now the speed is multiplied, not only mutating/adapting with every biological generation, but also in real-time and in every ideological generation by employing the computational power of the brain and more advanced communication

8.     Organisms that evolved greater brain power and efficient communication have greater adaptive ability within their environment through faster replication

9.     Greater adaptability provides even greater adaptive speed and therefore domination

10.  Among the higher biological organisms, humans have developed the greatest brain capacity and with it, the greatest adaptive speed

11.  ...but this is still not fast enough because with the Force of Nature, the drive for greater adaptive speed never ends

At this point, one may be tempted to assume that the new medium in the process will be the artificial processing capacity of the computer. After all, if humans are the organism that has achieved the greatest speed and adaptive ability through evolution, then it seems to follow that humans must give rise to the new medium for replication. Is the next succession in the process the advent of artificial intelligence? The answer is… not yet, there is something in-between.

The argument continued:

12.  At the heart of biology's winning formula for adaptive speed is the replicating gene or genetic code, stored in the DNA

13.  Genes are structural information that mutate and are passed on, or communicated to successive generations (passing on the improved information of the genetic code)

14.  This allows the force of nature to continually improve on its mandate, which is to dominate the resources within an environment as fast as possible

15.  Like the DNA, the relatively new neo cortex also has the capacity to store and communicate information, however it is in the form of a replicated idea

16.  The parallel to biology of the information stored in the genetic code of the gene is the information stored in the brain 'ideologically' or 'mentally'

17.  So, gene is to biology as idea is to ideology, both being simply information stored within the structure of their respective medium. This is not merely any information, it is the very information that the Force of Nature uses to achieve domination of the given environment. Put mental and gene together and you get 'meme’-based, memetic replication information

18.  By using the same process, but in a different medium or structure, memetic evolution is born

19.  … and this is where it gets really interesting

With the advent of the meme, the stage has been set for a new type of organism or species. Just as the human organism is composed of trillions of cells, each carrying the coded information to fulfill its role within the larger whole of the organism, the code of the meme is being carried within the minds of humans, serving the role within larger Memetic Superorganism. To illustrate this point ask the question, what are we? It has been observed that our bodies consist of somewhere around 90 percent foreign cells. What this means is that only about 10 percent of the cells in our bodies actually carry our DNA code, the rest of the cells are made up of bacteria, viruses, fungi or protozoa and other primitive forms of life carrying their own DNA.

Thus it would seem that upon closer inspection, we are not what we think we are. When we look in the mirror, how many of us realize that most of what we see is not actually us at all, rather it is a mass of other creatures combined with what we think of as us. Now we realize that we have had an extreme misperception of what we really are. So, what about the 10 percent that does carry our DNA? If 90 percent of what we are can be so drastically different than what we originally thought, is it possible that the other 10 percent isn’t exactly what we think it is either? The answer is even more bizarre than we might first imagine.

The 10 percent of our bodies that actually carries our DNA is really made up of divisions of cellular structures, each arriving at its place and function by way of a far more independent path than we realize. As we have evolved, countless independent organisms have been incorporated into the whole of our organism to make us the human beings that we are today. For example, a significant fact that is regularly overlooked is that the mitochondria organelle within human cells is a separate organism that contains its own DNA.  This process is a very familiar feature of natural selection. Incorporating other successful forms or organisms into the larger organism can be a very efficient method for improving mutation and accelerating adaptation. When this happens evolution and the Force of Nature do not object or cry foul, particularly if the outcome serves the requirements of the Power Equation.

As with the biological, so it is with the ideological. As genes within single celled organisms can combine to form larger complex organisms, so do the memes held within human minds combine to form the Memetic Superorganism. If it is so that we humans, being composed of genes benefiting from this process, can possess a form of consciousness, then is it also possible that the organism composed of memes can also possess a form of consciousness. This describes the Memetic Superorganism and hints at an emerging theory.  The Memetic Superorganism exists as a concrete, tangible entity, built upon the structure of biology that precedes it and this entity possesses its own kind of consciousness that must not be ignored.

So, the Memetic Superorganism, while relatively new in evolutionary terms, is not a new life form. Rather, it has probably been with us since before the dawn of Homo sapiens. Its existence is only now being recognized and it is now entering our consciousness. We are becoming aware of it. It is higher on the food chain than we are and because of its formidable skill at manipulating the Power Equation, it affects every living thing on the planet.  Moreover, as you may have guessed by now, there are many more than just one of them… this is why we should care.

 

Coming up next… How to Identify a Memetic Superorganism in the Wild. 

 

 

Essay Two

How to Identify a Memetic Superorganism in the Wild

By L. E. Nielson

At first it seems difficult to identify the Memetic Superorganisms that surround us and that we are a part of. The greatest obstacle in making this identification is the constraint of our own perception. Most would not argue with the assertion that humans possess the greatest perceptive capacity of all creatures living on the planet. If our incredible perceptive capacity is our greatest strength as a species, then it’s possible that it is also our greatest weakness. It has been said that the human mind loves to delude itself. In order to identify the Memetic Superorganism in the wild, we must first overcome this limitation of our own perception.

Memetic Superorganisms occupy the top niche in our ecosystem so; it helps to look for them there. They feed off of the energy that we humans provide. Wherever a group of humans can be observed working toward the same goal or purpose, you can find a Memetic Superorganism. Of course, they’re not all menacing creatures, exploiting our energy with no symbiotic benefit to us. Indeed, we humans have profoundly increased our domination of the planet because of our relationship with the Memetic Superorganism. As components of the Memetic Superorganism, we constantly give our energy to its metabolism. We are a part of its body and using our energy, it has grown, thereby ensuring a broad expansion across our environment.

A hallmark of the Memetic Superorganism is the idea that there is strength in numbers. This concept fits nicely into the Power Equation. After all, what is strength without power and what are numbers without resources or energy? So, groups of people working together for a common purpose constitutes a Memetic Superorganism in some form. The size of the Memetic Superorganism obviously depends upon the size of the group in question. Likewise, the strength of the Memetic Superorganism depends upon the cohesion of the group.

As with all biological life, it is important to observe the lifecycle of the species if one hopes to understand how the species fits into the ecosystem. From the ‘Meta-Perspective’ point of view, ideological life is not much different; therefore Memetic Superorganisms may be observed using the same methodologies that we employ to observe biology. So, a direct comparison is in order.

The average house cat for example, begins its life cycle when the egg, (containing DNA information) and sperm, (also containing DNA) combine. The new embryo depends directly on the environment provided within its mother’s womb for shelter, safety and food. In terms of the Power Equation, at this stage the embryo gets its power to grow and develop from the control over energy, (P = C/E), within the womb of the mother cat. Because the cat is mammalian, the length of this process is a necessary expenditure of energy.  It is required for the proper development of the kitten’s body, but more important, for the development of its own control mechanism, its brain. Through the kitten’s birth and adolescence, more energy will be spent by the mother cat in order to aid the process toward maturity.

The fully grown cat can now hunt, (or grovel depending on the circumstances), for its own food. It is important at this point to make the distinction that food is a code word that we use for energy. Assuming the cat lives in an ordinary household, we have the opportunity to observe the organism fulfilling its energy requirements at the dinner bowl. Otherwise, we need to track down the cat and quietly observe while it hunts, catches, plays with and eventually consumes its prey. This is how the organism of the cat, using its highly developed skills and mammalian brain, provides for its energy needs. But this is only part of the life cycle. The cat does not live forever; therefore it must find a mate and produce offspring if it is to continue doing what it means to be a cat. So, the cat finds a mate and now we’re back to where we started with the cat.

By having kittens, the feline species is able to propagate its own specific biological structure virtually indefinitely through replication. Viewed from the ‘Meta-Perspective’, the feline species is a structure wherein a self-enabling system controls the flow of energy through the system, thus giving the species the power to replicate itself. Conclusion: Felines have the power to control the flow of energy, limited as it may be.

Now for the Memetic Superorganism…

The average Memetic Superorganism begins when individual packets of information combine, just like the sperm and egg. Each contains the same kind of replicating information that the DNA of the cat employs to grow its own organism. It is important to note that the major difference between the genes replicated in the cat and the memes replicated in the Memetic Superorganism is strictly the medium by which the information is stored and transmitted.  Another important point to understand is that genes cannot replicate unless all of the components of its replicating information are present. If any part of the gene is missing within the DNA, it will not properly replicate. Memes are no different.

So, as with the cat, the ideas making up the memes within the new embryonic Memetic Superorganism begin to gestate within the safety of their womb. In this case, the womb is part of the human mind. It’s that portion of memory, revisited by cogitation that is set aside to consider the new ideas of the meme. If it’s a strong meme, the mind starts to ‘mull over’ this new information and it begins to grow by taking up more space in the mind. This process requires increasing amounts of energy provided by the host-mind.  Like the genes in the fetal kitten, if the memes are strong, they will successfully mature to adolescence and birth into an ever increasing portion of the mind, taking up more synaptic real estate and resources. The energy for this growth is supplied through the host-mind, which gets its energy from the food consumed by the human, whose mind has now been commandeered. The stronger the meme, the greater the amount of energy required to nurture its growth to maturity.

Like the mammal cat, this is not the end of the Memetic Superorganism’s life cycle. The fully grown Memetic Superorganism can now hunt on its own to provide for its energy needs. It does this by spreading its memes to another mind and communication is the means by which this is accomplished. Because of the energy consumed within the host mind, the human becomes obsessed with the new memes of the Memetic Superorganism that it serves. The human host is thus compelled to ‘share’ the memes with others. By now, the strength of the memes has been proven and once spread to the next human mind; they begin to propagate as before.

By spreading memes to another host mind, the Memetic Superorganism species is able to propagate its own ideological structure virtually indefinitely through replication. Viewed from the ‘Meta-Perspective’, the Memetic Superorganism species is a structure wherein a self-enabling system controls the flow of energy through the system, thus giving the species the power to replicate itself. So, Memetic Superorganisms have the power to control the flow of energy, like the felines. Significantly different are its limits over power, as we shall see.

So, what does a Memetic Superorganism look like? Well, one of the reasons they are so difficult for us to identify is that their form is not what we might expect. Let’s look closer at the ‘Meme’ as a basic element. Some researchers use the analogy that a meme is to the mind as a virus is to a biological organism. The reasoning usually suggests that the meme ‘infects’ the host mind like a virus and spreads. While this description is not disputed here, it is the position of this project that this description is grossly incomplete.

It is more likely that once the mind is infected, there is a symbiotic process that ensues, and the newly merged mind and meme develop a hybrid organism which is then incorporated into the larger Memetic Superorganism. If one were to imagine the physical shape and appearance of the Memetic Superorganism, it would most likely resemble a mold, or a fungus as it spreads across its environment, consuming the available energy stored within the environment’s resources. With this in mind, suppose each individual that has adopted the ‘memes’ of a given superorganism had a visible marker, identifying them with the ‘ideology’ coded in the memes.

For example, one aspect of the meme might be that it requires all of its adherents to dye their hair purple. With all of the ‘infected’ constituents so identified, their presence and movements could be easily observed and monitored. Imagine one could track this purple hair by satellite. With this perspective, imagine what ‘shape’ the spread of the Memetic Superorganism would take. As suggested above, it would look something like a mold or fungus spreading across its portion of the planet, only on a much grander scale. This is what the physical appearance of the Memetic Superorganism would look like and we can ‘see’ this using the Meta-perspective.

With this knowledge, identifying a Memetic Superorganism in the wild should be easy. Look for them where humans share ideas that orchestrate their energy and efforts toward a common goal or cause. That is where Memetic Superorganisms will be found going about their daily business of consuming and controlling energy. In every action they take, as with all life, they are industriously and dutifully balancing the Power Equation.

 

Coming up next… What Makes a Good Meme?

 

Essay Three

What Makes a Good Meme?

By L. E. Nielson

Memes, like genes, must be strong in order to survive. Primarily, a strong meme must contain a message that is easy to remember… it must impress upon the mind. Equally so, it must be a message that directly addresses the extremes of human emotions, these being:

Hope and Fear.

Robust, healthy memes need to associate powerfully with these extremes of human emotion if they are to be successful in forming a Memetic Superorganism.

Gaining a complete grasp of this concept requires a better understanding of the true dynamic force provided by human emotions. What are emotions anyway? What function to they perform? Viewed from the Meta-perspective, human emotions serve to move us into action. We are driven by emotions to expend our energy so that we may satisfy or resolve the emotive impulse. For example, if a child feels extremely sad, they are often driven to bawling and crying. This expends energy and helps to resolve the emotive impulse. Any parent knows how this emotional display can draw them into the rush of emotional energy. The parent, being a dutiful caregiver, is recruited into helping the child find resolution.

Imagine that there exists a spectrum of emotional states which represents the sum total of all human emotions. In the middle is apathy, a lack of emotion. Someone experiencing this state of indifference is not moved one way or the other, so the position on the spectrum is ‘neutral’. The two extremes of the spectrum are terminated by positive emotions on one end and negative emotions on the other end. For example, moving from the neutral middle toward the positive side may be a simple delight, like the smell of a flower or a bacon and egg breakfast. Conversely, a nudge toward the negative side of the spectrum may be a whiff of rotten eggs, or the annoying buzz of your alarm clock waking you from a pleasant dream. Either way, the minor emotive state moves your metabolism to expend energy, even if the amount of energy is very little.

It is important to specify that we are discussing strictly the emotional sensation at this point. There are related ‘physical’ extremes that will be addressed in another essay.

Sometimes ‘fear’ is juxtaposed with ‘love’, as if these two were opposites. They are not. While it is true that love is an extremely positive emotion, it is the position of this project that love is a ‘function’ of hope. More precisely, ‘hate’ is the opposite of ‘love, because ‘hate’ is a ‘function’ of fear. So a simple diagram of the ‘emotional spectrum’ looks like this:

Fear-------Hate----------------------------------Apathy---------------------------------Love-------Hope

 

Restated then, the human is compelled to action by either positive or negative emotion and the action commands more energy when the emotion is closer to the two extremes of hope and fear.

It follows then that when we are exposed to the ideas espoused by the meme and the ideas strongly evoke our concept of hope or fear, the meme is impressed upon our mind. Furthermore, when a meme encompasses ideas that evoke archetypal images of both hope and fear, the meme holds maximum power over us.

For example, a parable of sorts will illustrate the point.

Imagine you are in a very dark and ominous place. Surrounding you is a densely wooded forest, full of sounds that you can’t quite make out and you’re not sure you want to anyway. It’s not a very comfortable place to be. You want to get out now. You walk carefully through the dim light and eventually come to a rocky ledge. There is a very steep precipice and you can’t see the bottom. It just gets darker and appears to be bottomless. Walking along the edge, you come to an old rotting rope bridge with broken wooden planks stretching to the other side. Across the frightening void, on the other end of the sad looking bridge, there is a beautiful village, full of light. It looks very inviting and you want nothing more than to be over there, instead of the dark, lonely and uncertain place you are in now. You know that if you stay here it would mean certain death.

But you’re afraid to cross the rotting bridge, it doesn’t look like it will hold your weight, you might not make it.

Now suppose a friendly stranger appears and tells you that he knows a safe way to make it across the bridge. He is, after all, the keeper of the bridge and the one who knows its secrets. He says, “The bridge may look old and dangerous, but it was made that way on purpose to keep out the ne’er-do-wells.” Your attention is rapped by the tone of his voice and so you listen intently.  “The bridge is safe”, he continues, “ but you must know the hidden code of instructions. If followed, the special instructions will help you get to the other side safely.” Now it seems, the kind stranger can tell that you are the sort of person that deserves a chance to make it across; it’s just something special about you that he can sense. He decides to give you the code. He says, “You can make it to the other side if you step only on every third board, then count stop and count to twelve, and proceed to step again, but only on every third board. In this way you can make it safely across the dark chasm”. You are grateful and begin to feel a sense of relief. It’s a good thing this wise friend came along.

As you make your way to the first step the bridge keeper yells, “Stop! You must listen very carefully. Do you see that village of light on the other side? It is a place where there is no pain or fear and the people there live out their lives in complete happiness. It is a wonderful place, filled with joy and only those who follow my instructions can get there. You might be one of the fortunate few if only you heed me now!”  This sounds good; you could use a bit of cheer after suffering in this horrible forest. Then the stranger says, “But if you fail to cross using the code in exact detail, then the bridge will break out from under and you will fall to a very painful, agonizing death!”

Now, could you follow the instructions? Would you safely make it to the other side? If this were an actual circumstance in real-life terms, the entire story would be a very powerful meme. This meme identifies with the hope of living in a secure and safe place, while also identifying with the fear of a horrible death. Indeed, if your life actually depended on following the wise bridge keeper’s instructions, you would likely be counting and stepping carefully at this very moment.

More to the point, if you could see that the bridge keeper’s code worked, you’d feel compelled to tell others the good news, especially those you loved… Right?

You would be spreading the memes, helping them propagate into other minds.

The point of this parable is neither to specifically criticize any particular set of memes nor any Memetic Superorganism that they may spawn. It is rather to help the reader identify the components of a powerful set of memes and the process by which the memes are spread.

It is from this process that the Memetic Superorganism is given form, function and life. The parable outlines a set of memes that are spread within the minds of the fictitious characters, who then form a unified group. The group then continues to spread the memes and thereby grow the Memetic Superorganism.

There is much variety within the Memetic Superorganism ‘species’, this is due to the vast number of ‘meme sets’ that are continually being formed. Additionally, each meme set will have a different level of complexity depending upon the ideological environment in which it was formed. Therefore, some Memetic Superorganisms are far more advanced than others. More directly stated, some Memetic Superorganisms are more effective at directing energy and consolidating power than others. The Memetic Superorganisms compete against each other for the limited resources within their respective environments and they evolve.

So in order for the meme to be strong, it must address our deepest fears and greatest hopes. It must contain a set of ideas that speaks to our desire to survive and these ideas must propose a plausible solution for survival that is easy to remember. The ‘meme set’ is then injected into our consciousness, remembered and spread, creating a Memetic Superorganism.

 

 

Next essay… The Importance of The Self Preservation Ideology

 

Essay Four

The Importance of The Self Preservation Ideology

By L. E. Nielson

 

It is generally understood as a given that organisms strive to preserve themselves. We humans are no exception; rather we excel at the process. Self preservation is accomplished through a variety of means that can sometimes seem confusing and even counter-productive. Indeed, acts of self sacrifice tend to contain elements of self preservation. The range of these elements is brought into focus once we consider the role that ‘ideology’ plays in our own self preservation. Understanding this concept is relevant to our relationship with the Memetic Superorganism.

The foremost example of how the self preservation ideology relates to the life of a Memetic Superorganism is the ‘myth of the chosen people’. There is a dynamic that is created when two or more groups of the same species are competing for the same resources. It is important to remember that the term ‘resources’ is simply another way to say energy, and this energy provides for the group’s survival.

For example, let’s say there is a tribe in Africa that has thrived reasonable well. It is made up of extended families and relatives like most tribes, but now the tribe faces a common dilemma. Because of the tribe’s success, it has outgrown its territorial resources and can no longer support its numbers. The pressure created by this development forces a faction of the tribe to split off and move to a nearby territory. A colony is established.  As is the case, the faction consists of brothers, sisters, cousins and other friends of the tribe and they locate in a not too distant area, but far enough away to seek their own resources.

This solution works for a while and the colony establishes a comfortable foothold in its new land.  Unfortunately it isn’t long before a drought hits and the normal resources that have supported the two tribes diminish. This creates a new tension between the tribe and the colony, so hostilities ensue. It’s not difficult to imagine the first confrontation; two hunting parties come across each other one day and are caught up in a fight over the rights to a herd of succulent gazelle.

Deadly fighting breaks out, fueled by the desperate pangs of hunger on both sides. Imagine the pressure felt by both groups, not only to fill their own stomachs, but also the stomachs of their families back in their respective villages. The next thing we find is that these people who are related, some directly by blood are now at one another’s throats literally and they end up killing each other over the limited resources.

Imagine the horror.

What must be going through the minds of these tribesmen? What possible thoughts must they be formulating in order to justify the killing of their brothers? It must be a moment of singular cognitive dissonance when they realize that they must kill their own kind if they want to survive. It’s kill or be killed. How could any rational person justify the killing of their own blood relatives and friends, their tribesmen? Yet, this is exactly what we do as nations and battling factions every day and for the same reason: competition over resources. How is this justified within our minds?

Enter the ‘self preservation ideology’ and ‘the myth of the chosen people’.

In the past, what ideas have been adopted to justify the killing of our own kind? If I am a tribesman hunting for the same food as my newly established competition, even though they are my brothers and if the only option is to die or allow my children to die if I don’t get to the prey first, then I must justify killing my brothers. How is this horrible thing done? How is this agonizing decision made?

If one believes in a higher being… a god, then how can we square such a decision and action with our maker? In this situation, we can see no other alternative than to kill or be killed, this is the foundation of ‘the self preservation ideology’.  From this perspective, if our god wishes for us to live in exchange for the life of our brother, than our maker must have chosen us over them. This misguided rationalization is the foundation of ‘the myth of the chosen people’.

These two components of survival are the catalyst for the births of many memetic superorganisms. The concepts of ‘the self preservation ideology’ and ‘the myth of the chosen people’ will be explored throughout this writing project.

Here is an example of how learning these concepts may improve the understanding of our relationship to these forces within our environment.

Jane Goodall is a prominent researcher in the field of primates. Many reading this may know of her groundbreaking work with chimpanzees. Along with her research team, she lived among the chimps in Africa for many years, observing and documenting their behavior. One such documentation is a film that revealed the idiosyncratic social workings of her beloved tribe of chimps.

There are two such behaviors of this tribe that have particular relevance to this project:

The assassin squads and the selection of the alpha male.

The first of these is a very interesting development that appeared to baffle Ms. Goodall, Like the example above, members of the chimpanzee tribe split from the main group and established a colony in a nearby area. It is probable that this happened for the same reasons given in the above example; the tribe out grew its resources, or at least that was the perception in the minds of the chimps. This last point is significant because much of the confusing behavior demonstrated by the chimps can be explained through the understanding of how perception among the chimps plays its part.

After a while, the original tribe began to assemble small but lethal assassination squads whose purpose was to methodically kill members of the new colony one by one. They continued to attack over several weeks until they had eliminated all of the colony members. Ms. Goodall was understandably heartbroken and disturbed by these events. As expressed in the documentary film, she could not comprehend why these ‘sister’ tribes, who once lived side by side and were literally family, could behave this way. She speculated that ‘maybe there was just some kind of unexplained destructive impulse in both human and primate nature’ that caused this behavior.

This ‘unexplained destructive impulse’ is no mystery when taking the meta-perspective view. It’s obvious that the ‘assassin squad’ chimps shared a collective perception that the colony represented a threat. It didn’t matter whether the threat was real or not. Maybe there were plenty of resources for both tribes in the larger jungle; it could be that the chimps simply did not know about them. The fact that the threat could be perceived as real is what makes the difference. It was just a collection of ideas within the minds of the chimps.

Based upon this perception and driven by the Power Equation, the chimps then justified their actions through the ‘kill or be killed’ rationalization. Now we can’t possible know exactly what they were thinking as they processed this rationale. Yet we can certainly infer that they made the calculation that it was justifiable and acceptable behavior.

Presently, humans are doing exactly the same thing; the difference is that we are much more complex. In order to build the rationale behind such unthinkable killing, we must have what we consider a justifiable cause and if we believe in a higher being, we must have the approval of this higher being. This ‘approval’ is the ‘self-preservation ideology’ and it is the justification for what would otherwise be thought of as extremely unacceptable acts of killing and destruction.

We can see these phenomena in countless ideologically based extremist groups. These groups usually espouse a belief system that allows its adherents the comfort of thinking that when they kill another human being in the name of their ‘faith’, they have the approval of their higher being. This rationalization is often expressed and solidified by the mantra that the ‘higher being’ must have ‘chosen’ us to prevail as his special people, in order for us to be placed in this position over our ‘enemies’. All hail, ‘the myth of the chosen people’ has shown us the way.

The texts and tenets of their belief systems will always provide passages for such justifications, especially when the system is being threatened. And the same dynamic exists even if the ‘threat’ is merely a perception in the mind(s) of the ‘faithful’; it doesn’t have to be a real threat. Little do they know that it is only a mechanism of the memetic superorganism to balance the Power Equation and satisfy the force of nature.

The phenomenon is not limited however, to the ‘extremist’ groups alone. It can be found in almost every belief system. It’s just less obvious in the ‘main-stream’ or widely accepted belief systems. This is due to the fact that widely accepted belief systems face far less threat because they have already established superior dominance over the resources within their environment. They have mastered the Power Equation and wield enough power to largely suppress any upstarts.

What the faithful do not realize in their alternating euphoria and frenzy is that what they are actually doing is serving the will of an orgasm that feeds upon their energy. This is a Memetic Superorganism. It metabolizes their energy by using the thought processing, memory storage and communication ability of their minds to propagate its control over the resources in its environment. Most importantly, as it does this, it is competing for these resources… it competes against other Memetic Superorganisms.

This is the cause of war.

Now some words on perception… some readers may be skeptical of the above example and argument regarding the chimpanzees. It may seem that too much has been assigned to the chimps’ capacity to perceive. The justification for this attribute however, can be found in the same documentary. This is offered as a side note to another seemingly bizarre occurrence in the chimpanzee tribe; that of the selection of the ‘alpha male’.

The chimps have developed a ceremonial method for determining the alpha male for the tribe. Rather than the challenger being required to actually beat the incumbent alpha male in a potentially deadly brawl, the chimps have cleverly chosen a fierce display of prowess as a means to make the determination. When the challenger musters up the courage to ‘take on’ the alpha male, he hoots and screeches then rustles branches and shakes whatever he can find to amplify his performance. This challenge is answered by the alpha male by the same type of display and this goes back and forth. Apparently, the larger group then decides which of the two is more convincing and demonstrates the choice by cow-towing to the mutually agreed winner. They vote. It’s a kind of chimp democracy. Of course, due to the requirements of the performance, usually the largest, loudest and most fierce chimp wins.

The most interesting development in this part of the documentary is that there was a particular chimp that was not the largest or most fierce chimp; a favorite of Jane Goodall’s. He was the first to be intrepid enough to stumble into the human camp and prior to strict protocols being set for non-interference with the subject tribe, he got into quite a bit of good natured trouble.

Because he was a chimpanzee, he was undoubtedly curious, but he was more curious than the others. Eventually he discovered that by rolling some empty tin kerosene cans around that he’d found in the human camp, he could make quite a ruckus. It sounded a bit like thunder. Meanwhile back in the chimp tribe, he was looked upon as a meddling trouble maker. Being much too small, he hardly posed a real threat to the alpha male. However, something unexpected and amazing happened when he rolled those kerosene cans into the center of the chimp tribe one day.

This scrawny trouble-maker was suddenly perceived very differently by the other chimps. The chimps of his tribe had never seen the kerosene cans before and certainly had not witnessed the very loud performance, accentuated as it was by the ‘thunder’ of the cans being rolled around the jungle floor. The presiding alpha male rose to the unintended challenge, but he was no match. He wasn’t loud enough to drown out the shouts and hoots of the serendipitous challenger, particularly because the cans made most of the racket. Nor was he familiar enough with the kerosene cans to be able to manipulate them the way the scrawny chimp could. In fact, he appeared to be afraid, uncertain and overwhelmed.

Astonishingly, (or perhaps not so astonishingly), the tribe treated the whole charade exactly as they would the real thing. Can you guess who became the new alpha male of the tribe? That’s right, the scrawny, yet cleverly curious unintended challenger.

What does this say about the perceptive abilities of chimpanzees? Just as humans, the increased ability to perceive is cursed by the increased ability to misperceive.

Now the main benefit of being the alpha male of a chimpanzee tribe is the undisputed right to demand unencumbered reproductive activities with any of the tribes females. Yeah, the little guy made a lot of chimpanzee babies, much to the chagrin of the larger males.

The questions here are:

Do you think the tribe benefited more by having the scrawny but more clever genes propagated that generation?

Is this a case where intelligence overcame brute strength?

What does this say about natural selection among higher life forms?

Can this direct example illustrate an evolutionary path for larger brain growth?

How much of a role does perception and misperception play in our development as a species?

Apparently, it plays a very important part. In fact, perception and misperception among humans is exactly what it takes to support and maintain the Memetic Superorganisms that we serve. For millennia, humans have been placed in situations where they have had to justify otherwise unspeakable actions. Among the rationalizations are the ‘self-preservation ideology’ and ‘the myth of the chosen people’. It is our perception of what we think is true, real and important to our survival that allows the symbiosis between humans and Memetic Superorganisms.

 

Next Essay… Memetic Superorganism Immune System and Immune Response