2021-12-20

模倣子 Memetic Glossary

Memetic Index - Essay List - Old Glossary - Concept Map - Footnotes 
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Glossary

Action Meme 
Also known as a "Functional Meme" or a "Mechanomeme".

Memetic Agent
An individual who is able to deploy and resonate with memes deployed by other agents. An agent can be a person, an animal, a machine (computer system), an organization. In terms of animism or theism or other superstitions, a tree, the weather, the sea, the volcano, a handful of bones, tea leaves, or some "god" is not a true agent (at best a quasi-agent) because while they may be able to broadcast their "state" to other agents, they are not able to respond to the memetic deployments of other agents. "...he sends rain upon the just and the unjust alike." (Matthew 5:45) However, if you believe that sacrificing all those virgins really did make it rain, and that it would not have rained otherwise, then a superstitious attribution of agency may work, in a way. In fact, as with all things human, macromemetics may shed a great deal of light on superstition. Mother Nature herself is a kind of memetic agent, from the point of view of the scientist. It's not so much whether there really is a Tree Nymph, and that we have angered her, and that certain bad things will happen and not others, and that we must appease her by sacrificing olives around her tree, or apples, if it's a Tuesday, it's that we believe that she exists, and our memetic relationship with each other, that counts. It's a bit like watching TV. Even if we can't change what comes over the TV by our actions, we can talk about it with each other.

Alienation
See memetic destitution. Alienation is the state where an individual has a paucity of memes which he may deploy with any hope of resonance within the population in which he finds himself. This suggests a physiological quantity, i.e., the minimum number of possible memetic interactions available to produce the level of memetic resonance necessary for health.

Alliance Theory
The attempt to model how some agents (benefactors, allies) help other agents (beneficiaries, protegées) to success. The object of study is what sort of memes to allies and protegées deploy, how does it change the function of the memetic matrix. Another focus of study may be the opposite of Alliance Theory, that is, Oppression Theory, where instead of allies deploying memes and even creating states that make it easy for protegées to rise, we have oppressors (name TBD) and victims, where oppressors deploy memes that make it harder for victims to succeed, even place additional obstacles in their paths, or bad things that can happen to them and not to others. Recent riots and movements have drawn more attention to race and class problems which have always been there, so there must be a lot of interest in development of this body of theory, and the ability to clearly understand this situation and manipulate it and remedy it with an actual engineering discipline. An example is The Dining Philosophers where Plato and Confucious help Socrates avoid bullying by the other great thinkers, and also The Candy Conspiracy.

Bullying
See also immunomemes. Behavior towards an individual in response to the memes they deploy which is negative or injurious in nature.

Memetic Chain Reaction  See also memetic orgy. A situation where members of a cohort continually feed one another memes the other can react to, resulting in a strong resonance along a certain shared memetic inventory. People like to get into chain reaction situations.

Closure
The property of a memetic transaction (see "memetic loop") that it is clear that the transaction is completed (10). Poor closure means that it is not easy to tell if a deploy meme, receive counter-meme exchange has taken place. This is related to residual memetic dept.

Memetic Cohort 
(see also "memetic fabric") The collection of individuals inured of a given memeplex. A cohort is the group of people who are inured of the given memeplex or in a shared memetic state. Related to a memetic fabric. However, a cohort refers to the set of all individuals that participate in a memeplex, whereas a memetic fabric can be a superset in that it is the set of all collected brains in communication with one another in an interconnected community all of which may or may not be inurred of the memeplex in question. See memetic polarization.

Community
See Population.

Compelled State 
A state in which it is impossible to remain for any extended period of time with one or more memes which may be deployed to exit the state. A unipolar compelled state gives the captured agent only one deployment option, while a multipolar compelled state has two or more. Not to be confused with a "Leaf State" which has zero deployment options. See Leaf State.

Contact memes   
For example the Joe Piscapo sketch from Saturday Night Live, "Oh, you from Jersey? I'm from Jersey! What exit?" The joke is people from New Jersey identify where they live by which exit is closest on the New Jersey Turnpike.  From what I gather from my friends who are from New Jersey is that no one from Jersey says this and that they find it offensive. Stereotypes would seem to be related to this, to these memes that evince a strong response in out-groupers to recognize in-group members, or that in-groupers are being referenced. As with all memes, there is nothing guaranteeing that these be logical, consistent, or kind.

Residual Memetic Debt 
Related to a memetic loop and to memetic reward. Memetic debt is incurred during the effort to enact or to learn to enact a meme  Once the memetic loop is closed, i.e., the meme is successfully enacted and this is rewarded by resonance from the cohort (which the individual may have just entered), the memetic debt is resolved. Residual memetic debt is incurred when the individual is not allowed to enact the given meme(s), or is not rewarded appropriately for doing so. This is another micromemetic concept which is one of the few I include here. This is how intergenerational abuse functions: the child (victim) is not allowed to reciprocate, or close the memetic loop, on the abuse heaped on by their more powerful abuser (who may also have the prevailing memeplex on their side), until they themselves become a parent and are finally able to close the memetic reward loop with their own children, effectively getting to enact the other half of the exchange which was denied them up to that point. The pent-up desire to redeem residual memetic debt is a motivation for remaining in abusive situations.

Memetic Density
The interconnectedness of a collection of memes in a given state of a given group of individuals (community). Also, the likelihood that deployment of a given meme will produce a strong resonance. This is related to a memetic orgy, i.e., a state in which there is a rich choice of deployable memes which will produce a strong reaction in the rest of the group. The number of meme pathways that are dead ends or which are not shared by a high percentage of members are few.

If there are few reaction meme systems available to be stimulated by interface memes from another group, then we are in a state of alienation or memetic destitution.  That is, the groups cannot interact with one another at a memetic level, and this leads to violence, and possibly...apathy.  Note that memetic destitution is not the same thing as oppression. A group may be oppressed vis-a-vis another and still have a rich interplay of interface memes between the groups. The oppressed group may be denied freedom, access to services and basic necessities, but not (yet) be in a state of memetic destitution.  This is the theory, at any rate, and more research on the relationship and interplay between these two quantifies would almost certainly be useful.

Deployment 
(see also "Enactment" or "Performance"): the act of enacting a meme for others to see, also "performance," and "enactment" though these latter can mean going through the actions of a meme, but not in front of others, i.e., "rehearsal," or "practice."

Performing the act of imitating some behavior, i.e., a meme. Are memes simply triggered as the result of an incoming meme?  That is not the model, really, that is, an automaton.  The idea is that given a certain memetic state, the individual has the opportunity to deploy certain memes based on their perceived chance of garnering memetic rewards, which is a physiological gratification response (also somewhat light-heartedly known as a "memetic orgasm"). There are a couple of problems here: one is that the individual's assessment of a chance for reward may be wrong, and they may not be perfectly skilled at deploying the meme which would otherwise net said reward.

Deployment Decision 
The process whereby the next meme will be deployed and by which agent in a given state.

Deployment Descriptor 
A specialized mathematical notation for a memetic deployment. Some examples in this essay.

Deployment Opportunity 
The chance for an agent to deploy a meme, a context, a state, when there is some chance to actually enact a meme. The idea is that there would be a chance for resonance. In the case of an opportunity to deploy an immunomeme, we have the special term of a "bullying opportuntity."

Enactment: see "Deployment"

Endomeme: (see also "idiomeme" and "exomeme") Obsolete term.

Memetic Enlistment 
The degree to which an agent has a large or small numbers of deployment opportunities of a large or small memes. A "memetic enlistment gradient" for an agent, or for a cohort of agents, if is positive, then the member agents of the cohort will favor the state transition and the memetic deployments that will cause it, even adding their own deployments to that end, while if negative, the agents feel themselves losing power, they may deploy immunomemes against the state transition. This is distinct, perhaps deceptively similar to memetic injection, or the degree to which a meme is familiar to a given cohort. They are related, but not the same. One is focused on the states of a memeplex, one by one, and how available a meme is and to which agents, while injection refers to how many agents are "injected" or "inured" of a meme (or "infected" with a meme) across a whole population, or cohort.

This is an important concept, and has a lot of bearing on the discipline of memetic engineering. The term "enlistment" may seem paradoxical, but it refers to the portion of the memetic inventory that is available to a given agent (or population, or such). So it is the memes in the inventory which are "enlisted" and not the agent or cohort or state. So if an agent has access to deploy, say, all the memes, in a memeplex in a given state, they could be said to be "fully enlisted," and as that portion of the total memes available dwindles, it finally reaches zero, or memetic destitution (or "alienation"). So memetic destitution is a state where the agent's (or cohort's) memetic enlistment has dropped to nil.

Memetic Fabric 
The matrix formed by all the minds in a memetically connected population (as opposed to a cohort (2)), specifically the capacity of that matrix to support the activity of memes copying and transmitting themselves and competing with one another.

Free Play 
(See Leaf State and Compelled State) Childlike play in which there are no "rules." Any game or sport with rules is not free play, because they involve the interplay of the deployment of memes and immunomemes. Free play can be looked as a non-memetic activity, or an extramemetic activity, as may meditation, dreaming, and sexual activity.

Memetic Hacking  memetic hacker (a person with whom I have a purely meta-memetic exchange, i.e., we talk about the memetic system, not through it, as with a psychologist, a memetic researcher, or a trusted spiritual advisor), I can enact any meme I like, since I am not out for a genuine memetic reward.

Memetic Hell 
(see also Leaf State, Compelled State, Free Play) The fact that humans are memetic creatures (memetophilic) inextricably condemned to engage in memetic transactions with one another as part of their basic drives.

Memetic Hub see memetic nexus.

Idiomeme Obsolete term.

Immunomeme  A special class of signal meme which is enacted in response to an alien meme, that is, a meme which is not in the memetic inventory of the given memetic cohort. This definition may need to be updated/expanded.

Laws of Immunomemetics 
1. Any stable memeplex contains an immunomemeplex
2. A system of rules or laws translates to a collection of bullying behaviors
3. An immunomeme is a meme that works to prevent a mutation to a memeplex (see MADSAM)

Infection
Whether an individual resonates with a given meme. More research and definition needed here. A person may be passively receptive, i.e., recognize the meme but not react outwardly to it, react outwardly (such as laughing at a joke or following a line of discussion in which the meme is a pivotal element, etc.), or even actively propagating the meme from simply repeating it (deploying or enacting) when opportunities arise.

Memetic Injection 
The process of introducing a meme into a population. "Injectability" is a memetic engineering term for how easy or hard it is to introduce the meme, and theoretically the transmissibility or "success" or "virility" of a meme is positively related to this quantity. More research required here to demonstrate the truth of that theory.

Island Meme (semi-obsolete term)
I give the example of traditional golf clothing (5). Memes that are okay only within a certain narrow context, and all agents in the environment are aware of this distinction, but feel unable to deploy immunomemes when the contextual requirements are met (5). 

Isolated Meme
A meme that cannot invoke any of the memes in a given sub-memeplex, nor be invoked by them. Think of an immigrant who doesn't yet speak the language. None of what he says (his linguistic memeplex) is going to resonate with the natives.

Inurement 
The internalization of a given meme (or memeplex) such that one resonates with the enactment of said meme(s) by another, or is able to enact them in response to appropriate signal (triggering) memes.

Memetic Inventory
Quite simply, the set of all memes that make up a memeplex, memetic fabric, memespace, or agent (2). The degree of inurement of an individual by a given memeplex depends on how many of the memes in the inventory of said memeplex the individual is infected with. Memetic inventory of a memeplex or individual or memetic state and is what defines in-group and out-group status of a person or a meme. It's the set of all memes that make up the memeplex or sub-memeplex, or the set of all memes the individual is able to enact (which may span partly or completely multiple memeplexes). This is distinguished from a memespace.

Laws of Macromemetics, Immunomemetics
Look under M and I respectively in this glossary, and MADSAM.

Leaf State 
(See also Compelled State and Memetic Hell) A state from which there are no available deployment options leading away to other states. A "cornered" agent may resort to violence or any of a few emotional responses such as crying or laughing. A leaf state is not always a bad thing. A successful joke is an example of mutually consensual memetic cornering into a leaf state. Sexual activity can also involve many elements associated with a leaf state. "Free play" can be a leaf state, as can meditation (see Blackmore, The Meme Machine).

Memetic Loop 
(see also Memetic Debt) Along with the memetic reward, the concept of the "memetic loop" forms the motivational basis for an individual to participate in a memeplex, even a dysfunctional one. When one individual enacts a meme and a second uninurred individual shows they have learnt it by imitating it back to the initiator or resonates (enacts an appropriate response meme) with the enacted meme, the loop initiated by the first person is closed, or completed, giving a physiological reward to all involved. Note that this theoretically forms the basis for intergenerational abusive behavior, but that is outside the scope of this essay.

Macromemetics 
The study of systems of memes (memeplexes) at a large scale, i.e., large numbers of memes interacting with one another as systems withing large human populations, interactions between large memeplexes. A comparison could be drawn with Hari Seldon's Psychohistory from Isaac Asimov's Foundation Trilogy, i.e., a deterministic, mathematical discipline for accurately predicting the behavior of large populations of human beings. Contrasted with micro-memetics (or just "memetics").

Laws of Macromemetics 
1. An agent deploys memes in order to achieve optimal resonance
2. Deployment of a meme causes a transition to a new state
3. A mutation is a Modification, Addition, or Deletion of a State, Agent, or Meme (see MADSAM)

MADSAM 
A mnemonic for how a memeplex can mutate. MAD is a Modification, Addition, or Deletion. Theoretically memes, rather like General Douglas MacArthur's take on old soldiers, never die, they just fade away. Memes are best removed by injected a more virile meme and have the old one atrophy from disuse, but that is a memetic engineering issue. States are similar, i.e., they atrophy, displaced by better ones. Agents tend to be people, so "adding" or "deleting" them starts to sound like the mass-murderers of history. The hope of macromemetic engineering is to make possible massive political change without things like genocide.

Marking 
The property of a meme that it is either easy or difficult to distinguish (9), that is, that the meme has been deployed or not. This can be if the meme is itself ambiguous, like symbols or expressions that are too complex and don't stand out, or are confusingly similar to others, for example. It can also be the "who made the coffee?" problem where the marking of the meme is poor because nobody can observe who made the coffee outside of the time they actually make it, and even if there's some kind of a log or something (since this could be forgotten, and inspecting it is not part of the main flow of the process). The coffee maker is perhaps an interesting example of poor marking, but high closure (10), since it's impossible to reliably hang memetic potential on who actually made the coffee (bad marking of that individual), it is nonetheless clear that the coffee has been made (11).

Memetic Matrix
Obsolete term--see Transition Matrix Set. A conceptual, mathematical representation of how a memetic system evolves over the course of individual actions and the reactions of other agents to those actions, and so on. The structure of the memetic matrix is related to the first two of the three Laws of Macromemetics. The matrix is composed of states (7), each containing a list of agents and those agents' "deployment opportunities," or memes which each of them is allowed to deploy in the given state, and possibly some kind of probabilistic weighting for each possible deployment decision. These matrices are known as "Transition Matrices." The deployment of a meme by any agent leads to change in state (second law). Obviously, "deployment decisions" (in natural memeplexes) is a huge area of study, but artificial memeplexes (8) provide illumination. Of course, if a memetic engineer can limit and control the number of states in the system she is designing or trying to manipulate, she can greatly simplify and linearize her task, i.e., make it look more like a simple, artificial memeplex, with a simpler memetic matrix to grapple with.

Meme
See Susan Blackmore, Wikipedia, Dawkins, et al. A meme is an "atomic" behavior which may be recognized and imitated (6). A meme relates to culture much as a gene relates to biology.

Memetics
See Susan Blackmore, The Meme Machine; et al. I also refer to his as micromemetics, so as to contrast it with macromemetics. The study of how the human brain processes memes. This has a lot to do with our Dunbar Number, our mirror neurons, our ability to watch others' behavior, interpret it, and imitate it, our relationships to artifacts and culture, how we can judge whether some action or artifact is the same or different than another, our ability to teach each other complex behavior, the way we use and process language, and so on. In macromemetics, I take all of those things that an individual does "as read," and go from there, looking at how large groups of individuals doing these very human things behave.

Memetic System (see "Memeplex")

Memeplex
See Susan Blackmore, Wikipedia, et al. See also "Memetic System." A memeplex is a collection of memes that work together as a system. In order for a meme to be considered part of a memeplex with other memes, it must be able to cause in invocation (deployment) of other memes in the memeplex, as well as be able to be invoked by other memes in the memeplex. See also "Island Meme" and "Isolated Meme".

Megamemeplex
A memeplex involving millions of minds (agents). See also "Supermemeplex."

Memespace 
A memespace (2) is the set of all active memes residing within a given memetic fabric (or memeplex). The term finds its major use in macromemetic engineering (3). The "carrying capacity" of a memetic fabric is limited, so if new memes appear and grow, they will undermine existing memeplexes, weakening them if not replacing them outright. 

MIAO (Memetic Iconic Anchoring Object)
An object (can be abstract) to which memes may be associated. Appearance or invocation of the MIAO makes all of the associated memes available. Branding is an example of MIAO creation/engineering.
Shared MIAOs are another important concept, particularly as concerns racism, stereotyping, and cultural cooption. MIAOs are objects to which memes may be attached, that is, they invoke memes when they appear. This is where the sometimes fine line between memes and "iconic objects" comes in. An object or image such as a coffee cup, a cat (or a caricature of one), a swastika, etc., is clearly not a meme since it cannot be "imitated". One could draw or make one, but that is not imitating the object itself. But what do we mean by a meme being "attached" or "anchored" to an object? We could say that when a person is exposed to a MIAO, there are all sorts of memes attached to that MIAO, and if they are interface memes for reaction memes for the memetic state that person is in, then the MIAO can effectively trigger those reaction memes.

Micromemetics 
The study of the behavior of memes at a conceptual level, e.g., how they are transmitted, their effect on individual human behavior, how they are transmitted from one person to the next, etc.

Memetic Nexus
See also Memetic Hub. A situation where a memetic agent (person, robot, organization, etc.) is at the center of a network such that memes that agent deploys are immediately received (after one jump, or a few jumps) by all the "subscribing" agents to the memetic nexus. The nexus deploys memes on a regular basis. This is so that subscribers regularly receive their doses of memes, and they all get the same ones at the same time, so they are able to exchange memes with each other, which allows them to have reliable memetic exchanges, even memetic orgies, which is the benefit of subscription. Quality is less important than regularity. I theorize that the memetic nexus phenomenon is closely related to power, though I now suspect that Alliance Theory may play a big part.
Some rather surprising examples of memetic nexus include the news, the weather, science, Mother Nature, sporting events, reporting on sports events, the body of human literature and entertainment, to name a few. The Office of the President of the United States of America is a good example, since if the President says or does something, within half an hour billions of people know of it.

Memetic Orgy
A memetic orgy is a chain-reaction situation produced when a cohort are in a state where almost all memes deployed resonate and continues to build and maintain a high level of memetic resonance over an extended period. Obviously the deployment of memes in this scenario produces very reliable rewards, which is a major point of this essay. See also Memetic Chain Reaction.

Memetic Polarization
The extent to which individuals comprising a fabric respond to a given MIAO by enacting any of the memes within a given memeplexes associated with the MIAO. For example, there are a number of memes surrounding religion, feminism, or any other dogma or "belief system", which might be classed as "for" and "against" (I use these terms loosely). The degree to which individuals in a fabric tend to resonate to or enact any of the memes of the memeplex attached to a given MIAO is the memetic polarization of the fabric (as opposed to some cohort). For example, if wearing a T-shirt with a given image or slogan elicits some kind of response within a given memeplex from most ever person in a community, one could say that the fabric is highly polarized around that MIAO. For example, when I wear a gun rights shirt in my community, many people notice and respond positively, including inquiring where they might obtain a similar shirt. However, wearing a "The Patriarchy made me do it" shirt elicits only very occasional response (sometimes quite strong), but largely no reaction (despite my community have a large population of young university students). This suggests that the fabric here is not very polarized around the concept of "The Patriarchy", i.e., many people either are unaware of the concept or have no memes to enact around it, in other words they are not members of any cohort related to "feminism" or any reaction group against "feminism". This could be related to "apathy", but this is another concept I hope to explore later, i.e., "apathy" as an immunomeme.

Population
A collection of individuals who are in communication with one another such that it is possible for them to exchange memes, e.g., they live in the same area, share a common language, use/consume the same media, etc. Also referred to as a community.

Reaction memes 
Memes that trigger in-group members to go into a different memetic state, or change the current memetic inventory available to them. The presence or non-presence of a perceived out-grouper could be such a trigger. Another SNL reference is Eddie Murphy's sketch where he played an African-American man who put on "whiteface" and went among white (ethnic Northern European) people and found that, as the joke went, white people completely change their behavior when the last non-white person leaves the bus, room, etc. It becomes a party, everybody is open and nice to one another, and so on. This is often a component of racist narratives, by the way, that one group or the other, usually both each in their own way, has some kind of "secret life" which may only come into being when no members of the other group are present. This can center around race, religion, gender, sexual orientation, age, and so, and conjures images of shared intimacies, orgies even, kindness, relaxing of harsh rules which are in full force when the other group is around. Reaction memes are those that tell the members of the memetic cohort to change their memetic inventory, either to go into a state of not being able to enact some of the memes they normally would, or to have a larger or different set of memes.

Memetic Replacement 
See MADSAM. The theory is that mmes cannot be "deleted," per se, they must be replaced. The reason is that existing memes have investment by some cohort, they are enlisted, and so agents that are infected with them are reluctant to give up these memes because they represent resonance rewards. The key is to create new memes that are "more appealing" than the undesireable memes, which replace the lost resonace, or memetic reward potential. The other thing is to stop the deployment of the bad memes, again, by directing away, not by interdiction. In sum, create new memes, stop stimulating the bad memes, so that they atrophy.

Resonance
Responding with a physiological reaction, e.g., laughter or tears, or the deployment of any of a set of "expected" or "appropriate" memes, in response to a meme deployed by another. Note that this may also be giving no reaction under certain circumstances. This would typically occur in a special memetic state. For example, the realization that all persons present were members of the same sect, political persuasion, gender, hobby interest, etc. Among nudists, for example, one of the memetic rewards one expects from one's cohort is that of not reacting when one takes off all of ones clothing. Likewise, in other groups, one might make a remark or gesture which would be very inappropriate in a general setting (different memetic state where different reaction memes apply), would expect to be greeted with (mild) agreement, or even just (approving) silence, i.e., one "got away with it", so to speak. Note also that the resonance memes deployed may or may not be "nice". One may still be a member of an oppressed racial, religious, gender, etc., group, but still have a rich panoply of memes one may deploy to elicit a resonance response, in fact, one may have more such memes available than a "non-oppressed" person. It's just that those memes overwhelmingly result in mistreatment and denial of resources. Lack of opportunities for resonance is related to memetic destitution.

Memetic Reward 
Also called "memetic orgasm". The driving force for humans to enact (or deploy), and resonate with memes. Theoretically humans experience a "rush" or "pleasure reward" when they successfully enact a meme, or when they close a memetic loop. This is actually a micromemetic concept, one of the few I'll use herein. It is also a candidate for a way of "proving" that memetics may be (physiologically) accurately measured, much like the X-ray crystalography of the DNA molecule provided evidence that the human genome might possibly exist as a collection of information and might be entirely stored in these long-chained molecules. This may be one of the first places where quantitative units may begin to be applied to memetics, e.g., if the "memetic reward" turns out to be a cocktail of blush response, galvanic response, blood pressure, etc., or even just a firing of some very specific and localized nerves in a specific part of the human brain, then things like quantities, thresholds, latency periods, and so forth, could begin to be assigned, once the details of this process are identified.

Signal Meme
A loose category of meme which serves more to signal other cohort members to deploy further memes as opposed to representing any substantive action. Of course, so-called "action memes" can also send signals at the same time.

Memetic State
This is part of a mathematical representation of how a memetic system progresses through a series of (meme) deployments, using a memetic matrix.
A memetic state is a transitory condition of a memetic agent or a collection of agents in a memetic fabric with one another where each of them has a deployment opportunity, described by a Transition Matrix.

A memetic state refers to when an individual is able to enact a larger number of memes reliably, usually because they are in a special state of attention with other individuals (see also "memetic hacking"), usually individuals sharing some kind of common interest or persuasion, e.g., same religion, speakers of a common language(s), same hobbies or interests or profession such as gun owners, car fanatics, manga nerds/otaku, engineers, parents of young children, etc. The result is that such a sub-cohort(9) can exchange more memes more efficiently, with a larger inventory of shared memes, and can place those individuals in a state where practically every meme they deploy produces a strong resonance, and can lead to a memetic orgy. A teaching scenario may also produce a high memetic density state, and may be the motivation for pursuit of this occupation.

State Diagram
A graphical way of representing a memeplex, showing states, and transitions between states. The role of individual agents is usually not depicted. A couple of exceptions I have are The Dining Philosophers and The Candy Conspiracy where I specify on a state diagram which agents can make a deployment.

Submemeplex
A collection of still-interconnected memes which are all part of some larger memeplex. See also "Supermemeplex." Note that simply taking a random sampling of memes from a memeplex may yield only a "memetic inventory" or a "subset of the memetic inventory of a memeplex" and possibly one or more submemeplexes and disjoint memes, but not necessarily a single functional submemeplex. The sampling must be a coherent, functioning subsystem.

Supermemeplex
Not to be confused with a megamemeplex. A supermemeplex is a larger memeplex made up of a collection of smaller memeplexes. One could think of one dialect of American English as opposed to the collection of all of the dialects of English together. This would be an "overlapping supermemeplex" since most dialects of English have a lot in common. However, knowing how to put on your shirt, socks, and shoes (both lace-up and slip-on) would be a collection of four or more memeplexes which are almost totally independent, hence a "non-overlapping supermemeplex."

Three Narratives Model
The three narratives are The Radical Narrative (aka The Fundamental Narrative), the Conservative Narrative, and the Liberal Narrative (aka The Pseudo-Liberal, Crypto-Conservative, or Status Quo Apologist Narrative). The Conservative Narrative grows by taking memes from the Radical Narrative (all people are equal, killing is bad, everybody should have food and a place to sleep, etc.) and "wrapping" them with other memes (eg, men and women are sometimes not equal, people can have food and bed if they can pay for it, people can kill others if they deserve it, etc.). The Liberal Narrative, instead of "fixing" the "flaws" in the conservative narrative, as it purports to do, fixates on some conservative memes, typically pulls out some radical memes, and generates a new memeplex which it imposes on the memetic fabric usually in the form of "Stop doing that BAD THING," and possibly "Do this WEIRD NEW THING instead." Per the principles of macromemetics, such memetic injections result in polarization, allowing everybody to continue accepting the "bad" memes, either by accepting or rejecting (or accepting it's opposite) the new memeplex. The result of this process is that conservative memes get progressively wrapped in more and more layers of "acceptance" and "justification" all the while the memetic inventory grows of the Conservative Narrative grows with more and more memes added from the Liberal narrative.

Transition Diagram  A directed graph showing all the states and memes of a memeplex and how deployment of memes by agents moves the memetic cohort through the various states. See this essay for an example. This is the "visual description" of a memeplex, showing all the same information as the collected Deployment Descriptors, or the Transition Matrix Set, only in visual form (so it can get unwieldy for large, complex memeplexes).

Triple Narrative Model (see Three Narratives Model)

Transition Matrix  It is what describes how the system may change (to which new state) based on the actions of the agents in the system. It's a matrix (7) with a list of agents on one axis, and the list of possible memes on the other axis, with each node of intersection between them the state to which the system transitions if said agent deploys said meme. A transition matrix is one node in the memetic matrix Transition Matrix Set (12) of an entire system.

Transition Matrix Set  The collection of all Transition Matrixes for a given memeplex. Every transition matrix has a name, which appears in at least one other matrix in the set. This is a matrix representation of the collection of all Deployment Descriptors in the memeplex, as well as the Transition Diagram.

Virtual State 
See "Compelled State"

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A visual, graphical representation of these relationships may come later. For now, I will list the concepts and how they relate to other concepts.

Action meme (is a subtype of) meme
Memetic Agent (can be) a person, an animal, an AI, an organization, etc.
Agent (is able to) make memetic deployment decisions
Agent (has a set of deployable memes) in a given memetic state
Alienation (relates to) Memetic Destitution
Alliance Theory ()
Bullying (relates to) Immunomemes
Memetic Cohort (is a property of) a Population, a Fabric, a State, a Memeplex, a Meme
Closure (relates to) Residual Memetic Debt, Marking
Community (relates to) a Population, a Fabric
Compelled State (effectively the same as) a Virtual State
Contact Memes ()
Memetic Dept (is incurred) when a meme is deployed
Residual Memetic Debt ()
Memetic Density ()
Memetic Destitution (causes) Alienation, violence 
Memetic Destitution (incurs) memetic debt
Deployment (is when an agent does) a meme
Deployment Descriptor (consists of) a state, agent, meme string and a target state
Deployment Descriptor (together can completely describe) a memeplex
Deployment Descriptor (together can completely describe) a memetic matrix
Deployment Descriptor (represents a transition in) a state diagram
Deployment Descriptor (represents a transition in) a transition matrix
Deployment Descriptor ()
Economics (sub-discipline of) Macromemetics
Enactment (is similar to) Deployment
Enactment (is when an agent acts out) a meme
Enactment (is similar to) "practice" or "rehearsal"
Enactment (is similar to) Free Play
Enactment (does NOT incur) memetic debt
Endomeme (is not outwardly visible)
Endomeme (a meme internal to) an Agent
Endomeme (may be discernable indirectly by) Memetic Hacking
Endomeme (theoretically influences) Deployment Decisions
Endomeme (may be a theoretical component of) a Memeplex
Enlistment (motivates) Deployment
Enlistment (is a property of) a Memetic State
Memetic Fabric (consists of interconnected) Agents
Memetic Fabric (possesses) a Memetic Inventory
Memetic Fabric (contains) a Memespace
Memetic Fabric ()
Free Play ()
Memetic Hacking (a way of interviewing) Agents
Memetic Hacking (may help to identify) Endomemes, Idiomemes
Memetic Hell (may be escaped through) Free Play, meditation, and sleep
Idiomeme (a meme internal to) an Agent
Idiomeme (a real-life instance of) an Endomeme
Idiomeme (might be identified by) memetic hacking
Immunomeme ()
Infection ()
Injection ()
Island Meme ()
Inurement ()
Memetic Inventory ()
Leaf State ()
Memetic Loop (produces) Memetic Debt
Memetic Loop () 
Macromemetics ()
Marking ()
Marketing (is a sub-discipline of) Macromemetics
Memetic Matrix (is made up of) transition matrices
Memetic Matrix (can be represented by) a transition diagram
Memetic Matrix (can be represented by) a collection of deployment descriptors
Meme ()
Memetics ()
Memetic System ()
Memeplex ()
Megamemeplex ()
Memespace ()
MIAO ()
Memetic Nexus ()
Memetic Orgy (exists when) each deployment triggers a new deployment
Memetic Polarization ()
Political Consulting (is a sub-discipline of) Macromemetics
Political Science (is a sub-discipline of) Macromemetics
Population ()
Psychology (is a sub-discipline of) Macromemetics
Public Relations (is a sub-discipline of) Macromemetics
Reaction Memes ()
Resonance (is produced by) Successful memetic deployment
Resonance (yields) Memetic reward
Resonance (happens as) a memetic loop is closed
Memetic Reward (comes from) Closing a memetic loop
Memetic Reward (is gained with) resonance
Semiotics (is a sub-discipline of) Macromemetics
Signal Meme ()
Sociology (is a sub-discipline of) Macromemetics
Memetic State (defines) the set of memes each agent can deploy
State (is a matrix of) the target state for each meme deployed by each agent
State Diagram (depicts) a collection of states with meme deployments that connect them
Submemeplex (is a subdivision of) a memeplex
Supermemeplex (is a collection of) memeplexes
Three Narrative Model ()
Triple Narrative Model ()
Transition Matrix (describes) the memes, target states, and agents of a single state
Virtual State (relates to) Compelled State



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(1) The amount of memetic activity required for good health. This would be related to things like children (or adults) who do not receive enough attention and become ill or die as a result. There may already be medical data on this. Also, people who become addicted to things like sex addiction, or even things like social media, which seem to provide social reward, but actually don't.

(2) Memetic Fabric, Cohort, Memetic Inventory, Agent, Population, Environment, and Memespace are worth discussing together, as they say subtly different things about the same small collection of things. An agent is an individual able to engage in memetic transactions, in other words, able to perceive that other agents have deployed a meme, and able to deploy memes in return. Once upon a time, this was constrained to humans (and many animals), but now computer systems must also be included (and computer "environments"). A population is, simply enough, a collection of agents. An environment is a "place" (for lack of a better word) that some collection of agents coexist. This brings us to a memetic fabric. A fabric is a collection of agents who are able to interact mememtically, that is, to exchange memes. It helps to think of this in terms of set theory. A memetic inventory has multiple applications. It means the collection of memes that are contained is some given "memetic object." For example, a memeplex, obviously, has some collection of memes that belong to it, i.e., the memetic inventory of the memeplex. An individual agent has a memetic inventory, which is the set of all memes that agent is capable of deploying (or resonating with). By extension, a population of agents has a memetic inventory (even though all agents may not have all the memes). Here we get to a distinction between a population and a cohort. Given a memetic inventory, you can talk about the cohort of that memetic inventory within a given population. For example, you could talk about a show called "Star Trek" with a character "Spock" with catchphrases, "Fascinating, Captain," and "Live long and prosper," and so we could talk about the group of people in some town who recognize these memes or are able to generate them. These people are the cohort of that memetic inventory (Spock's phrases). Note also that said people may not all be part of a single memetic fabric merely by virtue of those shared memes, since they may not otherwise be in memetic contact with one another. On that note, however, we can talk about the cohort of a memeplex, or the cohort of a memetic fabric, concepts which I hope are obvious at this point. I think that leaves only memespace. Since inventories and cohorts can be supersets of 

(3) Packing the Memespace is an interesting memetic design approach for preventing the erosion of memes (in a memeplex the designer wishes to support) and may help distinguish between memespace, memetic inventory, and memetic fabric. A memeplex or a memetic fabric can have a memespace, and this refers to the inventory of active memes in said memeplex or fabric. By active we mean brains can only hold so many memes for active use, so there is the possibility of memes pushing their way in and pushing others out. "Packing the Memespace" is about deliberately creating "junk memes" (like "junk genes" that don't code to any proteins) within a given memeplex, and of course in the target cohort inured of it. The object is two-fold: make sure that "our memeplex" is running as much as possible (if a brain goes into another memeplex, who knows when it'll come back?), and starve other memeplexes out of space in the memespace (and by extension, the memetic fabric). These junk memes also serve to connect our "functional" memes together, which serves the objectives.

(4) Golf clothing such as the big hat with the pop-pom, long Argyle socks, etc. Examples of "Island Memes" Behaviors which are okay in a very specific context, but not at all outside of that context. This term is somewhat obsolete, since it may not fit in well with other terminology, but is nevertheless quite useful (rather like memespace).

(5)  Breastfeeding should be an example of an island meme, although it may not work very well as such. In some places (ideally) a woman getting her breasts out to feed a baby provokes no notice or response, whereas doing the same thing sans baby is something else altogether. As with many things to do with the oppression of women, this is an interesting example. Is the population polarized around public breastfeeding being okay or not? The age of the nursing child involved seems to be quite a problem for some (6), so that might be another island meme.

(6) The one time that Carrie and her crew from Sex and the City left Manhattan to go to a baby shower in Connecticut (God forbit they go to somewhere like Long Island, am I right?), one of the group told the others that "There's a woman over there breastfeeding a kid with enough teeth to chew steak." If it's on the media, it's a meme. If comedians include it in their acts, it's a meme.

(7) I've written a number of essays which deal directly with memetic state modeling, and the systems of notation I've come up with to represent them.  What are Memetic States Like? is one. I cover a lot of definitions and notation in Escaping Meme Hell. I also dive a lot into deployment descriptors and state transition diagrams in my first and second essays on the Dining Philosophers Problem (8).

(8) In addition to the Dining Philosophers, the game of Baseball (see the film Moneyball with Brad Pitt) and Robert's Rules of Order are familiar systems which are easy to model using the deployment descriptors and state transition diagrams. Part of the reason for this is that these systems have very clear states, and it's clear which agents are allowed to deploy which memes at which times (states), the states are of a reasonable, bounded, number, and the complexity of the deployment decision process is minimal. I'm actually trying to write some essays on what I call Triangular Baseball. I reduce the number of bases and players a bit, so as to decrease the number of states and possible transitions.

(9) Marking and Closure (10) are related. Marking refers to how easy (or difficult) it is to tell if a meme has been deployed or not. Poorly marked memes lead to unreliable, inconsistent behavior of a system. A memetic designer should make sure to design well-marked memes, or when that is impossible, to link the critical memes to well-marked memes (that are not important and only exist for improving the marking. See "Koffee Klatch" and "Prime Pizza Thursday" experiments). Poor marking tends to lead to poor closure, but even with acceptably marked memes, poor closure can result.

(10) Closure is related to Marking (9), and describes how easy or difficult it is to discern whether a memetic transaction has been completed or not. Closure can be poor if it's unclear that a reply meme has been deployed, or if the transaction itself doesn't end clearly. An example is the Seinfeld episode "The Soup" where Jerry accepts an Armani suit from fellow comedian Kenny Bania, whom Jerry doesn't like, on the agreement that Jerry "buy him a meal sometime." The whole episode revolves around what constitutes "a meal" in order to complete the transaction, famously including Elaine asking Jerry if Kenny "crumbled any crackers into his soup" (which would make it more like a meal). Taking somebody for a meal is an example of poor closure. The memes, i.e., buying soup versus something more substantial, and whether in a coffee shop or a proper restaurant, may also be an example of poor marking.

(11) The Koffee Klatch research is interesting because of the light it shines on residual memetic debt. The fact that you can tell that the coffee got made, but you can't tell who did it, since most of the agents in the fabric will miss this memetic deployment, that is, making of the coffee, so it's not a reliable marker (9). For example, if you wanted to enable other agents to deploy memes at the maker of the coffee, in order to positively reinforce making it, for example, this doesn't work (because of poor marking). A very critical design factor is that the memes you want to happen need to be well marked so that other agents can deploy memes in response to those memes, to give the social reenforcement. The reverse is true as well--attaching shaming (immunomemetic) behavior to memes you don't want means those bad memes must be well-marked, or attached to some that are.

(12) I am obsoleting the term memetic matrix for the more descriptive Transition Matrix Set, since it is made up of a set of matrixes.

1 comment:

  1. Nice to see such comprehensive glossary of memetic concepts! I wonder if it would be useful to provide a separate page where these terms are organized in a concept map (like, for example, the ones used on the hyperphysics site)?

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