Memetics is a Darwinian approach to evolution of culture proposed in late 1970s. This thesis proposes an approach to Memetics, which is an effort to overcome some of the problems involved. It is argued in this thesis that units of cultural evolution are functional abstraction of physical reality and are realized within the boundaries of our cognitive processes. The boundaries of human cognitive processes are defined by Clark and Chalmers (1998) in their extended cognition hypothesis according to which, human cognition is understood as a part of the cultural environment. Therefore human cognition and cultural environment can best be understood by studying them together. As for identifying these units, an extended functionalist approach has been proposed and an empirical cultural transmission study has been conducted and explored in the thesis.

Made available in DSpace on 2015-04-17T15:02:26Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 arquivototal.pdf: 737646 bytes, checksum: 52a1da47d70df2014c22498d05cd0edf (MD5) Previous issue date: 2009-09-25 / Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior - CAPES / Memetics and Heresies in Mormonism: an overview of the memes of the Great Contemporary Heresy , such as expressed in its catechism does a memetic analysis of the doctrine exposed in the Mormon catechism, Gospel Principles, including in this analysis the very front cover of the catechism and some internal illustrations. Memetic analysis consists in extracting from texts and images the memes behind the discourse; in this case, the Mormon discourse. The memetic analysis is preceded by the definition and discussion of the concept of meme, with special attention to the distinction between the concepts of meme and idea, the latter being defined not according to dictionaries, common sense or traditional theories, but according to the theory of memes itself. Distinction is also made between the concepts of viral meme (or mind virus) and non-viral meme. After the memetic analysis, the results are used in order to analyze the conflictional relationship and the rivalry between Mormons and Protestants and to explain the strong growth of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in many parts of the world. / Memética e heresias no mormonismo: Uma viagem pelos memes da Grande Heresia Contemporânea , tais como expressos em seu catecismo faz uma análise memética da doutrina exposta no catecismo mórmon, Gospel Principles ( Princípios do Evangelho ), incluindo, nesta análise, a própria capa do catecismo e algumas das ilustrações internas. A análise memética consiste em extrair de texto e imagens os memes que há por trás do discurso, no caso o discurso mórmon. A análise memética é precedida da definição e discussão do conceito de meme, com atenção especial para a distinção entre os conceitos de meme e idéia, sendo o conceito de idéia definido não segundo os dicionários, o senso comum ou as teorias tradicionais, mas conforme a própria teoria dos memes. É feita também uma distinção entre os conceitos de meme viral (ou vírus da mente) e meme não-viral. Após a análise memética, seus resultados são usados para analisar a relação conflituosa e a rivalidade entre mórmons e evangélicos e para explicar o forte crescimento da Igreja de Jesus Cristo dos Santos dos Últimos Dias em várias partes do mundo.

A dissertação pretende permitir ao leitor simular a forma de pensar de Daniel Dennett, e perpassa toda sua filosofia, com ênfase em seu tratamento de o que são padrões, o algoritmo evolutivo, intuition pumps, consciência, e seu uso dos conceitos de illata, abstracta, semântica e sintaxe para compreender a natureza, a biologia e a mente humana. O trabalho reapresenta, sob nova luz, grande parte das ideias mais importantes de Dennett, e procura fazer a engenharia reversa de o que o levou a pensar de determinadas maneiras, guiando o leitor através de caminhos similares, procurando fomentar um aprendizado ativo de uma forma de pensar, acima e além de uma exposição dos resultados obtidos ao longo de décadas desse pensamento no próprio Dennett / This dissertation intends to provide the reader with an inner simulation of Daniel Dennetts form of reasoning, spreading over his whole philosophy, emphasizing his treatment of patterns, the evolutionary algorithm, consciousness, and his use of illata, abstracta, semantic, and synthax, to carve nature at its joints, especially biology and the human mind. It recasts, in a new light, great part of his most important ideas, and reverse engineers what made him think in particular ways, walking the reader through similar pathways, fostering an active learning of a thinking style, above and beyond a mere exposition of the results obtained by this thinking style over the years

1 ABSTRACT This work consists of two parts. The first one, "Lost Ideas of Middle Age" has a character of an auxiliary study and does not hold any particular scientific ambitions. It serves as a reservoir for monitored case out of history of science in its widest meaning. Good deal of attention is dedicated to so called blind alleys of science, too (therefore "Lost Ideas"), as they are considered an important source. This wide scope was necessary due to the task of the second part of the work, i.e. tracking and identification of evolutionary processes of ideas/"memes" in medieval natural philosophy. Even those ideas, that do not directly share on "pedigree" of thesis claimed by modern science, were subject to evolution and in effect, even their death or degeneration should be of an interest. Another reason for chosen wide scope was a question of proper context. Medieval philosophers were interested in general questions and any particular problematic they were interested in was related to the "big picture". Medieval universe felt a bit like a living organism where every single part played its specific role in supporting harmony of the whole - in contrast to modern science which disintegrates into number of ever more specialised branches with increasing tendency to lose ability to communicate among themselves....

1 ABSTRACT This work consists of two parts. The first one, "Lost Ideas of Middle Age" has a character of an auxiliary study and does not hold any particular scientific ambitions. It serves as a reservoir for monitored case out of history of science in its widest meaning. Good deal of attention is dedicated to so called blind alleys of science, too (therefore "Lost Ideas"), as they are considered an important source. This wide scope was necessary due to the task of the second part of the work, i.e. tracking and identification of evolutionary processes of ideas/"memes" in medieval natural philosophy. Even those ideas, that do not directly share on "pedigree" of thesis claimed by modern science, were subject to evolution and in effect, even their death or degeneration should be of an interest. Another reason for chosen wide scope was a question of proper context. Medieval philosophers were interested in general questions and any particular problematic they were interested in was related to the "big picture". Medieval universe felt a bit like a living organism where every single part played its specific role in supporting harmony of the whole - in contrast to modern science which disintegrates into number of ever more specialised branches with increasing tendency to lose ability to communicate among themselves....

No description available.

Formulamos um modelo matemático determinístico baseado no princípio de ação de massas, em analogia aos trabalhos que estudam a dinâmica de doenças infecciosas em Epidemiologia. Analisamos a dinâmica do espalhamento de rumores levando em conta a simetria no número de contatos diretos entre suscetíveis e infectados pelo rumor e estudamos as implicações de uma campanha publicitária educativa na dinâmica do modelo. Posteriormente, propomos uma simplificação do modelo e desconsideramos o contato entre os indivíduos suscetíveis e infectados supostamente mais resistentes às novidades. Discutimos suas implicações no espalhamento do rumor e a conexão com os parâmetros que descrevem o comportamento social. / We have developed a deterministic mathematical model based on the mass-action principle, in analogy to the works that study the dynamics of infectious diseases in Epidemiology. We analyzed the dynamic of rumors spreading, taking into account the symmetry of contacts among susceptible and infectious individuals and studied the implications of an educative broadcasting advertising in the model. Afterwards, we proposed a simplification ot the model excluding the contact among susceptible and infected individuals supposedly more resistant to novelities. Their implications to the spread of rumor and its connection with parameters describing social behavior are discussed.

Made available in DSpace on 2016-04-25T19:20:32Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Clarissa de Franco.pdf: 3281883 bytes, checksum: 9bdef4d359b91f69b35ab1ca66383f0c (MD5) Previous issue date: 2014-06-09 / Fundação de Amparo a Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo / The object of study is the main Richard Dawkins ideas of atheism and this reception on the brasilian atheists. Dawkins is one of the leading publishers and militant atheist movement today, and despite his public facet - released worldwide on websites and in books of recognized success - there are debates of the author , pertaining to academic spaces and restricted to scientists, who do not always have congruent to its exhibitions and public defenders . Internally the walls of science, Richard Dawkins can not find full verification and corroboration of some central points of his theory that seem to support its public arguments of atheism, such as the theory and the concept of memetic and selection gene, ideas presented to the lay public one of his most famous books, The Selfish Gene (2001a [1976]) and maintained publicly with the status of consolidated science. We assume that the figures of scientist and militant atheist from Dawkins mingle in front of the public imagination, which tends to lead his followers to understand atheism as a more legitimate and true way that religious, being interpreted that as a way to free choice and the latter undergoes a indoctrination. We believe, however, that atheism can be understood as subject to natural cognitive mechanisms, as religion. We take into account the political scene today is favorable to atheists, since we observed a phenomenon we call "moral atheists revenge", a reversal of official protection and legitimacy of the state, which has long been welcoming and protecting the speech religious and today happened to be synchronized with atheistics claims, being religious in an outdated and uncomfortable place in the democratic debate. These hypotheses was investigated by means of confrontation between the scientific and public speeches of Richard Dawkins and through a mixed questionnaire (with open and closed questions ) that investigated 1022 atheists, noting whether and to what extent atheism sample follows trends thinking of Richard Dawkins. We observed patterns of response, three groups: Super Atheists, Moderates Atheists and Discrete Atheists. Approximately 30% of the sample declare themselves as followers of the author, and all, nearly 80% have knowledge about any point of the theory of Dawkins / O objeto de estudo consiste nas principais ideias ateístas de Richard Dawkins e na recepção destas por parte dos ateus inseridos na cultura brasileira. Dawkins é um dos principais divulgadores e militantes do movimento ateísta da atualidade, e a despeito de sua faceta pública divulgada em sites mundiais e em livros de reconhecido sucesso existem debates do autor, concernentes aos espaços acadêmicos e restritos a cientistas, que nem sempre se apresentam congruentes às suas exposições e defesas públicas. Internamente aos muros da ciência, Richard Dawkins não encontra plena verificação e corroboração de alguns pontos centrais de sua teoria que parecem embasar sua argumentação pública do ateísmo, tais como a teoria da memética e o conceito de seleção de gene, ideias apresentadas ao público leigo em um de seus mais célebres livros, O gene egoísta (2001a [1976]) e mantidas publicamente com o status de ciência consolidada. Consideramos que as figuras de cientista e militante ateu em Dawkins fundem-se diante do imaginário público, o que tende a levar seus seguidores a compreenderem o ateísmo como um caminho mais legítimo e verdadeiro que o religioso, sendo aquele interpretado como um caminho de livre escolha e este último submetido a uma doutrinação. Acreditamos, no entanto, que o ateísmo pode ser compreendido como submetido a mecanismos cognitivos naturais, como a religião. Levamos em conta que o cenário político hoje é favorável aos ateus, uma vez que observamos um fenômeno que chamamos de vingança moral dos ateus , uma inversão da proteção oficial e da legitimidade do Estado, que durante muito tempo esteve acolhendo e protegendo o discurso religioso e hoje passou a se afinizar com reivindicações ateístas, ficando o religioso em um lugar ultrapassado e incômodo no debate democrático. Estas hipóteses foram investigadas por meio da confrontação entre os discursos científico e público de Richard Dawkins e através de um questionário misto (com questões fechadas e abertas) que investigou 1022 ateus, observando se, e em que intensidade, o ateísmo da amostra segue as tendências do pensamento de Richard Dawkins. Pudemos observar nos padrões de resposta, três grupos: Super Ateus, Ateus Moderados e Ateus Discretos. Aproximadamente 30% da amostra declara-se fã do autor, e ao todo, perto de 80% tem conhecimento sobre algum ponto da teoria de Dawkins

University of Macau / Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities / Department of Communication

Formulamos um modelo matemático determinístico baseado no princípio de ação de massas, em analogia aos trabalhos que estudam a dinâmica de doenças infecciosas em Epidemiologia. Analisamos a dinâmica do espalhamento de rumores levando em conta a simetria no número de contatos diretos entre suscetíveis e infectados pelo rumor e estudamos as implicações de uma campanha publicitária educativa na dinâmica do modelo. Posteriormente, propomos uma simplificação do modelo e desconsideramos o contato entre os indivíduos suscetíveis e infectados supostamente mais resistentes às novidades. Discutimos suas implicações no espalhamento do rumor e a conexão com os parâmetros que descrevem o comportamento social. / We have developed a deterministic mathematical model based on the mass-action principle, in analogy to the works that study the dynamics of infectious diseases in Epidemiology. We analyzed the dynamic of rumors spreading, taking into account the symmetry of contacts among susceptible and infectious individuals and studied the implications of an educative broadcasting advertising in the model. Afterwards, we proposed a simplification ot the model excluding the contact among susceptible and infected individuals supposedly more resistant to novelities. Their implications to the spread of rumor and its connection with parameters describing social behavior are discussed.