[FRIAM] anthropological observations

Wed Apr 15 13:12:30 EDT 2020

Jochen,

Thank you for introducing a fascinating concept.

What you describe is triggering all kinds of echos in the material I have been reading the past year at the Ritman Library in Amsterdam. This material includes works on Hermetic (Alchemical) philosophy, Jung, Gurdjieff, etc. etc. Those readings also resonate with much of what I studied in anthropology as well as writers like Eliade and Campbell.

You are offering a metaphoric lens for interpreting and "explaining" this body of knowledge. I would really like to pursue it more, and in depth.

Did you say your book was available in English somewhere? How might I get a copy? I have ordered Darwin's Cathedral and will read it upon arrival this weekend.

Any other sources you might point me to would be greatly appreciated.

dave west

On Wed, Apr 15, 2020, at 11:07 AM, Jochen Fromm wrote:
> Yes, Richatd Dawkin's memes ("The Selfish Gene") are a nice idea, but they are not like genes at all. They are like viruses. If we consider the memes that are generated by "meme generators" and shared in social media, then they can at best be described in terms of viruses. For example a post that goes viral etc.
> 
> The idea of "hidden genes" is different. They are not really new, they are rather hidden in plain sight because everybody knows them. Nobody has recognized them for what they are though, as far as I know. Except David Sloan Wilson ("Darwin's Cathedral") maybe.
> 
> Think of a typical church service on a Sunday or synagogue service on a Saturday: a priest in front of a group is reading an encoded text. The text is decoded and translated in a speech so that it is understandable for the target audience. If the audience is willing to believe in the propagated message, the behavior of the group is changed. Members will behave a bit different if the preacher has been successful. They support and help each other. They form a group. 
> 
> If we consider that God is the group itself from a sociological perspective, as Randall Collins ("Sociological Insight") and the founders of Sociology told us, then it is hard to overlook that this repeated process of reading the holy scriptures and explaining them in fact nothing else but a gene expression. 
> 
> The text contains non-coding parts, just like normal DNA, and parts which encode "recipes" to control the behavior of the group. We know them for instance as the basic commandments. The 10 commandments we all know so well are in fact the 10 basic genes. They create a collective organism, a life-form which is bigger than any individual member. 
> 
> These life-forms are long-lived as plants, but agile as animals. In this sense they are different from biological organisms. But they can get cancer, just like biological organisms. We know it as the various *-isms: fascism, communism, nazism, totalitarianism, etc. I consider fascism as the most general form and nazism as the worst and most aggressive form. If we really want to understand how fascism works, we have to understand religion first, IMHO.
> 
> -J.
> 
> 
> -------- Original message --------
> From: Steven A Smith <sasmyth at swcp.com>
> Date: 4/14/20 23:41 (GMT+01:00)
> To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <friam at redfish.com>
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] anthropological observations
> 
> Jochen -

> Can you describe more about how your idea of "hidden genes" contrasts and compares to Dawkin's "memes"?

> Glen (I think) has questioned the term (meme) in the past, but I don't think we ever discussed the point here? I don't know if his argument was more against Dawkins, against the use of analogy/metaphor to relate genes to memes or something yet more fundamental? 

> I find the least-common-denominator common-usage of the term "meme" to be somewhat lame but the original term as presented by Dawkins was fairly compelling and widely applicable... but like all metaphors, it has it's limits. 

> I'd be interested in a discussion here on that topic, and perhaps how that relates to this thread.

> - Steve

> On 4/14/20 3:28 PM, Jochen Fromm wrote:
>> Yes, it was not a real publisher, just a self-publishing company where you can publish anything. I cancelled the contract because you need to pay every year. It was a sort of trial balloon to see if anybody is interested in the topic which I believe is quite explosive. Actually nobody was interested. I figured that it is not that dangerous to publish it in English if nobody is interested anyway.
>> 
>> The basic idea is that there are "hidden genes" which are expressed like normal genes. The only difference is that they are not encoded in organic molecules and they do not create biological organisms. We know them simply as laws, rules & commandments. They are indeed expressed by propaganda or whenever someone preaches something, for instance if General Patton preaches to his men that they should "do more than is required of you". 
>> 
>> It explains everything from the secret of religions to the nature of fascism (which is IMHO a form of cancer as old as civilization itself). I believe that the deepest secrets hide in plain sight: the most intangible mysteries are hidden in the best known daily objects most of us have outgrown even noticing. We have stopped wondering about things we experience every day or every week, like political rallies, campaign speeches, ads and church services.
>> 
>> -J.
>> 
>> 
>> -------- Original message --------
>> From: uǝlƃ ☣ <gepropella at gmail.com>
>> Date: 4/13/20 21:54 (GMT+01:00)
>> To: FriAM <friam at redfish.com>
>> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] anthropological observations
>> 
>> I presume it's this one:
>> 
>>  Die geheimen Gene: Das Geheimnis der Kirche und die soziale DNA
>> https://books.google.com/books?id=lpqUDwAAQBAJ&newbks=0&printsec=frontcover&dq=inauthor:%22Jochen+Fromm%22&hl=en&source=newbks_fb
>> 
>>  No copies seem to be available. I also assume propaganda plays a prominent role in your explanation. I keep wondering why Trump's sycophants like Navarro keep claiming the Spanish Flue happened in 1917 instead of 1918. E.g. in this clip: https://youtu.be/nSx704KK_Ik
>> 
>>  #5 and #6 from this list seem plausible to me:
>> https://theweek.com/articles/832990/6-theories-trumps-pointless-lies
>> 
>>  When Trump hears Navarro say "1917", it's a signal of loyalty, even if everyone knows it's the wrong year, that he uses that year, helps confirm his loyalty. Knowing to use "1917" instead will help me code-switch if I find myself in a conversation with these people. If you use "1918", they'll know you're out-group. Hypothesis #6 is only plausible if you think Trump is an idiot. But I buy the argument put forth here:
>> 
>>  Tony Norman: Who are you going to believe — POTUS or an actual expert?
>> https://www.post-gazette.com/opinion/tony-norman/2020/04/07/1917-Donald-Trump-truth-George-Orwell-Anthony-Fauci-Peter-Navarro-hydroxychloroquine/stories/202004070017
>> 
>>  Maybe it's a perverse mix of the expression of power, loyalty, and getting the audience used to fudging the details ... encouraging the cult members to impute the nomothetic even though it fails to fit the idiographic.
>> 
>> 
>>  On 4/13/20 11:04 AM, uǝlƃ ☣ wrote:
>>  > Link! I should buy the German version and see if I can read some of it. The last time I tried that was with Faust after my German II semester in college ... terrible failure.
>> 
>> 
>>  -- 
>>  ☣ uǝlƃ
>> 
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