Brin

In the beginning of Brin’s work, he brings up the idea that it is possible that the molecules that make up our biological body may produce in us ideas, and actions, due to our make up, simply as a way for our bodies to reproduce and make copies of itself (or rather the molecules that make up our bodies to reproduce and survive). He thinks of it like evolution, however he then starts dealing with the evolution of ideas, rather than just bodies. He thinks that ideas are like bacteria and argues that ideas are like these bacteria, but they are produced in our brain. Furthermore these ideas spread, much like bacteria, but they are spread not through contact with them like viruses, but by telling people about your ideas. So I guess ideas actually are spread through contact, like a bacteria. He then goes on to say that to reproduce these ideas in society can cause much conflict between competing ideas; and even goes as far as to say certain ideas become eradicated like a weak species. He gives the example of Russia, and I cannot say if I agree or disagree but I can see exactly what he means. He then distinguishes into four different memes, which was defined as living bundles of ideas. There is paranoia; which takes advantage of peoples fear of invading enemies, which in turn gives the people in charge power to do all sorts of crazy things, and the people will be ok with this as long as their protected from foreign enemies. Second is machismo, which is just like it sounds. It favors male dominance and suppresses everything that comes to challenge it. During this section I could not help but think of the mid-east in particular. Third is the east; which is less war prone, and more environment friendly. During this sections I thought of Los Angeles. The fourth he calls the dogma of otherness which seemed to focus on the theme of constantly creating new ideas as to not fall into one of the other categories. He states that this is by far the least common, and is even a small percentage in the largest of societies that follow this meme.

I thought that this was very interesting and quite true. While he gave specific names to all of them, upon reading about them it seems to be almost intuitive that he should classify these memes or ideas into these certain categories. I also thought it was very interesting that he said that it is more a war of ideas now rather than a war of guns and dropping bombs. His quote summed it up perfect when he says it’s not the bombs we fear but your pagan ideas.

One question I had while reading was if more closed minded societies would read, and accept anything that he has said. I feel like while these things seem so clear to us, in different parts of the world they could have a completely different take. That leads to a dilemma however and think that we could classify other cultures rejection of the idea into the fact that it is a war of ideas, and frankly, some societies will not even listen to a word of this.