Susan Blackmore studies memes -- those self-replicating "life forms" that spread themselves via human consciousness. We're now headed, she believes, toward a new form of meme, spread by the technology we've created.
Why you should listen to her:
Susan Blackmore is dedicated to understanding the scientific nature of consciousness. Her latest work centers on the existence of memes -- little bits of knowledge, lore, habit that seem to spread themselves using human brains as mere carriers. She's exploring the existence of a new class of meme, spread by human technology. It's temporarily named the "teme."
She has written about memes, consciousness, and near-death experiences; has appeared on the British Big Brother to discuss the psychology of the participants; and writes for the Guardian UK.
"She took Richard Dawkins' intuition about memes (ideas that, like genes, take a life of their own) and turned it into a fully fledged theory."Bruno Giussani, TED Blog
Quotes by Susan Blackmore
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“We humans are Earth’s Pandoran species.”
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“Information that we copy from person to person, by imitation, by language, by talking, by telling stories, by wearing clothes, by doing things — this is information copied with variation and selection. This is [a] design process.”
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“All other species on this planet are gene machines only. They don’t imitate at all well; we alone are gene machines and meme machines as well.”
