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Susan J. Blackmore
Author profile
born
July 29, 1951
in London, The United Kingdom
gender
female
website
genre
influences
Daniel C. Dennett, Richard Dawkins
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The Meme Machine
by Susan J. Blackmore, Richard Dawkins (Goodreads Author)    3.73 avg rating — 654 ratings
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published
1999
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8 editions
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Conversations on Consciousness: What the Best Minds Think about the Brain, Free Will, and What It Means to Be Human
3.93 avg rating — 180 ratings
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published
2005
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8 editions
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Consciousness: A Very Short Introduction
3.89 avg rating — 230 ratings
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10 editions
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Consciousness - An Introduction
 4.35 avg rating — 20 ratings
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published
2005
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4 editions
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Ten Zen Questions
3.56 avg rating — 18 ratings
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published
2009
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Dying to Live
3.76 avg rating — 17 ratings
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4 editions
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In Search of the Light: The Adventures of a Parapsychologist
3.85 avg rating — 13 ratings
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published
1987
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3 editions
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Beyond The Body: An Investigation of Out-of-the-Body Experiences
3.46 avg rating — 13 ratings
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published
1982
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3 editions
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Zen and the Art of Consciousness
4.75 avg rating — 4 ratings
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published
2011
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Test Your Psychic Powers
by Susan J. Blackmore, Adam Hart-Davis 5.00 avg rating — 1 rating
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2 editions
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“If we take memetics seriously then the 'me' that could do the choosing is itself a memetic construct: a fluid and ever-changing group of memes installed in a complicated meme machine.”
― Susan J. Blackmore, The Meme Machine
― Susan J. Blackmore, The Meme Machine
“Humans are often credited with having real foresight, in distinction to the rest of biology which does not. For example, Dawkins compares the 'blind watchmaker' of natural selection with the real human one. 'A true watchmaker has foresight: he designs his cogs and springs, and plans their interconnections, with a future purpose in his mind's eye. Natural selection . . . has no purpose in mind'.
I think this distinction is wrong. There is no denying that the human watchmaker is different from the natural one. We humans, by virtue of having memes, can think about cogs, and wheels, and keeping time, in a way that animals cannot. Memes are the mind tools with which we do it. But what memetics shows us is that the processes underlying the two kinds of design are essentially the same. They are both evolutionary processes that give rise to design through selection, and in the process they produce what looks like foresight.”
― Susan J. Blackmore, The Meme Machine
I think this distinction is wrong. There is no denying that the human watchmaker is different from the natural one. We humans, by virtue of having memes, can think about cogs, and wheels, and keeping time, in a way that animals cannot. Memes are the mind tools with which we do it. But what memetics shows us is that the processes underlying the two kinds of design are essentially the same. They are both evolutionary processes that give rise to design through selection, and in the process they produce what looks like foresight.”
― Susan J. Blackmore, The Meme Machine
“When I say that consciousness is an illusion I do not mean that consciousness does not exist. I mean that consciousness is not what it appears to be. If it seems to be a continuous stream of rich and detailed experiences, happening one after the other to a conscious person, this is the illusion.”
― Susan J. Blackmore
― Susan J. Blackmore
Topics Mentioning This Author
| topics | posts | views | last activity | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Science and Inquiry: May 2011 - The Information: A History, A Theory, A Flood | 85 | 109 | Aug 14, 2011 05:37am |
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