http://www.memecentral.com/vmintro.htm
Virus
of the Mind,
Richard Brodie
introduction
crisis
of the mind
What a waste it is to lose one’s
mind or not to have a mind is very wasteful.
—Dan Quayle,
mutating the memes
in the United Negro College Fund’s motto,
"A mind
is a terrible thing to waste."
There is some good news in this book. So before
I get into how mind viruses are spreading wildly throughout the world—infecting
people with unwanted programming like the Michelangelo computer virus infects
computers with self-destruct instructions—I’ll start with the good
news.
The good news is that the long-awaited scientific
theory unifying biology, psychology, and cognitive science is here. An
interdisciplinary effort by scientists in all those fields over the last 20
years or so—really back to 1859 and Charles Darwin, if you like—has produced a
new science called memetics.
The science of memetics is
based on evolution.
For those of us who yearn to understand ourselves,
learning about memetics gives us a huge amount of satisfaction. I also believe
that people who understand memetics will have an increasing advantage in life,
especially in preventing themselves from being manipulated or taken advantage of. If you
better understand how your mind works, you can better navigate through a
world of increasingly subtle manipulation.
Now the bad
news. The bad news is that this
book raises more questions than it answers. In particular,
memetics has uncovered the existence of viruses of the mind, but gives us
few insights into what to do about them.
Viruses of the mind have been with us throughout
history, but are constantly evolving and changing. They are infectious pieces of
our culture that spread rapidly throughout a population, altering people’s
thoughts and lives in their wake. They include everything from relatively
harmless mind viruses, such as miniskirts and slang phrases, to mind viruses
that seriously derail people’s lives, such as the cycle of unwed mothers on
welfare, the Crips and Bloods youth gangs and the Branch Davidian religious
cult. When these pieces of culture are ones we like, there’s no problem. However, as the Michelangelo computer
virus programs computers with instructions to destroy their data, viruses of the
mind can program us to think and behave in ways that are destructive to our
lives.
This is the most surprising and most profound insight
from the science of memetics: your thoughts are not always your own original
ideas. You catch thoughts—you get infected with them,
both directly from other people and indirectly from viruses of the mind. People
don’t seem to like the idea that they aren’t in control
of their thoughts. The reluctance of people to even
consider this notion is probably the main reason the scientific work done
so far is not better known. As we’ll see, ideas people
don’t like have a hard time catching on.
Further compounding the problem, you don’t immediately know whether the programming you get from a
given mind virus is harmful or beneficial. Nobody every joined a religious cult
with the intention of getting brainwashed, moving to
paradigm
shift
Every so often, the world of science experiences
something called a paradigm shift. That happens when one of the basic,
underlying assumptions we’ve been living with changes, such as when we shifted
from looking at the universe as revolving around the earth to the earth
revolving around the sun. Another shift occurred when Einstein discovered the
relationships between space and time and between energy and matter. Each of
these paradigm shifts took some time to penetrate the scientific community, and
even longer to become accepted by the general public.
Viruses of the mind, and the
whole science of memetics, represent a major paradigm shift in the science of
the mind.
Because understanding this new science involves a
significant change in the way people think about the mind and culture, it has
been difficult for people to grasp. As with any paradigm shift, memetics doesn’t fit into our existing way of looking at things, of
understanding the world.
The trick to learning a new paradigm is to set aside
your current one while you’re learning rather than
attempt to fit the new knowledge into your existing model. It won’t fit! If you’re willing to set
aside your current thinking long enough to consider four concepts, some or all
of which may be new to you, you’ll be rewarded with an understanding of
memetics. With that understanding, I hope, comes a call to action for anyone
concerned with the future of human life.
The first concept—the star of the show—is the
meme, which I introduce in Chapter 1 and which plays a leading role
throughout this book. The meme, which rhymes with "beam," is the basic building
block of culture in the same way the gene is the basic building block of life.
As I outline in Chapter 2, memes are not only the building blocks of culture on
a large scale—making up countries, languages, religions—but also on a small
scale: memes are the building blocks of your mind, the programming of your
mental "computer."
Second is the concept of virus. It’s well known that viruses exist in biology and in the
world of computers. Now we’ll see how they show up in
the world of mind and culture, the world of memetics. In Chapter 3, I’ll draw parallels between the three different universes
that viruses live in to show what we can expect from mind viruses in the
future.
The third concept that contributes to this paradigm
shift is evolution. Evolution is one of those words that many people use,
thinking they are talking about the same thing, but really having different
ideas of what evolution is and means. I’ll discuss
scientists’ most current theory of evolution in Chapter 4, and how it applies to
memes in Chapter 5.
The fourth concept necessary to understanding mind
viruses is the new science of evolutionary psychology. This field
examines the biases and mechanisms of our minds that evolved to support our
survival and reproduction. Some of these biases take the form of psychological
buttons that can be pushed to penetrate our mental defenses. I called
this part of the book "Crisis of the Mind" rather than simply "Introduction"
because the former pushes more buttons: it attracts more attention and more
people will read it. I called this book Virus of the Mind rather than
Introduction to Memetics for the same reason.
Currently a controversial topic, evolutionary
psychology explores and explains many of the stereotypical differences between
men and women, especially in the realm of mating behavior. Chapter 6 is about
the mating part of evolutionary psychology; Chapter 7 covers the survival
aspect.
Memetics builds on these four
conceptual blocks to form a new paradigm of how culture evolved and is
evolving. It illuminates a major
decision point for humanity:
Will we allow natural selection
to evolve us randomly, without regard for our happiness, satisfaction, or
spirit? Or will we seize the reins of our own evolution
and pick a direction for ourselves?
Memetics gives us the knowledge and power to direct
our own evolution more than at any time in history. Now that we have that power,
what will we do with it?
a
threat to humanity
A mind virus is not spread
by sneezing, like the flu, or by sex, like AIDS. It’s
not a physical thing. Mind viruses are spread by
something as simple as communicating. I discuss the ways we get programmed by mind viruses in Chapter 8. In a way, mind
viruses are the price of one of the freedoms most dear to us: freedom of speech.
The more freedom there is to put forth any communication, the more welcoming the
environment for mind viruses.
Some mind viruses arise spontaneously, as I
discuss in Chapters 9 and 10; some are created
intentionally, as I cover in Chapter 11. But all of
them share one thing in common:
Once created, a virus of the
mind gains a life independent of its creator and evolves quickly to
infect as many people as possible.
Viruses of the mind are not some far-off future worry
like the sun burning out or the earth being hit by a
comet. They are here with us now—have been with us since before recorded
history—and they are evolving to become better and better at their job of
infecting us. We are being infected in some new ways—television, popular music,
sales techniques—but also in very ancient ways—education, religious teachings,
even talking to our closest friends. Our parents unwittingly infected us when we
were kids. If you have children, chances are you are spreading the viruses to
them every day.
Read a
newspaper? Catch a mind virus.
Listen to the radio? Catch a mind virus. Hang out with
your friends and shoot the breeze about nothing in particular? Catch one mind
virus after another. If your life isn’t going the way
you would like, you can bet mind viruses are playing a large part. Having
relationship problems? Mind viruses take over parts of your brain and divert you
from what would give you long-term happiness in a relationship. Having trouble
in your job or career? Mind viruses cloud your future and steer you along a
career path that supports their agenda, not your quality of
life.
Cult religions are springing up everywhere, the
result of more and more powerful mind viruses. These cults take control of
people’s minds and make members engage in bizarre behavior ranging from odd
rituals to mass suicide. If you think you’re immune,
remember: nobody ever set out intentionally to join a cult and have their mind
taken over. It’s the work of tricky and pernicious mind
viruses. And once the founder of the cult starts the
process, the virus of the mind takes on a life of its own.
Because of mass media and direct elections, the
What brand of soft drink do you buy? The ones that
sell the most cost twice as much as unadvertised store brands. The extra money
goes into television advertising, sending out the spores of ever more
penetrating mind viruses that literally take control of your mind and make you
push your shopping cart over to their shelf. Successfully programming your mind
to believe that you prefer that brand, advertising agencies are among the most
brazen and calculating of the mind virus instigators.
The unchecked spread of mind viruses shows up most
alarmingly in the state of our children today. Starting with the inner cities
and quickly spreading, the mind viruses infecting many children are pushing them
into hopelessness, single motherhood, and gang warfare. Many children seem to be
losing their sense of values and taking off in some very unsettling directions.
Chapter 12 discusses the possibility of disinfection for us
and our children.
my
agenda
Let me tell you right now, I have an agenda in
writing this book, and that agenda is to make a difference in people’s lives.
Some of the content in this book could be used
for self-improvement. You might not expect a book about science to include ideas
from the self-development field, but the science of memetics deals with the
mind, with people’s lives. Understanding memetics can naturally help increase
the quality of people’s lives.
In the first place, I would never have written this
book—or my first book, Getting
Past OK—if I had not intentionally disinfected myself of many of the
memes I got as I grew up and reprogrammed myself with new memes. What new memes
would you choose to reprogram yourself with, given the chance? That’s entirely up to you. I had no idea what that even
meant when I started this research. Now that I do, I choose to program
myself with memes that support my values in life rather than ones that support
the agendas of viruses of the mind. You can do that or something different.
But you won’t have the option to do anything like that
unless you understand memetics.
The reason I’m writing this
book is that I really enjoy making a difference in people’s lives. My
agenda in writing Virus of the Mind is to do just that. I believe that
knowledge of memetics is important, and so I’m
spreading it. I’m not just writing this book as an
intellectual exercise. Although this book is about science, it’s obviously not a scientific text. It’s designed with an intention, and that is to consciously
spread the new paradigm of memetics because I think it’s
important.
Consciously spreading ideas you
consider important is one way to combat mind viruses.
Have you ever wondered why life seems so complicated
today, more complicated and stressful year after year? One reason is the
ever-evolving army of mind viruses, taking a greater and greater share of your
mind, diverting you from your pursuit of happiness and due to have an even
greater effect on the next generation.
Ever wonder why, with greater and greater progress
and technology, life doesn’t seem to get simpler, but
just the reverse? Every time you’re exposed to a new virus of the mind, your
mind takes on just a little more stress, a little more
confusion.
People are flocking to everything from psychotherapy
to the New Age movement to try to relieve the crushing burden of stress. Doctors
are more and more certain that excess stress is our No. 1 killer, but experts
disagree on what causes stress and how to cure it. The medical community talked
of stressed-out "Type A" and laid-back "Type B" personalities, with no clear
idea of what caused someone to have one or the other. And even the "Type B’s" had stress-related symptoms
sometimes. The new science of memetics gives much insight into the problem of
stress.
Taking over bits of your mind and pulling you in
different directions, mind viruses distract you from what’s most important to you in life and cause confusion,
stress, and even despair.
They infect your mind, programming you with
directions that point you away from where you want to go. Since this all happens
unconsciously, all you’re aware of is that, as you grow
older, life becomes more stressful, less fun, more of a drag, and less
meaningful. You may feel your motivation slipping away. You may get less excited
about things than you used to. These are some of the effects
of infection by a virus of the mind, an infection we cannot avoid entirely short
of living in complete isolation from birth.
You can, however,
begin to disinfect yourself. My hope is that the understanding people
gain from this book will be a big first step in that disinfection. But it takes a bit of effort to teach yourself a new
paradigm.
birth of a
new paradigm
It’s always been hard for scientists to communicate their
ideas to the general public. Science, by its very nature, is an artificial
selection of ideas based on rigorous testing of their usefulness rather than
on people’s gut feelings. As such, new scientific ideas tend to rub people
the wrong way at first and produce predictable reactions. When
Charles Darwin first proposed his ideas on natural selection in 1859, there were
several stages of public reaction, stages that any revolutionary new scientific
idea seems to go through before becoming accepted:
1.
Complacency/Marginalization. At first, the new theory is
seen as an off-the-wall idea: quaint, but not a serious threat to the
dominant world view—perhaps a simple variant of some already known theory.
Memetics is graduating from this stage to the next as I write this. Editors of
The New York Times Magazine of
2.
Ridicule. Complacency
fades as the new idea refuses to die, resulting in ridicule by people who
clearly and laughingly see that it’s inconsistent with
something they hold to be true. In
3.
Criticism. As the new idea
gains acceptance, people who have held conflicting world
views for some time, or who have their reputation invested in old
paradigms, take off their gloves. Darwinism is still being
attacked today by creationists who believe it conflicts with their Truth.
It’s possible that this book will touch off serious
criticism of memetics. If it does, we shouldn’t worry;
it’s the nature of a paradigm shift.
4.
Acceptance. Finally,
enough people make the leap to the new paradigm that it gains psychological as
well as intellectual acceptance. Those who understand the new ideas are no
longer as alone and unloved as
Our minds, it seems, are not well equipped to
understand how they themselves work. You, in fact, may at first be very confused
or distracted, or suddenly get tired as you read this,
or even get angry just from reading these words. Although right now you may
think this statement absurd, those feelings and symptoms are actually the
defense mechanisms of mind viruses. They have evolved to be very protective of
the parts of your mind they have stolen, and any attempts to cleanse yourself of
them can trigger reactions.
If you experience one or more of these reactions
while reading this book, don’t worry: the reaction will
pass if you ride it out. If you do, you’ll be rewarded
with a powerful tool for your future and the future of
humanity.