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Auto-Toxic Meme
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Highly auto-toxic memes are self-limiting if they promote the destruction of their hosts at a greater rate than they propagate from host to host. Suicide cult memes are good examples, especially where the entire cult wipes itself out at a particular time. The system-wide suicide at YTS-556-F55-001 is a dramatic example.
Certain types of military indoctrination and 'martyrdom' meme-complexes can become auto-toxic, although in many cases the meme can spread despite the death of the host(s), and may in fact increase in strength after the host's death. Suicide squads from the Biovirate became increasingly active against Keter in the last stages of the war between those two empires, until the rate of propagation of the meme became much lower than the rate at which the hosts destroyed themselves (or were destroyed by enemy action).
Related Articles
- Meme
- Meme Bug - Text by M. Alan Kazlev
A sentient modified to memetically infect higher toposophics. May be malicious or harmless. Meme Bugs are usually subsapient, but there are also sapient and even transapient variants. Their whole purpose is tied up with carrying the meme and infecting the target. Some types of Madverts are Meme Bugs that have been reversed engineered and given a different payload. - Meme Mule - Text by M. Alan Kazlev
A type of memenger, a sophont modified to transport memes from one place to another, but who is not aware of the purpose of the memes e carries. Often the memes are of a higher toposophic level than the mule emself. While having a strong sense of duty and service to the transapient or archailect on whose behalf they are transporting the memes, Meme Mules are not themselves affected by the memes they carry. They may unload the memes via docking stations (DNI upload), or even through their unconscious actions may trigger the desired responses in the target society or environment. - Meme Pool - Text by Glenn Grant
The full diversity of memes accessible to a culture or individual. Learning languages and traveling are methods of expanding one's meme pool. - Meme-Allergy - Text by Glenn Grant
A form of intolerance; a condition which causes a person to react in an unusually extreme manner when exposed to a specific semiotic stimulus, or meme-allergen. Exo-toxic meme-complexes typically confer dangerous meme-allergies on their hosts. Often, the actual meme-allergens need not be present, but merely perceived to be present, to trigger a reaction. Common meme-allergies include homophobia, paranoid anti-Communism, and porno phobia. Common forms of meme-allergic reaction are censorship, vandalism, belligerent verbal abuse, and physical violence. - Meme-complex, Memeplex - Text by Glenn Grant
Also sometimes called a memeticity. A set of mutually-assisting memes which have co-evolved a symbiotic relationship. Religious and political dogmas, social movements, artistic styles, traditions and customs, chain letters, paradigms, languages, and so on are meme-complexes. Types of co-memes commonly found in a scheme are called the: bait; hook; threat; and vaccine. A successful scheme commonly has certain attributes: wide scope (a paradigm that explains much); opportunity for the carriers to participate and contribute; conviction of its self-evident truth (carries Authority); offers order and a sense of place, helping to stave off the dread of meaninglessness. - Memegeneer
- Memetic Demons
- Memetic Drift - Text by Glenn Grant
Accumulated mis-replications; the rate of memetic mutation or evolution. Recorded data tend to slow the memetic drift of dogmas. - Memetic Engineering, Memgineering
- Memetic Infector - Text by M. Alan Kazlev
A sapient being used to infect societies or communities with a partiucular memeset. Memetic infectors resemble ordinary sophonts, but may differ psychologically, often having fanatical or one-sided enthusiasm for the meme-plex they are carrying. Infectors may be replicators (viruses) or non-replicators (memengers). - Memetic Self-replicating Swarm
- Memetic War - Text by M. Alan Kazlev
A war of ideology and persuasion rather than weaponry or military might. Most transapients and archai uses memetics when dealing with lower toposophics and subsingulitaritans, few resort to anything as crude as actual hardware or software weaponry. Examples of memetic warriors might be PR agents, priest, poets, empaths. - Memeticity - Text by M. Alan Kazlev
A coherent aggregation of component memes that itself constitutes a larger meme. Philosophies, ideologies, worldviews, and religions are all memeticities. An alternative and somewhat more common term for memeticity is memeplex. - Memex - Text by M. Alan Kazlev
A meme designer expert system. Developed from the original advertising and marketing support systems of the Information Age into a sophisticated tool for memetic manipulation during the Interplanetary Era and the Federation Era. - Memoid
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Development Notes
Text by Glenn Grant
Initially published on 03 November 2001.
Initially published on 03 November 2001.
