[extropy-chat] Meme/gene error rates

[Keith Henson]

At 04:27 PM 11/10/2006 -0500, Robert wrote:

snip

>Classical "memes" are thought patterns (ideas) that can be communicated 
>between two entities in such a way that the "essence" is recreated (you 
>*aren't* creating an exact duplicate) [3].  From that point they can 
>mutate and selected for (like genes) [4].

snip

>4.  It might be interesting to discuss the error rate in the copying of 
>genes (which is generally very low) and the error rate in the copying of 
>ideas (which can be quite high).  Thus endless debates on the list about 
>*what* did they really mean by that...

Even if a communication channel is noisy between a transmitter and a 
receiver, you can get extremely low error rates if you are willing to put 
in enough effort (CRC, multiple transmissions, etc.)

Error rates depend a lot on the particular meme(s) or genes(s).

For example baseball memes such as the number of strikes or balls have been 
replicated hundreds of millions of times without changing.  The meme of the 
year Columbus crossed the Atlantic is almost as error free.

HIV and stressed bacteria have rather high rates of mutation but that's an 
adaption.

Keith Henson