Am I Using The Word 'Meme' Correctly?

The way I use the word "meme" is to describe any picture with any text on it. Quotes, satires, jokes, etc. Including ones I made myself, which included rectangular pictures of quotes.

A lady once told me I was using the word "meme" incorrectly. Am I? And then what do you call what I just described above?

 

This is a "Meme" which is strictly an internet phenomenon. So even if this Karen were a school teacher, she wouldn't be the Authority on the subject.
NOTE: Karen's are also a recent phenomenon. Be careful they are a wiley bunch

 

Quick question: so what do you call everything else? What's the generic term for pics, quotes, etc.?

 

Meme was originally a nonsense word, but militant atheists made it so popular the linguists had to give it some sort of real definition, because it was about to be added to the dictionary. What it refers to these days, most of the time, is a popular imitation of something. In other words, just saying something like, "Where's The Beef!" is a meme, simply due to it being a popular imitation.

 

That is everything. The One I posted, I made as an example.
the term MEME, comes from the Greek (mimema) meaning that which is imitated.
Originally used to denote an element of culture or system of behavior that is passed down from one person to another by imitation or non-genetic means.

So basically, if you go to a Standup Comedy sow and yo hear a joke that you tell someone else the next day, THAT is also a Meme..

For the most part, any picture that you put words on and post on the internet is a meme, humorous or not. Quick videos showing a prank, or some pratfall, is also a meme.

 

"Meme" means free for all.......humour/shitpost.............interwebz/forum culture

PS.

Mzzls

 

I too dont understand some of these newords. What is mzzis?

 

Its a meme, memes are our friends, true to the end!

 

In modern terms a meme is specifically something that gets passed around A LOT!

In other words it must achieve some popularity, or notoriety for it to be considered an internet meme.

Just something that gets posted in only one place isn't going to qualify as a meme.

Also a meme doesn't have to be an image or even something posted on the internet. It can be an expression or an idea that gets passed around or enters the language as a new word.

 

It depend on the context. There are two very distinct meanings of the term: a unit of culture (the original technical meaning) and a humorous or catchy item spread rapidly by internet users (the popular meaning ). The term was coined in 1976 by atheist evolutionist Richard Dawkins in The Selfish Gene to designate a basic unit of human culture comparable to a gene in biological evolution. It was an effort to explain why some concepts or behavior patterns become widespread by imitation: e.g., catchphrases, fashion styles, genres, religious concepts and behaviors, etc. In religion, gods, prayer, the afterlife, heaven, hell, would be examples.

One of Dawkins points was that, like selfish genes, memes succeed by replicating themselves, and are "successful" by being selfish--i.e., doing so without regard to the effects on the people who adopt them. And like genes, they are subject to mutation and mutant forms compete with one another and with the original meme--some succeeding while others falter and become extinct. These are the central idea behind the field of study called mimetics, which "sees ideas as a kind of virus, sometimes propagating in spite of truth and logic". Definition of MEMETICS In religion, for example, megachurches are the rage, and have even caught on with atheists. Atheist "mega-churches" take root across U.S., world - CBS News Some mimeticists consider "god" to be like a virus, replicating at the expense of its human hosts. Darrell Ray, The God Virus. That, of course, regards religion and its memes as pathological. As a Christian, I happen to think the good outweighs the bad. Memes like "Love they neighbor', "Do unto others as they do unto you", "judge not', etc., are the hope of humanity. I hope they can withstand the competition.

That's the technical meaning of the term and the one I tend to use the most. But then, I'm weird. Most folks who use the term are referring to the catchy item on the internet.

 

Virus's produce some of the fundamental enzymes necessary for life as we know it, and could argue that we are the parasites. Dawkin's theory of evolution was disproven, and any linguist will tell you his theory of language is the same as his command of language, garbage. He's a fucking militant atheist, with twenty kinds of meaningless rhetoric he spouts. I simply could not believe, that academia was censoring the truth from the public, that they're "tenured" professors at Oxford can't even use a dictionary. Never trust a militant atheist. They're the ones who taught fundamentalists how to destroy the dictionary and, of course, the Tea Party is helping them censor the mass media.

In the US, we've seen the same bullshit repeatedly. Conservatives love pissed off fools who believe they already know the truth, and exploit their mindless anger for their own purposes, then censor things like linguistic analysis, or anything that might expose what the fucking lawyers are doing with language, and with the complete idiots who popularize nonsense words and rhetoric for them. My work makes it possible to program an AI, to put all the pieces together, and trace them back to their origins, and exploit liars and bullies, in high places, for every dime they have.

 

Nonsense, as usual.What's in a Meme? | Richard Dawkins Foundation for Reason and Science

 

Mathematical nonsense, that AI can comprehend.

 

I remind all posting here the topic is Memes, not mimetics, nor enzymes which is different. We don't speak Greek here.

Yes a meme IS like a virus in that it gets passed around. It doesn't stay in one place like a web post.

 

According to physics, everything gets around, and nothing stands still. The word "virus" is not an English word, but we don't have another one. Skiing is the only word in English with two ii because its Scandanavian in origin. Memetics is the study of things that are similar, which is the definition of analog and nature. Without memetics, you can't study language, and are stuck with the original definition of "meme". which is indemonstrable nonsense.

 

I'm stickin' with the original definition. Yes, Dawkins is "a fucking militant atheist" but he occasionally does the Lord's work in combating religious superstition and the pseudosciences of creationism and ID, and we can learn by seeing where he goes wrong. I'll get back to that shortly.

In answer to the question posed by the OP: No, Jimbee, you haven't been using the word "meme" correctly if you've used it to refer to "any picture with any text on it." That misses the central feature of both of the standard meanings I identified in Post #10: the tendency to "go viral"--or as Toker says "something that gets passed around A LOT!" . As Woolee points out, viruses aren't all bad.
The Good that Viruses Do
Viruses Can Help Us as Well as Harm Us | Scientific American
Not All Viruses Are Bad For You. Here Are Some That Can Have a Protective Effect

Unlike Woolee, I don't think Dawkins' original concept is "a nonsense word." It makes sense to me, and is useful in explaining the way, e.g., the simple original ideas of Jesus-- "peace, love and understanding"--have mutated into 40 thousand Christian denominations around the world--some downright pathological. It also accounts for why variants like "mainline Christianity', which seem relatively sensible, are losing ground to more irrational mutants. I'm thinking, for example, of the "Christian nationalists" who laugh when Trump calls immigrants "animals" or "not human". To my knowledge, Dawkins' theory of evolution hasn't been "disproven". His biological theory is essentially that of Darwin, whom most scientists accept as true, and for which there seems to be an abundance of empirical evidence from multiple fields of science.
Alan B. Rogers, The Evidence for Evolution
Douglas Futayama, The Case for Evolution
Evidence for evolution | Nature
15 Answers to Creationist Nonsense | Scientific American
The case for evolution
Biology and Religion: The Case for Evolution
Like all scientific theories, Darwin's is tentative and stands one pre-Cambrian rabbit fossil away from being discredited, but so far, no rabbits!

As for cultural evolution, memes, and mnemetics, there is far less consensus on that! The relationship of genes to memes is at best a loose metaphor. A meme, unlike a gene, has no identifiable "code" like DNA to give it tangible empirical foundation. It's arguable that the concept 'meme" is itself memetic, leading to the development of different schools about what a meme is and how it replicates. When the Journal of Memetics ceased publication in 2005, critics took it as a sign that the field had reached a blind alley or dead end as a useful basis for studying cultural evolution. I personally think it is intuitively useful as an analogy, as long as we recognize that it's not rocket science!

 

Linguists had to give "meme" a real definition, or it would have gone in the dictionary. If you disagree with their opinion, then I suggest writing a formal letter of protest to Oxford Publishing. Even though they're all militant atheists, they will tell you to get a life.

 

Well, I quoted Merriam-Webster, and it seemed to have no trouble giving Dawkins' original concept a "real definition", albeit now a secondary one. The Cambridge dictionary also seems to have no problem defining it as "a cultural feature or a type of behaviour that is passed from one generation to another, without the influence of genes" Likewise, the Encyclopedia Britannica defines it as a "unit of cultural information spread by imitation". As for the Oxford Dictionary, they seem to provide as a first definition: "an idea that is passed from one member of society to another, not in the genes but often by people copying it." Oxford Publishing also has given us the Encyclopedia of Semiotics, Paul Bouissac, ed., which tells us that, according to Dawkins: "a meme is a unit of culture—such as 'tunes, ideas, catch‐phrases, clothes fashions, ways of making pots or building arches.' In humans, memes have supposedly taken over much of the evolutionary burden of the traditional units of heredity, the genes." Meme - Oxford Reference All of these are basically ways of restating Dawkins' original formulation. The level of emotion in your reaction to Dawkins original use is puzzling, but so are many of your posts.

As for the modern meaning, "An amusing or interesting item (such as a captioned picture or video) or genre of items that is spread widely online especially through social media", those carry their own dangers. In this sense, "A meme is an idea shortcut, triggering an understanding of something in multiple ways, said Ingram-Waters. For instance, an image of a dog making a side-eye glance can be utilized in a meme to call an idea or scenario into question or to denote suspicion." Like all shortcuts, it presents the danger of bypassing critical analysis and triggering emotional reactions as substitutes for thought. What is a meme? Meaning and history of the cultural phenomena

 

Oxford were the ones who gave meme a real definition, and there is no "unit of heredity". If there were such a thing, you could quantify a culture. That's my job, to show how half of reality is obviously self-organizing, and can't be broken down into digital logic. Duelism is a lie, and Dawkins is such a bad liar, he has militant atheists upset. They really wish he'd just shut up, because he's an embarrassment. They're paying close attention to the nonsense he spouts, so they can pressure him to shut the fuck up.

Militant Atheists are famous, for their warm fuzzies.