We talk daily about memes, and getting the longevity meme into the popular culture, but how many of us are aware that memes have a greater structure?
When a group of memes is joined into a group, and transmitted in such away as the entire group is seen as a single structure, you start to understand that there are higher level meme organisms that have evolved and dominate far too much of our lives. These higher level memetic organisms surround us and control our culture, our beliefs and even our very existence.
For example, suppose I had you a list with ten guidelines, and ask you for your opinion of each one. You could go down the list and evaluate each of the ten guidelines, and tell me, I like this this and this, but these here don't really sound too good. It's natural for us to analyze and think about each item separately.
But if I hand you that same list, titled The Ten Commandments, and told you it is from God, how many of you would look at the list as ten separate items that you could accept or reject independantly?
It is through such things as this, the grouping of ideas into Ideologies, that the higher level memetic organisms evolved.
And these Ideologies are what we will have to overcome in order to ensure immortality comes, because these organisms don't want the status quo disrupted. If you can live forever, why would you be willing to die to further the ideologies goals. If you can always be healthy, beautiful, and not in desperate want of food, shelter, healthcare, etc, then how will these Ideologies motivate you to do their bidding, and put their existence above your own?
In their book, God Want's You Dead, Sean and Paul not only show convincingly that these Memetic Organisms exist, But that they exist in a complex ecology where seemingly antagonistic beliefs in truth are the dearest allies. If Islam didn't have infidels, and people willing to oppress Islamics, then it would have much harder time convincing people to blow themselves up to strengthen it's hold on the majority and inspire it's minions to spread it into more hosts.
This same is true of other Ideologies as well, From Nationalism, to Corporatism, to Fundimentalism. In GWYD they not only point out how these Distributed Identities (their term for them) work by bundling parasitic memes in with seeming symbiotic ones, but point out how they only have power when taken as a mass. By breaking apart these massive complexes of memes into their individual memes one is free to choose what to keep and what is parasitic.
They also cover the anticipated suppression of anti aging research, nanotech research, and many other forms of advanced technology which promises to weaken their dictatorship of the masses.
Written in a very readable and often humorous style, I recommend this book for anyone who values life, liberty, and the freedom to think for yourself.
