The Nature of Ideas

Nature of Ideas

Ideas, or memes, can be measured by the amount of minds they are present in. For example, democracy can be said to be a very strong or popular idea as it's basic concepts are instilled in the majority of the Western world as well as many areas of the East. Satanism, by comparison, is a very weak idea, having only a few adherents primarily in the West. Ideas gain strength by infecting more minds, the more people who share the idea, the stronger the idea becomes, the more influence on the world it may have.

Communication is a vital part of the nature of ideas for without proper communication the idea cannot be shared and adherents cannot contact each other to spread the idea and keep it up to date. With the advent of the internet, television, radio, etc. ideas have become progressivley stronger as it becomes easier to infect others across the globe. This is also an important factor in the conflict between ideas.

How Ideas Grow

People are usually happiest when they are surrounded with other people who share their opinions-ie- their ideas. This trait of our's is instrumental in the growth of our ideas. As we interact with more people, we spread our ideas and opinions over to others, and then we tend to segregate oursleves all under one meme or another. By doing this we defend the meme from outside attack, by pooling our resources, our defenses and our arguments. We are also encouraged to spread our ideas and actively search out for follow infectees so that we can be around people who share our ideas and thus be happy, making the world a better place,ie- one full of or dominated by our own particular meme(s). This behavior is seen in published books, pamphlets, magazines, television shows, movies, and all manner of media. This evangelism helps the idea adapt as it will infect intellectuals and philosophers who flesh out the arguments of the idea, making it more palatable as well as a better opponent against other ideas.

Ideas and Conflict

Physical conflict such as war is the final stage of a conflict between ideas. The primary battle ground for ideas is debate- either in an open forum, in a coffee shop, or in the middle of a lecture hall. Here the idea's strength depends soley on it's logical soundness, validity, it's range of argument, adaptibility, as well as charisma of the speaker. However there is a moment when two ideas are in such stark contrast that the only way to resolve the matter is to subjugate the one by the other.

Conflict, whether it be a brawl between gangs or a world war, occurs only when two ideas of opposing nature (Nazi Germany and the Democratic West for example) are able to communicate their existence to each other, and are of equal or almost equal strength. Ideas will never physcially conflict if there is no way to communicate them both. A country could have ideas directly opposed by another country, yet if there are no lines of communication between them, no conflict will become of the situation untill one of the ideas becomes aware of the other. If idea A is in opposition to idea B, yet idea B has only 100 adherents, while A has a thousand, there is likely to be little physical conflict untill the strengths of the ideas balance out. Ideas do not prey on each other, they exist together begrudgingly unless attacked directly or untill an idea of similar strength comes into fruition.

In the event of all out physical conflict between ideas, the conflict will not cease untill one idea has forced the other into submission, done simply by killing off the adherents untill the rest surrender, or untill there are no more left to fight. Ideas in oppostion rarely wipe out the enemy meme completely, instead another balance is achieved where the now lesser meme limps along with a diminished and demoralized following, or perhaps even with only ideas left in books or other types of recordings. Untill one meme is clearly the dominant of the other, the conflict between them will continue.

Memes never exist peacefully as equals.