Intellectual Natural Selection...how many great thoughts die?

[Protagoras]

Ever wonder that? We have an amazing space here at DU. But there are now literally millions of great spaces on the Internet. Every day there are thousands if not millions of great ideas expressed...every day.

And the vast majority of them are simply scrolled off the page in a few minutes or hours, to be quickly forgotten.

Each birthplace an echochamber...each survival dependent upon a bizarre array of conditions like the daily MSM misinfo, or the mood, or what happened on TDS last night, or what the DNC Chair said the week before...each altering the temperature of the room...each changing the terrain and, consequently allowing some ideas to thrive, not necessarily because they are better...but because they are more suited to that environment...they find a niche, and grow. At least until the next day when some new variable is added and poof, suddenly they disappear and a new birth batch takes its place, to fight it out among the throngs of competing ideas.

Thinking about it this way...I don't know if I feel happy that there are still so many amazing and diverse ideas being born each day...or if I'm sad because so many great potentialities never see the light of day, being lost in the latest echo chamber climate change.

These are the things I wonder about some days :D

Peace all,

Prot.

[Ravenseye]

1. The good ideas continue

They get discussed, and don't drop off the front page. Or they do, but they inspire someone.

That person, or persons make their own website specifically around those views, be it comedy, intellectual, religious, or whatever.

Then the idea can grow and grow...

Mass discussions can cause people to think in new and tangental ways and come up with ideas that they otherwise wouldn't. I think it's a good thing. Not every great idea needs to be followed up with something more. Just because it slipps off the front page doesn't mean someone won't remember it and spread it in the real world where it could become a meme of it's own.

It's all good baby.

[Warpy]

2. They certainly do

I've heard a lot of my stuff elsewhere, phrased the way I post it on this board or another, and sometimes out of the mouths of people with access to media. I'm generally shocked when I hear it, but never surprised.

Good ideas never die. They travel, and sometimes they take a while to get where they're going.

Unfortunately, as we're seeing with the march towards fascism in the US, bad ideas never die, either.

You can't kill an idea.

[EstimatedProphet]

5. Maybe...maybe not

The good ideas CAN, but is that what always gets carried over? I think instead it may be the popular ideas-the ideas that are easy to believe because they reinforce what someone already believes.

For example, it will always be easier to keep the ideas that say "We're #1!" in play, rather than "We need to fix this", because it is easier to flatter yourself, and believing that your country/business/neighborhood/affiliation is better than everything else in comparison makes a member of that affiliation better by association. That's why we have such a problem getting past the "USA-love it or leave it" crowd: when we criticize what is wrong in the country, we threaten the security of the people that are insecure with themselves and use the Americans Are Better Than Everyone meme to bolser their self-image.

Good ideas will survive, but it helps if they are easy to believe too.

[Protagoras]

6. Indeed. Silver City has a line to this effect

where Kris Kristoferson says that essentially we're a country more worried about being "#1, or most popular, or mainstream than actually being good or right.

Can't recommend the whole movie, but I can definately recommend some of the ideas expressed in it.

Natural Selection insures some change...but it doesn't insure long term success. Plenty of really great species die out. All I'm saying is that we may want to pay attention to how this happens with our ideas, just like it happens with animals.

It's an abstract position I admit.

And I'm well aware of the irony of this thread itself :D

[info being]

3. That's why we need to communicate more wisely

I was out for a walk yesterday, I got to thinking about how tens of millions of people around the world are using such incredibly sophisticated technology...but we aren't necessarily using it very wisely. We communicate with people we already know in new ways, but the technology doesn't always enhance our lives.

We need to become more consciously aware of how we communicate and why we are communicating. Isn't this networked world supposed to be about connecting people in never-before-thought-possible ways to do never-before-thought-possible things? Isn't communications technology supposed to open the door to new opportunities?

Much is being made of Social Networking sites like Ryze, Linked In, and Friendster. Social Software like this is a step in the right direction, but in my opinion it still isn't any easier than the slow and sometimes painful process of working the room at a party. And you're supposed to get introduced before you can talk to someone? Forget it. Seems like more of a barrier to communication that a facilitator.

I've been working for a few years on my own Social Software -- Infobeing.net. The site is fully-functional and I believe it solves the problem of Social Networking in large-scale communities. We start by asking the user what they want to do and about what. Once that information has been captured, the user begins receiving relevant messages from other users and from blogs, news sites, and discussion forums around the web. So on the flip side, when you have something to say to the world (searching for a job, organizing an event, publishing news, whatever), its a little like shouting from a stage into a room of people...with the knowledge that all the right people, and only the right people, will hear you. The cool thing is the same communications model effectively routes messages about anything.

We only have about 1,000 users right now. We've yet to do much advertising because we've yet to figure out a revenue model. At this time I'm approaching other web communities to see if they'd like to use our service as an underlying message-routing / social networking layer to what they are already doing. It isn't about the money, but I'm finding it very difficult to make this thing work without any revenue...and I'm determined to change that.

If Infobeing.net isn't the answer, I sincerely hope somebody figures out a way to use all this expensive and sophisticated technology to communicate more wisely.

[forgethell]

4. If they are great, they won't die.

That's how you know they are great.

[Protagoras]

7. Pretty solid circular argument there

I'm a tad concerned that we find this disturbing when people on opposing sides use it to justify say...distribution of wealth...or positions of power.

[forgethell]

8. Well, yes, it is.

But in this case, I would think it justified. If enough people like the idea, believe in it, it will be discussed, information about it will grow, etc. The pen mightier than the sword.

If not, not. But, how would you define a "great" idea? If we have a definition that we can agree with, we can get off the circularity loop. I would say first: It must inspire people to spread it. By this partial definition we could include Christianity and Islam, as well as such horrendous philosophies as Communism and Nazism.

But for me, we need something more. So the second component would be, it must inspire toward the improvement of mankind. This pretty much lets out communism and Nazism, IMO. But there are others who would think differently, especially about communism. There are still innumerable people who sorrow over the fall of the Soviet Empire.

So, third, IMO, it must work. In the real world, this lets out communism. As far as Christianity and Islam, I guess it would depend on how accurate their visions of the afterlife and the nature of God are.

But to get that far, the first thing is, it must inspire sufficient people to spread. In other words, in some way it must resonate with immutable human nature in such a way as people will want to share it with others and convince them of their rightness.

What's your definition?