Godheval

Genes, Memes, and Waves

In both biological and psychological studies, one thing that is always subject to debate is whether human beings are more defined by their “nature”, i.e. their genetic predispositions, or their “nurture”, reflections of the environment’s influence upon them. It is said that every trait in a being, from its physical appearance to its personality and temperament, is in some way represented within within its genetic code. Each gene accounts for a different element of a being’s composition. The genome, however, is filtered through the influence of the external environment, given over to probability and chaos, from which manifests a phenotype. So even at this level of existence, a being is the product of both “inherent” characteristics and external influence.

There is a branch of philosophy called “memetics”, credited to British zoologist Richard Dawkins. It is the study of “memes”, which according to Dawkins are units of information that are passed between people by imitation (Dawkins; The Selfish Gene; 1976). Ideas, stories, culture, behavior – anything that can be copied and then passed on again – qualify as memes. Dawkins makes a comparison between memes and genes, in that both replicate themselves, and thus propagate from one medium (or host) to the next, be it bodies in the case of genes, or brains and other data storage devices (e.g. computers or paper and ink) in the case of memes. What is being suggested here, however, is that both genes and memes are manifestations of underlying waves.

Genes rely on matter in order to propagate themselves from one generation to the next, while memes – if we are to assume exist – rely mostly on energy, i.e. light and sound serving as mediums through which they are perceived by the inheritor. It should be noted, however, that memes can also use matter as a medium, as in cases of physical renderings, e.g. beaver dams and human inventions.

If energy and matter are two forms of the same thing, then so too must genes and memes share some common “heritage”, i.e. both must be derived from some kind of mathematical designation. It is this common element that is referred to as an “existential wave”, i.e. a pattern that represents any given state and/or conditions of existence. Each wave has lesser components as well, small fluctuations which comprise them. In conscious beings, thoughts, desires, memories, and feelings would be examples of these fluctuations.

Both genes and memes are so driven to replicate, and appear to – as Dawkins says – “manipulate” their hosts towards that goal. Just as two animals may fight for territory or food or mates to ensure the propagation of their genes into the next generation, humans argue, fight, and wage war over ideological differences. That is to say that the memes of those ideas or views are so powerful as to even cause a host to sacrifice his or her life in order to force them upon others. Again, this suggests that genes and memes are mere manifestations of some common intangible “wave” conducted through matter and energy.

What is a Wave?

The most concise way to describe it would be “component of existence”. The wave is the first “replicator” and can manifest as genes or memes or any other phenomena whether physical or intangible. Waves are conducted through mediums to manifest in countless different forms such as sounds, colors, shapes, genes and memes – indeed as anything and everything that can be perceived to “exist” – thus the term “existential wave”.

It should be clarified here that existential waves are not the waves of physics, as they are abstract and observable only by proxy.  They propagate primarily through matter and energy, as do the waves of physics, but what I am positing is that they exist independently of any medium – or at least any medium we can observe.  I acknowledge that for this reason existential waves and existential wave philosophy are not scientific concepts, as they cannot be proven or falsified.  They are pure metaphysics – a conceptual exercise for postulating the “nature” of existence.

Another way to understand existential waves is to consider the difference between a number and a numeral. Take the number three for example. What is it? Is it merely the word “three”? Is it the curly symbol “3″, or the three horizontal lines “III”? No. Those are merely representations of this abstract quantity called three. “3″ – the symbol – is the numeral, but three the abstract can manifest through an infinite number of mediums – such as symbols, words, sounds, locations, or quantities of objects. This is the same as existential waves – intangible qualities that can manifest in energy or matter, like genes or memes or inorganic molecular compositions, or that can remain abstract.

Existential Wave Philosophy represents my particular understanding of what I imagine to be an actual phenomenon, the same phenomenon that Darwin grazed in his theory of natural selection, and Dawkins further extrapolated through memetics.  This philosophy suggests that waves exist and function regardless of whether I talk about them here, in this particular way, or not – and would have done so even had Darwin never conceived of natural selection, or had Dawkins not proposed the meme as a second replicator in 1976.

Here a distinction must be made between “waves” and “waveforms”, which may sometimes be used interchangeably. Waves are the base constituents of existence, and waveforms are the schematics of existence composed of waves. That is to say that a single wave – however they may be quantified – may not correspond to any identifiable phenomena, while waveforms represent specific phenomena made from a conglomeration of waves.

Waves do not only manifest in life, but also through inorganic phenomena, and are represented in patterns of energy and matter in all their forms. Just as genes code for traits in organisms, the movement of tectonic plates create mountains. Both are manifestations of existential waveforms.

It is known that light is propagated or transmitted through matter by bouncing in between its atoms. Light slows down when passing through matter, how much depending upon the “refraction index” of that matter’s atomic composition.  American and Korean researchers discovered that the light from a laser beam can be trapped within a solid by using another laser beam to excite the atoms of that solid to raise their refraction index. Light that is trapped within a solid is not destroyed (as that would conflict with the Law of Conservation), but rather its frequency (waveform) is “remembered” by the atoms, and can be re-emitted. This implies that both matter and energy can represent the same waveform.

Just as a waveform outlines a specific pattern, so too does chemical (and thereby genetic) composition lay out a similar patterns as a material medium for waves. Chemical composition is the arrangement of different elements to form various molecules. Rearrange these compositions and the matter takes on a different form. The “alignment” (coincidence in pattern) of a being’s waveform with those of other phenomena determines their level of harmony with the surrounding “environment”. Environment, of course, is a relative term, used to describe all of the waves seemingly independent of any waveform being observed.

Emergence, Propagation, and Assimilation

Prior to the manifestation of an existential wave, there is a balance, a harmonization within the absolute – a primordial nothingness. Upon the advent of existence, an individual wave is borne into isolation, a distinction or separation from the whole.

Waves interact with one another, a process which we can call “experience”. Domains of interaction between waves lay out the framework for existence, and are represented by the spheres – such as the biosphere, which accounts for all interactions within any “living” context. The individually quantifiable waveforms that can be identified within any sphere are called types, such as the genotype of an organism – the physical manifestation of waves in the biosphere.

Visual Representation of the Spheres

The “alignment” or coincidence in waveform of one phenomena with the waveforms of others determines the degree of harmony or discordance between that phenomena and the surrounding environment. Harmony corresponds to viability, which in turn corresponds to a wave’s ability to propagate.

Where a wave is successful in propagating through any given medium, it will attempt to spread through the next medium it encounters upon contact. This propagation goes well beyond genetics and memetics, not only crossing between biological and cultural boundaries (the biosphere and ideosphere), but between the organic and inorganic. Consider the example of “inspiration” – which can also be understood as the propagation of waves. A human artist sees a mountain – born of waves transmitted through the movement of tectonic plates – and feels somehow compelled to replicate it, in pencil, paint, sculpture, or computer graphics. Another may simply take a photograph to preserve the waveform of the mountain and the feeling it invokes, or even to share it with others, thus propagating the waves even further. The “push” the artist feels to propagate the waveform of the mountain reflects the viability of the waveform, which as discussed earlier corresponds to a harmony between waveforms – in this case those of the artist and the mountain.

The aesthetic value of a thing – say, a mountain – could be intrinsic to the observer insofar as there is a coincidence in waveform between the observer and the phenomenon being observed.  That is to say that a being could have some biologically determined affinity to the mountain aesthetic. Aesthetic value can also be – and probably more often is – memetic because value itself can be copied through culture.

There is a complex interplay between memes and genes, nebulous and multidirectional, and one that suggests the transmission of something even more basic – that being waves. An example of this can be found in the beauty standards in any given human culture. Memetically transmitted beauty standards in turn contribute to the ability of of certain genes to propagate by increasing opportunity to mate.

Just as the beauty standards example shows how genes can rely on memes to increase viability, tongue-rolling demonstrates how memes can have a genetic basis, beyond the obvious need of an organism to produce and copy them. Tongue-rolling is a behavior that can be copied between two human beings – therefore a meme – but the ability to tongue roll is genetic.

Wave propagation may also be more subversive. A person may see a mountain and it may not register in their mind consciously. If that person happens to be an artist, they may go on to develop some concept inspired in part by the mountain. That concept may then be rendered physically in the way of an invention. In this case, perhaps it is not the waveform of the entire mountain that is propagated, but some lesser constituent, such as its slope, or color, or texture, or jaggedness – all of which are manifestations of waves.

In this case, the wave is passed to the human mind through light via eyesight, intepreted in the brain, where it generates awe (if there is “coincidence”), then becomes memetic as the human being is inspired to copy it – in art, architecture, music, or by taking a photograph to show others.

Yet another example can be found in the taste of a thing. Consider a piece of fruit, the inherent purpose of which is to nuture and/or protect the seeds. However, the natural flavor of that fruit, which with respect to the intepretive variations of those who partake, is a selected adaptation which can help the plant propagate its genes into future generations, based on its appeal to species who eat that fruit.

Simple enough, but let’s consider an artificial flavor, whose waveform may be similar to, or at least inspired by that of the actual fruit, and is in fact designed to mimic it or generate the same appeal in those who partake. The success of the artificial flavor in the market may ensure the survival of a given product, which in turn benefits the company that produced it – companies of course nothing more than memetic constructs. The increased viability of the company benefits the human beings who run and work for it. Here we see how the waveform representing the original flavor propagated with some variation by way of both genetics and memetics, perhaps only as a consequence benefiting the plants or humans that utilized it.

An artificial flavor does not necessarily do anything to aid the survival of the plant that inspired it. It may in fact decrease the survival fitness of the plant by reducing any human incentive to raise crops and produce the flavor naturally. The company that markets the artificial flavor could in turn build factories which encroach upon the natural environment where the plant grows, further diminishing its survival fitness. So here we have a situation where a waveform – a flavor reproduced in full or in part – propagates independently of its source.

Waves: Constituent and Transcendent

Existential waves not only apply to individual phenomena but to the actions of those phenomena and all events taking place throughout the universe. If there was a way to mathematically represent the rises and falls of civilizations, which genes are in circulation in an ecosystem or which lifeforms are best suited to survive in that ecosystem at any given time, which ideas (memes) are dominant or merely plausible amongst a given group of people – all phenomena could all be explained in terms of waves.

As a brief but relevant aside, consider the idea of an “existential continuum”. People perceive things individually and in groups; one object, a family of people, a species of animal, the earth, stars, a galaxy. How many individual parts of something we perceive depends upon how close we examine. A person is just a person at a glance, but upon closer inspection they become a conglomeration of organs, skin, hair, bones, and fluids. Closer still they become a collection of cells. Increasing the depth of our examination, people become a collection of molecules, then atoms, then subatomic particles – or, depending upon the observation, waves.  And at this level beings prove to be more empty space than matter.   So where does one thing really begin and another thing end?

Physics seems inclined to want to break things down into the infinitely small or expand its view to see the infinitely large. Another way to look at the universe is as one massive continuum of existence. You can think of the earth’s surface as smooth, but of course it is really infinitely “textured”. But what things are part of the earth’s surface, and which merely “inhabit” it? Are trees part of it? Are people and animals? The Existential Continuum view suggests that all things be considered as part of a greater whole. The Earth’s surface includes everything touching it, moving or not, and the earth is part of the surface of the fabric of space-time. Everything is connected, although the link is not always readily noticeable. Furthermore, what this suggests is that our organism-centered perception of the world is not necessarily “correct”, or at least not the only view. The whole nature vs. nurture debate becomes irrelevant, as there is no longer a discrete separation of organism and environment.

Following this line of thought, there is a universal waveform to be considered, of which all other “lesser” waves are components. Imagine that at the “beginning of time”, these smaller “waves” of existence were all intertwined, tightly bound like the threads of a rope. During energy’s flow throughout time and existence, these different waves undulate and collide in various ways. Each individual strand of that rope could represent life, color, sound, or energy’s many other forms. Everything is connected and bound by its waveform, the pattern of its existence.

Just as thoughts, impulses, and memories are component waves of one person’s overall waveform, so perhaps does the totality of one being’s waves contribute to a greater universal waveform. As the energy flowed throughout time and space, however, for some reason the “rope” began to fray and split apart. There is “harmony” amongst similar waves, while there is discord between waves that misalign. Conflict could be explained by a lack of harmony, or even “competition” (as with genes and memes) between waves. Perhaps there is some relationship between this dissension and the natural entropy that governs the universe.

Applications in Sound, Light, and Emotion

Now let’s consider some other applications of existential waves. Sound is the ear’s interpretation of a certain waveform – through vibrations – rendered in the air by energy. That interpretation itself may be affected by a person’s own waveform – rendered through genes and memes – which may determine whether or not the sound is regarded as pleasant or disturbing. Color is the eye’s interpretation of the light wave. An object absorbs the frequencies of the light that align with its own composition, and reflect the rest to be taken in by the eye. So it is in fact the absence of a certain frequency that manifests itself in the brain through the eye’s interpretation as a color. As with sound, interpretation of color may also be affected by a being’s own waveform. Where a person sees a color, the waveform of the light aligns with the waveform of the person. Where the interaction of the two waveforms creates harmony, then perhaps the being favors that color. Where the interaction creates discord, the color is unfavorable, or where discord is too great – not visible at all. This may explain why a cat is able to view a larger range of the spectrum than humans, for their own waveform – namely something in their biology – bears a greater alignment with the electromagnetic spectrum.

What is that makes a song inspire feelings of happiness or sadness in a person? There is no pre-established standard for what sequences cause certain feelings. One explanation is that the melody of a song aligns with a person’s waveform in a way that corresponds to the part of that waveform that represents a certain emotion. In other words, consider the waveform for “happiness” in a given person, then imagine that a song, if represented as a waveform, would align or match the waveform for happiness.

By the same reasoning, a person may like the taste of something because the pattern of its chemical composition aligns with the part of their wave that represents joy or satisfaction. To clarify, it is not being said this filter of interpretation is genetic, because as mentioned earlier, wave is shaped both innately and externally – and there is really little distinction to made between them, given the subjectivity of existential boundaries. Just as energy and matter are forever preserved (Conservation of Energy Principle), so are these waves, conducted through time and space, channeled through (and defining) the different states of matter, including different beings as they live and die.

Traversing the Boundary between Life and Death

What do those terms “life” and “death” even mean? What I will propose next is that there is no real distinction between the two. These concepts are mere human rationalizations of the different states of matter as it changes. The aging process is a series of reactions which follows the instructions entailed in a being’s genetic code, i.e. how its body will change and what new conditions may manifest themselves, intiated by chemical triggers and probability.

What is “dying”? What does it mean when a being dies of “natural causes”? It reached its maximum age, a figure presumably set in their DNA but allowed some range of variation with respect to whether or not the being was properly nurtured. Removing the variables of illness and bodily harm, to be “dying” simply means that a being is approaching that maximum age, that point where their bodily matter changes to a state that no longer sustains the conditions required for “life”. Isn’t a being “approaching” that point from the moment they are born? We don’t consider things in these terms; dying is used to explain the period during which death is imminent, and life for all the time before that. Where is the line to be drawn between “living” and “dying”? I would argue that there is no line at all. Both living and dying are rationalizations of the movement of matter from one state to the next. Even after “death”, the matter of the body continues to move from one state to another in decay, until eventually it is assimilated into the surrounding environment.

The distinction between life and death, beyond physical terms, comes when we consider the idea of “consciousness”. It is when consciousness deteriorates that a being is no longer “living”, but merely a mass of organic material. Many religions choose to ascribe the term “soul” to that which distinguishes the living from the dead. What is this intangible entity? Is it to be regarded as temporarily occupying, yet independent of the body? I would say no. The soul is consciousness, which has yet to be formally defined, but which by my philosophy is derived from some kind of waveform conducted through matter. This waveform is a pattern which manifests itself in a being’s DNA, and that fluctuates in response to the environment. These fluctuations, as mentioned earlier, may take the form of thoughts, memories, impulses, or remain abstract and unidentifiable. The environment itself is composed of various waves, exhibits its own patterns, and it is the interactions between these waves that constitute existence as we know it.

This brings us to the concept of reincarnation, which is believed by many around the world to be what occurs to living things after death. This philosophy affirms that to some extent, but not in the mystical sense that one singular “soul” departs one body to merge with another. The body disintegrates, but then eventually becomes the matter for something else. In this way death provides for life, maintaining the cycle, the movement of matter. Consider a man who has died. The matter of his body has finished its transition from the state called “life” to the state called “death”. It no longer possesses “consciousness”, or “soul” if you prefer.

If we regard consciousness as a waveform, rather then as some independent entity, then it still exists within the dead man, albeit perhaps in some altered capacity. Once his body breaks down to its raw components, however, that waveform fluctuates such that it is no longer representative of the man at all. Is that waveform thus cast into oblivion? Not necessarily, because there are other ways for it to be propagated. If the man had children, then that part of the wave which manifested itself in his genetic code will be passed on. Afterall, procreation itself is merely a “strategy” by which a wave (using genes as a medium) propagates itself into the future. Also, if the man ever expressed his thoughts to, or shared his memories with anyone, then that part of his waveform propagated memetically as well. It is also possible that the waveform that defined the man could manifest again through phenomena and circumstances completely unrelated to him – that is, through a different medium.

It is also conceivable that the matter that composes a person’s body has a refraction index such that it slows down the movement of their life’s energy, temporarily trapping it to sustain their existence. It is not completely trapped, as in the case of the laser experiment, which is why people eventually die. What energy does pass through the body’s matter can be replaced, such as through nutritional sustenance, but not at a rate equaling the amount lost.

Thoughts, memories, and even “consciousness” can also be propagated, although with degrees of variation. In the case of genes, the existential wave is not preserved from one generation to the next in sexual reproduction, for it combines with that of another being – that is, a new wave is born exhibiting a pattern akin to those from which it was derived. In the case of “memes”, there are variables such as perception and understanding which distort the wave before it is passed on. It is possible, albeit going against probability, that interactions between beings and their environment (which includes other beings) may cause fluctuations that create in one being a wave akin to one “lost” in the past. This could be compared to reincarnation. It is not that a “soul” is moving from one body to the next, but rather that a waveform is manifesting itself again in at least some capacity. This could explain memories of “past lives”, and also why those “memories” are only partial, rather than preserved in full.

Applications in Philosophy and Religion

An understanding of waves suggests that both intuitive rationalization and empricism are equally valid in the search for so-called “truth”, because information drawn from within and absorbed from the surrounding environment woiuld all be derivative of that source. The very inclination to observe, to study, to gather information all begins with an idea, whether it is the person’s own or one passed down from others.

The idea may not even be concrete in terms of human reasoning, but rather an abstract desire, as is the case with infants. A person acts on that inclination, collecting data through their senses, correlating it with what they already know. Where there are gaps in the universal consciousness, fostered by the existence of individuals, they are filled by interaction amongst those individuals, and between them and the environment. In essence, the acquisition of knowledge as a whole works towards the reassembly of a fragmented state of existence, or at least perception of that existence. Perhaps unlike Eastern philosophy iterates, learning and rationalization may be movements towards the “harmony” or the “Tao”. The individual waves may require synchronization or complementation with the others, and beings’ ability to sense and perceive are purposive in the assimilation of other waves. Unfortunately, this “greater perception” that we strive to attain, is inhibited by other waveforms, which I have collectively named the Static.

Summary

Genes are understood to be the most basic constituents of biology. Likewise, memes are understood to be the most basic components of culture. Genes and memes engage in complex relationships that produce complex organisms and artifice, but what they have in common before that is their mutual role as replicators. Replicators are units of information whose sole purpose seems to be self-propagation into future “generations”. In that genes and memes are limited to organic phenomena there was a need for another replicator, one that could account for the movements of matter and energy of all kinds, such as the climate changes or the shifting of tectonic plates.

Existential Wave Philosophy proposes that prior to and underlying memes and genes, there are existential waves. These waves – and the more complex waveforms they compose – are themselves intangible, but drive matter and energy (their mediums) to behave in ways that enable propagation. Waves are the the first and most fundamental replicators – the first ripples in the ocean that eventually create the tides, the beating of a butterfly’s wings that could contribute to a tornado miles away. Colors, sounds, angles, shapes, flavors, phonemes, – any phenomenon or its behavior – that is, any interaction between phenomena – can be understood in terms of existential waves. This, in effect, establishes existential waves as the fundamental building blocks of all existence.