How _antimemetics_ is used here On this channel, antimemetics names a research direction explored by writer Nadia Asparouhova—author of the upcoming book Antimemetics—in her conversation about Jhana meditation and LLMs. Her guiding question: why do some ideas resist spreading or being remembered? [^e82f3d23-2fb9-5cb6-a3b3-143a6bc7adf3@2982] The two levels of the idea The concept works at two distinct levels: - Individual: things a person can't seem to retain—like cognitive biases, or anything “slippery and hard to hold on to,” including taboos. - Collective: things everyone knows but can't say aloud—posing the question of how a society makes progress on ideas it collectively suppresses or forgets. [^e82f3d23-2fb9-5cb6-a3b3-143a6bc7adf3@2982] Why it's a response to web 2.0 Asparouhova frames the project partly as a reaction to the web-2.0 assumption that everything should go viral. In recent years, she observes, people increasingly workshop ideas in private and semi-private group chats, not wanting their ideas to escape context. [^e82f3d23-2fb9-5cb6-a3b3-143a6bc7adf3@2982] - Antimemetics here refers to Asparouhova's upcoming book and its core question: ideas that resist spreading or being remembered. - It spans the individual level (unretainable ideas like cognitive biases) and the collective level (widely known but unsayable ideas). - It is positioned against the web-2.0 premise that virality is the default, pointing to the rise of private and semi-private idea work.