Chapter Five:

Meta-Biological Organisms

Gregory Bateson³⁷ defines a mind as the total cybernetic information system that is involved in an action. Combined with Deleuze's conception of body as defined not by physical extension but by participating together in action, this definition preempts the common humanistic assumption that mind is limited to the individual human agent. It is the intelligence or flexibility of the overall network that leads to the system's results rather than the intentions of a single individual. This means that a person is part of many different and much larger minds.

These can be thought of as group minds, and have been referenced in contemporary magical theory as egregores³⁸, emergent entities made up of the complex systems that compose these social bodies. The individuals are not in complete control of this egregore because they are constrained by the system that allows it to manifest, but the egregore is not in complete control either, because its actions are determined by the interaction of its various parts. It is a meme carrier, just like humans are, except it does not require a physical presence.

Three institutional egregore types are religious, governmental, and corporate egregores. Religious egregores are the most readily understood as meme carriers because it is usually the 'true religion's task to spread the egregore's mind share by any means necessary. These egregores are symbolically represented in the archetypes of the deity or deities of the religion, along with whatever embodiment of evil that deity may oppose. The physical accretions of the egregore are then the temples, structures, and iconography made manifest by, and at the commission of, the religion's followers. Often these entities have moved across different languages in their spread and, correspondingly, they become adaptable across cultures, yet they rely on embedded mythologies and archetypes to resonate, bond, and spread in new cultural environments.