Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id BAA21018 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Wed, 3 Apr 2002 01:22:34 +0100 X-Originating-IP: [137.110.248.206] From: "Grant Callaghan" <grantc4@hotmail.com> To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk Subject: RE: To be or not to be: memetics a science? Date: Tue, 02 Apr 2002 16:16:38 -0800 Content-Type: text/plain; format=flowed Message-ID: <LAW2-F104tvqbUBkcEl0001a0b8@hotmail.com> X-OriginalArrivalTime: 03 Apr 2002 00:16:39.0525 (UTC) FILETIME=[D328E950:01C1DAA4] Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
>Hello, Grant, to be specific, what social sciences cover the areas
>addressed
>by memetics?
>
>Lawrence
>
To tell the truth, I still haven't been able to pin down exactly what
memtics addresses. This list, for example, seems to address everything from
science to newspaper stories but none of them in a way that seems any way
different from the general discussion of these subjects. What areas are we
addressing as suitable to the study of memetics? What do we say about them
that is not taken from some other science, such as genetics or philosophy?
We cam't even agree on a definition of the subject and what it encompasses,
as near as I can see.
If we're just going to back our arguements with the words of philosophers,
biologists, cosmologists and neurologists, why not cut out the middle man?
The arguements are stimulating, but neither Dawkins nor Darwin would refer
to themselves as memeticists, I don't believe. Who are the memeticists who
define the interests of memetics? Susan Blackmore leaps to mind, but her
book seems to be more of a general survey of the literature than a defining
treatise on the subject.
Maybe I just don't get it, but so far all I've seen on the subject of
memetics is tons of speculation and very little of the kind of rigor that
categorizes and defines what is and is not memetic.'
Grant
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