Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id WAA22225 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Wed, 14 Feb 2001 22:06:13 GMT Date: Fri, 09 Feb 2001 11:27:26 -0800 From: Bill Spight <bspight@pacbell.net> Subject: Re: Darwinian evolution vs memetic evolution To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk Message-id: <3A84449E.82F38FD0@pacbell.net> Organization: Saybrook Graduate School X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.72 [en]C-CCK-MCD {Yahoo;YIP052400} (Win95; U) Content-type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit X-Accept-Language: en References: <20010208201954.AAA9140%camailp.harvard.edu@[128.103.125.215]> <3A8328F4.73C83319@pacbell.net> <20010209091819.C1178@reborntechnology.co.uk> Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
Dear Robin,
> > But there is no germ line with memes. "Play it, Sam, for old times'
> > sake," is altered by the environment to "Play it again, Sam," and the
> > alteration is passed on. That's Lamarckian evolution.
>
> Your logic works either way. If there is no germ line, no memeotype/
> phemotype dichotomy, then is no way to distinguish between Lamarckism and
> ordinary mutation.
Ah, but there is. Memes are altered in such a way that they fit the
environment better. Their survivability is enhanced. That is not so with
random mutation. Au contraire: random mutation is detrimental, on
average.
Best,
Bill
===============================================================
This was distributed via the memetics list associated with the
Journal of Memetics - Evolutionary Models of Information Transmission
For information about the journal and the list (e.g. unsubscribing)
see: http://www.cpm.mmu.ac.uk/jom-emit
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Wed Feb 14 2001 - 22:08:30 GMT