Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id LAA29559 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-bounces@mmu.ac.uk); Thu, 4 Oct 2001 11:35:15 +0100 From: Philip Jonkers <P.A.E.Jonkers@phys.rug.nl> X-Authentication-Warning: rugth1.phys.rug.nl: www-data set sender to jonkers@localhost using -f To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk Subject: RE: Thesis: Memes are DNA-Slaves Message-ID: <1002191441.3bbc3a516ca47@rugth1.phys.rug.nl> Date: Thu, 04 Oct 2001 12:30:41 +0200 (CEST) References: <E15n3vE-0007DX-00@dryctnath.mmu.ac.uk> <E15nOyv-0001q5-00@dryctnath.mmu.ac.uk> In-Reply-To: <E15nOyv-0001q5-00@dryctnath.mmu.ac.uk> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit User-Agent: IMP/PHP IMAP webmail program 2.2.6 X-Originating-IP: 129.125.13.3 Sender: fmb-bounces@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
Philip:
> > Blackmore's). However, it is a hard to maintain the viewpoint
> > that memes are slaves of genes or vice versa, as the
> > co-evolution has somewhat flatted down or perhaps is slowly
> > reversing (now this *is* my hypothesis, posted some 2 months ago).
Salice:
> well i agree.
> i just found it annoying reading things like meme were enemies of dna
> or they had a different independent evolution. i also believe that
> dna and memes influence each other but i don't think that they work
> against eachother.
They can even do that. Take celibacy memes or memes that propagate
homosexuality, or the highly actual suicide-bomber memes for
example. Surely cherishing such memes does not
do much good to your *own* genes. It's not true that genes and
memes live separate lives by having two independent evolutions.
This is prohibited as both share the same turf, the human brain;
genes build the near-blanc brain (hardware), memes fill it up
(software). Memes might favor certain kind of brain-building
genes (memes guiding genes). Conversely, a particular
brain might limit its memetic input to certain classes of memes
(genes guiding memes). My intuition
(that tricky trait) says the former dominates, the latter
therefore requires an example: religious brains violently
jettisone atheist memes but warmly welcome spiritual and
metaphysical ones.
Anyway, genes and memes are therefore hopelessly tied to
each-other evolutionary-wise, this is the much referenced
gene-meme co-evolution. The gene-meme correlation can
be either positive or negative, however, depending on the
phenomenon at hand.
Philip.
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