RE: The selfish gene meme

From: Vincent Campbell (v.p.campbell@stir.ac.uk)
Date: Fri Dec 07 2001 - 12:36:17 GMT

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    From: Vincent Campbell <v.p.campbell@stir.ac.uk>
    To: "'memetics@mmu.ac.uk'" <memetics@mmu.ac.uk>
    Subject: RE: The selfish gene meme
    Date: Fri, 7 Dec 2001 12:36:17 -0000 
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            <When I say "even social scientists," I imply that we ordinarily
    expect social
    > scientists to prefer the most precise terms available when describing
    > social
    > phenomena. In other words, I am suggesting that the usual preferences of
    > social scientists may have been circumvented by a replication phenomenon.
    > >
    >
            Nice of you to say so Aaron. I think, however, that most social
    scientists would/do baulk at the idea of memes, and cultural evolution more
    widely, partly because of the field's inherent suspicion of the hard
    science's muscling in on their territory (I say 'their' only because I don't
    share my colleagues' suspicions), but also because amongst the various terms
    in social science that are not agreed upon 'culture' is probably towards the
    top of the list (up there with things like 'society' and 'theory' and many
    others actually). You can imagine from that, what "fun" cultural studies is
    as a field....

            It seems to me that the cultural replicator ideas, in all their
    forms, seems to appeal most to people who have cross-disciplinary
    interests/experience. Virtually everyone on this list appears to occupy
    this space- whether as lay contributors or people who've put themselves into
    print on such issues like yourself. I wonder why....

            Vincent

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