Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id UAA05346 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Sat, 22 Dec 2001 20:51:03 GMT Message-ID: <000c01c18b2a$9419f160$8506bed4@default> From: "Kenneth Van Oost" <Kenneth.Van.Oost@village.uunet.be> To: <memetics@mmu.ac.uk> References: <200112201240.fBKCex116743@sherri.harvard.edu> <000d01c18a49$ede15da0$6187b2d1@teddace> Subject: Re: Religious Thought and Lamarckism Date: Sat, 22 Dec 2001 21:51:38 +0100 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 5.00.2314.1300 X-MIMEOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.00.2314.1300 Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
----- Original Message -----
From: Dace <edace@earthlink.net>
> > >Is this a reason why Lamarckism seems to pop up in cultural evolution
!?
> > Cultural evolution is inherently lamarckian in process. Memes _can_
> > change in situ, and do, whereas genes need the whole offspring thing to
> > happen.
> >
> > The illusion of design in nature is just that.
> Not according to neo-Darwinian theory. Disposing of the designer does
> nothing, by itself, to eliminate the design. Identical objects are still
> identical even if they're produced through radically different means. A
car
> is still a car whether it was made by an assembly plant or by hand. And a
> design is still a design whether it was created intentionally or by random
> mutation.
> We're trying to have it both ways. After recognizing the impossibility of
> design in natural evolution, we eliminate the designer and imagine that
this
> solves the problem. But we've still got a blueprint from which the body
is
> formed. Nothing has really changed. It's a sleight-of-hand. While one
> hand conspicuously disposes of the design, the other hand furtively
> reinstates it in a more subtle form.
Hi Ted,
Thanks for this !
That is just the difference in point of view !
We dispose ourselves from the guiding hand of God and reinstate the
designer- thing as a process of selection.
But we don 't live solely in a biological world but far out more in a
political one. The latter, in how many ways we try to deny this, runs
our lives_ the memetic influence is huge.
The former is just a supportative model, it is the world which allows
the memes to exist. Both work together as one.
Lamarckism is applied in the political context as compatible with
socialism. Darwinism is applied in the more strict liberal sense. But
nowadays, Darwinian capitalism is threated by scepsis and anti- glo-
balism. The democratic socialist- movement or liberal- socialists tend
away from the hard Darwinian view and go to a more Lamarckian based
model. In that case, ' culture ' becomes more Lamarckian- orientated.
That is the position I defend.
Regards,
Kenneth
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