Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id RAA29153 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Sat, 26 Jan 2002 17:06:56 GMT Message-ID: <C4C20D0AEF0BF84B90CFEA0105EEB0BD29ADC9@selene.shu.ac.uk> From: "Price, Ilfryn" <I.Price@shu.ac.uk> To: "'memetics@mmu.ac.uk'" <memetics@mmu.ac.uk> Subject: RE: Selfish Meme? Date: Sat, 26 Jan 2002 17:03:08 -0000 X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2653.19) Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
If
>However that progress is episodic and science does have a tendency to
>cling to old paradigms until "The old guard finally dies or retires" (I
>think but do not have the reference that that was Bohr). Science in
that
>sense is still a social construct or a paradigm replication system
(Hull,
>1988) or a creation of memeplexes (for those of us of the inclusive
bent),
>albeit one where the selection process is ultimately grounded in
objective
>reality (just to raise a few constructionist hassles. Therein lies the
>great hope of memetics (which is why some fear it) putting some science
>(back into for there is an evoluionary tradition) into social science.
Keith
There may be a reason for this. Humans are most susceptible to memes
when
they are young. Same thing is true for other primates, the potato
washing
behavior spread only slowly into the older groups of monkeys in that
study.
Though there are exceptions in humans most older people are not so keen
about learning new material--and in the stone age environment such a
trait
would not have been much selected.
If
Possibly. However younger scientists (in this example)working in the same insitutions are under pressure to conform to current paradigmatic
norms (grants, PhDs etc are then much easier to come by) so a memetic ESS has a tendency to self preservation, even in science. That said,
given the origin of this exchange, I do accept science has having more selective pressure for true explanations than other meme constructs.
If
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