Date: Tue, 08 Sep 1998 10:10:38 -0400
From: Michael Best <mikeb@media.mit.edu>
To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
Subject: Re: Nothing succeeds like success
BMSDGATH wrote:
>
> On Mon, 07 Sep 1998 19:06:14 -0400 Michael Best <mikeb@media.mit.edu>
> wrote:
>
> > The behaviorist, as exemplified by Gatherer, are
> > overly pessimistic about the progress made on the neuroscience front.
> > Real progress in neuroethology and indeed neuroecology now allows
> > researchers to trace certain behavioral states at the neuronal level in
> > animal models.
>
> That _is_ the kind of evidence that would knock me off my perch. Do
> you have any references?
>
> Derek
This stuff is just getting started to be sure, but some review material
include:
Camhi, J.M. 1984. Neuroethology: Nerve Cells and the Natural Behavior of
Animals. Sunderland, MA: Sinauer.
Heiligenberg, W. 1991. The neural basis of behavior: A neuroethological
view. Annual Review of Neuroscience. 14: 247-267.
Of course things have not centered on social transmission. But there
also is the very promising work ongoing at Cold Springs Harbor and UCLA
(which I know has been mentioned to you before) to study the neural
basis of social learning of food preferences in Norwegian black rats. If
this succeeds it really will be a neural-based experiment in memetic
transmission. So a rat learns via social transmission from a conspecific
to eat casein and a little probe in its head lights up. Something like
that.
Regards,
Mike
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