Message-Id: <199903301404.JAA17944@smtp5.mindspring.com>
Date: Tue, 30 Mar 1999 09:18:24 -0400
To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
From: bbenzon@mindspring.com (Bill Benzon)
Subject: Re: Where does Blackmore's Replicator Power Come From?
>
>I do like the way you characterize it as the "memetic =E9lan". It is very
>reminiscient of older fallacies in the biological sciences. It's interesti=
ng
>how the pattern is repeated in cultural studies.
>
>-Jake
Ahem.... Not all of us have been taken-in by this fallacy. That's why, in
my own work, I've been attempting, perhaps not successfully, to articulate
a concept of cultural phenotype that is subject to selection in the
environment of the human mind. While it is certainly true, as others have
noted on this list, that I believe memes to be located in the environment
and not at all in the mind/brain, to stop there is to mis-represent my
thinking on cultural evolution. For I also do have this notion of
phenotype that most certainly is in the mind/brain, where "we" can select
the cultural traits we wish to embody.
See papers at my website:
http://www.newsavanna.com/wlb/CE/Arena/Arena03.shtml (phenotype etc.)
http://www.newsavanna.com/wlb/CE/landscape.shtm
William L. Benzon 201.217.1010
708 Jersey Ave. Apt. 2A bbenzon@mindspring.com
Jersey City, NJ 07302 USA http://www.newsavanna.com/wlb/
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