From: <MemeLab@aol.com>
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 1999 13:01:08 EDT
Subject: Re: implied or inferred memes
To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
In a message dated 9/20/99 10:16:16 AM Central Daylight Time,
bspight@pacbell.net writes:
> Bill:
>
> Maladaptive from the point of view of the humans? Or from the point of
> view of the memes? Actually, I think that it is here that the memetic
> viewpoint pays off, where persistent cultural practices do not benefit
> the people involved.
>
I would think that we would have to be saying specifically maladaptive from
the point of view of the genes, not necessarily from the point of view of an
individual human organism, although that might be the case in some
circumstances as well. That is the necessary distinction to cleave memetics
from the strictly sociobiological PoV. As Blackmore would say it, we have to
demonstrate that memes are not effectively on a "genetic leash."
-Jake
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