Memes: Protoscience or Pseudoscience?

[Wowbagger]

Splitting from this thread: http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?t=69697

Are the concept of memes useful as a science? Although memes are considered, by their supporters, to be a "protoscience", what objective studies have been conducted to verify or falsify their existence, or their usefulness as a model for social evolution?

Or, should memes be considered junk science, since many of its critics claim that none of its concepts are well defined?

Are memetics mutually exclusive to other theories on social evolution, or are many of them valid, from certain levels of view?

There was one study, I vaguely remember, about a game of "Telephone" getting analyzed, by humans and computer, for discreet units of mutation and propagation, and stuff like that. But, I could not re-locate it, yet. If anyone know of this study, or a similar one, please let us know about it.

This is a topic that may have been discussed here, before, but there are a few new people interested in it.

[Cynric]

Hmm, thorny question. I've been wondering about it too, whilst reading the God delusion.
I get the feeling that Dawkins himself isn't completely sold on the issue, and that he only raised the idea in order to broaden the scope of the Selfish Gene. I think it served a useful purpose there in getting people to think in terms of replicators rather than organisms, but is it a science?
At the moment I would say no, simply because I struggle to think of a good experiment to test the hypothesis. It seems inevitable that ideas will spread through society (brains), and will be selected for by appeal, but can we really define a "unit" of idea-ness in such a way as to make it a useful analytical device? It also seems seductively easy to explain every observation in terms of memetics, making it vulnerable to the same pitfall as pseudosciences such as psychoanalysis.
So, I'm sceptical, but I think those researching it are doing so in an openminded and scientific manner - so I guess protoscience wins over pseudoscience at this stage.
Until someone invents a "meme-clean" helmet to remove toxic thought parasites, of course ;).

[Danniel]

I think that memes are more a synonym or term for "cultural information", or small units/entities of cultural information (of which the imprecise delimitation doesn't seems to matter), rather than something that could have a precise size and a whole new science of "memetics" for studying it. It would still be studies of compared cultures or whatever.

I do not know much about other theories of cultural evolution, but I think that the gene metaphor/analogy indeed brings something, because to me seems that without that we are a bit more prone to think of cultural evolution in a adaptationist and orthogenist-like fashion.

As if culture were always evolving toward progress, and also as if the culture were necessarily adaptations of their "hosts" rather something that can evolve on its own, despite of bringing any "real benefit" to their hosts.

It is an interesting awareness, I think. There's a bit of problem in defining what would be a "real benefit" tough, it could end in everlasting phylosophical discussios of whether just feeling good or relieved despite of the truth of the information held and spread isn't already a "real benefit" and things like that. However, it could just be rephrased as that culture can evolve on its own, despite of the truthfulness of the content then, to avoid that.

[drkitten]

I think that memes are more a synonym or term for "cultural information", or unimportantly undefined small units/entities of cultural information, rather than something that could have a precise size and a whole new science of "memetics" for studying it. It would still be studies of compared cultures or whatever.

I do not know much about other theories of cultural evolution, but I think that the gene metaphor/analogy indeed brings something, because to me seems that without that we are a bit more prone to think of cultural evolution in a adaptationist and orthogenist-like fashion.

If you want specifics -- there are a lot of theories of cultural, and specifically linguistic, evolution that hinge on the idea of language-as-a-replicator.

In particular, the sentences that I say -- the sounds -- are interpreted by your brain into a set of symbols -- and then reproduced later when you try to say the same thing. Sound reproduces sound, or alternatively symbol reproduces symbol.

And there's lots of opportunity for re-analysis and mutation; the prefix "cyber-" used to mean "control" and now means "computer." Or on a ligher note, how many of you have sung the hymm about "Gladly, the cross-eyed bear"?

So something is replicating and mutating. But what? The replication "elements" are something smaller and less specific than sentences or words. Phonemes? Sounds? Morphemes? Ideas? Absent any other term for the elements of this replication system , "memes" is as good a word as any.

Linguistic evolution is a real phenomenon, studied by real scientists. If you don't want to use the terms derived from memetics and biological evolution to describe it -- what terms do you suggest?

[Dark Jaguar]

How about "bits"?

[Danniel]

I think that a "bit" somewhat implies something even more specific and quantitatively delineated than "meme" suggests.

Since "meme", if I recall, aims to be analogue not to a certain well defined physical sequence of nucleotides, but is more in the sense of whichever network of nucleotide sequences and all the pyisiology are the cause or "factor" (as genes used to be called) of a specific phenotype, which, just incidentally, can several times be traced to a key sequence in a certain context. They are like "cultural factors" of something done by cultural reasons.

[drkitten]

How about "bits"?

Not a chance. Bits are defined probabilitistically and information-theoretically, not in terms of semantic content.

[Dave1001]

Hmm, thorny question. I've been wondering about it too, whilst reading the God delusion.
I get the feeling that Dawkins himself isn't completely sold on the issue, and that he only raised the idea in order to broaden the scope of the Selfish Gene. I think it served a useful purpose there in getting people to think in terms of replicators rather than organisms, but is it a science?
At the moment I would say no, simply because I struggle to think of a good experiment to test the hypothesis. It seems inevitable that ideas will spread through society (brains), and will be selected for by appeal, but can we really define a "unit" of idea-ness in such a way as to make it a useful analytical device? It also seems seductively easy to explain every observation in terms of memetics, making it vulnerable to the same pitfall as pseudosciences such as psychoanalysis.
So, I'm sceptical, but I think those researching it are doing so in an openminded and scientific manner - so I guess protoscience wins over pseudoscience at this stage.
Until someone invents a "meme-clean" helmet to remove toxic thought parasites, of course ;).

I think if in studying ideas and how they propagate, mutate, etc. we stick with the scientific method (Popper, etc.) we'll be somewhat protected from falling into pseudoscience a la psychoanalysis.

[Mercutio]

"Memes" appear to be perfectly compatible with an operant conditioning/verbal behavior approach. When I first heard of the term, I was intrigued, but the more I read, the more I thought (quite favorably) "this is old B.F. Skinner in new bottles".

[Dave1001]

"Memes" appear to be perfectly compatible with an operant conditioning/verbal behavior approach. When I first heard of the term, I was intrigued, but the more I read, the more I thought (quite favorably) "this is old B.F. Skinner in new bottles".

Does the B.F. Skinner stuff look at how ideas spread, decline, and modify in populations over time? Also how ideas "compete" with each other in the medium of human brains (for example attaching an idea such as "Jesus is God and died and was reborn" or "Muhammed was Allah's propheit" to commands to proselytize and be fruitful and multiply)?

[John Hewitt]

How about "bits"?

I go with memetics being junk science. I think that Dark Jaguar's suggestion contains some sense, one might even say several bits of sense.

In general, I have suggested that the fundamental entities of evolution are "self-bounding data sets" and that such data sets are always asscoiated with "evolving systems," where the word system should be given its IT meaning. (A data system is defined in terms of data inputs, data processes and data outputs. An evolving system requires certain other properties as well.)

This is what I call bioepistemic evolution and, within it, evolutionary analysis involves giving chemical and biological intepretations to the data inputs, processes and outputs of biological evolving systems.

As for the word "meme," it just leaves me cold. It is so vacuous, I don't see where you go with it.

[Dave1001]

I go with memetics being junk science. I think that Dark Jaguar's suggestion contains some sense, one might even say several bits of sense.

In general, I have suggested that the fundamental entities of evolution are "self-bounding data sets" and that such data sets are always asscoiated with "evolving systems," where the word system should be given its IT meaning. (A data system is defined in terms of data inputs, data processes and data outputs. An evolving system requires certain other properties as well.)

This is what I call bioepistemic evolution and, within it, evolutionary analysis involves giving chemical and biological intepretations to the data inputs, processes and outputs of biological evolving systems.

As for the word "meme," it just leaves me cold. It is so vacuous, I don't see where you go with it.

So your objection is basically aesthetic? No one claims that memes are the fundamental entities of evolution, any more than are rna or (if Smolin is correct) black holes. It sounds to me like you're suggesting "bioepistemic bits" as an alternative to "memes" for ideas that can propagate and mutate? If so, that term has the benefit perhaps of being more accurate, but the disadvantage of being a little more clunky and in less common circulation, which could increase the costs of getting it widely adopted.

[Wowbagger]

As for the word "meme," it just leaves me cold. It is so vacuous, I don't see where you go with it.I think you gave slightly more intelligent criticism on my other Replicator thread.

When I asked "Does your favorite alternative explain socialization as well or better than that?", you responded:

My favourite explanations is Darwinian sexual selection with social structure as its phenotypic target. Yes I think it does.Which sounds more legitimate than "the word 'meme,' it just leaves me cold".

For the record, my response to that comment is reprinted below:

------------------------------------------
Ah, yes. I will not deny that is a useful model. Just like group-selection is also a useful model. It may be useful, from certain levels of view. But, it does not get into the core foundation levels.

"Survival of the Species" (as a group) was, and to a certain extent, still is, a good way of thinking about adaptations, from a distant point of view. But, once you start examining things closer: first self-survival becomes more apparent. Then cell survival. And then, once you find what drives cell survival the most, you find it could very well be gene survival.

Social structure as the target of sexual selection, also looks good, from a distant point of view, and can still be useful, when examining societies at that granular stage. But, when you wish to see more detail, you discover that all those bits of information passed, back and forth, in a social network, can themselves, be thought of as replicators. These replicators, of course, exploiting the very "plastic" brains that were the product of selection (sexual or otherwise).

These are not necessarily mutually exclusive ideas. Just different ideas that work at different levels of examination.
------------------------------------------

Let's continue to hear arguments that go beyond athestics, please.

[Wowbagger]

Some definitions of Protoscience to help us out:
http://www.skepticwiki.org/wiki/index.php/Protoscience
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protoscience

Given these definitions, it would appear, to me, as if memetics were proto, not pseudo. Useful models are being developed, even if it is not a hard science, yet. Unlike junk-science or pseudoscience, where the model is either completely useless, or flatly contradicts other sciences.

[Jeff Corey]

I never saw the use of the concept. A meme is an idea that can change? So?

[Mercutio]

Does the B.F. Skinner stuff look at how ideas spread, decline, and modify in populations over time? Also how ideas "compete" with each other in the medium of human brains (for example attaching an idea such as "Jesus is God and died and was reborn" or "Muhammed was Allah's propheit" to commands to proselytize and be fruitful and multiply)?Beyond Freedom and Dignity, 1971. Chapters 6 & 7, on the evolution of culture and design of culture, respectively. Although your assumptions ("in the medium of human brains"?) needlessly limit your investigation, and your examples are not the same as his, the notion of competition and selection of belief systems is there.

[UserGoogol]

Memetics is more of a paradigm than a theory. The fact that ideas are things that replicate from person to person is fairly obvious, the point of memetics is merely that if you look at culture in that way, you get a valuable new perspective. That is, it's less like Newton's Laws of Motion and more like the idea of describing reality in terms of numbers and then describing the relationships between those numbers.

The paradigm of memetics can of course be directed towards psuedoscientific ******** if someone wants, but I don't think memetics is itself psuedoscience. But then, I haven't really heard any concrete claims, psuedoscientific or not, coming out of the world of memetics. A bit of speculation here or there, but there's no woo in that.

[Jeff Corey]

Memetics is more of a paradigm than a theory. The fact that ideas are things that replicate from person to person is fairly obvious, the point of memetics is merely that if you look at culture in that way, you get a valuable new perspective. That is, it's less like Newton's Laws of Motion and more like the idea of describing reality in terms of numbers and then describing the relationships between those numbers...
Paradigm, another fashionable term for what used to be called a "school". But I would like to know what valuable new perspective I would get out of calling an idea a meme.

[athon]

Any time you have a complex pattern where the survival of the pattern within a changing system relies on how it interacts within its environment, you're going to see evolution. We can see examples of this in chemical competition, computer programs, living systems and of course, in socially learned behaviours.

I see no problem with defining a unit of cultural inheritance a 'meme'. Indeed, it makes a comparison with genetics, but then I think if it serves to demonstrate that there are parallel rules between any such competing systems, then all the better.

The term is useful in describing something that in itself isn't novel (cultural evolution). If so far the only criticism is one of aesthetic displeasure, then we've got little to argue.

Athon

[Wowbagger]

I never saw the use of the concept. A meme is an idea that can change? So?So, they not only change, but can do so in ways that can aid or hinder its replication. In other words, there are selection pressures (natural and artificial) that impact ideas, not just physical objects.

It is a useful concept, for thinking about ear worms, fashion trends, folklore, urban legends, artistic methods, and teaching of more practical skills, such as bridge building. Oh, and also religion. I have yet to find a better explanation for how it spreads.

[athon]

Paradigm, another fashionable term for what used to be called a "school". But I would like to know what valuable new perspective I would get out of calling an idea a meme.

For the same reason you wouldn't just refer to a gene as 'a nucelotide sequence'. With the term gene comes a sense of behaviours and interactions that is not present in the term 'nucleotide sequence', just as meme refers to more than just an idea.

The evolutionary stresses which can influence the changes, proliferation or extinction of a single idea throughout a community is connoted in the term meme, where an idea implies simply a concept created by a single entity. The term draws parallels between evolving systems which encourages us to explore how we can use, say, genetics to better understand the evolution of a culturally learned unit.

Language can be problematic if jargon terms are used to isolate other parties or no longer mean what they are supposed to. But coining a new term to better define a concept can often be useful if that concept has connotations that didn't exist before.

Athon

[Jeff Corey]

So, they not only change, but can do so in ways that can aid or hinder its replication. In other words, there are selection pressures (natural and artificial) that impact ideas, not just physical objects.

It is a useful concept, for thinking about ear worms, fashion trends, folklore, urban legends, artistic methods, and teaching of more practical skills, such as bridge building. Oh, and also religion. I have yet to find a better explanation for how it spreads.

And the explanation is? That's the part that doesn't strike me as compelling. Certain ideas are held by a group and they seem to work. When they are clearly not working, they suffer extinction (in the operant sense).
Religion, on the other hand, seems to violate this.
And wlf is an ear worm? Is it similar to a Babel fish?

[athon]

And the explanation is? That's the part that doesn't strike me as compelling. Certain ideas are held by a group and they seem to work. When they are clearly not working, they suffer extinction (in the operant sense).

I think the reason why you don't see where religion fits is because your definition is a little too basic.

An idea serves a purpose. If that purpose is served, it remains until a better concept replaces it. For instance, a variation in the spelling of a word might suit a population as it better reflects their accent. Or, as the case was in England in past centuries, a variation in spelling demonstrated that the author of the word was influenced by a continental education (hence, demonstrating that the person was well travelled). Such 'Francasized' spellings therefore became more popular than other versions as the person's position is society was perceived as higher.

Religion serves a purpose of comfort in the face of uncertainty (indeed, false or not, it's the sense that is important). Singificantly, it ties communities together with a common set of morals and beliefs. Since we are more influenced by social thinking than we are by critical thinking, various forms of religion flourish over that of science.

And wlf is an ear worm? Is it similar to a Babel fish?

An 'ear worm' is a sound, string of words or a melody that persists in the mind when the sound is no longer being heard. Like those bloody annoying Eurovision songs...

Athon

[Mercutio]

The problem, Corey, is that you already think of verbal behavior as being subject to selection pressures from the environment, in the form of reinforcement & punishment. So this is a yawn for you. For the people who bought the whole "cognitive revolution--behaviorism is dead" meme, this is a way of approaching the matter without admitting they were wrong.

[only partially facetious...]

[Mercutio]

An 'ear worm' is a sound, string of words or a melody that persists in the mind when the sound is no longer being heard. Like those bloody annoying Eurovision songs...

Athon

Aw, man, I love Eurovision...

"We are the winners...of Eurovision"... Now that will be stuck in my "mind" for the rest of the evening. Thank you!

[Dave1001]

And the explanation is? That's the part that doesn't strike me as compelling. Certain ideas are held by a group and they seem to work. When they are clearly not working, they suffer extinction (in the operant sense).
Religion, on the other hand, seems to violate this.


How does religion seem to violate this? Your field of psychology has informed economics in part by demonstrating the varieties of ways in which people aren't always rational self-interest maximizing agents. Widespread religions seem to prey on those aspects of people for the propagation of the religion very effectively.

[Jeff Corey]

...An 'ear worm' is a sound, string of words or a melody that persists in the mind when the sound is no longer being heard. Like those bloody annoying Eurovision songs...

Athon

There ought to be a whole range of ear worms, then, ranging from, "Oh, no, it's Mr. Sluggo", to "Stairway to Heaven" to Alfred Bester's, "Tenser said the censor, censor said the tensor, tension, apprehension and dissention have begun." (from The Demolished Man, derived from a Mark Twain story about a dittie that people could not get out of their head.)
Cute term. So why is it a meme?

[Mercutio]

Religion, on the other hand, seems to violate this. Think, Corey, it's basic behaviorism...

We do not reinforce a person; we reinforce a behavior. Same with punishment. The analysis is not based on the person (or organism) but on his, her, or its behavior; indeed, reinforcement and punishment are defined by their effect upon rate of behavior, not by how the organism feels. This is precisely what "memes" give us. Natural selection (or operant conditioning) working on the verbal behavior rather than the organism. It is not a matter of what is good for the organism, but what behavior is reinforced; social traps show us that short-term reinforcement can lead to long-term catastrophe. The behavior is being selected for, not the organism. Same with memes. Religion can be selected for, even at some considerable expense of individual organisms. In the long term, an attractive but deadly meme does not last, but it certainly controls in the short term!

[Wowbagger]

To summarize Mercutio's point: Memes replicate based on their ability to be replicated, not on their usefulness (practical or otherwise) to us.

The spread of religion benefits the meme, not necessarily its host.

Just like a brain fluke in an ant: If an ant gets this certain brain fluke infection, it starts trying to climb up a blade of grass. Why? Not for the benefit of the ant, that's for sure! But, for the benefit of the fluke: It reproduces better in the stomach of a cow. So, the fluke adapted the ability to encourage itself to try to get eaten by a cow, should it end up infecting an ant.

Memes spread religion, not to the benefit of the people who follow religion, but for the benefit of the meme's own survival. Scary, but the model works reasonably well, I think.

[Jeff Corey]

So memes are not tacts, nor mands, they seem to function as autoclitics. Sort of.

[athon]

There ought to be a whole range of ear worms, then, ranging from, "Oh, no, it's Mr. Sluggo", to "Stairway to Heaven" to Alfred Bester's, "Tenser said the censor, censor said the tensor, tension, apprehension and dissention have begun." (from The Demolished Man, derived from a Mark Twain story about a dittie that people could not get out of their head.)
Cute term. So why is it a meme?

Indeed, there are a whole range of 'ear worms'. China Mieville has a neat little short story on ear worms, which kill.

It's a culturally inherted unit. If it is spread in an accomdating environment, and it is by its nature adequately contagious, then it will spread through repitition. Calling it a meme insinuates the selection pressures such a string of words (and its social associations) has on its propagation.

Athon

[Wowbagger]

And wlf is an ear worm? Is it similar to a Babel fish?Well, on certain planets, having a babel fish in your ear will expose you to more ear worm infections, that is for sure! :D

But, seriously, you should learn to look stuff up: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earworm

[Wowbagger]

So memes are not tacts, nor mands, they seem to function as autoclitics. Sort of.
Autoclitics might be an example of memes. Or, a structure for memes to work within. Or, something like that.

[Jeff Corey]

Well, on certain planets, having a babel fish in your ear will expose you to more ear worm infections, that is for sure! :D

But, seriously, you should learn to look stuff up: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earworm

But seriously, I don't use wikipedia. Too many brain worms.

[Jeff Corey]

brain worms.

[Mercutio]

Autoclitics. Seriously, it has been over a decade since I have heard that term. If it were a more successful meme...

Never mind.

[Jeff Corey]

I tried to explain it as putting words together to make a point that others could understand, if not necessarily agree with. A connected series of discourse you put together to make a point and make sense to your audience. Much of the preparation for it could be covert (rehearsing to yourself) or practicing with others,

[Mercutio]

Rule-governed behavior, Corey. The whole operant is expressed. People can follow via Pliance or Tracking. Either way, the rule (meme) is propogated.

The vocabulary is different, but the idea is the same...

[Jeff Corey]

But there is a distinction between rule governed behavior and contingency governed behavior, as I understand it. "The rule's a tool, could fool."

[Mercutio]

Yes, of course--RGB is insensitive to changes in contingencies...leads to exactly the sort of thing you mentioned: : "religion, on the other hand, seems to violate this".

ETA: when we are reinforced for following rules, we get pliance...

[John Hewitt]

So your objection is basically aesthetic? No one claims that memes are the fundamental entities of evolution, any more than are rna or (if Smolin is correct) black holes. It sounds to me like you're suggesting "bioepistemic bits" as an alternative to "memes" for ideas that can propagate and mutate? If so, that term has the benefit perhaps of being more accurate, but the disadvantage of being a little more clunky and in less common circulation, which could increase the costs of getting it widely adopted.
No, my objection is not aesthetic, my objection is that, despite repeated requests, nobody has yet suggested what memetics achieves in the way of testable predictions. I am suggesting that the reason for this lack of testability is the failure to define the word gene.

As for "bioepistemic bits," that is your phrase - kindly use mine, "self-bounding data sets."

I said that, in my opinion, ALL evolutionary theory should be based on the concept of data, not genes or any other supposed replicator. That is bioepistemic evolution. I expand bioepistemic evolution to ask about
1. The format of the evolving data and the hard and soft nature of the evolving system that utlizes this data.
2. The interpretative and selective processes occurring within the evolving system and the information and knowledge they produce.
3. The bounding processes that delineate data sets and the evolving systems on which it runs.
4. The biological and social correlates can link such studies with empirical work.

I can do such things with bioepistemic evolution. I can interpret standard genetics, molecular biology, human sexuality, humour and prebiosis in those terms.

When I say I can do nothing with the meme, I mean that it into that framework at all. It is so undefined that I can see no way to understand its format as a data set, the interpretative processes to which it is subject, the bounding processes that delineate one meme from the next, or any biological or social correlate that links it to empirical studies.

Please, tell me some serious correlations with observation that come out of memetics.

[John Hewitt]

I think you gave slightly more intelligent criticism on my other Replicator thread.
[/group]
This is patronizing.

[quote]
Ah, yes. I will not deny that is a useful model. Just like group-selection is also a useful model. It may be useful, from certain levels of view. But, it does not get into the core foundation levels.

"Survival of the Species" (as a group) was, and to a certain extent, still is, a good way of thinking about adaptations, from a distant point of view. But, once you start examining things closer: first self-survival becomes more apparent. Then cell survival. And then, once you find what drives cell survival the most, you find it could very well be gene survival.

Social structure as the target of sexual selection, also looks good, from a distant point of view, and can still be useful, when examining societies at that granular stage. But, when you wish to see more detail, you discover that all those bits of information passed, back and forth, in a social network, can themselves, be thought of as replicators. These replicators, of course, exploiting the very "plastic" brains that were the product of selection (sexual or otherwise).
Dawkins antipathy toward group selection is a good example of how poor his work is. There is no doubt in my mind that group selection is valid in humans and I am happy to see that E.O. Wilson has come to appreciate that.


Let's continue to hear arguments that go beyond athestics, please. Absolutely, lets hear some arguments that can hope to address observable facts.

[Dave1001]

No, my objection is not aesthetic, my objection is that, despite repeated requests, nobody has yet suggested what memetics achieves in the way of testable predictions. I am suggesting that the reason for this lack of testability is the failure to define the word gene.

As for "bioepistemic bits," that is your phrase - kindly use mine, "self-bounding data sets."

I said that, in my opinion, ALL evolutionary theory should be based on the concept of data, not genes or any other supposed replicator. That is bioepistemic evolution. I expand bioepistemic evolution to ask about
1. The format of the evolving data and the hard and soft nature of the evolving system that utlizes this data.
2. The interpretative and selective processes occurring within the evolving system and the information and knowledge they produce.
3. The bounding processes that delineate data sets and the evolving systems on which it runs.
4. The biological and social correlates can link such studies with empirical work.

I can do such things with bioepistemic evolution. I can interpret standard genetics, molecular biology, human sexuality, humour and prebiosis in those terms.

When I say I can do nothing with the meme, I mean that it into that framework at all. It is so undefined that I can see no way to understand its format as a data set, the interpretative processes to which it is subject, the bounding processes that delineate one meme from the next, or any biological or social correlate that links it to empirical studies.

Please, tell me some serious correlations with observation that come out of memetics.

"self-bounding data sets" seems to me to be a broader term than meme. For example, folks probably wouldn't say there has been replication of a meme when an amoeba replicates itself, but they would probably agree that a "self-bounding data set" had replicated. Similarly someone probably wouldn't say that an organism had been completely replicated when Bobby believes Johnny kissed Susie, and he whispers to Mary "Johnny kissed Susie" and Mary now believes Johnny kissed Susie, but they would probably agree that a self-bounded data set had been replicated, since two people now believe the information string "Johnny kissed Susise" instead of one.

So it seems to me that "Self-bounding data set" is a broader descriptor than users of either "gene" or "meme" aspire them to be.

[Dave1001]

It is a good question Hewitt brings up. It doesn't sound too difficult to put together solid experiments testing how the spread of memes function. Have they been done already under different auspices (such has by Skinner/behaviorists)? Where's the data, the research, etc. I imagine marketing departments and Darpa would heavily fund this type research.

[Jeff Corey]

Not likely to be done by behavior analysts.We typically use single-subject methodology to study the behavior of individuals.

[Dave1001]

Not likely to be done by behavior analysts.We typically use single-subject methodology to study the behavior of individuals.

Why? Is it that much of a complexity barrier to use 2 or 3 subjects in interaction? I understand the value of single-subject methodology, but not for all research in that area to be almost completely limited to single-subject methodology.

[Jeff Corey]

Your original question had to do with how the spread of memes function. This could be the concern of social psychologists and would typically involve much larger groups of people than 2 or3.
As I said, behavior analysts prefer to focus on the behavior of individuals rather than groups.

[Mercutio]

As I said, behavior analysts prefer to focus on the behavior of individuals rather than groups.
Yes, but not exclusively. As an example, Volume 15 of Behavior and Social Issues (http://www.uic.edu/htbin/cgiwrap/bin/ojs/index.php?journal=bsi&page=index) explores "Cultural Analytic Science"; the behaviorists in our department were strong proponents of cultural application of behaviorism. I don't know what they would have thought of "memes".

[Dave1001]

As I said, behavior analysts prefer to focus on the behavior of individuals rather than groups.

As I asked before, why? Why don't the prefer to look at both behavior of individuals, and behavior of multiples?

[Mercutio]

As I asked before, why? Why don't the prefer to look at both behavior of individuals, and behavior of multiples?
Much tighter experimental control. And let's face it, this behavior is reinforced by a history of successful investigations. If it works...

Corey--found this a bit ago, the abstract to a paper by Catania.As instances of behavior, words interact with environments. But they also interact with each other and with other kinds of behavior. Because of the interlocking nature of the contingencies into which words enter, their behavioral properties may become increasingly removed from nonverbal contingencies, and their relationship to those contingencies may become distorted by the social contingencies that maintain verbal behavior. Verbal behavior is an exceedingly efficient way in which one organism can change the behavior of another. All other functions of verbal behavior derive from this most basic function, sometimes called verbal governance. Functional verbal antecedents in verbal governance may be extended across time and space when individuals replicate the verbal behavior of others or their own verbal behavior. Differential contact with different verbal antecedents may follow from differential attention to verbal stimuli correlated with consequential events. Once in place, verbal behavior can be shaped by (usually social) consequences. Because these four verbal processes (verbal governance, replication, differential attention, and verbal shaping) share common stimulus and response terms, they produce interlocking contingencies in which extensive classes of behavior come to be dominated by verbal antecedents. Very different consequences follow from verbal behavior depending on whether it is anchored to environmental events, as in scientific verbal practices, or becomes independent of it, as in religious fundamentalism. That last sentence suggests to me (I have not yet read the paper) that this analysis is certainly applicable to cultural stuff.

[Jeff Corey]

Much tighter experimental control. And let's face it, this behavior is reinforced by a history of successful investigations. If it works...

Corey--found this a bit ago, the abstract to a paper by Catania. That last sentence suggests to me (I have not yet read the paper) that this analysis is certainly applicable to cultural stuff.

Yes, at a theoretical level, but will it lend itself to experimental analysis?
And Charley's always been enamored of his own verbal behavior.
Not that there's anything wrong with that.

[Dave1001]

Yes, at a theoretical level, but will it lend itself to experimental analysis?
And Charley's always been enamored of his own verbal behavior.
Not that there's anything wrong with that.

You're hilariously gossipy about your field.

Mercutio, I'm still surprised that there isn't a large body of experimental analysis (according to you and Jeff) with 2 people in interaction. And then 3 people in interaction. Relatively small numbers of people beyond 1.

[Mercutio]

Well...any analysis of verbal behavior is going to have at least 2 people, by definition. Verbal behavior requires another person for reinforcement.

And there is an entire journal on The Analysis of Verbal Behavior (http://www.abainternational.org/journals/analysis_verbal_behavior.asp). So it's not like there is no research going on.

[Dave1001]

Well...any analysis of verbal behavior is going to have at least 2 people, by definition. Verbal behavior requires another person for reinforcement.

And there is an entire journal on The Analysis of Verbal Behavior (http://www.abainternational.org/journals/analysis_verbal_behavior.asp). So it's not like there is no research going on.

In that case 2 people seems to me to be an ideal unit to do a lot of research on, as it's probably the simplest and most controllable unit (with the fewest costs involved).

[Dave1001]

Also, fascinating journal title and mission by the way. I wonder what insights have been gleaned from the work published there.

[John Hewitt]

Well...any analysis of verbal behavior is going to have at least 2 people, by definition. Verbal behavior requires another person for reinforcement.

And there is an entire journal on The Analysis of Verbal Behavior (http://www.abainternational.org/journals/analysis_verbal_behavior.asp). So it's not like there is no research going on.

Yes, there may well be some interesting analyses going on in a journal with that title but I am a bit puzzled by the answer emerging from this thread. Dawkins introduced the idea of memes in "The Selfish Gene," which was published, to widespread acclaim, in 1976. So the meme concept has just passed its thirtieth birthday. No doubt the concept of memes took a little while to take off but it had a flying start and memetics has been around now for some time. After such a passage of time, I find it a bit strange that we are still discussing whether memetics is a protoscience or a science or even a pseudoscience. Surely, by this time the field should have produced some results. Should we not be able to point to concrete interpretations of hard data and say, "look, this breakthrough is a result of memetics. Without memetics we just would have no way of understanding these results." Should we not be seeing those results in journals devoted to the topic?

Instead, this thread is suggesting that that we could begin looking at social psychological results for something relevant, or we could look at a journal about "The Analysis of Verbal Behaviour."

Once upon a time, there was a "Journal of Memetics" and I would have thought we could look at the results it has published in the expectation of finding such breakthrough results there. Well, as I mentioned somewhere before, I think that journal folded because its published data was seemingly not found to be of much real value.

Still, perhaps you are correct and there are good results somewhere but I feel that, by now, they should be real results, not mere twinklings in a memeticist's eye. I would like someone to show them to me.

[Dark Jaguar]

I suppose memetics could at least hypothetically be used to predict how ideas will flow and allow us to do something about that, much in the same was as genetics allows us to predict how bacteria might mutate.

[Schneibster]

See, when I read "pseudoscience," and then I hear people refer to psychology as pseudoscience as well, then I get kinda all up in arms. Now, mind you, I'm no psychologist myself- much more the hard-science type, physics for recreation, computers and software for money. Still and all, I have to say that having read a fair number of books on the brain, and on cognitive studies, and even gone so far as to read a textbook on psychology, I find referring to psychology as a "pseudoscience" pretentious to say the least, and more like downright misleading or even patently and obviously false. I see modes of behavior defined in that psychology text that are obscure until they are pointed out, but are obvious thereafter. This, for me, is the hallmark of accurate observation and classification, and that, in turn, makes the treatment of the subject scientific in my eyes; what could be more scientific than accurate observation, and classification of one's observations? How can one make good theories in the absence of good data? And how can anyone claim that we have good data where our own minds are concerned? We are still discovering what are obviously foundational mechanisms in our own brains, not to even speak of any kind of understanding of the foundational mechanisms of our minds, or how those mechanisms vary from one individual to another, and how they remain the same. And even with that small depth, we have managed to make discoveries that at least mitigate the effects of emotional or mental disorders among the worst affected.

By no means would I characterize psychology as anything more than an infant science, if that much; we know a hell of a lot, but it is obvious to anyone who thinks seriously about it and does some studying that we are a hell of a lot farther from knowing much compared to how much there is to know, than we are in more mature areas of study like astronomy or chemistry. We are still at the stage in cognitive studies of all types of defining empirical knowledge; we don't have enough to start looking for meaningful global patterns, or devising solid theories that have very much scope (although there is considerable room for limited sorts of theories, that actually pass scientific tests that those here who denigrate psychology as "pseudo-science" would be surprised if not chagrined to discover) compared to the breadth of the subject matter. It is likely to be a very long time until we do. To judge psychology, therefore, on the basis of this extremely incomplete data set, is not merely unfair but actively deceptive; the extent to which it is deliberately so is even open to question.

So when faced with a choice in this particular case, I have no hesitation in stating that we do not and cannot know enough to define memetics as "either" anything "or" anything to do with science. All that we can say at present is that it is a relatively plausible way of defining fairly amorphous and very ill-delimited "units of social discourse" (whatever the hell that might mean) and ways that such units might, if we understand things correctly, change and get distributed over time. Whether it will survive our acquisition of more and more data about ourselves, and the construction of well-grounded theories of psychology, or sociology, remains very much up in the air, and in fact it may be alternately asserted and denied many times over before we come to any sort of deep understanding of what it means, much less what it implies, about our minds, brains, and emotions.

[Wowbagger]

...(snip)...
All that we can say at present is that it is a relatively plausible way of defining fairly amorphous and very ill-delimited "units of social discourse" (whatever the hell that might mean) and ways that such units might, if we understand things correctly, change and get distributed over time. Whether it will survive our acquisition of more and more data about ourselves, and the construction of well-grounded theories of psychology, or sociology, remains very much up in the air, and in fact it may be alternately asserted and denied many times over before we come to any sort of deep understanding of what it means, much less what it implies, about our minds, brains, and emotions.So, I'll take that as a vote for protoscience, then?

If it's "relatively plausible", right now, that ought to be good enough for such a vote. Unlike real pseudoscience, which is never plausible, from a scientific stand point.

Of course, in the event (which I think is unlikely) that memetics gets definitively disproven, you could then argue that anyone who still promotes it, is doing pseudoscience.
Since we can't tell if that is going to happen, yet, it is "proto", for now.

How about that?

[Walter Wayne]

I'll say neither, unless you take meme too literally. In science, like in everything else, invoking a metaphor can help steer ideas in a certain direction. A good thing while the idea is new, and you want to get lots of people exploring it, and a bad thing if it gets so instilled that other avenues of thought go unexplored.

As usual, choice of language can open up avenues of thought or close them down.

Walt

[Dark Jaguar]

As I understand it, all "memes" is, as an idea, is that some ideas are more likely to be spread than others and so they do. Why they are more likely (agrees with other existing widely held views or are compatible with our brain setup so they can be adapted or take advantage of weak points in design or encourage the survival of the "hosts" that hold the idea) is another matter entirely but that single aspect taken itself seems obviously true to me, in the same way "survival of the fittest" seems obviously true. Beyond that, that's where things get questionable really fast.

[Dave1001]

Once upon a time, there was a "Journal of Memetics" and I would have thought we could look at the results it has published in the expectation of finding such breakthrough results there. Well, as I mentioned somewhere before, I think that journal folded because its published data was seemingly not found to be of much real value.

Where can we read a good assessment of the material published in the journal of memetics, it's history, and how and why it folded.

[Schneibster]

Apparently, according to entries in the Wikipedia article on memetics, and I was able to confirm it by browsing a few of the last articles from the JoM, the idea is that memetics has reached the end of its "childhood," so to speak, when the initial ideas were laid down, and entered the period when it must be shown to be properly scientific, that is, conforming to Occam's Razor, and falsifiability, and so forth. If it passes this period, then it may become a science; if it does not, then it was nothing but a good idea (meme, heh).

The JoM is on-line, apparently; unlike many more mature journals, its content was available without paying a high price, and potentially for free; certainly it is all now available for free. This may have contributed to its demise; it is, after all, a rather thankless task to publish free literature.

[Schneibster]

So, I'll take that as a vote for protoscience, then?

If it's "relatively plausible", right now, that ought to be good enough for such a vote. Unlike real pseudoscience, which is never plausible, from a scientific stand point.

Of course, in the event (which I think is unlikely) that memetics gets definitively disproven, you could then argue that anyone who still promotes it, is doing pseudoscience.
Since we can't tell if that is going to happen, yet, it is "proto", for now.

How about that?Well, really, I think the question at this point (and my opinion has changed somewhat from last night) is whether it will survive; i.e., whether someone with vision and background will come along and pick the idea up, and put together material that will make it a science. Kind of like Newton did for physics. If that happens, then I feel it will become scientific; if it does not, it may linger around a while in the dustbin of good ideas that never quite went anywhere.

I think that a certain amount of its attractiveness (and it's clear to me from your thoughts that you see that aspect just as I do) is that it is such a neat explanation. It's not really any more refutable than the Theory of Evolution by Natural Selection- creatures that have characteristics that give them advantages in survival are more likely to mate, passing on those characteristics. Ideas that have characteristics that make them more likely to survive in our minds and be transmitted are more likely to be... well, transmitted, passing on those characteristics. I think the real problem is that proof of the mechanisms involved await a far more thorough understanding of our minds/brains so that we can see enough similar cognitive structures between two minds to see what sort of "hooks" a meme might use to get replicated.

[John Hewitt]

Where can we read a good assessment of the material published in the journal of memetics, it's history, and how and why it folded.

I believe the journal of memetics was an online journal and that its articles are generally accessible. Here are some relevant links.

Bad science - a discussion forum of which I am not currently a member

Meme Poll
http://www.badscience.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=1061
What is the evidence for the existence of memes - a very long thread.
http://www.badscience.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=1060&start=0

journal of memetics
http://cfpm.org/jom-emit/
Critique of memetics from that site
http://cfpm.org/jom-emit/2005/vol9/edmonds_b.html

[Dark Jaguar]

Well, really, I think the question at this point (and my opinion has changed somewhat from last night) is whether it will survive; i.e., whether someone with vision and background will come along and pick the idea up, and put together material that will make it a science. Kind of like Newton did for physics. If that happens, then I feel it will become scientific; if it does not, it may linger around a while in the dustbin of good ideas that never quite went anywhere.

I think that a certain amount of its attractiveness (and it's clear to me from your thoughts that you see that aspect just as I do) is that it is such a neat explanation. It's not really any more refutable than the Theory of Evolution by Natural Selection- creatures that have characteristics that give them advantages in survival are more likely to mate, passing on those characteristics. Ideas that have characteristics that make them more likely to survive in our minds and be transmitted are more likely to be... well, transmitted, passing on those characteristics. I think the real problem is that proof of the mechanisms involved await a far more thorough understanding of our minds/brains so that we can see enough similar cognitive structures between two minds to see what sort of "hooks" a meme might use to get replicated.

Well I suppose a start would be to not really think of it too much like a virus and just start thinking maybe about ideas that allow the vessels holding them to survive better, like how to make fire or hunt a mammoth, as opposed to ideas more likely to end with the death of the holder, such as how to make longjohns out of your own intestines for fun and profit. I think that we already have a good idea of certain situations where we can predict things obviously anyway, like if you live in Salem during an... unfortunate era... certain ideas are more likely to get you killed and thus less likely to be spread around as often as ideas that favor the church, which are much more likely to spread, and so on in a cycle. The real question is instead of just rephrasing something we already knew in a memetic way can we get some NEW information by using the memetic model? That's certainly something I'd be interested in.

[Schneibster]

Well I suppose a start would be to not really think of it too much like a virus and just start thinking maybe about ideas that allow the vessels holding them to survive better, like how to make fire or hunt a mammoth, as opposed to ideas more likely to end with the death of the holder, such as how to make longjohns out of your own intestines for fun and profit.I think that might have less to do with the ideas themselves, and I think the point of memetics is that the ideas are themselves replicators. Watch a fad grow and die; think pet rocks, think Fonzie. Aaaaayyyy.

Then think about people who craft memes, perhaps ones that already exist, perhaps new ones, and use them to get people to, oh, for example, believe that a magic box with dials and stuff can tell them how they're doing on improving their minds, or that drinking the kool-aid is a really good idea, or that the aliens are coming in the comet and if you kill yourself they'll pick up your soul. Whatever, you get the idea.

I think part of the interesting thing about such memes is not the effects they have on people, although those are pretty awful and someone oughta do something about them. I think the interesting thing is that they actually get transmitted. And they are accepted, by at least some people. And then there's the big religion memes; particularly the real fundies, who do stuff like believe jebus made the universe and it's really, really, really small, or that Satan makes televisions, or that women are evil and should cover their bodies so they don't make men helplessly lust after them. And if you think I'm kidding or exaggerating in any way whatsoever, let me tell you, friend, I ain't; most likely you know it. So, how come these ideas actually exist, not to mention how come so many people believe them? You got some other explanation than they're riding along with something that's really good at replicating? Because they sure are some pretty damn stupid ideas.

[drkitten]

So, how come these ideas actually exist, not to mention how come so many people believe them? You got some other explanation than they're riding along with something that's really good at replicating? Because they sure are some pretty damn stupid ideas.

Well, this is one of the less-examined assumptions of "meme" theory; the idea that the ideas -- memes -- themselves have properties including ones that affect their ability to replicate.

In some contexts, this makes intuitive sense. For example, I hear more jokes than I re-tell myself; the ones I retell are the ones that I find both memorable and funny. We can then talk about the intrinsic "funnyness" of a joke and draw elaborate graphs of perceived funnyness vs. probability of retelling, and so forth, and we get something that looks pretty much like a population genetics study.

On the other hand, there are also things that are replicated, not because of intrinsic properties, but because of extrinsic ones. There are a lot of pyramids scattered all over Egypt, not because the pyramid was an inherently pleasing shape that lots of people wanted to build, but because there was this damn great overseer with a whip telling you to make a pyramid. (Perhaps not, depending upon which historical theory you buy.) There are a lot of theories about why something might be widespread that don't hinge on "replicability" as a theory or property.

The strength of "mimetics" is that it forces us to look at ideas-as-replicators and figure out what properties they themselves have to encourage or discourage replication., But at the same time, that's a weakness of mimetics, precisely because it encourages -- forces -- us to think about replication as a quality of the ideas, and not simply as a consequence of a persistant environment.

[Dark Jaguar]

I think that might have less to do with the ideas themselves, and I think the point of memetics is that the ideas are themselves replicators. Watch a fad grow and die; think pet rocks, think Fonzie. Aaaaayyyy.

Then think about people who craft memes, perhaps ones that already exist, perhaps new ones, and use them to get people to, oh, for example, believe that a magic box with dials and stuff can tell them how they're doing on improving their minds, or that drinking the kool-aid is a really good idea, or that the aliens are coming in the comet and if you kill yourself they'll pick up your soul. Whatever, you get the idea.

I think part of the interesting thing about such memes is not the effects they have on people, although those are pretty awful and someone oughta do something about them. I think the interesting thing is that they actually get transmitted. And they are accepted, by at least some people. And then there's the big religion memes; particularly the real fundies, who do stuff like believe jebus made the universe and it's really, really, really small, or that Satan makes televisions, or that women are evil and should cover their bodies so they don't make men helplessly lust after them. And if you think I'm kidding or exaggerating in any way whatsoever, let me tell you, friend, I ain't; most likely you know it. So, how come these ideas actually exist, not to mention how come so many people believe them? You got some other explanation than they're riding along with something that's really good at replicating? Because they sure are some pretty damn stupid ideas.

Well even genes don't replicate themselves so much as require a cell, a body, to DO the replicating for them, they just design how that process goes about. A single gene on it's own can't replicate for jack. I'm not so sure the idea actually is that a meme is "self replicating" so much as it is replicated by certain systems.

[drkitten]

Well even genes don't replicate themselves so much as require a cell, a body, to DO the replicating for them, they just design how that process goes about. A single gene on it's own can't replicate for jack. I'm not so sure the idea actually is that a meme is "self replicating" so much as it is replicated by certain systems.

But if you take this approach, then "memetics" loses all content and drops back from protoscience to pseudoscience. If you think that mimetics is simply the study of "things that replicate," including hailstones and forest fires, then there's no content to the meme=gene analogy.

We know of a number of things that replicate without anything gene-like involved. Fires are a good example. DIfferent fires will have different properties -- they can be hotter or colder, smokier or less smoky, steady or flickering, and differently coloured. However, these aren't heritable properties, but properties of the burning substrate. This is one reason that no one in their senses would study "the evolution of fire."

If you take the analogy of memes to genes seriously, you have to believe that the properties of the memes themselves are influential in their reproduction; they're not just slaves to the environment in which they reproduce. Without this, "memetics" is empty.

So the key unasked question is whether the reproduction of ideas is more like the reproduction of cells and genes, or the reproduction of fire. Dawkins' suggestion, way back in Selfish Gene is that they are more like genes. But that's a suggestion and a hypothesis, not a reasoned conclusion.

[Schneibster]

drkitten, have you read any of the books on memetics, particularly The Meme Machine by Susan Blackwood? She develops the case for memes farther than Dawkins did, although I'm not sure I'm comfortable saying she proves it.

I think there is more work to do. I think there are hints in the existence of both computer viruses and biological viruses, but I think memes are more like bacteria or even multicellular organisms than they are like viruses; and I think computer programs might be a better analogy than computer viruses. I think there are probably things like computer viruses in peoples' minds, but I'm not sure how I'd differentiate those things from "memes," or even if I'd differentiate them. I suspect such things have to do with why these stupid things are as successful as they are. I also suspect that memes are probably more likely to be easily identified and classified as simple ideas rather than the complex ideas that have built our societies.

Finally, I frankly speculate that the situation with memes is very much like the situation with genes. What precisely is a gene? The biochemical description is that it is the code for a protein or non-coding RNA molecule, along with its regulators; however, genes may overlap one another, so one can't point to a particular locus along a particular chromosome and say, "That's the gene for..." and name either some particular protein or RNA molecule, or even some particular phenotypical characteristic uniquely, because multiple molecules and/or characteristics might be partly coded for by the same sequence. For Wilhelm Johanssen, a gene was "that which directed" the formation of some particular phenotypical characteristic; and that is a very, very abstract idea from the point of view of molecular biology. I speculate that the same obtains with memes; when we are done figuring out what's underneath, its "units" will have little directly to do with the characteristics of most memes.

[John Hewitt]

drkitten, have you read any of the books on memetics, particularly The Meme Machine by Susan Blackwood? She develops the case for memes farther than Dawkins did, although I'm not sure I'm comfortable saying she proves it.

I think there is more work to do. I think there are hints in the existence of both computer viruses and biological viruses, but I think memes are more like bacteria or even multicellular organisms than they are like viruses; and I think computer programs might be a better analogy than computer viruses. I think there are probably things like computer viruses in peoples' minds, but I'm not sure how I'd differentiate those things from "memes," or even if I'd differentiate them. I suspect such things have to do with why these stupid things are as successful as they are. I also suspect that memes are probably more likely to be easily identified and classified as simple ideas rather than the complex ideas that have built our societies.

Finally, I frankly speculate that the situation with memes is very much like the situation with genes. What precisely is a gene? The biochemical description is that it is the code for a protein or non-coding RNA molecule, along with its regulators; however, genes may overlap one another, so one can't point to a particular locus along a particular chromosome and say, "That's the gene for..." and name either some particular protein or RNA molecule, or even some particular phenotypical characteristic uniquely, because multiple molecules and/or characteristics might be partly coded for by the same sequence. For Wilhelm Johanssen, a gene was "that which directed" the formation of some particular phenotypical characteristic; and that is a very, very abstract idea from the point of view of molecular biology. I speculate that the same obtains with memes; when we are done figuring out what's underneath, its "units" will have little directly to do with the characteristics of most memes.

Actually, Schneibster, there is no generally usable and agreed definition of the word "gene," and you do indicate some of the problems.

(I do give a bioepistemic definition of gene, namely
"Genes are subsets of the data set defined by the nucleotide sequence of DNA. To qualify as a gene, the data subset must be so formatted that it can be interpreted by an organism into a distinct biochemical activity. An important implication of this definition is that, because biochemical activities are distinct and chemically separable from other such activities, genes may become manifest as distinct and distinguishable, biological phenotypes. (I would like to refine this definition to maximise its generality and would like to hear any critiques.)")

Whatever precise deifnition is eventually accepted, most people mean the same thing when the say the word, "gene."

Meme, is rather different. There seem to be a great many discussions which are more about the definition of meme, rather than any application of that meaning. I would be interested in any defintion, provided it was capable of being used in serious, predictive theory construction.

[Schneibster]

But see, JH, there's a problem here. We DO understand molecular biology, we DO understand the central paradigm of DNA, and we DO know how sequences are expressed and proteins produced, and how production is inhibited or promoted to control the expression. And while we don't yet understand precisely how these expressions, inhibitions, proteins, and non-coding RNA sequences PRECISELY specify EVERY phenotype, we know FOR CERTAIN that they do; and we can in fact identify quite a few phenotypes' precise loci (although most of them require multiple different proteins, expressions, inhibitions, non-conding RNA sequences, and/or promotions). No question about it. So when you make arguments against genes because they are not precisely quantifiable, you are basically ignoring the facts in order to concentrate on a weakness in an old theory that's meaningless except as a paradigm in the first place.

Please don't try to claim that I am giving you ammunition against evilution- nothing could be further from the case. In my carefully considered and deeply researched opinion, no one can deny evolution who does not misunderstand, obfuscate, or ignore evidence.

And I have the same complaint about people who label memetics as pseudo-science because we cannot precisely quantify a meme- albeit, I admit, with considerably less underpinning in terms of direct evidence of and understanding of the underlying mechanisms. Nevertheless, I believe those mechanisms are present, however little we may understand them yet, though this opinion is CONSIDERABLY less well-supported than genetics, molecular biology, and evolution.

[John Hewitt]

But see, JH, there's a problem here. We DO understand molecular biology, we DO understand the central paradigm of DNA, and we DO know how sequences are expressed and proteins produced, and how production is inhibited or promoted to control the expression. And while we don't yet understand precisely how these expressions, inhibitions, proteins, and non-coding RNA sequences PRECISELY specify EVERY phenotype, we know FOR CERTAIN that they do; and we can in fact identify quite a few phenotypes' precise loci (although most of them require multiple different proteins, expressions, inhibitions, non-conding RNA sequences, and/or promotions). No question about it. So when you make arguments against genes because they are not precisely quantifiable, you are basically ignoring the facts in order to concentrate on a weakness in an old theory that's meaningless except as a paradigm in the first place.

<snip>

And I have the same complaint about people who label memetics as pseudo-science because we cannot precisely quantify a meme- albeit, I admit, with considerably less underpinning in terms of direct evidence of and understanding of the underlying mechanisms. Nevertheless, I believe those mechanisms are present, however little we may understand them yet, though this opinion is CONSIDERABLY less well-supported than genetics, molecular biology, and evolution.

Yes, I agree with you that we understand a lot of molecular biology and it is clear that organisms bear an evolutionary relatedness to one another and, I think, have arisen from one another by an evolutionary process. I have no problem with that of with evolution as a matter of fact. I do have a problem with the construction of modern evolutionary theory, the theory that supposedly describes that fact, which I find well-nigh indefensible.

Genes, we are told, are the fundamental basis for evolution. Actually, genes are not even definable from within molecular biology and, when used as a foundation for evolutionary theory, they produce a theory that is grossly inconsistent with other fields of science.

You are trying to understand social evolution by introducing a meme, as analogous to a gene, and then saying that, of course, a meme is not really like a gene at all. Presumably, when you say "UP" you might really mean "DOWN." Sorry, I just thing that's nonsense.

The correct way to construct a general form of evolutionary theory is to seek measurable attributes, characteristics and processes that are necessarily present in ALL forms of evolution and construct the theory around them. Bioepistemic evolution argues that data is necessarily present in all forms of evolution and that evolutionary theory should be built around data and the processes to which it is necessarily subject.

Social data is formatted differently from genetic data and is subject to different interpretative and selective processes. I argue that a theory of social evolution should investigate the format of social data and the interpretative and selective processes to which that data is subject. I think it is completely meaningless to simply declare, as memetics effectively does, that the formatting of social data must be like that of a gene. That is patently not so.

[Dave1001]

But at the same time, that's a weakness of mimetics, precisely because it encourages -- forces -- us to think about replication as a quality of the ideas, and not simply as a consequence of a persistant environment.

I don't see why mimetics can't do both, just like genetics/evolutionary biology does for analyzing how certain genes become widespread.

[Dave1001]

But if you take this approach, then "memetics" loses all content and drops back from protoscience to pseudoscience. If you think that mimetics is simply the study of "things that replicate," including hailstones and forest fires, then there's no content to the meme=gene analogy.

We know of a number of things that replicate without anything gene-like involved. Fires are a good example. DIfferent fires will have different properties -- they can be hotter or colder, smokier or less smoky, steady or flickering, and differently coloured. However, these aren't heritable properties, but properties of the burning substrate. This is one reason that no one in their senses would study "the evolution of fire."

If you take the analogy of memes to genes seriously, you have to believe that the properties of the memes themselves are influential in their reproduction; they're not just slaves to the environment in which they reproduce. Without this, "memetics" is empty.

So the key unasked question is whether the reproduction of ideas is more like the reproduction of cells and genes, or the reproduction of fire. Dawkins' suggestion, way back in Selfish Gene is that they are more like genes. But that's a suggestion and a hypothesis, not a reasoned conclusion.

I'm no expert on the subject, but I'd be suprised if people don't study how forest fires replicate (and persist) phenomenologically. I'm not sure the analogy between fire and genes is entirely empty: genes like fire, may arise spontaneously in the right environments, and may be extinguished when they exhaust the resources of their environment and it changes. It may be a bit of an anthropic conceit to think there isn't a parallel there. It can be good science to study how genes, fire, and memes/ideas all propagate. Of course, I'm not suggesting that fires self-replicate in a manner identical to genes, it seems from what I've read that it's often a more complex process than "burn baby burn". I'm curious to the degree forest fires can persist and even self-regulate (if the answer is "they can't self-regulate at all, Id like to know that too.:p ) in the matter of other apparently non-conscious, apparently "unorganized" phenomena like tornados and markets.


I do think memes aren't "things that replicate" but rather "ideas that replicate". I would make a dna/protein analogy for memes vs. environmental results. Genes express proteins in my understanding, similarly ideas presumably located in our brains may be expressed in the external environment as speech, actions, social formations, and built structures.

Overall this seems like a valuable area to subject to rigorous scrutiny, and I hope it is.

[drkitten]

I'm no expert on the subject, but I'd be suprised if people don't study how forest fires replicate (and persist) phenomenologically. I'm not sure the analogy between fire and genes is entirely empty: genes like fire, may arise spontaneously in the right environments, and may be extinguished when they exhaust the resources of their environment and it changes.

They also attract all other object in the universe with a force proportional to the product of their masses and inversely proportional to the square of the distance between them. Genetics isn't chemistry and it isn't physics.

Here's an example of what I'm talking about:

Suppose that I take a set of a hundred identical candles. I will light twenty-five of those candles from matches. I will light twenty-five of those candles from cigarette lighters. I will then light twenty-five candles -- one each -- from each of the twenty-five match-lit candles, and twenty-five from the lighter-lit candle.

Is there a test that can be performed on the second generation candles to determine whether the parent candle was lit from a match or not?

I submit that there isn't -- that this would qualify as supernatural and win Randi's million if it could be done. The reason, of course, is that fires reproduce, but do not inhereit.

Conversely, if I did the same thing with two bacterial cultures -- say I took two different bacteria, and bred several generations from each founding sample in identical environments -- I would have no problem distinguishing their g'g'g'g'g'g-great-grand-bacteria. Because bacteria not only reproduce, they inherit.

Genetics is the study of inheritable reproduction in biological organisms. That's why people don't study "the genetics of birth order" (If your parents were both first-born, are you more likely to be first-born?), since birth order isn't inheritable. There are no properties of fire that are inheritable.

I would make a dna/protein analogy for memes vs. environmental results.

Yup. And that's what makes it pseudoscience. If all you have is an analogy, you're not doing science, but sympathetic magic.

[Halden]

Memetics is an interesting allegory for the propagation of ideas, cultures etc. but I do not know that there is enough data or even the potential to test for such data to support Memetics as a solid science. I enjoy the intellectual exercise of studying and discussing it but I am unsure that it can ever move beyond a hypothesis and hence always be a protoscience why great potential to be abused by pseudoscientists.

[Dark Jaguar]

Well certainly this is food for thought. I have to say that yes, my ideas probably just turn memetics into a bankrupt exercise in semantics, if it isn't already that.

I could take it or leave it at this point, but I can see the parallels in computer software and even printing press. At the very least, it's an interesting way of looking at it, even if it in and of itself doesn't really reveal anything new. I do find it interesting to think of a local group of people as an "environment" with an existing collection of thoughts. As new thoughts are introduced or produced, whether they persist or not largely depends on the existing environment. An environment of christians is very unlikely to sustain ideas such as "there is no god" or "the bible is merely a historical document" and those will be put out. Those that are a little more well adapted such as "not ALL of the bible should be taken literally" are more likely to survive, perhaps with some mutation. It is an interesting way to see it at least...

But what happens if you get an environment where everyone just accepts every single idea as equally valid, and nothing is weeded out or modified for the goal of perfect acceptance? All ideas being preserved in all their triteness, an "it's not my fault, it's not your fault" group, like the intertubes? I think that in this case any memetic parallel to evolution will stagnate and stop completely. Maybe this is the sort of falsifiable prediction that memetics can provide?

[Wowbagger]

Time for me to chime in, a little bit.

Genes, we are told, are the fundamental basis for evolution. Actually, genes are not even definable from within molecular biology and, when used as a foundation for evolutionary theory, they produce a theory that is grossly inconsistent with other fields of science.I think you are suffering, a little, from the Tyranny of a Discontinuous Mind (a term Dawkins uses to describe our difficulty to conceptualize non-discrete categories). Genes are not straight-forward separable from each other, and into phenotypic effects, because nature is not obligated to make things easy for us to delineate. But, that does not mean that genes, as a model for bits of material that express phenotypic effects, that are subject to selection pressures*, can not work within science. As such a model, genes work tremendously better than anything previous.

Read more closely to what Schneibster, had said (emphasis mine):
We DO understand molecular biology, we DO understand the central paradigm of DNA, and we DO know how sequences are expressed and proteins produced, and how production is inhibited or promoted to control the expression. And while we don't yet understand precisely how these expressions, inhibitions, proteins, and non-coding RNA sequences PRECISELY specify EVERY phenotype, we know FOR CERTAIN that they do; and we can in fact identify quite a few phenotypes' precise loci (although most of them require multiple different proteins, expressions, inhibitions, non-conding RNA sequences, and/or promotions).


(*germ-line more so than somatic, of course)

You are trying to understand social evolution by introducing a meme, as analogous to a gene, and then saying that, of course, a meme is not really like a gene at all. Presumably, when you say "UP" you might really mean "DOWN." Sorry, I just thing that's nonsense. Okay, now would be an excellent time to write about how genes and memes are fundamentally similar to each other, and how they differ in their environment:

Genes and Memes are both basic replicators. For scientific purposes, Replicators can be called such, if they exhibit the following properties** very well:

Longevity: The longevity of a single copy is not as important as the longevity of any copy of that "information". A single instance of a gene may die, but it has the ability to live on, as new copies in offspring. A single instance of a meme may "die" (if a specific person dies, or merely forgets the idea), but the idea it conveys has some ability to live on, as new copies in other people.

Fecundity: The ability to reproduce. Some specific items may reproduce more effectively than others, because they are subject to selection pressures. Genes that are more successful in passing themselves on, have higher fecundity. This usually means they are beneficial to the overall survival of the host, but not always.
Memes have the ability to reproduce, by getting "absorbed" into people's minds. (Humans are particularly susceptible to these replicators, because of our pliable brain structure.) Some are more successful than others, and, like genes, this success is not always to the overall benefit of the host. They copy well, because they copy well.

Copy-Fidelity: The ability to be copied with minimal, if any, errors. Genes clearly have an advantage, here, because they are reliant on a physical structure. Memes are more prone to errors, because they have no physical presence. Memes "sacrifice" physical presence for more efficient fecundity. But, even so, it is possible that the evolution of social ideas can be tracked, and broken down into individual memes.


When someone says memes are analogous to genes, they mean both can be demonstrated to exhibit these properties. Clearly, though, there are differences in their environment and how they replicate.

(** personal note: in my thread for listing non-living replicators (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?t=69697), the "definition" of a replicator is much looser. For the purposes of that thread, Crystals are considered replicators, though in the above definition, they clearly would not be.)

The differences, to reiterate, stem from the fact that genes have physical material to work off of, and memes do not. Genes are passed on through germ-line transmission, and that means only to offspring of the parent(s). Memes transmit more effectively, jumping to any brain that will absorb them, no matter their physical relationship (although their cultural upbringing could have an impact on whether they will absorb any given meme or not).

Since memes can propagate with more freedom than genes, it is going to be more difficult specifying and measuring each individual one, according to their "phenotypic" effects on the person.
But, that does not mean the endeavor is impossible. Just like genes, we are starting to identify basic trends in social evolution, in which the model of memes is at least some-what useful.
This is unlike pseudoscience, which is counterproductive in nature.

The correct way to construct a general form of evolutionary theory is to seek measurable attributes, characteristics and processes that are necessarily present in ALL forms of evolution and construct the theory around them. Bioepistemic evolution argues that data is necessarily present in all forms of evolution and that evolutionary theory should be built around data and the processes to which it is necessarily subject.
The only comment I want to add here, is only somewhat relevant, but important to communicate:

It is possible that, like physical evolution, social evolution can work at different levels of units. Physically, we can map evolution at the species, family, individual life-form, cell, and ultimately gene. Perhaps memes can be identified at certain levels, as well: world-level, country or national level, community level, circle-of-friends-and-family level, etc. And, some levels at which they could overlap those: age group, religion, etc.

The point of bringing this up, here, is to communicate the idea that perhaps some of the conflicting views about what separates one meme from another could come from some people measuring the population at different levels.

The theory of memes was constructed out of the recognition that social ideas evolve, and that certain specific ideas seem to permeate people, at different levels of observation.

Social data is formatted differently from genetic data and is subject to different interpretative and selective processes. I argue that a theory of social evolution should investigate the format of social data and the interpretative and selective processes to which that data is subject. I think it is completely meaningless to simply declare, as memetics effectively does, that the formatting of social data must be like that of a gene. That is patently not so. Actually, I think your ideas of meme theory is a little distorted. Memetics already tries to model social data to the selective processes to which it is subject. Why would it be developed otherwise?

No one is saying memes MUST be like a gene, in ALL respects: declaring that is almost straw-man like: Scientists already understand memes are not like genes. However, they do share quite a bit in common, and not just at a superficial level. Check out those three properties I listed above, again, if you must.

So, with that, I continue to argue that memes, at worst, can still be classified as a protoscience.

[articulett]

It's not science or pseudoscience--it's a language tool--a concept for understanding. It's just a way of talking about what makes an idea get passed on. Systems evolve from the bottom up--be it planets, solar systems, humans, cities, technology, forums, languages, currency systems, libraries (and/or they die out)--Meme is just a way to refer to the why and how they do so.

Something as small as an atom combined with something as simple as an idea can evolve to become the atomic bomb (complexity). The meme would be the information part of the equation. (Atomic theory is a meme...we harness the info. we gather from this meme for Chemistry classes, nanotechnology, atomic energy, etc.

The only people who seem to want to define it as pseudoscience or who "don't believe there is such a thing" seem to be those who have a vested interested in not accepting evolution. It's an easy concept--I teach it to high schoolers. This classification thing seems like a slam to Richard Dawkins by intelligent designers who hate him for his atheism and his dismissal of their intelligent designer.

It's a useful term--like bytes. The meme concept is a meme itself. It spreads because it's useful. But useful concepts don't always spread and useless ideas can spread if they have some other trick (like promising eternal rewards or threatening eternal damnation or being catchy such as a mneumonic rhyme "I before e, except after c...")

[articulett]

I don't believe in "gerunds"...please give me some statistical data and studies to show me that they exist and what they can do. I say they are pseudoscience.
:) That's how John Hewitt sounds to me. Prove to me this spherical earth theory is true--let me see the statistical data that prove it--and how is it useful...it's such an unnecessary concept. If you can answer those questions, John--you will have probably reach similar answers to those we would give to you.

[articulett]

[quote=Wowbagger; 2161052]
I think you gave slightly more intelligent criticism on my other Replicator thread.
[/group]
This is patronizing.


Dawkins antipathy toward group selection is a good example of how poor his work is. There is no doubt in my mind that group selection is valid in humans and I am happy to see that E.O. Wilson has come to appreciate that.


Absolutely, lets hear some arguments that can hope to address observable facts.

Dawkins doesn't have antipathy toward group selection--it's just that religionists use it to imply mystical things--like morality and empathy--even though we know that social groups have survival advantages in the species that have them--and such groups develop things that look an awful lot like reciprocity--giving up one's life for other group members...group caring of the young--the basics of morality--all selected for in the genes (because the entities that have these cooperative genes have a vector that is more likely to live and procreate than it's less cooperative competetors.) It explains group selection in dog packs too. It's your bias towards your preferred delusion that keeps you from being able to understand this and incorrectly attribute traits to Dawkins (antipathy) that seem more applicable to yourself.

Did you watch the Beyond Belief tapes at www.edge.org by chance?

[Dark Jaguar]

You know I'd always thought that genes would have to be more complicated than just "this does exactly that". I'd think there would have to be various modules built up, for example a basic translation module to make sense of a lot of the instructions, without which the rest would be garbage. Of course, I'm using my programming experience as analogy when I say this, and as such I may be way off, as genes are not completely analogous to programming at all.

[articulett]

Does the B.F. Skinner stuff look at how ideas spread, decline, and modify in populations over time? Also how ideas "compete" with each other in the medium of human brains (for example attaching an idea such as "Jesus is God and died and was reborn" or "Muhammed was Allah's propheit" to commands to proselytize and be fruitful and multiply)?

Actually Dennet has a lot of Data--but the meme is pretty easy to understand...it's similar to Santa or chain letters; regimes use it too. -- (and it helps to have people who are told that faith and obedience are good while they are trusting children):

Promise rewards for belief and the spreading of the belief; threaten the lack of belief. Tell believers it's arrogant or unpatriotic to ask questions (or simply ignore questions) and presto!--an evolving memeplex.

Religions tend to have added memes for extra good spreading power.
Humans ask why--but they make up answers and accept most any answer proffered. Really. (see Cialdini's book Influence). Plus, once they believe something, they dismiss or ignore the evidence that negates their belief and readily notice all evidence that seems to support their belief. So here are some memes to fortify various religions (and predicts which religions evolve into assorted sects and which ones die out...obviously the ones that require castration die out. So do the ones that promote mass suicide...the memes lose their their vectors of replication.

Are you following? It's pretty easy. We don't even need to plug in data yet, as I think the concepts are self evident.

Some of the memes of successful religious sects include the following.

Make up a horrifically terrifying problem--like an eternal soul that can suffer damnation; offer the key to solve the problem and expect gratitude, humility.
Tell people they are arrogant if they question "god" (code word for leader of the cult) and that it's noble to have the "gift" of faith. Promise everlasting rewards of unimaginable bliss for "belief". Test that belief on occasion to reinforce it. Reward those who are most obedient with access to some powers, added sexual opportunities, a financial boost, favors, etc. Tell group members that they are chosen--more moral, right, and good than those who don't believe. Call doubters "doubting Thomas" or defectors or apostates or devils or traitors. Tell group memebers you must fight the evil others before they ruin your salvation or cause your faith to waiver. Threaten people who ask questions with "biting from the tree of knowledge" stories...or pandora's box stories (aim your stories at the women--they tend to be more credulous and it's easier to induce unwarranted guilt in them). Tell group members that they are to go forth and multiply...that god won't give them more than they can handle...that all they give up for their beliefs will be rewarded tenfold in the afterlife (or with 72 virgins)...tell them that birth control and abortion is bad--that life is precious (except for those evil others)--Tell them that getting others to believe brings extra goodies in this life and the next. Tell them that god wants them to convert others--it's part of their "testing".

Stuff like that. There are a lot of studies on cults and groupthink and how authority can make good people do bad things (google Zimbardo or Ron Jones "the wave"). I think it's all pretty easy to understand; you seem intelligent.

We call the above memes--they are mental constructs that people are encouraged to spread. Lots of memes spread because they are useful to humans. If you still can't comprehend the use and meaning of the word or doubt that they exist (a meaningless phrase) you may be meme infected. Suspect indoctrination in youth when you were a trusting child--ill equipped to separate belief from facts and never having learned how to distinguish between the two. Parents can't help but spread it--they're meme infected; they don't want their beloved children to suffer eternally.

[John Hewitt]

I think you are suffering, a little, from the Tyranny of a Discontinuous Mind (a term Dawkins uses to describe our difficulty to conceptualize non-discrete categories). Genes are not straight-forward separable from each other, and into phenotypic effects, because nature is not obligated to make things easy for us to delineate.
No, I want operational meanings, not just babbling. Genes arise from breeding experiments and, in most cases, operationally correlate with molecular biology. Memes have no operational meaning that I am aware of. I am asking you to provide one.

Okay, now would be an excellent time to write about how genes and memes are fundamentally similar to each other, and how they differ in their environment:

No, now would be a good time to do what I asked. Define the word meme, either from physics and chemistry or from operational activities.


Genes and Memes are both basic replicators. For scientific purposes, Replicators can be called such, if they exhibit the following properties** very well:

Longevity: The longevity of a single copy is not as important as the longevity of any copy of that "information". A single instance of a gene may die, but it has the ability to live on, as new copies in offspring. A single instance of a meme may "die" (if a specific person dies, or merely forgets the idea), but the idea it conveys has some ability to live on, as new copies in other people.

Fecundity: The ability to reproduce. Some specific items may reproduce more effectively than others, because they are subject to selection pressures. Genes that are more successful in passing themselves on, have higher fecundity. This usually means they are beneficial to the overall survival of the host, but not always.
Memes have the ability to reproduce, by getting "absorbed" into people's minds. (Humans are particularly susceptible to these replicators, because of our pliable brain structure.) Some are more successful than others, and, like genes, this success is not always to the overall benefit of the host. They copy well, because they copy well.

Copy-Fidelity: The ability to be copied with minimal, if any, errors. Genes clearly have an advantage, here, because they are reliant on a physical structure. Memes are more prone to errors, because they have no physical presence. Memes "sacrifice" physical presence for more efficient fecundity. But, even so, it is possible that the evolution of social ideas can be tracked, and broken down into individual memes.


When someone says memes are analogous to genes, they mean both can be demonstrated to exhibit these properties. Clearly, though, there are differences in their environment and how they replicate.

(** personal note: in my thread for listing non-living replicators (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?t=69697), the "definition" of a replicator is much looser. For the purposes of that thread, Crystals are considered replicators, though in the above definition, they clearly would not be.)

The differences, to reiterate, stem from the fact that genes have physical material to work off of, and memes do not. Genes are passed on through germ-line transmission, and that means only to offspring of the parent(s). Memes transmit more effectively, jumping to any brain that will absorb them, no matter their physical relationship (although their cultural upbringing could have an impact on whether they will absorb any given meme or not).

Since memes can propagate with more freedom than genes, it is going to be more difficult specifying and measuring each individual one, according to their "phenotypic" effects on the person.
But, that does not mean the endeavor is impossible. Just like genes, we are starting to identify basic trends in social evolution, in which the model of memes is at least some-what useful.
This is unlike pseudoscience, which is counterproductive in nature.


The only comment I want to add here, is only somewhat relevant, but important to communicate:

It is possible that, like physical evolution, social evolution can work at different levels of units. Physically, we can map evolution at the species, family, individual life-form, cell, and ultimately gene. Perhaps memes can be identified at certain levels, as well: world-level, country or national level, community level, circle-of-friends-and-family level, etc. And, some levels at which they could overlap those: age group, religion, etc.

The point of bringing this up, here, is to communicate the idea that perhaps some of the conflicting views about what separates one meme from another could come from some people measuring the population at different levels.

The theory of memes was constructed out of the recognition that social ideas evolve, and that certain specific ideas seem to permeate people, at different levels of observation.

Actually, I think your ideas of meme theory is a little distorted. Memetics already tries to model social data to the selective processes to which it is subject. Why would it be developed otherwise?

No one is saying memes MUST be like a gene, in ALL respects: declaring that is almost straw-man like: Scientists already understand memes are not like genes. However, they do share quite a bit in common, and not just at a superficial level. Check out those three properties I listed above, again, if you must.

So, with that, I continue to argue that memes, at worst, can still be classified as a protoscience.
All of which is your meaning today and has no operational applicability. Your friend has some other meaning and tomorrow you will swap things around yet again.

[John Hewitt]

Actually Dennet has a lot of Data--but the meme is pretty easy to understand...it's similar to Santa or chain letters; regimes use it too. -- (and it helps to have people who are told that faith and obedience are good while they are trusting children):

Dennet has data about what? The operational useability of memetics?

Promise rewards for belief and the spreading of the belief; threaten the lack of belief. Tell believers it's arrogant or unpatriotic to ask questions (or simply ignore questions) and presto!--an evolving memeplex.

Religions tend to have added memes for extra good spreading power.
Humans ask why--but they make up answers and accept most any answer proffered. Really. (see Cialdini's book Influence). Plus, once they believe something, they dismiss or ignore the evidence that negates their belief and readily notice all evidence that seems to support their belief. So here are some memes to fortify various religions (and predicts which religions evolve into assorted sects and which ones die out...obviously the ones that require castration die out. So do the ones that promote mass suicide...the memes lose their their vectors of replication.

Are you following? It's pretty easy.
No, weeping. Easy is not the word your looking for - cheap, empty of content. These do much better.

We don't even need to plug in data yet, as I think the concepts are self evident.
Or indeed ever; why, after all, would such self-evident concepts ever need observational data to support them? I shall refrain from answering the rest of your comments.

[John Hewitt]

[quote=John Hewitt;2162125]

Dawkins doesn't have antipathy toward group selection

Dawkins is quoted in this way about Sloan Wilson and group selection
Plenty of respected people still disagree with him, Oxford's famous evolutionist Richard Dawkins not least among them. Dawkins has denounced Wilson's ideas on group selection as "sheer, wanton, head-in-the-bag perversity."

http://www.binghamton.edu/inside/January-February/JAN-23-97/Wilson.htm

"sheer, wanton, head-in-the-bag perversity" - seems like antipathy toward group selection to me. And keep in mind that this is the man who thinks that genes "replicate" - even though they don't.

[Wowbagger]

No, I want operational meanings, not just babbling. Genes arise from breeding experiments and, in most cases, operationally correlate with molecular biology. Memes have no operational meaning that I am aware of. I am asking you to provide one. Babbling?! What is wrong with "a unit of cultural information, that can pass from one mind to another"?

No, now would be a good time to do what I asked. Define the word meme, either from physics and chemistry or from operational activities. Memes are not physical things. The structure of a meme in one brain may be different for the same meme in a different brain. It is not the brain structure that transfers, just the idea that the brain holds. How can you expect to define a meme within physics or chemistry?

Perhaps it was not the Tyranny of Discontinuous Mind you suffer from, after all. Perhaps it is over zealousness of materiality.

All of which is your meaning today and has no operational applicability. Oh, well then what alternative would you apply for the spread and evolution of religion?

Your friend has some other meaning and tomorrow you will swap things around yet again.Which "friend"? Schneibster? I am not responsible for what he says. But, the quote I copied from him, in my last post, happens to be correct about genes. I was going to say something similar to that quote, myself, but decided his wording was good enough.

Dennet has data about what? The operational useability of memetics? In fact, he makes use of memes to help unravel how consciousness works, at least to the extent of a plausible theory. Read his book "Consciousness Explained" for details on his "Multiple Drafts" theory of consciousness.
Note that this is not a very easy book to digest: you may have to read it twice, to fully grasp the concepts, like I did.

why, after all, would such self-evident concepts ever need observational data to support them? In general, one of the roles of science is to investigate beyond intuition. Someone may have a gut, 'self-evident' feeling about something, which may or may not turn out to be true, upon further investigation.

The behavior of Memes may seem self evident, but the next question is, do they hold up to further scrutiny? Well, so far, the model has been demonstrated to show new insight into various aspects of culture, such as religion, and the spread of catchy tunes and phrases, and more practical ideas, such as the building of bridges or vehicles.
But, perhaps memetics is not a hard science, yet. Perhaps it is slowly emerging from its existence as a protoscience.

You have yet to demonstrate how it is counter-productive to science, and so you also have yet to show us it is junk science.



Dawkins is quoted in this way about Sloan Wilson and group selection

http://www.binghamton.edu/inside/January-February/JAN-23-97/Wilson.htm

"sheer, wanton, head-in-the-bag perversity" - seems like antipathy toward group selection to me. And keep in mind that this is the man who thinks that genes "replicate" - even though they don't.

As far as I can remember, I think it is in "The Ancestor's Tale", that Dawkins retracts some of that antipathy, by admitting the model of group-selection has value when investigating life forms at the group level. Sorry I can not offer a quote and page number at this time. Give me a couple of more hours, and I will probably find the reference.

And, how do you know genes do not replicate? Isn't the fact that they replicate proof enough that they replicate? Are you not the product of replication of genes from your parents?

[John Hewitt]

Babbling?! What is wrong with "a unit of cultural information, (as a definition of meme) that can pass from one mind to another"?
It is not a definition with operational meaning or which is derived from fundamental principles. You can just substitute the term idea concept or whatever.


How can you expect to define a meme within physics or chemistry?
I wouldn't but I would derive evolutionary theory from data which can be defined in terms of statistical mechanics - physics.

Oh, well then what alternative would you apply for the spread and evolution of religion? I would talk about social evolution and the data set that is shared as social knowledge by different members of the same group.

Which "friend"? It was a non-specific friend. I am making the point that the meaning of the term meme can easily vary from person to person.

As far as I can remember, I think it is in "The Ancestor's Tale", that Dawkins retracts some of that antipathy, by admitting the model of group-selection has value when investigating life forms at the group level. Sorry I can not offer a quote and page number at this time. Give me a couple of more hours, and I will probably find the reference.

It would be useful but, in bioepistemic terms, group selection is more than just a model. Social data, shared within a group is shared between members of that group. Its exitence is ignored by conventional genetic proofs that group selection can't be right.


And, how do you know genes do not replicate? Isn't the fact that they replicate proof enough that they replicate? Are you not the product of replication of genes from your parents?

Genes do not replicate themselves, any more than proteins do. Genes are copied by the cell - this is just standard cell biology. The idea of genes as replicators is just empty hypothesis - it is very influential but has no observational support. My parents' cells copied the genes that made me, they did not copy themselves.

[Wowbagger]

It is not a definition with operational meaning or which is derived from fundamental principles. You can just substitute the term idea concept or whatever. Ah, so perhaps I should expand my definition a little: "a unit of cultural information, that can pass from one mind to another, that demonstrates properties of longevity, fecundity, and copy-fidelity."

Of course, the idea of a unit of cultural evolution was not a new idea from Dawkins. The first thing Dawkins did was come up with the name "meme". So, in retrospect, you could be a little right: you could substitute other words. But, by using this one, it emphasizess the evolutionary aspects that are similar to genes. (although they clearly operate in a different manner).

I wouldn't but I would derive evolutionary theory from data which can be defined in terms of statistical mechanics - physics. In that case, memes was derrived from examining similar statistical data about cultures.

I would talk about social evolution and the data set that is shared as social knowledge by different members of the same group. Okay. That's a good start. Now, what model would you use for tracking this data between specific individuals?

It would be useful but, in bioepistemic terms, group selection is more than just a model. Social data, shared within a group is shared between members of that group. Its exitence is ignored by conventional genetic proofs that group selection can't be right.
Fine. Just like the periodic table ignores the various quarks.

But, just because the periodic table is used more often, that does not mean that more fundamental particles do not exist.

Just because group selection is used to study groups, that does not mean that more fundamental selection pressures do not exist.

Genes do not replicate themselves, any more than proteins do. Genes are copied by the cell - this is just standard cell biology. The idea of genes as replicators is just empty hypothesis - it is very influential but has no observational support. My parents' cells copied the genes that made me, they did not copy themselves. Did you read "The Selfish Gene"? How do you know the cell could not simply be a vehicle for genes to spread themselves?

In fact, I already showed you examples of genes observed duplicating themselves: Look up the word "Transposon" or "jumping gene" in your favorite biology reference source.
Transposons can best be explained by the model of genes being the fundamental unit of selection.

[John Hewitt]

Ah, so perhaps I should expand my definition a little: "a unit of cultural information, that can pass from one mind to another, that demonstrates properties of longevity, f