'Memes' were doomed from the beginning. They may be the best example yet conceived of duping natural scientists (those highly intellectual persons) into a 'cultural' or 'ideological' theory because it closely parallels naturalistic thought. Your argument is sound, Jon, in recognizing that the 2-dimensional root-and-branch tree idea of Darwinian evolution is almost completely insufficient in the 3-D world of human culture, society and human-made things (e.g. such as automobiles).
An 'argument from biology' only goes so far - apparently Dawkins, Harris, Dennett, Blackmore and many others want it to go much further!!! The phrase 'progressive evolutionary development' may be a tautology, but it shows how Dawkins' idea is d.o.a. outside of his ethology-centric specialized view of knowledge. 'Memes' don't fit with human-cultural reality, haven't worked and won't work, but don't tell this to some people like Bernie who are attracted to the idea simply because it 'looks scientific.' - G.A.
Jon Tandy <tandyland@earthlink.net> wrote:
I haven’t read Dawkins, but I was considering the implications of his argument that things like morality and altruism could have evolved naturally over time, because (for instance) altruistic behavior could prove to be more beneficial to a species or group than non-altruistic behavior to the survival of the group. On one hand, this sounds on the surface like it has some merit, even if I don’t like or believe that that is the source of altruism or morality in general.
However, I was also considering one of the key arguments from Ken Miller and others regarding the evidence for biological origins, which is that the evolutionary model (descent with modification and common ancestry) requires that new discoveries fit into their correct place on the phylogenic tree. If you find mollusks with feathers, or recent mammals with scales, or any sort of randomly distributed pattern of characteristics that didn’t fit into the phylogenic tree of common ancestry of species, it would be evidence against evolution. The argument, as far as it goes, says that both genetic and heritable characteristics in biology fit perfectly into such a pattern, whereas in things like automobile design (2 or 4 doors, paint color, size, shape, weight, body style, etc.) do not. Automobiles can essentially mix and match features, because they are each designed uniquely, and do not share a heritable common descent through a progressively branching lineage through time.
Before I go further, is this essentially a correct statement of the argument from biology?
So now, applying this to “memes”, such as altruism, or charity, or empathy, etc., it seems to me that this fails to fit an evolutionary phylogeny, in anything like biological evidence seems to show. One can find just in the known course of human history those individuals and cultures and sub-cultures which had these characteristics in varying degrees, and others which don't. You find sub-cultures or individual philosophies anciently which were peaceful and were open to accepting foreigners, and then you find in modern history Hitler exterminating Jews, Christians, and others. Even in animal populations, you find some which care for their young, and some who kill or eat their young or their mate, etc. Unless Richard Dawkins could show a progressive evolutionary development of something like affection for one's young, it seems his idea is in trouble on this basis. Just as Ken Miller makes the case that biological evidence which falls outside the predicted phylogeny
would have meant trouble for evolutionary biology, doesn't this argument do the same for Dawkins' theory of memes?
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Received on Wed May 7 03:17:57 2008
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.8 : Wed May 07 2008 - 03:17:57 EDT