I agree with the problem of analogy, but I disagree with the use of memetics as an example.
You can apply the same criticisms to genetics to prove that genetics doesn’t work. Genes don’t work in isolation; in order for the gene for penicillin resistance to work, it requires at the very least all the genes requires for DNA and RNA replication, protein translation, a large subset of metabolism genes, and all the genes involved in replication in order to observe the result. Genes by themselves are merely underspecified encodings of useful information, which only mostly function because most life share mostly the same language (though there are many incompatibilities in codons usage between groups). The final function of a gene is heavily dependent on the context it finds itself in, the same as a meme embedded in a culture. Often, in both cases, they are unintelligible and useless.
The “replication with low variance” is also something selected for. A simple language evolution experiment showed that languages become more learnable over time (Kirby, Cornish & Smith, 2008), because memes that are more easily transmitted (successfully) are, well, more easily transmitted. You cannot assume that any random meme (“I’m getting bored of being here”) to be successful at spreading any more than you can assume any random sequence of nucleotides to become fixed in a population.
In fact, language itself is a meme, likely one of the most ancient ones, because at some point someone had the idea that sharing information is good (is this an idea, or a genetic biological function? evidence, like a compass, spins).
In order to spread, memes need to convince the host that is beneficial to spread it. This necessarily requires an ability to communicate, but often leverages other systems like survival and status drives (are these cultural or genetic?). A meme, such as “the red berries are poisonous”, will be spread between people who have a shared culture of reciprocity and cooperation. It doesn’t matter if “the red berries are poisonous” is true or not, it will spread, with high fidelity, because the host believes that spreading it with high fidelity will be beneficial to itself, in the culture it is in.
I’m not a fan of the Sol Invictus / Christ model, because there’s a high likelihood that it was dependent on authoritarian top-down prescription, as opposed to a horizontal transfer model that virulence implies.
I agree that the mutation of memes is quite distinct from the random mutations of genes; the remixing of memes can be thought of akin to recombination, but there is a lot less random noise. That being said, certain biological systems have bias towards certain kinds of mutations, but I agree that the generation of variation is extremely different between the two.
I guess I should flip it, as “the agent will spread memes that it thinks are beneficial to spread”, the same way that a cell will spread viruses that are capable of hijacking their machinery. I think the meme exists separately from the distortion as information; it can be encoded in many different ways (in speech, in text, as an image, etc.). Decoding the information requires a cultural context, and the cultural context also shapes the virulence of the spread.
(or rather, “agents are machines that perform behaviors towards increasing fitness, and memes are information shaped in ways that appear that spreading them increases fitness.”)
(though I think it would be good to take a step back and stop inscribing agency on genes, memes and people, the last of which is controversial but cells don’t have agency so it’s probably good to frame the two similarly, unless that’s a crux)
I don’t think the information we largely communicate every day are good memes. The juiciest gossip is virulent due to status games, but most communicated information are probably barely about the informational content at all, and more about reinforcing bonds and maintaining a shared culture (and shared cultures are important when trying to communicate important information).
For both memes and genetics, there is the information, and there is the context. The right information with the right context can replicate the information and spread it, and if it finds the right context again, it occurs recursively.
(although memes, unlike genes, cannot be vertically transmitted, since it uses the same method of transmission as horizontal transmission.)
I think Dawkin’s God meme refers to all kinds of religious thought; of all practices ascribing cause to unknown capricious forces beyond control, but it’s been a while since I’ve read it and that might be a generous interpretation.
There is information, and there is context, and information in the right context can self-replicate. This framework applies to both memes and genes. Your analogy framework states that the two are not necessarily identical, and I agree. But this, as you say, does not preclude analogy from having its revelatory function.
I think evolutionary lens to look at memes is an interesting one, even if it does not explain everything. I think it’s most misleading from a competition aspect, as only mutually exclusive ideas compete to extinction (other than vague definitions of attention), and you rightly point out that mutation of ideas is a much less random processes.
I agree with the problem of analogy, but I disagree with the use of memetics as an example.
You can apply the same criticisms to genetics to prove that genetics doesn’t work. Genes don’t work in isolation; in order for the gene for penicillin resistance to work, it requires at the very least all the genes requires for DNA and RNA replication, protein translation, a large subset of metabolism genes, and all the genes involved in replication in order to observe the result. Genes by themselves are merely underspecified encodings of useful information, which only mostly function because most life share mostly the same language (though there are many incompatibilities in codons usage between groups). The final function of a gene is heavily dependent on the context it finds itself in, the same as a meme embedded in a culture. Often, in both cases, they are unintelligible and useless.
The “replication with low variance” is also something selected for. A simple language evolution experiment showed that languages become more learnable over time (Kirby, Cornish & Smith, 2008), because memes that are more easily transmitted (successfully) are, well, more easily transmitted. You cannot assume that any random meme (“I’m getting bored of being here”) to be successful at spreading any more than you can assume any random sequence of nucleotides to become fixed in a population.
In fact, language itself is a meme, likely one of the most ancient ones, because at some point someone had the idea that sharing information is good (is this an idea, or a genetic biological function? evidence, like a compass, spins).
In order to spread, memes need to convince the host that is beneficial to spread it. This necessarily requires an ability to communicate, but often leverages other systems like survival and status drives (are these cultural or genetic?). A meme, such as “the red berries are poisonous”, will be spread between people who have a shared culture of reciprocity and cooperation. It doesn’t matter if “the red berries are poisonous” is true or not, it will spread, with high fidelity, because the host believes that spreading it with high fidelity will be beneficial to itself, in the culture it is in.
I’m not a fan of the Sol Invictus / Christ model, because there’s a high likelihood that it was dependent on authoritarian top-down prescription, as opposed to a horizontal transfer model that virulence implies.
I agree that the mutation of memes is quite distinct from the random mutations of genes; the remixing of memes can be thought of akin to recombination, but there is a lot less random noise. That being said, certain biological systems have bias towards certain kinds of mutations, but I agree that the generation of variation is extremely different between the two.
I guess I should flip it, as “the agent will spread memes that it thinks are beneficial to spread”, the same way that a cell will spread viruses that are capable of hijacking their machinery. I think the meme exists separately from the distortion as information; it can be encoded in many different ways (in speech, in text, as an image, etc.). Decoding the information requires a cultural context, and the cultural context also shapes the virulence of the spread.
(or rather, “agents are machines that perform behaviors towards increasing fitness, and memes are information shaped in ways that appear that spreading them increases fitness.”)
(though I think it would be good to take a step back and stop inscribing agency on genes, memes and people, the last of which is controversial but cells don’t have agency so it’s probably good to frame the two similarly, unless that’s a crux)
I don’t think the information we largely communicate every day are good memes. The juiciest gossip is virulent due to status games, but most communicated information are probably barely about the informational content at all, and more about reinforcing bonds and maintaining a shared culture (and shared cultures are important when trying to communicate important information).
For both memes and genetics, there is the information, and there is the context. The right information with the right context can replicate the information and spread it, and if it finds the right context again, it occurs recursively.
(although memes, unlike genes, cannot be vertically transmitted, since it uses the same method of transmission as horizontal transmission.)
I’m getting lost and confused here.
I think Dawkin’s God meme refers to all kinds of religious thought; of all practices ascribing cause to unknown capricious forces beyond control, but it’s been a while since I’ve read it and that might be a generous interpretation.
There is information, and there is context, and information in the right context can self-replicate. This framework applies to both memes and genes. Your analogy framework states that the two are not necessarily identical, and I agree. But this, as you say, does not preclude analogy from having its revelatory function.
I think evolutionary lens to look at memes is an interesting one, even if it does not explain everything. I think it’s most misleading from a competition aspect, as only mutually exclusive ideas compete to extinction (other than vague definitions of attention), and you rightly point out that mutation of ideas is a much less random processes.