TenDimensions
April 6th 2003, 03:22 PM
I'm very interested to hear what everyone's opinions are regarding evolution as it applies to non-biological systems. To recap what the Theory of Evolution has (ironically enough! :rofl:) evolved into:
Evolution is the process of change over time when the following three criteria are met:
1) Some "thing" is replicating itself in an imperfect fashion.
2) The collection of "things" exist in an environment such that not all the "things" have equal chances to replicate due to their own inherited qualities. A certain amount of them will "die off" before successfully replicating.
3) In addition to imperfect replication there exists a certain amount of random mutation that can occur between generations as well.
Probably the most famous and impactful application of evolutionary processes outside of biology is how it applies to the ideas that are past between people.
Richard Dawkins is the man responsible for coining the term meme (pronounced meem) to describe the evolutionary forces acting on ideas just as evolutionary forces act upon our genes.
An idea (meme) will get replicated when it is passed from one person to the next. That meme will only be passed on if it can successfully reproduce in the environment it exists in (our brains). The process of reproduction, of course, is the sharing of that meme with someone else. There exists the potential for all sorts of random and not so random changes to the memes over time. Memes from two different locations can combine in new ways to create new memes that may then be more successful and reproduce more. Even determining the truth or falsity of a meme is a meme in itself (e.g. Christianity is a meme, but it is coupled with another meme that is whether or not it's true). And actually, Christianity is not a meme, it is a meme-complex, a collection of memes that represent a way of life, a school of thought, etc...
Obviously, memes and meme-complexes spread and evolve over time. Some memes grow more complex (types of governments) and others go extinct (Greek mythology), but the fact remains that the forces of evolution rule over them just as the force of gravity rules over all matter.
One might even be tempted to say that this is an example of intelligently directed evolution, but that would not be correct. It is impossible for a single intelligence to be behind the evolution of all memes in existence. It's impossible for one intelligence to be behind even a single meme as it takes much more than one person to ensure the survival of a meme. It can be said that intelligence is used when combining different memes to create newly mutated memes, but their survivability is based on the merits of the meme and can not be ensured. In a very real sense, the memes we spread do so not by the conscious will of a group of people, but through the natural selection process that governs why the human brain likes one meme over another.
And so I would like to first hear opinions regarding memetic evolution particularly from opponents of biological evolution. I'll warn you in advance that I then plan to compare and contrast the two.
Evolution is the process of change over time when the following three criteria are met:
1) Some "thing" is replicating itself in an imperfect fashion.
2) The collection of "things" exist in an environment such that not all the "things" have equal chances to replicate due to their own inherited qualities. A certain amount of them will "die off" before successfully replicating.
3) In addition to imperfect replication there exists a certain amount of random mutation that can occur between generations as well.
Probably the most famous and impactful application of evolutionary processes outside of biology is how it applies to the ideas that are past between people.
Richard Dawkins is the man responsible for coining the term meme (pronounced meem) to describe the evolutionary forces acting on ideas just as evolutionary forces act upon our genes.
An idea (meme) will get replicated when it is passed from one person to the next. That meme will only be passed on if it can successfully reproduce in the environment it exists in (our brains). The process of reproduction, of course, is the sharing of that meme with someone else. There exists the potential for all sorts of random and not so random changes to the memes over time. Memes from two different locations can combine in new ways to create new memes that may then be more successful and reproduce more. Even determining the truth or falsity of a meme is a meme in itself (e.g. Christianity is a meme, but it is coupled with another meme that is whether or not it's true). And actually, Christianity is not a meme, it is a meme-complex, a collection of memes that represent a way of life, a school of thought, etc...
Obviously, memes and meme-complexes spread and evolve over time. Some memes grow more complex (types of governments) and others go extinct (Greek mythology), but the fact remains that the forces of evolution rule over them just as the force of gravity rules over all matter.
One might even be tempted to say that this is an example of intelligently directed evolution, but that would not be correct. It is impossible for a single intelligence to be behind the evolution of all memes in existence. It's impossible for one intelligence to be behind even a single meme as it takes much more than one person to ensure the survival of a meme. It can be said that intelligence is used when combining different memes to create newly mutated memes, but their survivability is based on the merits of the meme and can not be ensured. In a very real sense, the memes we spread do so not by the conscious will of a group of people, but through the natural selection process that governs why the human brain likes one meme over another.
And so I would like to first hear opinions regarding memetic evolution particularly from opponents of biological evolution. I'll warn you in advance that I then plan to compare and contrast the two.