Genes or Memes? The Relationship of the Two Replicators

The novelty that memetics brings to evolutionary theory is the second replicators in their own right.

The whole point of a memetic theory of cultural evolution is to treat memes as replicators in their own right. This means that memetic selection drives the evolution of ideas in the interests of replicating memes, not the genes. This is the big difference that separates memetics from most previous theories of cultural evolution (Blackmore, 1999, p. 24).

With a meme’s eye view we ask not how inventions benefit human happiness or human genes, but how they benefit themselves. For example, why did farming spread at all? Most of these theories answer this question as farming makes life easier, or it provides genetic advantage to those who practice it. However, memetics has quite different answer: farming spread because the farming memes are good replicators.

If there is no second replicator, then everything automatically must come back to genes or to biological advantages. Sociobiology, biology, and evolutionary psychology reduce every human phenomenon to biology, and do not clarify how culture supervenes on biology. Obviously, these three reductionist stances cannot manage to embrace all human world in its complexity, extremeness, and multiplicity. At that point memetics offers second replicator in order to stave off the obsession with biological advantage.

Lamarckianism believes that acquired skill from the environment is transferred to the other generations, thus Lamarckian explanations of culture depends on environmental changes of human behavior. Sociobiology developed by Edward O. Wilson (1980), which studies genetic and evolutionary basis of human behavior made great progress in explaining culture with genes. Wilson introduced the concept of the ‘culturgen’ as “the basic unit of inheritance in cultural evolution” (Lumsden and Wilson 1981, p. x). However, they always came back to the genes as the final arbiters. Ultimately, the genes will win out. As they put it – “the genes hold culture on a leash” (Blackmore, 1999, p. 33). However, according to memetics, “the genes may turn into a dog and the memes become the owner, each running like mad to serve their own selfish

replicator” (Blackmore, 1999, p. 33).

Each replicator works for its own agenda. Both are able to evolve successfully within their respective attribute spaces. To a large degree they co-evolved in evolutionary history, but sometimes this co-operation is broken in favor of memes. The effects of memes’ more rapid rate of evolution in comparison to those of genes compel genes to change. Memes sometimes have a significantly detrimental effect on the evolution of genes. “As the comparative rate of meme evolution increases, such that if genes cannot effectively select memes a high percentage of the time, they suffer from meme evolution as if they had almost no selective capability” (Holland & Blackmore, 2000, p. 227).

Memes can create selection pressure on genes by changing selective environments. In that process, we can use Baldwin Effect, which explained above, claims new acquired skills provide a higher chance to those individuals who can imitate, hence those who are successful in learning get more change to survive in relation to the other.

However, unlike Dennet, Blackmore says the Baldwin Effect is not sufficient to explain the relation of genes and memes. She accepts that the Baldwin Effect may be explanatory in some cases, but, memes can operate without establishing a relationship with genes. To give Blackmore’s own example, suppose that there are a dozen different basket types around that compete with each other for imitation. Now it is important for any individual to choose the right basket to copy, but which is that? If we look at this issue from genes’ point of view it probably has to be the biggest, strongest, or easiest one. But, from the memes’ point of view the answer may be the flashy one. The more flashy looking basket may be chosen for copying, so baskets that exploit the current copying tendencies spread at the expense of those that do not. (Blackmore, 2001) This process is not quite the same as traditional gene-culture evolution or the Baldwin effect. Blackmore (2001) explains:

The baskets are not just aspects of culture that have appeared by accident and may or may not be maladaptive for the genes of their carriers. They are evolving systems in their own right, with replicators whose selfish interests play a role in

the outcome (p. 245).

Blackmore uses here Dennett’s question Cui Bono? which means for whose benefit? As it was explained, memes and genes struggle for their own benefit, in deed many times they cooperate, but sometimes they contradict and “memes hold genes an on a leash”. She puts it directly:

This comes to the heart of the issue. For me, as for Dawkins and Dennett, memetic evolution means that people are different. Their ability to imitate creates a second replicator that acts in its own interests and can produce behavior that is memetically adaptive but biologically maladaptive (Blackmore, 1999, p. 35).

Well, who is this potent entity that can overwhelm even genes and make humans special among other creatures. What is a meme for Blackmore?