and cannot do. We need to start with a clear and precise definition of the meme and decide just what does and does not count.
The most important point to remember is that, as in Dawkins’s original formulation, memes are passed on by imitation. I have described them as ‘instructions for carrying out behaviour, stored in brains (or other objects) and passed on by imitation’. The new
Oxford English Dictionary
gives meme (mi:m),
n. Biol.
(shortened from
mimeme…
that which is imitated, after GENE
n.
) An element of a culture that may be considered to be passed on by non–genetic means, esp. imitation’. Imitation is a kind of replication, or copying, and that is what makes the meme a replicator and gives it its replicator power. You could even say that ‘a meme is whatever it is that is passed on by imitation’ – if it didn’t sound so awkward.
We may (and will) argue about just what counts as imitation but for now I shall use the word ‘in the broad sense’, as Dawkins did. When I say ‘imitation’ I mean to include passing on information by using language, reading, and instruction, as well as other complex skills and behaviours. Imitation includes any kind of copying of ideas and behaviours from one person to another. So when you hear a story and pass on the gist to someone else, you have copied a meme. The important point is that the emphasis on imitation allows us to rule out all kinds of things which cannot be passed on and therefore cannot be counted as memes.
Look away from this page for a moment and rest your eyes on the window, the wall, a piece of furniture or a plant. Anything will do, but just look quietly at it for – say – five seconds before you come back to reading. I presume you experienced something. There were sights, sounds, and impressions that made up your experience in those few seconds. Did they involve memes? Perhaps you said to yourself ‘That plant needs watering’ or ‘I’ wish there weren’t so much traffic outside’. If so, you were using words; you obtained those words memetically and you could pass them on again – but as for the perceptual experience itself – that does not necessarily involve memes.
Of course, you could argue that now we have language everything we experience is coloured by our memes. So let us consider the experiences of some other animal that does not have language. One of my cats will do as an example. She is not the brainiest of creatures but she does have a rich and interesting life and many capabilities despite having acquired next to nothing by imitation.
First of all she can see and hear. She can run after butterflies andscamper up a tree – which requires complex perceptual and motor skills. She can taste and smell, and choose Whiskas over Katkins. She has a powerful sense of hierarchy and territory and will hiss at or run away from some cats, and play with others. She can obviously recognise individual cats and also some humans, responding to their voices, footsteps or touch, and can communicate with them using movement, physical contact and her own quite powerful voice. Her mental map is complex and detailed. I have no idea how far it stretches but it covers at least four human gardens, two roads and many human-made and cat-made paths. She can relate the position of a person at a window to the room they are in, and find the most direct route to the kitchen when the knife hits the bowl. And when she arrives, at the word ‘Hup’ she neatly stands on her hind legs and tucks in her front paws.
Her life includes many of the experiences that I can recognise in my life too – perception, memory, learning, exploration, food preferences, communication and social relationships. These are all examples of experiences and behaviours that have not been acquired by imitation and so are not memes. Note that my cat has done a lot of learning in her lifetime, and some of it from me, but it cannot be ‘passed on by imitation’.
If we are to be
The most important point to remember is that, as in Dawkins’s original formulation, memes are passed on by imitation. I have described them as ‘instructions for carrying out behaviour, stored in brains (or other objects) and passed on by imitation’. The new
Oxford English Dictionary
gives meme (mi:m),
n. Biol.
(shortened from
mimeme…
that which is imitated, after GENE
n.
) An element of a culture that may be considered to be passed on by non–genetic means, esp. imitation’. Imitation is a kind of replication, or copying, and that is what makes the meme a replicator and gives it its replicator power. You could even say that ‘a meme is whatever it is that is passed on by imitation’ – if it didn’t sound so awkward.
We may (and will) argue about just what counts as imitation but for now I shall use the word ‘in the broad sense’, as Dawkins did. When I say ‘imitation’ I mean to include passing on information by using language, reading, and instruction, as well as other complex skills and behaviours. Imitation includes any kind of copying of ideas and behaviours from one person to another. So when you hear a story and pass on the gist to someone else, you have copied a meme. The important point is that the emphasis on imitation allows us to rule out all kinds of things which cannot be passed on and therefore cannot be counted as memes.
Look away from this page for a moment and rest your eyes on the window, the wall, a piece of furniture or a plant. Anything will do, but just look quietly at it for – say – five seconds before you come back to reading. I presume you experienced something. There were sights, sounds, and impressions that made up your experience in those few seconds. Did they involve memes? Perhaps you said to yourself ‘That plant needs watering’ or ‘I’ wish there weren’t so much traffic outside’. If so, you were using words; you obtained those words memetically and you could pass them on again – but as for the perceptual experience itself – that does not necessarily involve memes.
Of course, you could argue that now we have language everything we experience is coloured by our memes. So let us consider the experiences of some other animal that does not have language. One of my cats will do as an example. She is not the brainiest of creatures but she does have a rich and interesting life and many capabilities despite having acquired next to nothing by imitation.
First of all she can see and hear. She can run after butterflies andscamper up a tree – which requires complex perceptual and motor skills. She can taste and smell, and choose Whiskas over Katkins. She has a powerful sense of hierarchy and territory and will hiss at or run away from some cats, and play with others. She can obviously recognise individual cats and also some humans, responding to their voices, footsteps or touch, and can communicate with them using movement, physical contact and her own quite powerful voice. Her mental map is complex and detailed. I have no idea how far it stretches but it covers at least four human gardens, two roads and many human-made and cat-made paths. She can relate the position of a person at a window to the room they are in, and find the most direct route to the kitchen when the knife hits the bowl. And when she arrives, at the word ‘Hup’ she neatly stands on her hind legs and tucks in her front paws.
Her life includes many of the experiences that I can recognise in my life too – perception, memory, learning, exploration, food preferences, communication and social relationships. These are all examples of experiences and behaviours that have not been acquired by imitation and so are not memes. Note that my cat has done a lot of learning in her lifetime, and some of it from me, but it cannot be ‘passed on by imitation’.
If we are to be
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