Product Description

Humans are extraordinary creatures, with the unique ability among animals to imitate and so copy from one another ideas, habits, skills, behaviours, inventions, songs, and stories. These are all memes, a term first coined by Richard Dawkins in 1976 in his book The Selfish Gene. Memes, like genes, are replicators, and this enthralling book is an investigation of whether this link between genes and memes can lead to important discoveries about the nature of the inner self. Confronting the deepest questions about our inner selves, with all our emotions, memories, beliefs, and decisions, Susan Blackmore makes a compelling case for the theory that the inner self is merely an illusion created by the memes for the sake of replication.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #19139 in Books
• Published on: 2000-03-16
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 288 pages

Amazon.co.uk Review
Habits, skills, songs, stories, ideas: humans are marvellously equipped to keep themselves and each other ceaselessly busy and it's as well, for no matter how hard we try, we humans just can't stop thinking. So, says Susan Blackmore, what if consciousness is not some esoteric genetic freebie but is itself the product of an altogether different evolutionary process?

Once humans learned to imitate each other--that is, receive, copy and retransmit "memes"--the rest, Blackmore argues, is a foregone and somewhat chilling conclusion: we are the product of our memes just as we are the products of our genes, the trouble being that memes, like genes, care only for their own propagation. The ability to imitate each other laid us open to ideas good and bad in equal measure. These proliferated in such numbers that individuals, competing to imitate the best imitators, needed bigger and bigger brains to contain the flood. Now our heads are so big, they are barely birthable.

Blackmore's brilliantly argued version of how humans became conscious--not to say downright troubled--demolishes some of the most intractable problems of human evolution and social biology, with flair. Hers is a book full of careful arguments and thrilling conjectures: riddled, in other words, with promising memes. --Simon Ings

Review
Anyone who hopes or fears that memetics will become a science of culture will find this surefooted exploration of the prospects a major eye-opener. (Daniel Dennett )

Any theory deserves to be given its best shot, and that is what Susan Blackmore has given the theory of the meme I am delighted to recommend her book. (Richard Dawkins )

Customer Reviews

The meme machine unleashed!
Human bodies evolved by natural selection, just as other animals. But still we are different. According to Susan Blackmore thats because we are capable of imitation. We can thereby copy ideas, habits, inventions, songs and stories. I.e. memes. And now memes are as powerful, if not more powerful, than the good old genes, in directing human evolution. I find the idea intriguing, and certainly Susan Blackmore argue well for the idea. The (evolutionary) pressure for imitation skills requires big brains. So we evolve big brains, as people mate with the ones with the most memes. Language is invented in order to spread memes. Film stars, journalists, writers, singers, politicians and artists become the most attractive, as they are the ones who spread the most memes. Things that are hard to explain in a genetic context (such as adoption, birth control, celibacy) are easy to explain in a meme context (the memes are happy with it, as it help spread more memes). Science becomes a process to distinguish true memes from false memes. Fax-machines, telephones, etc. are created (by the memes) in order to spread more memes. Writing is a battleground in the head between memes wanting to be spread etc.

It all rings true to me. Except Susan Blackmores claim that the self is a complex meme. Certainly it is puzzling that blind people are reported thinking that Their "I" is located at their fingertips, when they read Braille. Still there are other explanations to what a human "I" is than memes. Personally, I prefer Antonio Damasios, as he explain edit in the book "the feeling of what happens". Nevertheless, Susan Blackmores book is a very exciting read, with lots of clever thoughts. Or should I say memes?

-Simon

The world is still waiting for "the book" on memes.
Ever since Dawkins wrote his chapter on memes in The Selfish Gene, people have become captivated by the meme meme. Several people have attempted to wrap their minds around the concept, and present it in a useful and comprehensive way. While Blackmore's attempt is, I think, the best yet, it tries to do too much, and ends up collapsing under its own weight. Some of the assertions, such as the development of large brains in humans being a function of memes' imperative, while possibly correct in part, lose the force of their argument by their overstatement. Humans are thinking machines, not copying machines, and brains evolved to think. Memes ride along, for better or worse, on the waves created by the constant motion of our thoughts. Not the other way around. I believe memetics will someday prove to be a valuable tool for understanding some cultural and behavioural aspects of humans. But right now, they still more resemble Gould's "meaningless metaphor" description.

The Book of Common Sense
It will be interesting to see how long it takes for the term 'meme' to surpass the lexicon of phrases previously used to convey cultural ideas. "Shibboleth" is, of course, too 'foreign' for the WASP mind to grasp intuitively. "Myth" is nice and brief, but again has been relegated to minor considerations. It's something 'pagan' or out of time. "Cultural icon" conjures up images of rock stars or charismatic politicians. "Meme" has the advantages of universality; it's easy to remember, and isn't carrying any prior cultural overtones. In an age of fast moving technologies, 'meme' is timely - after all, how many readers here haven't heard something about genetic research. It's only shortcoming is the hesitation one hears when others are trying to say it: is it 'meem' or 'meemee'. The former is correct, of course, but you might have to have read Dawkins first to pick up on that.

Alien abductions and Near Death Experiences as expressions of memeplexes, complex, irrational memes. In 'Religions As Memeplexes' Blackmore explains how memes modify the genetic mechanism for altruism among kin by extending benificence to those who are 'like us'. This give great strength to religious memes, extending their influence over disparate groups. Religious memes did not set out to be successful, they have no more ability to foresee the future than do genes. Religious memes flourish in a given environment, with group selection rising above selection of individuals. The link of memetics to genetics and the reinforcing feedback loop of their interaction is the basis for successful religions.

It's a useful exercise to read this book in company with Richard Brodie's VIRUS OF THE MIND. Where Blackmore takes Dawkins' idea and fleshes it out with additional background information, Brodie applies practical applications of how memes impact our lives, and what, if anything, the reader might wish to do about that.