Dawkins Schmawkins-What Do You Think About Memes?

Question

Greetings,

How can I explain this, there is a theory that has been suggested that ideas behave like genes in the body, are a basic fundamental unit, and pass from person to person infleuncing their behavior. These fundamental units of ideas are called memes--suggested by the famed biologist Richard Dawkins.

Here are my questions:

1. Does this theory of memes sound a little familiar, espeically for those who have read the pyschologist Jung, who describes Archetypes as classical stories that persist in humanity that describe our Human Nature...?

2. Do you think that there's any truth to the belief that there are persistent ideas that reoccur throughout history, regardless that environments change?

3. And related to the last question, "Is Dawkins being a bad biologist if he supports the idea that changes in environment don't necessarily effect a change in biology?"

Phew, a lot to digest, so thanks for writing...

Answer 1

1) i know little about Jung's archetypes, but i believe this has little to do with Dawkins' theory.
2) memes are only persistent, if they are of any survival value for the individual or group that "carries" them.
3) whether biology changes with the environment or not, depends on the speed of the environmental change and its directions. as darwin showed, nature can and will adapt, but not to anything.