On Tue, 30 Dec 2003 06:51:23 -0800，rent@mob wrote:
> One thing all sciences must do is recognise which disciplines are
> competent to answer which questions. Applying Darwin's Universal Acid
> to the problem of human social organisation and belief gives off some
> heady fumes and some Wow! results, but the application of that acid to
> this problem is not sensible or useful, and any credible scientist
> should understand why - if biology does not collapse into physics,
> still less does sociology collapse into biology, and as for theology
> ...

what do you mean? the general theory of evolution (including meme-based,
and gene-based) require only the concept of replicator. so whereever a
population of replicator exist under selection, the process of evolution
will be inevitable. this is simple mathematic fact. just like any other
abstract mathematic tool, it works regardless where one apply it too,
as long as the condition met.
                                                                                           
                           
the replicator means anything (regardless they are physical or conceptual)
that can copied and randomly mutated. now, does culture trait agree with
this definition? obviously yes, each time you read a sentence, imitate a
behavior, you are copying one of the replicator, and whenever you cannot
100% accurately copy them, you are making some mutation to the copy you
have. also, it is very obvious that we apply a great deal of selection
on these cultural replicators, since we always selectively imitate other's
behavior, and selectively pass such behavior to others.
                                                                                           
                           
i don't if you see my point or not. see, here the condition of evolutional
process are met, and therefore such process is inevitable. you can use
some other theory to explain the result of evolutional process, but you
cannot change the way the is made.
                                                                                           
                           
by the way, why people always deny other's explaination, and never point
out what the problems are. if you disagree this theory, why don't you
just tell me why it is wrong, rather than make such meaningless argument?