Meme-users?

"...too many of us cannot grasp that words are only tools for our use..."
(Dawkins 1976, The Selfish Gene, p. 18)

"We meme-users..."
(Dennett 1995, Darwin's Dangerous Idea, p. 469)

"...we use memes so much..."
(Blackmore 1999, The Meme Machine, p. 15)

Humans aren't meme-users! Memes are human-users.

Het spel der memen

die Spiele bilden eine Familie

- Wittgenstein

"In merkwaardige tegenstelling tot het Grieksch met zijn gevarieerde en heterogene expressie voor de spelfunctie staat nu het Latijn met eigenlijk slechts één woord, dat het gansche gebied van spel en spelen uitdrukt; ludus, ludere waarvan lusus slechts een afleiding is. Daarnaast staat iocus, iocari, doch met de specifieke beteekenis van scherts, grap.

Het is opmerkelijk, dat ludus, ludere als algemeen woord voor spel, spelen in de Romaansche talen niet alleen niet overgaat, maar dat het daarin, voorzoover ik zie, zelfs nauwelijks eenig spoor achterlaat. In alle Romaansche talen, dus blijkbaar reeds in vroege periode, heeft het specifieke iocus, iocari zijn beteekenis tot die van spel, spelen verwijd, en ludus, ludere geheel en al verdrongen. De vormen zijn: Fransch jeu, jouer, Italiaansch giuoco, giocare, Spaansch juego, jugar, Portugeesch jogo, jogar, Roemeensch joc, juca. Of het verdwijnen van ludus aan phonetische of aan semantische oorzaken te wijten is geweest, blijve hier in het midden." (Huizinga 1938, Homo Ludens, p. 37)

On the Origin of Tepees

"Like Darwin, I ventured abroad, into the cultural wilderness of America, to search out first-hand evidence that ideas are subject to natural selection. As I crossed the prairies, I classified the changing moustaches of farmers, plotted the evolution of the cowboy hat, dated American barns, and charted a taxonomy of tepees. In doing so, I found the evidence I needed to suggest that ideas do evolve just like the finches and tortoises that Darwin discovered in the Galapagos.

What's more, I found that viewing our world through 'meme goggles' is like suddenly spotting that vase in the optical illusion with the two faces. Your focus shifts from the human beings to the things in between – the countless living ideas that skip through our seven billion brains, each one competing for space in our cerebrums and the chance to procreate through our tongue and wrist movements. The mêlée of a new form of life is revealed. It's quite a view!" (Jonnie Hughes)

Filosofie: hetzelfde anders leren zien. (Cornelis Verhoeven)

Dawkins' eiland

The Meme Machine

"We once thought that biological design needed a creator, but we now know that natural selection can do all the designing on its own. Similarly, we once thought that human design required a conscious designer inside us, but we now know that memetic selection can do it on its own. We once thought that design required foresight and a plan, but we now know that natural selection can build creatures that look as though they were built to plan when in fact there was none. If we take memetics seriously there is no room for anyone or anything to jump into the evolutionary process and stop it, direct it, or do anything to it. There is just the evolutionary process of genes and memes playing itself endlessly out - and no one watching."
(Blackmore 1999, The Meme Machine, p. 242)

“Die Sprache spricht, nicht der Mensch. Der Mensch spricht nur, indem er geschicklich der Sprache entspricht.”
(Heidegger 1956, Der Satz vom Grund, p. 161)

Memetics

“Memes are clusters of ideas and beliefs, which are supposed to compete with one another in much the same way that genes do. In the life of the mind, as in biological evolution, there is a kind of natural selection of memes, whereby the fittest memes survive. Unfortunately, memes are not genes. There is no mechanism of selection in the history of ideas akin to that of the natural selection of genetic mutations in evolution.”

(John Gray 2002, Straw Dogs, p. 26)

“The prospects for elaborating a rigorous science of memetics are doubtful, but the concept provides a valuable perspective from which to investigate the complex relationship between cultural and genetic heritage.”

(Daniel Dennett 1995, Darwin’s Dangerous Idea, p. 369)

“Memes have not yet found their Watson and Crick; they even lack their Mendel.”

(Richard Dawkins in Susan Blackmore 1999, The Meme Machine, p. xii)

Dr. Watson, I presume?

“There certainly are memes to be found that form parallels with the genes – memes that are at least 5000 years old, have continuously been replicating, have essentially stayed identical, while transforming according to strict laws. I indicate on Proto-Indo-European roots that all contemporary Indo-European languages have in common with languages like the ancient Indian, Iranian, Hittite, etc.

An example I do not randomly choose. When Dutch people are new in a certain region [regio] and ask for the right direction [richting] in order to receive [uitgereikt krijgen] rules [regels] and directives [directieven] to the straight [rechte] way to the government building [regeringsgebouw], they are being moved by the Proto-Indo-European meme *reg- that has been governing the language of the majority of the world’s population for thousands of years. This root underlies the word richting, but also recht. The word recht that according to Benveniste refers to the act of drawing a vertical line, shows a kinship to words like regel, regio regeren, rex.

The Latin word rex finds in Asia its pedant in the Indian word radjah. It is also related to the Greek oregô, which means stretching [rekken] and straightening [strekken]. Therewith the vertical gets a three-dimensional spaciousness. From here you can see that words like reaching [reiken], stretching [rekken], series / range [reeks], ridge [richel], calculation [rekenen] and correctness [correctheid] have all sprung from this single meme.

The meme *reg- has not only managed to multiply. It has nestled itself, as the organizer of an extended phenotype, into the organization of planet earth and set it to its hand. It forms the basis of language as a means of transport. Notice the title of a work that has been decisive for the way the world looks today. We think that Descartes is the author of the Regulae ad directionem ingenii. But the work has been written by *reg-: it hides both in the words regula and directio. This work refers to the idea that man thinks he can become king (rex) by accepting the rules that guide his innate understanding. This guidance is directed to the methodological straightening of reality with an eye to the possibility of calculation. Calculation gives life direction and provides the regulated organization of reality.

But: man is not the king of this, but the slave.” *

(Th. C. W. Oudemans 2002, Eigen taal eerst, pp. 7-8)

* Translated by Roel van Uden. The original Dutch text can be found here: 
http://www.oudemans.net/oudemans/eigentaal.pdf