Some very cool wordy over at Eclectics Anonymous in the article Evolution Works, Shit Happens.
"Perhaps my favorite spandrel is the idea of memetics codified by Richard Dawkins in his 1976 book The Selfish Gene. A meme is the mental equivalent to a gene;it is another word for idea but
with evolutionary connotations. It exists, is passed from one organism
to another, one generation to another, mutating and replicating along
the way. While most memes disappear quickly, literally forgotten,
extremely successful memes transmit themselves through society; some
are useful – like the idea of writing - some memes serve little or no
purpose, useful only for replicating themselves. An example of these
might be found in this week’s Top 40 play lists - in 20 or 30 years one
or two of these “hits” might still be recognisable, some for toe
tapping, others cringe-worthy.
Interestingly, Dawkins hadn’t planned on creating a meme when he
wrote his fateful chapter on memetics. As a matter of fact he was
simply looking for an example of something other than genes that could
be described as replicating itself in an evolutionary manner. That his
idea would even give rise to a short-lived scientific journal
wasn’t really planned. Ironically, memetics seems to be the ultimate –
um – memetic spandrel. (Which in and of itself is ironically humorous
seeing that Gould and Dawkins almost never saw eye to eye on much.)"
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