Richard Dawkins - Anti -Christ or Great Thinker?

The selfish gene idea is a very clever gimmick. Like a photographic negative, it doesn't actually add any new details to the picture, but it still gives the impression of being starkly and startlingly different from the original.

That can be a useful trick, in that by swapping the foreground and background, and making light what was dark, it emphasizes their unity and interchangeability. But once you've seen the trick, you have all of it. It doesn't tend to lead anywhere or suggest anything new. But it does teach you to shift emphasis more fluidly from genes to organisms and back again.

The concept of memes is a somewhat better trick, but the jury is out on it. Memes are not useful as science, but as a new metaphor. New metaphors can be very powerful catalysts for new thoughts. When Newton published his physical laws he indirectly gave birth to the metaphor of a clockwork universe. That new metaphor excited people and led to a lot of intellectual ferment and invention. In many ways Newton's laws catalyzed the Enlightenment. Darwin's theory altered our view of the universe almost as much, by placing us squarely in the animal kingdom.

Memes are Dawkins's bid to change our metaphorical view of human culture. Rather than have us be the wise creators and manipulators of ideas, he would locate the genesis of ideas in random variation and turn humans into their unwitting vessels. So far, he has not succeeded, but it is still early on in the game.

If I had to guess, I'd say that in 25 years the concept of memes will be a quaint relict of the past that only a few speicalists and crackpots have ever heard of. The problem has been that, as a metaphor, meme theory has not opened any paths of thought we want to follow and develop. We can't seem to wring any value out of it. Maybe that will come later.

As for the anti-christ thing, that's long odds.

Originality may not be the point though - writing a clear and persuasive summary of the status quo that is accessible to the general reader, particularly given the unfashionable nature of some of the "social science" implications, is an achievement that deserves a fair bit of kudos in its own right. Dawkins is frequently credited with ideas that are not his, but he has never claimed they were, and it is unfair that he is sometimes rubbished on the grounds that some of the ideas his over-enthusiastic fans credit him with are not his own.

I do think that Dawkins is on VERY shaky ground with his current notion that as conscious beings we can transcend our genes though. Where can the motives for such transcendence originate?

Are you talking about something other than what he said in The Selfish Gene? That our genetic code just predisposes us to certain behaviours, but that the human brain is such a powerful and flexible organ that we use it for things it didn't adapt to do? Like wear condoms. I don't think that's such a controversial, mystical notion.

I don't know what circles you move in, but I'd say this meme metaphor has been manna from heaven to people in the following categories:

PRs, style scouts, cool hunters, trend analysts, colour consultants, fashion designers, record labels, advertising people, journalists, cultural studies academics, consultants, marketers, market researchers, architects, designers, authors who write about 'the tipping point', 'power laws', or the 'winner takes all society', spinmeisters, political advisors...

In fact, the concept of the meme is a godsend -- sorry, genesend -- to anyone who wants to find (seemingly) rational ways to explain irrational human buying behaviour. As our postmodern capitalist economies skew more and more to the flow of information and services instead of raw materials and heavy industry, with faster and faster product cycles, these people -- the oracles and astrologers of consumerism, the hieratic keepers of its mysteries -- become more and more central to our economy.

This weekend I will show a Levi's 'cool scout' from LA around Berlin. I will take her to the launch of a new fashion store which will only survive its first year if its meme predictions are relatively accurate. I will show her a few of the places I think are 'meme labs', spicing or engineering new cultural ideas. (I won't call them that, of course. I'll just say 'Something interesting is going on here.')

The other thing I have to do this weekend is sit down and write an article commissioned by a NY style mag about the commodification of style. Now, whether or not I refer explicitly to Dawkins and 'memes' in the article, or with the scout, it seems clear that we're earning our living in a field which has the idea of the meme -- whatever you want to call it -- right at its centre. I don't see this going away any time soon, and while I don't see it becoming a more exact science, I do see it wanting to try. That's why, for people in our line of work, the meme is itself... a powerful meme. Because divining with tea leaves and crows' gizzards just doesn't seem to impress the client any more.

It depends what kind of hole you're using that argument to dig yourself out of. He is using it to say that gene theory isn't as determinist/mechanistic as it may appear. I don't think that works. A genetic predisposition can manifest itself in behaviour that, at least on the surface, doesn't appear to maximise the survival prospects of a particular individual's genes (self-sacrifice for the community, homosexuality, birth control yadda yadda). None of this indicates that behaviour isn't determined by genetic predisposition as modified by a particular environment. If you are going to suggest that the humans can defeat genetic predisposition by, say, consciously becoming more altruistic you run into a host of logistical problems, viz:

- where does the motivation to do that come from if not genetic predisposition interacting with a particular environment?
- if it is not an efficient strategy in terms of maximising genetic survival possibilities, won't it be selected out?

His arguments don't strike me as mystical but do they have the intellectual rigour you'd expect from a noted scientist. Of course it may be that a altruism's time has come, in that the human environment has tilted so that, relatively speaking, altruism has become a more efficient strategy than it once was. But you don't need to explain that in terms of humanity transcending its genetic inheritance.

'Interacting' being the key word. You can't unbake a cake (sorry if that's a cliché). The interaction produces behaviours that wouldn't have led the genes to propagate in the first place.

the imperative to fuck remains, and i dont think we can transcend that, for instance.

Tell that to a monk.

I'm not saying that humans can ever reach the end of evolution, just that evolution happens over long, long periods, and that in the short term the environment is the more vibrant end of the environmental-genetic interaction, and as such is of greater use in accounting for the diversity and changes in human behaviours.

So no, we couldn't do anything without our genes, but that doesn't mean all my behaviour is most usefully explained by reference to them. As an analogy, I wouldn't be able to show these words to you if I didn't own a computer, but Steve Jobs wouldn't have been much use in predicting what these words were going to be. And Charles Babbage would have had no conception of how his work could even have anything to do with discussing genetic theory with strangers hundreds of miles away.

I think all Dawkins is trying to do is distance himself from crude genetic determinism.

If I can just continue the sideline in which I defend the meme, and point to its metaphorical centrality in late capitalist societies, here's a chunk of Hardt and Negri's book 'Empire':

'Communication not only expresses but also organizes the movement of globalization. It organizes the movement by multiplying and structuring interconnections through networks... The political synthesis of social space is fixed in the space of communication. This is why the communication industries have assumed a central position. They not only organize production and impose a new structure adequate to global space, but also make its justification immanent. Power, as it produces, organizes; as it organizes, it speaks and expresses itself as authority. Language, as it communicates, produces commodities but moreover creates subjectivities, puts them in relation, and orders them. The communications industries integrate the imaginary and the symbolic within the biopolitical fabric, not merely putting them at service of power but actually integrating them into its very functioning.'

Note that interesting word biopolitical. Hardt and Negri (inverting the classic Marxist conception of superstructure and base) say that language produces commodities as it communicates. They also say that ideas and meanings are an essential part of power. Then they call society a 'biopolitical fabric'. It's easy to see that the concept of the meme fits this model perfectly, both for its emphasis on communication, and its template in biology.

Momus, I hope you realize that your quote, from which I have extracted the above specimen, is 99.44% pure gobbledegook. One would be hard pressed to paraphrase a single sentence of it. (No doubt that is why you chose to quote it verbatim.)

It is a singular quality of pure verbal nonsense that its meaning cannot be recast in another set of words, any more than a void can take on a different color. Of course, such nonsense can function as a sort of Rorschach Test, so it may be that you haven't sussed this, yet.

"The interaction produces behaviours that wouldn't have led the genes to propagate in the first place."

I'm not sure what point you are making here. Genetic mutation result in random changes that will reduce or increase the probability of genetic survival. How dogs will respond to a colonisation by Martians may be unpredictable and new but it is still genetically determined.

Concepts like time frames and "usefulness" are non-sequiturs in this context. In most contexts a genetic approach may not be the most useful way of understanding or predicting human behaviour, but the question we are asking here is can we transcend or "defeat" our genes.

I agree that Dawkins is trying to escape "crude" genetic determinism but the value judgement implicit in "crude" is telling. The kind of simplicity that would be thought of as "elegant" in describing the material universe becomes "crude", not because the thinking is rough and ready but because the "reductive" implications are an affront to human vanity. This is narcissism and wishful thinking (as well as an attempt to frustrate virulent criticism by other wishful thinkers) but it isn't science and I suspect deep down Dawkins knows this full well.

Separately what N is getting at does change the logic. we can behave, and alter our environment, in ways that do reduce the survivability of genes.

Memes organise production. Memes are what feed us. This is something you could only say of a postmodern, post-industrial economy where information and services have become the dominant 'products'. It's especially true of Berlusconi's Italy, where Negri was imprisoned for many years. I'm quoting this to point out that your prediction in 25 years the concept of memes will be a quaint relict of the past that only a few speicalists and crackpots have ever heard of is NOT ON THE MONEY!

What is it specified by?

Crudely, what Dawkins seems to be saying in recent interviews is:

You can observe a concept of genetic tendency (self propogation at any cost, say) (let's call that behaviour type A); and argue that can be defeated by a "conscious impulse" (or a decision to consign that kind of savagery to the past, for example) (which we can call behaviour type B).

This is just myth making. We can't decide to behave in a particular way unless our genetic predisposition leads us to behave in that way in that particular circumstance (or environment). Choosing behaviour type B in preference to behaviour type A is no less a decision determined our genetic make-up than the reverse would be. I can't believe Dawkins doesn't know this, and I think it is intellectually dishonest of him to imply otherwise.

I agree your point about the softer sciences. But it's tangential to the point I was making about Dawkins.

"Choosing behaviour type B in preference to behaviour type A is no less a decision determined our genetic make-up than the reverse would be"
similarly this doesn't follow either. if we are free to make any number of choices, in what way is this determined by anything?

Here the key word is 'leads'. This sentence is fine as long as 'leads' is neutral, but not fine if it's trying to imply that our genes are specifically prepared for each particular circumstance and can thus bring about a behaviour that to deal with it that is best for the propagation of the gene (which in all likelihood is likely to mean the individual too).

I haven't read the interviews, but from what you say you still seem to be missing the point. There is no gene or set of genes that equal the code for 'self-propagate at any cost'. Yes, successful genes are by definition those that self-propagate successfully (and of course they can have no notion of 'cost'), but that's just the mechanics of replication. The type B behaviour you cite relates to the behaviour of the individual, not the gene. Our brains are part of our phenotype. The genotype behind them has evolved because it allowed the genes to be passed through generations successfully, but in the relatively short-term, in unadapted-for environments, those same genes can see us ending up exhibiting behaviours that if exhibited consistently in the past would have led those genes to die out.

Like I said before, the human brain is a very powerful organ - on balance it must have been a good thing that it evolved that way - we survive and produce children with it well because it allows us to direct our behaviour in v.complex ways. But the 'bad' flipside of this for our genes is that it gives us very free rein to do crazy things that decrease our chances of our genes being passed on.

Nick,

" not fine if it's trying to imply that our genes are specifically prepared for each particular circumstance and can thus bring about a behaviour that to deal with it that is best for the propagation of the gene (which in all likelihood is likely to mean the individual too)."

I don't intend to suggest anything as nonsensical as that.

"I haven't read the interviews, but from what you say you still seem to be missing the point. There is no gene or set of genes that equal the code for 'self-propagate at any cost'. Yes, successful genes are by definition those that self-propagate successfully (and of course they can have no notion of 'cost'), but that's just the mechanics of replication. The type B behaviour you cite relates to the behaviour of the individual, not the gene. Our brains are part of our phenotype. The genotype behind them has evolved because it allowed the genes to be passed through generations successfully, but in the relatively short-term, in unadapted-for environments, those same genes can see us ending up exhibiting behaviours that if exhibited consistently in the past would have led those genes to die out."

Well, apart from predictably not agreeing that I am "missing the point" I don't find anything to disagree with here. I flagged up in advance that the illustration was crude. Where Dawkins gets into trouble is that he suggests that there is behaviour that is gene-driven the more "instinctual" behaviour I illustrated by type A behaviour) and behaviour that defeats that instinct by conscious choice. My point is that there are no grounds for saying the second type of behaviour is any less genetically predermined than the first, and that it is a false dichotomy. I am not suggesting that there is any set of genes that say "self-propogate at any cost". The whole concept of "purpose" is problematic here. Looked at in close up, we try to survive but the bigger picture is that our genes have survived because in a contingent universe they happen to have turned out to be the things that survived. Intentionality is neither here nor there.

"Like I said before, the human brain is a very powerful organ - on balance it must have been a good thing that it evolved that way - we survive and produce children with it well because it allows us to direct our behaviour in v.complex ways. But the 'bad' flipside of this for our genes is that it gives us very free rein to do crazy things that decrease our chances of our genes being passed on."

Well it is pure chance that a powerful brain has turned out to be a "good thing" so far. Part of the way that genetic mutation works involves "wrong paths" that decrease survival chances. If an animal species adapts its behaviour in a way that mean it is less well adapted to its environment we don't take this as evidence that genetic tendencies can be transcended. Our sophisticated brains may yet turn out to be a "wrong path" from a large enough historical perspective."

I don't think is really going anyway. I think you're setting up some myth-making Dawkins straw man that I find it hard to believe he has begun to resemble. I'd need you to show me the interviews you're talking about if this is to go any further. Evolutionary theory is fraught with semantic difficulties, whenever expedient words like 'purpose', 'lead', 'design' or 'transcend' are employed. I really doubt you'd have any argument with Dawkins if you were to speak to him.

"We alone on earth can rebel against the tyranny of our genes, the selfish replicators"

"Our destiny, our better fate, is to be passionately Anti-Darwinian when it comes to politics and human affairs".

Much of which Dawkins says is unexceptionable, but the basic concept I object to - similar to the one you outline above - is that our conscious mind can evolve a "purpose" which is different from genetic "purpose". (There is some confusion here because he did argue that the notion of a genetic purpose was man-made/illusory but nevertheless goes on to differentiate between that purpose and a conscious purpose which rebels against it. I'm happy to acknowledge that this isn't Dawkins fault, he can hardly do justice to the subtleties in a short radio interview.) Nevertheless my objection to his basic premise stands - I DON'T believe we can develop some kind of conscious purpose that rebels against our genes. If we decide to blow ourselves up because we are an evil race and the world will be better off without us, that will be an act as much determined by our genetic make-up as any other.

This (without the 'our genes' bit) is from the 2nd (late 80s) edition of The Seflish Gene. It's not a new quote.

Rebels against the tyranny in the sense that we end up doing things that are very much at odds with the primary goal of genes, to replicate. The general result of genetic makeup is to act in selfish ways to those that don't share a significant number of those genes that differentiate a individual from others (ie. those who aren't close family). And to act even more heartlessly to creatures from other species, who share even fewer genes. He's just saying, in the face of people misunderstanding the title of his most famous book, that we don't have to act selfishly. That our genetic inheritance is not a licence for acting selfishly or denying the existence of true altruism in humans (he doesn't think any other species can manage this).

Your last sentence almost got me arguing again, but yeah, let's leave it.

I think it's time those who are intelligently without conviction became, er, stupidly brash and convinced of their own, er, intelligence.

(Actually I quite like the geneticist's explanation of religion, basically that there might be an evolutionary advantage in short circuiting your intelligence in this specific area. I've certainly met plenty of very conventional Christians who, with the whole "meaning of life" problem conveniently taken care of in a couple of hours on Sunday morning, are able to be much more single minded about getting on with career, family etc. But if these people are brain surgeons or nuclear physicists you're not going to impress a lot of people describing them as the unbrights).