Replicators

The most general way of stating the central assertion of the neo-Darwinian theory of evolution is that a population of replicators subject to variation (for instance by imperfect copying) will be taken over by those variants that are better than their rivals at causing themselves to be replicated. — David Deutsch, The Beginning of Infinity: Explanations That Transform the World

A population of replicators subject to variation (for instance by imperfect copying) will be taken over by those variants that are better than their rivals at causing themselves to be replicated. — David Deutsch, The Beginning of Infinity: Explanations that Transform The World

As I said, imitation is not at the heart of human meme replication. — David Deutsch, The Beginning of Infinity: Explanations That Transform the World

The most general way of stating the central assertion of the neo-Darwinian theory of evolution is that a population of replicators subject to variation (for instance by imperfect copying) will be taken over by those variants that are better than their rivals at causing themselves to be replicated. — David Deutsch, The Beginning of Infinity: Explanations That Transform the World

The more accurately the hobgoblin’s attributes exploit genuine, widespread vulnerabilities of the human mind, the more faithfully the anti-rational meme will propagate. If the meme is to survive for many generations, it is essential that its implicit knowledge of these vulnerabilities be true and deep. But its overt content – the idea of the hobgoblin’s existence – need contain no truth. On the contrary, the non-existence of the hobgoblin helps to make the meme a better replicator, because the story is then unconstrained by the mundane attributes of any genuine menace, which are always finite and to some degree combatable. — David Deutsch, The Beginning of Infinity: Explanations That Transform the World

Rational and anti-rational memes: Thus, memes of this new kind, which are created by rational and critical thought, subsequently also depend on such thought to get themselves replicated faithfully. So I shall call them rational memes. Memes of the older, static-society kind, which survive by disabling their holders’ critical faculties, I shall call anti-rational memes. — David Deutsch, The Beginning of Infinity: Explanations That Transform the World