The term “meme” was coined by Richard Dawkins, an evolutionary biologist, in 1976 in a book entitled The Selfish Gene. Dr. Dawkins said a meme can be ...”tunes, ideas, catch-phrases, clothes fashions, ways of making pots or building arches.” (Meme rhymes with steam.) Dawkins compared memes to diseases, seeking to propagate themselves by infecting people. They can spread rapidly, and they affect the way we think.
Kalle Lasn, the editor of the magazine Adbusters, is credited with sparking the “Occupy” movement. He deliberately set out to create a new meme. He said, “There’s a number of ways to wage a meme war. I believe one of the most powerful things of all is aesthetics.”
Did he succeed? If I say the words 99%, do you know what I’m talking about? Do you think the top 1% should be taxed? Do you think the benefits of government are going to the wealthy? It doesn’t matter if the Occupy movement people go home for the winter. We have a new meme going.
Tomorrow: Evolutionary psychologist Steven Pinker says we are growing less violent.
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