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ANNOTATION:
The Lucifer Principle: a scientific expedition into the forces of history
Two additional books of significance on memes are:
Howard Bloom. The Lucifer Principle: a scientific expedition into the forces of history. New York, Atlantic Monthly Press, 1995
"a freshly viable theory of human evolution"--The Washington Post
and
Richard Brodie. Virus of the Mind: the new science of the meme. Seattle, Integral Press, 1996.
Author: Kenneth Allen Hopf (khopf[ at ]ix.netcom.com)
Date: Apr 20, 1997
REPLY:
>I am just starting the book. It looks to me very interesting and
enlightening. I cannot help notice, however, that the Foreward
by David Sloan Wilson includes a statement that is clearly
false. He says "He believes that the Leviathan, or society as
an organism, is not a fanciful metaphor but an actual product of
evolution. The Darwinian struggle for existence has taken place
among societies, as well as among individuals within societies
... That is the vision of evolution and human behavior found in
_The Lucifer Principle_, and at the present it can be found
nowhere else."
Not true. One may find this vision in a great many other places
as well. For instance, it permeates Michael Rothschild's book
_Bionomics_. And as for the notion that societies as well as
individuals evolve and compete, one has only to peruse the work
of the Nobel prize winning economist Friedrich A. Hayek. I am
also surprised to find in the index not a single reference to
Hayek or to Karl Popper, one of the most outspoken and prominent
advocates of an evolutionary epistemology among 20th centuries
philosophers.
Copyright© 1996 Principia Cybernetica -
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