Gardner, Martin. "Kilroy Was Here" - significance of memes - Brief Article

Gardner, Martin. "Kilroy Was Here." The Los Angeles Times Book Review, March 5, 2000. Gardner reviews at length Susan Blackmore's latest book The Meme Machine. Richard Dawkins introduced the word "meme," short for "mimetics," a word denoting mimicry. "A meme," Gardner says, "is anything humans do or say that is not genetically determined and is passed from person to person by imitation or copying, such as the wish to 'have a nice day.'" One of Blackmore's theories is that there is no "self," but instead, "millions of memes shuffling about inside our skull." Gardner suggests that the notion of a meme is much too broad to be useful in explaining human thinking and behavior.

"A meme is little more than a peculiar terminology for saying the obvious."

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