Comment 8 by Zeuglodon

You missed the purpose of the thought experiment. The point is that the mutation rate cannot be too high, or it will destroy any serious attempt to call an idea a replicator.

I think you missed my point. I'm saying that what I think gets memetically passed on is not the idea itself, but the idea of the idea. It is the very notion that something is 'the same idea' that is being passed on and is the'replicator'.

Let me give an example...the word 'universe'. 100 years ago, the actual content of the idea of universe was solely our galaxy. People had no idea that other galaxies existed, let alone that there was any big bang. Clearly,'universe' today contextually means something completely different and more extensive than 100 years ago.......and the content of the idea 100 years ago has not survived. But...the meta idea of 'universe' has survived, in the sense of 'all that exists'.

Thus it is the meta idea...the actual idea of the idea...that is the actual replicator. That is precisely how a person can call themselves a 'Christian' ( for example the former Archbishop of Canterbury ) despite not believing 90% of what the Bible says.