dawkins' mighty hammer (original) (raw)

In a couple of days I'll finish an HTML document which connects ideas from memetics, evolution, psychology, neural anatomy, cultural anthropology, and complexity to explain why humanity has had so much difficulty facing the climate crisis. Not a shred of original research, but a new paradigm for who we are. Even the title sounds like hyperbole, "Darwinian Limitation and Transcendental Opportunity."

I'm an unpublished retired teacher. This will never be accepted, as is, by The Journal of Memetics, for example. In my experience of reviewers for journals, they don't actually read the hundreds of submissions. They look at the first few sentences and judge the academic style. There's a correct framing for academics in a field writing for their fellow academics. If I submit it, the document will lay about for three months and get fifty second glances by three people, who will see hyperbole. It's addressed to climate crisis concerns, and begins with those, not with memetic jargon.

So how can I possibly get the ideas even read by people who might understand them, to get in the door? It's too cross disciplinary and I have no academic institution behind me.

I've considered the Climate Outreach and Information Network, because George Marshall explicitly called for ideas on how the climate crisis can be seen as an opportunity. But this is evading peer review. Suggestions?

3/19/11 Here's a summary:

Our helpless response to climate destabilization is part of a larger problem, arising from Universal Darwinism. When memetics is treated as a unifying scientific theory, as Richard Brodie suggests, and we step back to view gene and meme evolution from a complex systems perspective, a new framing emerges to explain climate change denial. The language of blame and provisional self esteem inherent in Dominator culture have prevented us from embracing insights into human nature revealed by science, and taking collective responsibility. A memetic/complex systems approach provides the rationale for a deeper embrace of science, in order to reinvent our "selves" to face the climate crisis. While we face humanity's greatest threat, we also face our greatest opportunity.