THE CONCEPT OF THE MEME

The concept of the meme is considered by Richard Brodie as "the secret code of human behavior," a "Rosetta stone" that provides the "key" to understanding religion, psychology, politics, cultural evolution. However, although the disclosure of this secret code of the human behavior confers the key to new horizons of knowledge, ensuring our understanding of the cultural evolution, this "key" - says Brodie - also opens the Pandora 's box, "opening up new techniques for mass manipulation ". This is what stirs worrying about the human condition in the future, especially as manipulation techniques are "so sophisticated that we may soon look on today 's manipulative TV commercials, political speeches and televangelists as fond remembrances of the good old days"1.