Is Anthropology a method or a science?

In a recent discussion about the central focus of anthropology, what distinguishes anthropology from other disciplines, an argument was made that we do have a central theoretical focus. In fact, the argument goes, that theory is based on the fact that we are holistic and yet culturally relative. We are, in this formulation, the combination and contradiction of C. P. Snow's Two Cultures - Science vs Humanities. This approach, which goes back at least to Boas, is proposed to be the anthropological method.

 I agree that we have a central methodology. It is a methodology that in many ways also reflects our underlying philosophy of science and the nature of things -- that is, the objective (etic) observation of the world and the subjective (emic) nature of the observing instrument -- the anthropologist. We incorporate a "quantum" perspective which recognizes the fact that the observer IS part of the system being observed and thereby influences the observation -- i.e. creates a degree of uncertainty.

But a methodology is not a theory or explanation. It is only a process which without direction and purpose is like the mouse running on the wheel in its cage. Good exercise going nowhere. Theory is by its very nature "inductive" speculations based on deductive analysis of the observations made of nature. Induction is the "If, then" statement where the "if" statement is based on a known set of data, and the "then" statement is a generalization of that data into an unknown future event or situation. Deduction is tautological. It too is a set of "If, then" statements. However, these statement are known facts and relationships from which a new or previously unknown fact is "deduced" If A = C, and B = C, then A = B.

As "natural history" anthropology is a deductive science. But as an predictive science and an applied science, anthropology.is an inductive science. That is, in the former case we report what we see and then analysis it to see more detail in the facts we already have. In the latter case, we detect patterns from past observations and hypothesize or predict future outcomes based on the correlations found between variables from past observations, e.g. what the population of X will be in ten years based on the population rate for the past 30 years..

Inductive models or theories point out problems for study and to validate observed patterns or to disprove the pattern. Anthropology today, especially ethnography, does not seem to have an inductive focus -- a set of principles or correlations that drive the research or analysis. Instead we seem to be happy pursuing our own idiosyncratic emic agendas -- "description and deductions" based on a sample of one at one moment in time and space.

My personal bias in this regard is the broad generalized question of the human condition and what we can infer about it based on a 150 or more years of anthropological research. Some might say anthropology is the study of "culture" (e.g. Leslie White, Tylor, Kroeber) which is phenomenon oriented, while others might say anthropology is the study of mankind ( or pc "humankind") which is species (biologically) oriented.

In this regard, the concept "meme" or "trait" or any other term that one chooses that distinguishes the physical "gene" concept from the ideational "superorganic" concept presents us with an interesting and promising why to inductively test propositions that relate directly structure and dynamics of "culture" on one hand, and on the other to the "tipping" point between Hominid to Homo (Human like animal to the self aware Human animal).

Finally, those who question the validity of Memetics argue that it "is not a theory by any reasonable definition thereof. More a model, and a rather questionable one to anyone who has studied semiotic"

First, anthropology is not semiotics, although semiotics has much to contribute to anthropology. Second, "meme" is a theoretical concept, the same way the Higgs Particle is/was a theoretical concept, it is not a fact. As a theoretical concept it calls for an inductive approach.

The "meme" provides a basis for directing research by focusing on creating hypotheses to prove or disprove its existence. And if "meme" is not the right concept, the question still exists, how did man or culture become what it is and what it means to be human? Unless, of course, you accept the orthodoxy of the breath of life and the apple in the Garden of Eden.But then we have ceded a scientific approach to the study of culture and humanity to a religious orthodoxy.

What Do We MEME in Anthropology

A recent article in the Atlantic  "Are LOLCats Making Us Smart?," describes the popular fad of LOLCats and how this phenomenon is drawing the attention of academic researchers at such events as the ROFLCon, -- a conference devoted to Internet memes and the mini-celebrities that have emerged. The Atlantic, in another article, entitled "Memes are people too ..." describes the conference.

The "meme" is an extremely important concept for anthropology as the science of humanity (the human species). The term, coined by Dawkins in his "The Selfish Gene", addressed a very real problem in human/social/cultural evolution, "How do you explain the super-sonic development of humanity as the dominant species on the planet from an evolutionary (biological) point of view?" The answer he suggested is that you don't. You have to look to something that while it acts like a gene (encapsulating basic fundamental information for a biological organism) but which is not physically (chemically) based. This he called the "meme."

When Darwin (& Wallace) discovered the principle and mechanism for species evolution -- "survival of the fittest", it took the rediscovery of Mendel’s pea experiments to demonstrate how that process works (although it was long understood in agriculture and animal breeding on a practical level). Almost a century later, Watson and Crick, and Rosalind Franklin, aided with by the technological invention of x-ray crystallography, discovered the double helix nature of DNA, the basis of the gene. This has produced a explosion of understanding and application of the concept of the genetic technology.

But despite attempts to extend the power of the gene into the field of social organization of species and especially the human species, through sociobiology, such explanations are inadequate given the relativity short time period of Homo sapiens existence as just one of a variety of Hominid species to today being the dominate species on the planet.

The "meme" is a concept that helps to explain how this could and can happen -- which was Dawkins' point. Memetics is a relatively new field of study and considered by many as a fad. In the context of the internet, the term "meme" has taken on a superficial meaning of graphic images that has gone viral. The concept is still in a "toy" stage as the Atlantic stories demonstrate, yet I suspect in time will be given the serious attention it deserves.

To understand "culture" and the role that it has played and does play in human existence and evolution, we need a concept that explains the spread of cultural elements across populations and generation and even within populations and generation independent of the biological constraint of passing on of an individual's genetic material to the generation where it will come to dominate the population over time and under the given environment conditions that favored it.

The "meme" is such a concept and worthy of more serious attention than it is currently receiving. The technological advances in brain sciences and neurology may help us to bridge the gap. On the practical side -- understanding the nature of the meme has tremendous implications for education, marketing, advertising, and propaganda.