I LIKE Dawkin's Meme concept when speaking of popular culture. I
  believe it works VERY WELL when talking about etymological
  changes for examples, or the way fads and fashions pass down
  from one generation to the next, resurface in slightly altered
  forms and such.

  I'll even give Dawkin's his due with regards to progress in
  technology post WWII as having an evolutionary appearance to it,
  so far, thanks to economic growth and such.*

  If he's arguing that "people don't start from scratch and are
  raised within a culture with certain sets of assumptions about
  things", well that's plainly obvious. Of course they are.

  Then children grow up. Some accept received wisdom. Some
  question it. Some get greedy with power and want to change it.
  Some struggle to maintain a status quo. [which is an uneasy
  peace between religious groups regarding the Holy Sepulchre if I
  remember right - it's a technical term].

  His view of how children learn is oversimplified excessively and
  has no basis in actual reality.

  Dawkins is spinning a nice, plausible fantasy. His very good
  idea simply was taken a few steps further than necessary.

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