Abstract
Memetics studies the evolution of culture as a set of mutually cooperating and - above all - mutually competing memes and groups of memes (meme-complexes). A 'meme' is usually seen as a unit of cultural information expressed in human behaviour, so it can be transmitted from one individual to another and over time propagate by imitation.
Memes compete with one another in the speed of transmission within a population and consequently also for a maximum representation in a population meme pool. Many memes try to secure preferential imitation by being useful to their bearers, while others can efficiently spread even when they harm their bearers, i.e., when they lower their biological fitness.
Memetics experienced the main period of boom in the last decade of the twentieth century. Its development had now significantly slowed down, perhaps because most of its laws had been already described in a different context by population genetics and evolutionary parasitology.