Contents -- Acknowledgments -- Introduction -- why epistemology matters -- why evolution matters -- ontology, selection, and convention -- Part I -- Part II -- Part III -- preestablished harmony -- 1 Replicator Theories -- dawkins, replicators, and memes -- Memes: The Cultural Replicators -- david hull: replicators and the evolution of science -- Science as a Selection Process -- dennett's intentional-informational replicators -- What Exactly Is a Meme? -- conclusion -- 2 Ontologies of Evolution and Cultural Transmission -- an ontology of the cell -- horizontal transmission -- cultural transmission as a cellular process -- memetics: the ''meme's-eye view" -- three kinds of selfishness in evolution -- lineages and populations -- conclusion -- 3 Population Dynamics -- simple selection -- modeling evolution -- population models -- mutation -- frequency-dependent fitness -- selection-mutation in fixed-size populations -- sampling error or drift -- conclusion -- 4 Information Theory -- information basics -- why entropy? what metaphysics? -- dretske's indicator semantics -- using functions to determine informationally relevant states -- a tracking efficiency measure for naturalized epistemology -- information and payoffs -- pareto optimization of adapted responses -- conclusion: four concepts of information -- 5 Selection as an Information-Transfer Process -- putting it all together -- states of the world and the population -- the proof -- other receiver characterizations -- the slogan -- 6 Multilevel Information Transfer -- information and selection on two levels -- human knowledge -- common sense -- objections -- 7 Information in Internal States -- the model: real's bumblebees -- preference formation: adding a third level -- variable environments -- simulation results -- Information and Selection -- 8 Primitive Content -- meaning conventions.

converging on a new theory of meaning -- primitive content -- formalization -- representing rules -- objective rules of reason -- functional failure and primitive content -- 9 Is and Ought -- moore's ''open question" -- the phenomenology of agency -- the nature of the is-ought gap -- hume's argument by elimination -- genetic and cultural determinism -- a brief digression: supervenience? -- prospects for a theory of ought in general -- Epilogue -- Notes -- chapter 1 -- chapter 2 -- chapter 3 -- chapter 4 -- chapter 5 -- chapter 6 -- chapter 7 -- chapter 8 -- chapter 9 -- Appendix -- References -- Index.