Rather, they are disembodied collections of embodied entities. The pattern may be so big, that we can not see enough of it to recognize it as a pattern. There could be a developmental conductor that exists light years away and uses high energy cosmic particles as its baton. But also, I think, the lack of discernable patterns in collections of individuals could be attributed to the concept of free will, in which case humans are well suited to the entropic universe of Willard Gibbs, rather than the Liebnitzian clockwork monads. Societal patterns could also belong more to the temporal realm, than the spatial realm.
Genetic structures seem to operate in a fiercely competitive milieu, or one of limited symbiosis.
Their requirements for relatively large amounts of limited energy would seem to require this. Ideas can be selected and have an effect on the body, but in a cooperative, memetic arena, the complementary of selection is not necessarily elimination of discarded ideas, but storage for possible use in different circumstances, or as components of a recombination that works well in the present environment. In essence, the system is more open than genetic structures in that it can be more receptive to both new and old. In the genetic realm selection must entail elimination, both of species and lifeform traits. Because of its temporal abilities, memes can meet the anology of both requirements in a blink of an eye.