[ExI] Food for thought

[John Grigg]

On Wed, Sep 10, 2008 at 10:09 AM, hkhenson <hkhenson at rogers.com> wrote:

> At 10:42 PM 9/9/2008, John Grigg wrote:
>
> snip
>
>  Regarding religion, I would think non-violent proselytizing is a much more
>> enlightened form of the old "two tribes battling it out with swords and
>> bows."  Meme wars that don't end in human bloodshed!
>>
>
> Some 60 million people who died in the context of WWII would probably
> disagree with you if they were not dead.  They would lay a lot of blame on
> Nazi memes, communist memes and various memes held by the opposing parties.
>  Communism in particular had fairly long non violent proselytizing phase.
> But while memes are an element of the causal path to wars, they are not the
> ultimate reason for bloodshed.


The meme wars I was making reference to were those which dealt with
religious proselyting/competition (both within and between nations) and as I
said did not end in mass human bloodshed.  WWII was at least in part about
secular memes (not religious memes) helping to lead groups toward war.



>
> The ultimate reason is human populations that get too large for the
> resource base.
>
> The theory states that populations with a growing income per capita will
> not start a war.  (They can still be attacked of course.)
>

A resource poor Japan and Germany made their big grab for power and wealth
in WWII.  But of course their despotic governments used nationalistic memes
to fan the fires of patriotism and twist their citizens to their will.  I'm
not so sure that their populations truly got too large for their resource
base as states your theory (despite all the lectures given on "lebenstraum"
to the German people by their leadership).  I think it was more a case on
the individual/group level of greedy "we are a uniquely special & powerful
nation and must be number one, screw international trade, we will just seize
what we want" thinking.



>
> I have a particularly jaundiced view of religions.  Most of you know why.
>
> Keith


Keith, please don't think an organization such as the one you refer to is a
worthy excuse for having a particularly negative view of religions in
general.


John Grigg
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