[ExI] What is religion? What is god was The Meaning of

[William Flynn Wallace]

 Scientology    keith

This has always amazed me.  A science fiction writer tells his peers that
he is going to start a religion and he does!!  And people believe it
anyway.  I don't know if anyone has studied credulousness but I am going to
find out.

bill w

On Thu, Jun 16, 2016 at 11:18 PM, Keith Henson <hkeithhenson at gmail.com>
wrote:

> On Thu, Jun 16, 2016 at 8:53 PM,  John Clark <johnkclark at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > On Thu, Jun 16, 2016 at 11:24 AM, Keith Henson <hkeithhenson at gmail.com>
> > wrote:
> >
> >> More fundamental than the particular local set of myths is why people
> >> have myths at all.
> >
> > ?Because their mommy and daddy told them those myths were real. Genes
> that
> > make children believe what adults tell them will do better than genes
> that
> > tell them to ignore adults because adults do have a lot of wisdom to
> impart
> > on their children.
>
> This kind of harmless meme spread down the generations has been seen
> in many animals including crows.
>
> > And most adults don't have hallucinations but some do
> > and they will tell their children about them and they will believe what
> > they hear, and as adults they will go on to tell their children about it
> > and they will believe it too. And so it goes.
> >
> > Scientology may be a bit different as many became converts as adults,
> but I
> > don't think Scientology will ever become a major religion that way
> because
> > there aren't a
> > sufficient number adults that retain enough juvenile characteristics to
> > seek a father figure. If a religion wants to get big it has to snag
> people
> > when their young, very young, preferably learning to talk young
> > and before their critical thinking skills are developed.
>
> That may be true among some old line religions.  But I know of several
> cases where the children called bullshit on the parents at young ages.
> My take on how scientology works is in a 14 year old paper here:
> http://human-nature.com/nibbs/02/cults.html
>
> Sex, Drugs, and Cults. An evolutionary psychology perspective on why
> and how cult memes get a drug-like hold on people, and what might be
> done to mitigate the effects
>
> As for this cult, it's down by around 90% from when they tangled with
> the internet back in 1995.  My contribution was a lot less than the
> South Park, trapped in the Closet episode, but I think I helped bring
> them down.  Back in 1995 the media was terrified of them.  Now . . .
>
> http://www.esquire.com/news-politics/a44458/ruthless-scientology-excerpt/
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