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At 09:33 AM 12/10/2007, Seien wrote:<br>
<blockquote type=cite class=cite cite="">Two points I would make on this
email. Firstly, I would have said that religion was a combination of two
phenomena: antirational memes, </blockquote><br>
Exactly. But now (since this is an *evolutionary* psychology group)
you need to account for why the psychological trait to pick up
antirational memes would have been favored in the EEA. It took me
_years_ to come up with an explanation for that. Finally did when I
understood that Hamilton's inclusive fitness implied that you could get a
divergence of interest between an individual and his genes.
<br><br>
So an individual (warrior) could be influenced by a buildup of
antirational (or irrational) memes and take high risk or get himself
killed and genes for this psychological trait would do better than genes
for psychological traits to consistently reject antirational memes.
Weird eh? (You have to count copies of his genes in relatives for
this to make sense, and the propagation of antirational memes seems to be
modulated by future prospects.)<br><br>
<blockquote type=cite class=cite cite="">and the use of best available
explanations. In a time when people had barely any knowledge about How
Things Work, the best use it seemed they could put their creativity to
was inventing mythologies to explain the things they saw. In the absence
of any real knowledge, this <i>was</i> the best available explanation for
the natural phenomena they experienced. However, due to its obviously
irrational qualities, religion/mythology very quickly became an
antirational meme, resisting criticism through stubbornness rather than
any kind of deep truth. </blockquote><br>
True, but see above. Memes and humans co-evolved. If
irrational memes didn't help genes survive, the ability to believe in
them would have been bred out.<br><br>
<blockquote type=cite class=cite cite="">>Of course any *specific*
religion is a meme (or complex of memes) so<br>
>there is certainly a cultural element (memes *are* elements of<br>
>culture) to the particulars of any religion. But the general
human <br>
>ability to "have" religions is virtually certain to be
rooted in genetics<br><br>
Secondly,
<a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2004/11/14/ngod14.xml&sSheet=/news/2004/11/14/ixnewstop.html" eudora="autourl">
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2004/11/14/ngod14.xml&sSheet=/news/2004/11/14/ixnewstop.html</a>
<br><br>
"<i>Growing up in a religious environment was said to have little
effect on belief. Dr Hamer, who in 1993 claimed to have identified a DNA
sequence linked to male homosexuality, said the existence of the
"god gene" explained why some people had more aptitude for
spirituality than others." </i></blockquote><br>
"Dr Hamer insisted, however, that his research was not antithetical
to a belief in God. He pointed out: "Religious believers can point
to the existence of god genes as one more sign of the creator's ingenuity
- a clever way to help humans acknowledge and embrace a divine
presence." "<br><br>
That's deeply humorous. <br><br>
<blockquote type=cite class=cite cite="">Like Ayaan Hirsi Ali, for
instance.</blockquote><br>
An interesting case to be sure.<br><br>
Keith</body>
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