"God" is as interesting as any other concept, ie totally a game people play, linguistic or not. A gene for this probably does not exist, just like a gene for short skirts and high heels doesn't exist. What does exist is some people who can, will, can't or won't have a spiritual life, just like they will or won't have a sex life, a political life etc. For whatever reason most people will not reach levels worth talking about in any of these lives. But the list is a great place to discuss the mediocre and bellow :)
AT I Am On 16.11.2012, at 19:31, Steve Richfield <[email protected]> wrote: > Everyone, > > There is an important point that everyone here is missing: > > Believers actually do better in our world than do non-believers. Why? Because > others know that believers think God is watching them, so others expect > believers to be more trust-worthy than non-believers are. Hence, with greater > trust, believers are trusted with more, they build bigger fortunes, have more > wives, and sire more believers. > > Looking around, most people can see that believers usually have more than do > non-believers. Why? "Obviously" (if you believe the hype) because God has > rewarded them for their belief!!! > > My longtime friend Dan, a Baptist minister with a DD degree, related his > impressions when he first met my family, where no one had even the slightest > hint of religious leanings. Dan had "learned" that you can't trust > non-believers, yet we literally saved his life from a downward spiral, with > no expectation of any sort of direct reward. This turned into hours of > discussion about the cold hard logic of some forms of altruism, e.g. seeing > how little it takes to turn someone else's life around, to potentially be > used in the future to turn our own lives around. In short, the value of what > we learned exceeded the cost of saving Dan. > > There is a COST in non-belief that isn't exacted by God, but rather it is > exacted by society in the form of a sort of social tax that keeps away many > valuable contacts. Sure, you might think that a devout believer is a little > nuts, but that is better than their belief that you, a non-believer, are > untrustworthy and will steal anything you can get away with. > > Hence, reject the meme of God at your peril. There is a good reason why > everyone on this forum is too broke to fully fund their interests - because > your "God", AGI, isn't their God. > > Steve > ============== > On Fri, Nov 16, 2012 at 8:51 AM, Piaget Modeler <[email protected]> > wrote: > > Whether their host is biological or synthetic, I think memes will always find > a way to reproduce. > > ~PM > > Date: Fri, 16 Nov 2012 10:20:52 -0600 > Subject: Re: [agi] Minds and Gods: The Cognitive Neuroscience of Religious > belief > From: [email protected] > To: [email protected] > > > It would be interesting, though, PM, to see if the AGIs humanity eventually > produces are sufficiently similar to us to be susceptible to the same > parasitic exploitation. > > > > AGI | Archives | Modify Your Subscription > > > > -- > Full employment can be had with the stoke of a pen. Simply institute a six > hour workday. That will easily create enough new jobs to bring back full > employment. > > > AGI | Archives | Modify Your Subscription ------------------------------------------- AGI Archives: https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/303/=now RSS Feed: https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/rss/303/21088071-c97d2393 Modify Your Subscription: https://www.listbox.com/member/?member_id=21088071&id_secret=21088071-2484a968 Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com
