Richard Baker wrote:
I think that religions and cults are part of the same continuum.
Consider a population of people that hold a set of religious beliefs.
The size of this population can change in two ways. The population can
increase "vertically" though parents raising their children to hold
those beliefs and decrease vertically through people dying. It can
increase "horizontally" through people converting from other beliefs or
non-beliefs, and decrease vertically through people converting out of
the religion. I think that religious populations with a high vertical
flow are traditional religions and those with a high horizontal flow are
cults.
Rich--
It's a good model, but there is another kind of group.
As long as they avoid pogroms, there can be long lasting
small religious groups, which keep their membership by
making it very hard for their members to convert to other
beliefs. Do you want to call these "established cults"?
For example, some Amish sects fit this description.
...The virulence of the beliefs will thus fall with time as
people who are born into the religion will be more likely to leave if
it's not relatively mild.
I'm not sure about this statement. : )
...
If religions are viruses of the mind, then cults are like ebola,
Christianity like the common cold, and mythologies are like the fossil
retroviruses in our junk DNA.
And the Amish are like chicken pox/shingles ?
No, too virulent...
---David
ROU Antibodies
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