On Thu, Jan 31, 2013 at 3:46 AM, meekerdb <[email protected]> wrote:
> On 1/30/2013 7:22 AM, Terren Suydam wrote: > > Personally, my take on religion is that it has been an extraordinarily > successful means of organizing groups. I don't religion has ever been any > one person's Machiavellian scheme, > > > Then perhaps you unaware of Joesph Smith and L. Ron Hubbard. > > haha, sure. Actually I was talking more about the "institution of religion", or perhaps the "first" religion - loosely defined as appealing to a supernatural authority. > rather I think religion (and other cultural institutions) have been > selected for in the evolution of culture. > > > This is not contrary to them having been started by a single schemer. > Note that many - David Koresh, Jim Jones, Marshall Applewhite,... schemers > try but fail and some may come to believe their own myths. > > I also tend to see collectives of humans as organisms-in-themselves, in > roughly the same way that a hive of bees can be seen as an organism in > itself; and that human genetics has co-evolved with the cultural memetics. > > As such, I tend to run religious dogma through this filter: does it > promote values in individuals, that, taken collectively, make the > collective more likely to persist. > > > You don't care about anything but persistence? > Not really, no, at least not in this context. That's all evolution is when you get down to it, a search of increasingly persistent forms under dynamic conditions. Perhaps morals just happen to be what a successful (in terms of persistence) group instills in its constituent members... which would account for why morals are so divergent across cultures. Terren > Brent > > When I run the above prayer through that filter I find that it is a > pretty good fit for that idea. > > Terren > > > > > On Tue, Jan 29, 2013 at 11:13 PM, Kim Jones <[email protected]>wrote: > >> This is a pretty well-worn, oft-used, school prayer. Given it is recited >> or sung by the entire student body and staff at a good many schools and >> other institutions you would have to assume that it's all fundamentally >> good stuff. >> >> >> >> Teach us, good Lord, to serve thee as thou deserves; >> to give and not to count the cost; >> to fight and not to heed the wounds; >> to till, and not to seek for rest; >> to labour, and not to ask for any reward, >> save that of knowing we do thy will. >> >> >> Amen. >> >> >> But it's all incredibly bad advice, really - don't you think? Why do >> people assume God wants Earthlings to be such a bunch of try-hards? >> I hate this prayer. It advertises values that no one can live up to and >> no one need live up to. Surely we can invent a better, less servile, less >> obsequious, less cringing, less Gollum-like take on what we think God wants >> for us. >> >> All this servility, this grovelling at the feet of somebody. Is God >> really into all that? I don't believe it. >> >> >> >> Kim Jones >> >> >> -- >> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups >> "Everything List" group. >> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an >> email to [email protected]. >> To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. >> Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. >> For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out. >> >> >> > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "Everything List" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to [email protected]. > To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. > Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out. > > > > No virus found in this message. > Checked by AVG - www.avg.com > Version: 2013.0.2890 / Virus Database: 2639/6069 - Release Date: 01/30/13 > > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "Everything List" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to [email protected]. > To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. > Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out. > > > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
