Hola Todos: With no disparagement intended to Jochen, I will point out that the sacred texts of Judeo-Christianity are riddled with commandments of intolerance as well as love. God is on the record as demanding murder and worse for trivial acts or for simply living in the wrong valley.
---- Pat On Monday, January 20, 2014, Jochen Fromm <[email protected]> wrote: > > It is not only a metaphor. It goes deeper, and it touches the core of our > civilization and what it means to be human. Religious groups are adaptive > units subject to evolution. They are based on replicating entities shaped > by group selection. > > First I want to say that true Christians are wonderful people, they are a > blessing for everybody. Those who really read the bible every day and > practice it, not the ones who only pretend to be it. Jesus must have been a > wonderful person, too, someone who loved everyone, men or women, old or > young, rich or poor. And when he died this horrible death at the cross his > followers must have thought this can't be true, such a wonderful person > doesn't deserved this. And some of his followers had the idea to write his > story down. > > When human beings are really governed by love, you indeed get a society > worth living in. "thou shalt not" and "eye for an eye; tooth for a tooth" > is the Old Testament, the foundation of the Jewish religion. The main > commandment of the New Testament is love (Matthew 22, 36-40): "Love the > Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your > mind. And [..] love your neighbor as yourself. All the Law and the Prophets > hang on these two commandments." > > Christians live in bubble of politeness, but rich people, too. See e.g. > http://www.vice.com/read/filthy-lucre "If you have money, you can pay to > live in a bubble of politesse. Excellent wine choice, sir. Here's your gift > bag, madam. Often, you don't have to pay for it [..] Soon, you think this > treatment is earned." Rich people pay much money to live in this bubble of > politesse and politeness. Living in such a bubble can indeed make you > believe you are worth it, and those with money usually think they deserve > it. Although they themselves behave quite contrary: arrogance is not > uncommon among the rich. > > Christians have discovered much earlier a way to get along with each other > without money, and how to make this miserable place a bit less miserable. > Religions are not ancient nonense, they contain ancient wisdom how to make > a life worth living. They consist of rules and instructions which are > thousands of years old and still work. > > You know, the holy book which is read every saturday (in the Jewish > religion) or sunday (in the Christian one) is in fact nothing else but a > bundle of instructions how to create a group of people which get along with > each other. The preacher who preaches a sermon is like someone who > translate the genes of the holy script. He reads the genetic information > (the DNA) and creates a message (the RNA) so that the believers can > translate the information into behavior. The behavior of the church members > is the protein which is generated. Church service is the expression of > cultural genes, and religious groups are adaptive units subject to > evolution and group selection. > > There you have it, the mystery of religion. From a sociological > perspective it is quite obvious. All the basic religious terms are related > to group terms: > > god: group > sin: breaking the rules of the group > blessing/curse: wish to be included in/excluded from the group > heaven/hell: being loved/hated by the group > prophet: founder of the group > priest: maintainer of the group > holy (profane): something which belongs to the group (or not) > holy book: history and blueprint of the group > prayer: conversation of individual and group > word of god, commandment: laws of the group > baptism: gain a new existence as a member of a group > > This doesn't mean that we all have to eat only "kosher" things now, though > ;-) > > See also > * Emile Durkheim, The Elementary Forms of Religious Life, 1912 > * Randall Collins, "Sociological Insight", Oxford University Press, 1992 > * David Sloan Wilson, "Darwin's cathedral", University Of Chicago Press, > 2003 > > -Jochen > > > On 01/20/2014 10:40 PM, glen wrote: > >> On 01/20/2014 12:39 PM, Jochen Fromm wrote: >> >>> http://blog.cas-group.net/2013/07/fascism-and-cancer/ >>> >> Great post! But, as usual, the metaphor prevents me from thinking more >> than it helps me to think. >> >> It seems fairly obvious to me that cancers are failures at the cellular >> scale. (Am I wrong?) The coarser and finer constructs are all useful >> mechanisms that only go bad when the cell scale goes wonky. In order to >> make this metaphor between totalitarianism and cancer into a useful >> thinking tool, we have to identify the analog of the cellular scale >> within the totalitarian system. Does the cell map to the individual? >> ... if not, then what? >> >> If we push the metaphor, I would argue that the humans that constitute >> totalitarian regimes are _normal_ humans. The merged sub-systems that >> you're mapping to tumors aren't (to my mind) like tumors at all. >> They're more like resonant frequencies than misgrown tissues. This >> brings us back to Arlo's concept of kindling homogenously strapped to >> the handle of an ax. It's a systemic pattern that, if broken, could >> snap back to a healthy regime. That's definitely not the case with >> cancer. Just breaking the resonant pattern so that the cells can float >> around amongst the their healthy brethren won't do much good at all, and >> would probably make things much worse. >> >> But I suppose you could counter with the idea that the individuals who >> have been _trained_ by a resonant frequency like capitalism are (over >> time) broken/damaged by that coarser forcing structure. But I think the >> cause vs. effect is flipped for the two systems, making the analogy fail >> in an important way. In one the resonant structure causes the broken >> individual. In the other, the broken individual causes the neoplasm. >> >> > > ============================================================ > FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv > Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College > to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com -- The information contained in this transmission may contain privileged and confidential information. It is intended only for the use of the person(s) named above. If you are not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any review, dissemination, distribution or duplication of this communication is strictly prohibited. If you are not the intended recipient, please contact the sender by reply email and destroy all copies of the original message. To reply to our email administrator directly, please send an email to [email protected].
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