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Dawkins Memes

Buttons*

Buttons*

Glass half Panda'd
Jaiket said:
In what way, Ash?
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WELL... if we take into account all the things that come into people making decisions: brute force, good ideas, social paradigm shifts, taboos, varying concepts, etc. it seems that conversion of religious ideas (when only sometimes accepted, and not completely - as we DO have different religions out there) aren't completely understood by anyone that hears of them. In order to gain a full understanding of a religion, someone must actually participate in it. Religions can't be understood by sharing ideas, and the visible/physical transformations that happen in people when they convert or find religion or leave religion have nothing to do with ideas that "infect" people. The act of taking it on oneself to participate is the only way to come to know the religion fully.
 
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themadhair

Well-Known Member
Buttons* said:
No, I'm not. I don't think that Dawkins and his theories are God either.
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For the record I have never read a single one of Dawkins’ books and know jack ѕhit about mimetics.

I just think that your claim that religious ideas don’t replicate is simply wrong. Where do you think you got your knowledge of different religions from? Might you have inherited them from others? Isn’t that the definition of what replication involves here???[FONT=&quot][/FONT]
 
Buttons*

Buttons*

Glass half Panda'd
themadhair said:
For the record I have never read a single one of Dawkins’ books and know jack ѕhit about mimetics.

I just think that your claim that religious ideas don’t replicate is simply wrong. Where do you think you got your knowledge of different religions from? Might you have inherited them from others? Isn’t that the definition of what replication involves here???[FONT=&quot][/FONT]
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No, because true religious understanding can't come from reading a book. One must actually experience the religion first hand, and this is something that cannot come from others opinions or thoughts. My comment to Jaiket sort of goes through this.
 
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themadhair

Well-Known Member
Buttons* said:
No, because true religious understanding can't come from reading a book. One must actually experience the religion first hand, and this is something that cannot come from others opinions or thoughts. My comment to Jaiket sort of goes through this.
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I’m confused here – why are you defining religious replication as coming from reading a book?

Consider the following image:
URL]

Doesn’t that depict the religion spreading and replicating? I just don’t get why your seem intent on dismissing that religion replicates. If it didn’t it wouldn’t be around for very long unless people were continuously discovering it on their own.
 
Buttons*

Buttons*

Glass half Panda'd
themadhair said:
I’m confused here – why are you defining religious replication as coming from reading a book?
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The idea of religions and the actual religions themselves in my mind, aren't the same thing. Whether you get the info from a book or a person is irrelevant. The idea may be there, but the actual conversion is something different, subjective, and personal.

themadhair said:
Consider the following image:
URL]

Doesn’t that depict the religion spreading and replicating? I just don’t get why your seem intent on dismissing that religion replicates. If it didn’t it wouldn’t be around for very long unless people were continuously discovering it on their own.
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That depicts the religion spreading, but by varying means. If you're conquered and threatened with "convert or die" you're going to convert even if you don't understand or believe the faith. That's a different sort of phenomenon than random spontaneous conversion by idea sharing. In THAT (idea sharing) case, you could possibly say that memes are applicable because the idea is replicating. But the thing is, not everyone converts simply because they've heard of a faith. people DO create their own religions all the time, just look at this forum lol! People who have the idea of a religion and create it to fit their personal quirks is NOT the same as understanding a religion, embracing it, and converting to it.
 
Buttons*

Buttons*

Glass half Panda'd
themadhair said:
But how the religion spreads isn’t relevant in so much as the fact that it actually spreads. Isn’t people being converted (whether real/fake and for whatever reason) not represent a successful replication?
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I don't believe that we can overgeneralize :)
 
rojse

rojse

RF Addict
Buttons* said:
...... right.....

Religious ideas replicate themselves? I doubt it... Even if they are replicated through people's converting, that is a totally different kettle of fish than some evolving "meme" that reproduces virally in other people. If it were the case, people would all think the same about things.
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Not at all. Replication happens when new followers are brought into the fold of religion - old people whom are new converts, or perhaps the children of the original converts.

And memes provides an explanation for why the transmission of ideas is somewhat haphazard - it does not say that ideas are fully transferred at all.
 
logician

logician

Well-Known Member
rojse said:
And memes provides an explanation for why the transmission of ideas is somewhat haphazard - it does not say that ideas are fully transferred at all.
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My take on Xianity is that the ideas and traditions it has today are nothing like what existed in the original Xian cults of the second century - it has evolved into something totally different.
 
Yerda

Yerda

Veteran Member
Buttons* said:
WELL... if we take into account all the things that come into people making decisions: brute force, good ideas, social paradigm shifts, taboos, varying concepts, etc. it seems that conversion of religious ideas (when only sometimes accepted, and not completely - as we DO have different religions out there) aren't completely understood by anyone that hears of them. In order to gain a full understanding of a religion, someone must actually participate in it. Religions can't be understood by sharing ideas, and the visible/physical transformations that happen in people when they convert or find religion or leave religion have nothing to do with ideas that "infect" people. The act of taking it on oneself to participate is the only way to come to know the religion fully.
Click to expand...
I'm sorry, Ashles, I don't follow ye at all. :eek:
 
Bedlam

Bedlam

Improperly Undefined
Don Penguinoini said:
Dawkins is like most atheists to me, cannot disprove any religion except Christianity.
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Two things.

One, it's not the job of the scientist to disprove religion. It's the follower's job to prove the religion is right.

Two, Dawkins isn't singling out any one religion. Atheists are of the mind that nothing supernatural is real. If it came down to it, Dawkins or any other Atheist could show that the Greek Pantheon is just as absurd as Santa Claus or magical Elves. There wouldn't be a point to it though, because less than one percent of the world's population believes in the Greek Pantheon. A much higher number believes in Christianity.
 
Don Penguinoini

Don Penguinoini

Modi.
Bedlam said:
Two things.

One, it's not the job of the scientist to disprove religion. It's the follower's job to prove the religion is right.

Two, Dawkins isn't singling out any one religion. Atheists are of the mind that nothing supernatural is real. If it came down to it, Dawkins or any other Atheist could show that the Greek Pantheon is just as absurd as Santa Claus or magical Elves. There wouldn't be a point to it though, because less than one percent of the world's population believes in the Greek Pantheon. A much higher number believes in Christianity.
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Right, it is not, but this one seems to really hate religion, and MOSTLY Christianity.

And most athiests may like to think that, but when it comes to them justifying their beliefs, they will go to the Bible or the Quran, they would not go to the Vedas or the Upanishads.

Not only are there more Christians, it is easier to refute their religions.
 
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themadhair

Well-Known Member
Totally offtopic for the thread but relevant to what we are discussing my Hindu friend.

I’m studying Scientology materials right now to help me understand its effects on people, and to hopefully use that knowledge to coax people out of that organisation. I’m reading material that I think is a total crock of ****. My mind, after a reading sessions, almost feels like it is screaming “stop filling me with this ****”.

To study material that makes no sense, is outright illogical and daft beyond belief is extremely hard work. The reason Christianity gets such a hard time is because, with it being so prevalent, a lot of atheists (this may be true of Dawkins) were raised as Christian and thus have a great deal of experience with the bible. This is the case for me.

To sum up – do you think I would spend valuable time and effort reading materials on Hinduism I strongly suspect are founded on an untrue premise (i.e. they were supernaturally inspired)?
 
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