On Friday 15 November 2002 01:43, Sam Ritchie wrote: > Actually, hehe, I've made this comparison before, of religion to a disease. > (first off, let me clarify that I have nothing against anyone's religion! > I'm looking at this from an outsider's perspective, and harbor no biases.) > The torah, for example, has very strict guidelines in it for reproduction > of the book, and strongly encourages its followers to go out and make > copies. As you mention, religion can act as a virus of sorts, "infecting" > its carrier and urging it to carry the "virus" to others.
The problem with that kind of "religious meme" is that the original book will refer to a certain time and society.. wich as time passes becomes more and more idyossincratic and out-of-sync... The usual answer to that problem from a religious comunity is to maintain the original lifestyle in wich the "memetic code" was written has to give its followers a sense of "right" in reality and truthnes in the written word. You can see for example the orthodox jews. The other ways are: 1) a prophet in direct contact with the god. Example: Any prophetic sect or reformed religion with a charismatic leader 2) a church wich has a outside "transcription factor" that enables an adaptation to reality. Example: The catholic church, wich has theology as a transcription factor. And the church burocracy to define wich is accepted world-view, justified by theology. (Every 7 years, they revise the list of sins, for example...:)))) These types are not exclusive and usualy evolve from one to other... They all are kind of of an attempt to control the virus, wich is very interesting in itself.. Could we say that organised religion is not itself a disease, but an attempt to control disease?? (to someone's profit of course... : ) > > > > My experience in a former religious life, is that the mentally ill are > > drawn to the religious life... There's even a rare neurological sickness > > (caused by accidents and brain defects in certain parts of the brain ) in > > wich the patient has trancesdental experiences and direct contact with > > god. > > Ooh, and then there's the apparent tongue of Babel. Glossolalia, or > speaking in tongues, is sometimes said to be the human core language. I have read Snow Crash, too. ;) Myself I think that glossofalia is related to the core language, but it's not THE human core language... When 7th day Adventist or any rapture group start speaking in tongues they are usually in a kind of seizure... I think that it's more akin to the "universal gramatic" of Chomsky let loose and completely haywire. Like if you were working with a voice processor and it's phonem library got all mixed up... (The universal gramatic sets the POTENTIAL languages available to humans, so glossofalic languages sound like languages and even have kind of gramatical order but are not languages.. just attempts to speak with the wrong working-level of the brain) > > Interestingly, you can reproduce that experience with some mushrooms or > > roots from the amazon florest, there's even a cult in Brazil that uses > > them... (more incredible, is that its alucinations are individualistic... > > someone that believes in buda, will feel Buda... Jeovah, etc... there are > > people (usually atheists) that say they talked with aliens and space > > ghosts :))) This drug will even eliminate addictions.. There are heroin, > > tabaco, etc addicts that will have their addictions eliminated after a > > section with the so called sacrament... > > > > Weird. Very... It's like the drug that was used by a atheist/eastern mistic society in the book "The island" by Aldous Huxley (his last book). And you can see that tibetan budism, especialy the dalay lama has seen also the potencial children of joining science and eastern misticism. > > Wich is very, very interesting.... for "the god in our brains" seems to > > clear our deepest fears and pain. > > Have there ever been studies done on the actual, physical effects of > religion on the human brain? It definitely seems valid to say that > SOMETHING occurs within the mind when one "assumes a faith", something > which would definitely be worthwhile to look into... Anyone know? > ~SAM Only on meditation of buddist monks, and during prayer. There as not been to knowledge any study on before/after converted persons... And I think there would be no religion that would accept doing that kind of study... (For obvious reasons...) ~AIFE aka Stackbit
