> Someone said,
>
> > Even people who host the logic meme for the most part of their daily
> > lives can simultaneouly host a theistic meme with the addition of
> > one other meme, a sort of escape clause: God is beyond (outside of,
> > above) logic. This simple addition makes their religious beliefs
> > immune to any and all rational arguments so it is hardly surprising
> > to find it is quite pervasive in our culture.
>
> And then Boyd said,
> +++++++++++++++++
> Careful. I could put any person's name in place of 'God' there
> [workability of substitution in real life irrelevant!]. We need some
> content-based way to deny that formal substitution.
> +++++++++++++++++++
>
> I can't understand why we'd want to deny that substitution.
> Had he some better publicists and a few less powerful memes
> to deal with, Jim Jones could have become the next messiah to
> a larger portion of the population.
>
> Many hosts of god-memes believe in gods incarnate, so it seems like
> a misstep to rule out a substitution.
>
> As an analogy containing some relevance perhaps, many people see
> their political leaders as being beyond law, as gods are beyond logic.
Hmm. I see. Yes, that substitution is useful. If we allow that
substitution, we cannot use that substitution as evidence for nonexistence.
However, that's a flimsy nonevidence.
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/ Towards the conversion of data into information....
/
/ Kenneth Boyd
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