Re: virus: Why religious?

David Leeper (dleeper@gte.net)
Wed, 23 Oct 1996 01:56:16 -0500


David McFadzean wrote:
>
> At 11:58 AM 21/10/96 -0500, David Leeper wrote:
> >To beat Christianity we have to become Christianity?
>
> To beat Christianity we have to fulfill the same functional
> roles, compete in the same ecological niche in memespace,
> play the same game. We don't have to become Christianity to
> do that, but we do have to become a religion. It was that
> insight that prompted me to create the CoV originally.

How closely do we want to mirror Christianity? If the end result of all this is preaching to
passive minds, what difference does it make if the preacher says "God" or "Meme"? What would
be gained even if we totally replaced Christianity?

Also, it seems to me that Christianity is the best Christianity there is. Rather than trying
to take over their memespace, why not exploit our own? I think such a memespace exists and has
lots of potential. It seems to me that the power of Christianity, while broad, is not deep.
People don't run their lives by it anymore. It's almost as if they do it because that's what's
always been done. People are ready to hear new ideas. I think that if we present these new
ideas, CoV will spread. But if instead of presenting new ideas all we do is try to spread, CoV
will fail because that niche is already dominated by Christianity.

-- 
David Leeper
Homo Deus
http://home1.gte.net/dleeper/index.htm