Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id NAA10954 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Fri, 8 Dec 2000 13:23:45 GMT Message-ID: <2D1C159B783DD211808A006008062D3101745B7E@inchna.stir.ac.uk> From: Vincent Campbell <v.p.campbell@stir.ac.uk> To: "'memetics@mmu.ac.uk'" <memetics@mmu.ac.uk> Subject: RE: virus: Psychological Profile of Hall Date: Fri, 8 Dec 2000 13:21:22 -0000 X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2650.21) Content-Type: text/plain Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
>>Perhaps there's a qualitative distinction here between religions
and other
>>systems, say education.
<Hmmm, so why (or perhaps how) do so many religions, in their
> institutionalizations, maintain schools, and depend, for their
> propagation, on the religious education of the young members of the
> congregation/community/diaspora/tribe/cult?>
>
Because there's a clear difference between religious education,
which is about teaching the doctrine of tha faith without questioning it,
and education per se, which is about skills and knowledge acquisition. One
factor, perhaps in the decline of mainstream religions in developed nations
is precisely the rubbing of shoulders between religious education and
secular education. The more of the latter, which (ideally) stresses
rationalism, one receives the less open to the former, which stresses blnd
faith? (Mind you my biology teacher at school was a bit of an evangelical
who didn't really believe in evolution... he used to try the old 'perfect
eye' routine when we discussed evolution in his classes... I accepted he
knew how osmosis worked, but didn't buy his evangelical line).
<Drawing the line between religions and education is risky and
fruitless
> business, IMHO. Much of religion, as it's practiced, _is_ education, of
> the young, and of a continuing set of members, from birth to death, and
> in many instances, well beyond.>
>
Depends on one's definition of education, I suppose.
Vincent
===============================================================
This was distributed via the memetics list associated with the
Journal of Memetics - Evolutionary Models of Information Transmission
For information about the journal and the list (e.g. unsubscribing)
see: http://www.cpm.mmu.ac.uk/jom-emit
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Fri Dec 08 2000 - 13:25:11 GMT