Is religion a form of mind virus?

Question

If so was the "virus" purposely designed or has it naturally evolved?

Atheists only please.

Munro5112 - I think that childhood indoctrination does play a large part. Childrens minds are set up to believe adults - it makes very good sense for that to be the case, it prevents them from playing in the road or going off with strangers. An unfortunate byproduct seems to be the propensity for religious indoctrination and the unwillingness to question religious belief.

Answer 1

A most excellent question!

preamble:
The presentation of the Meme theory has been an extension of Dawkin's efforts in genetics and ethology.I am not quite sure about calling it a theory instead of a hypothesis yet, but it seems like a reasonable approach to accounting for religions. He introduced it in The Selfish Gene (1975) I think.

Technically the term "virus" is not too bad even though it is a bit loaded. He formulated the "Meme" term to reflect the concept of gene in terms of mind/memory/mentality.
"Virus" carries the additional implications of being infectious and harmful. This does seem to reflect Dawkin's current views.

Now towards the question of whether it was designed or evolved. I think it might have been both. Whether it arose spontaneously as a result of the breakdown of the bicameral mind or was deliberately created as a political control feature is very hard to decide. It is not like ideas leave fossils in great abundance. It is doubtful if we will ever find hard evidence that can show us what people were thinking about when they first created religion. Religion is before our earliest writing, it is before the earliest totems. I wonder what evidence we should even be looking at. Burials maybe?
It is obvious though that after the idea of religion was here it was often enhineered for various uses, and that it spontaneously evolves new features.
Maybe it is useful to think of it as a sort of "Frankenbug," created and nutated. Designed for one reason but gone wild and out of control when released.
Many things in the world do not do what they were expected to do.

Anyway, I doubt if there is a solid answer to your question but it does point in another direction, and has given me some thought to consider.
I wonder what Prof. Dawkin would think of it if you emailed the question to him through his foundation site.
He might decide to write a new book and send you a free copy.

Answer 2

I'd have to say, "No." A virus is always malignant to its host.

Actually, I believe that it did indeed naturally "evolve." Human beings are naturally superstitious, being so suffused with doubt. They cannot KNOW many things (e.g. their own bodily functions, the complete situations that underlie magic tricks). So, the very nature of 'religion' is quite understandable, what with humans possessing the fragile psyches that they do. However, specific mainstream religions seem to take advantage of such superstitious bends, especially when accompanied by numerous childhood instruction. It's more like a benign bacterial infection if anything. Usually.

Answer 3

i think that mankind would have possessed religion since mankind first evolved abstract thought. we will probably always have religion as it will be a neccessity for a certain percentage of the population. some people need a religion to make sense of the world, whereas some dont.
there is a famous quote that goes something like this - "if god didnt exist, then mankind would have surely created one anyway"
unfortunately religion seems like an inevietable part of the human condition. and would have probably always existed and probably always will.

i used to think that as science progressed, religion would eventually become obsolete. however i now see that religion is a delusion of the mind where reality and straight facts have no place. therefore despite all our advances, we're probably stuck with it too.


....so i think naturally evolved

Answer 4

It's like a movie, show on TV, book, picture, or sport. Some people like certain things and some people don't. Then you have people who become totally obsessed with these things who try to put there opinion of obsession onto weak minded people who agree with them until a fan base is started and becomes a convention by networking together with others who have the same like minded interests and opinions. A good example is trekies who dress up and worship actors of the TV show. Asking them stupid questions of a fantasy this virus of fantasy and reality spreads to become an obsession and a religion to them.

Answer 5

Yes .. looking back i can now see it as a form of brain washing started at child hood (for me and) for most. There is no physical proof at all that any god exists.
Now - if all those believers of their respective relegions believe that "their" god is the only one - then it goes to show that "all the others" must be false. Lets say there are 100 relgions in the world. That gives that particular relegion of only being 1% true in that believers eyes and the other 99% are false. I now believe in Darwins Theory 'Surivial of The Fittest' survive and we humans are just one intelligent animal above all the rest of the creatures.

Answer 6

I don't think i would call it a virus per say, but i definitely think it was used if not created Solely for the purpose of control of the masses.

Answer 7

I do see it, at times, as a kind of virus. I also see it has having been designed ( Coucil of Nicea) and evolving (Diet of Worms)...

(Diet of Worms is when Martin Luther posted his documents on reformation on the church doors in Worms, Germany).

Answer 8

religion as it is amounts to nothing more than mental dominance by one group of individuals over another, it goes back to the basics of nature and for social creatures such as humans to attempt to establish an order of dominance within the social group, in humans' case with our higher level of intelligence, the dominance becomes more intellectual vs. physical dominance.

Answer 9

The Bible God is a bloody gory murderer idea of a primitive mind. Most primitive people would have Gods meaner than their potential enemies... They would also tell stories about how great their God is!

Answer 10

I asked last week if religion may be caused by a microbe, like the "chocolate-craving" bacteria recently discovered.