virus: Origin of religion theory

David McFadzean (david@lucifer.com)
Wed, 15 Apr 1998 16:08:56 -0600


Some of you may have been around here long enough to read
my theory on the origin of religion. Basically it goes something
like this: Humans have evolved a natural (not learned) ability
to recognize faces; it is highly sophisticated, robust and
hard-wired into our brains. However, due to the nature of the
problem, it isn't possible to avoid getting a few false positives,
hence humans tend to see faces in natural formations such as
tree trunks, rocks and babbling brooks. Our ancient (million
years ago) ancestors accounted for this phenomenon by attributing
spirits to the natural words: forest dryads, rock trolls, and
water sprites. This belief complex, animism, is the memetic
ancestor of all our modern (superstition-based) religions.

The reason I bring this up again is that I just noticed that
someone else has arrived at the same theory independently and
published a book on it called "Faces in the Clouds : A New Theory
of Religion".

<http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ISBN%3D0195098919>

--
David McFadzean                 david@lucifer.com
Memetic Engineer                http://www.lucifer.com/~david/
Church of Virus                 http://www.lucifer.com/virus/