Survival of the fittest Catholics

Is there anything we can learn about religion from natural
biology?

For example, if a religion were a living organism, would it be a
parasitic virus or a carnivorous animal? Or would it be something
else ““ like a bird ““ and if so, could we learn anything
from the melody of its song?

The parallels between biological and cultural evolution have
been pointed out over the past few decades by noted philosopher of
science Karl Popper and geneticist Luigi Cavalli-Sforza.

In their view, life consists of replicators that evolve when one
of the replicators has a higher reproductive fitness than the
others.

Culture, much like life, also evolves through the survival of
replicating entities. In “The Selfish Gene,” Richard
Dawkins argues that the same applies to “memes,” a term
he coins for “units of cultural transmission.”

Just as genes propagate from body to body by a sperm or egg,
memes propagate from brain to brain by imitation, so that they
essentially become living parasites of the mind.

One example cited by Dawkins is the birdsong of the New Zealand
saddleback. The saddleback is native to the Chatham Islands, and
each saddleback practices one or two of about 10 bird songs.

Analyzing family pedigrees over many generations shows that the
song a bird sings is not determined by genetic inheritance, but is
adapted from the nearby songs of the bird’s territorial
neighbors.

That is, it jumps from brain to brain by imitation.

The human meme pool makes up all of human culture and consists
of an enormous collection of ideas, fashions and catch phrases.

Organized religion is a meme complex, analogous to the gene
complexes of carnivorous animals in which genes for teeth, claws
and smell coalesce to enhance an organism’s fitness.

The meme complex of the Catholic church, for example, consists
of architecture, music, the call for faith, the threat of hell and
the promise of life after death.

The hell meme greatly increases the replication rate of the
Catholic meme complex by encouraging followers to save their
friends and family, spreading their beliefs from brain to
brain.

The call for faith decreases the mutation rate of the religion
which is necessary for its continuing perseverance.

The celibacy meme, on the other hand, is interesting because
such a trait is suicidal in the context of biological
evolution.

However, since a skilled meme “sales rep” like a
preacher can convert people faster than having sex and raising a
family with them, sex becomes a waste of time.

This usually holds true, but ironically, the sexual conservatism
encouraged by Pope John Paul II has recently led the church to
retreat from its European homeland.

Last year in Europe, the number of Catholics is estimated to
have decreased by over 600,000, largely due to the declining
European birthrate.

Also cited as reasons for the decline are increasing opposition
to the church’s teachings on sexuality and scandals over the
sexual abuse of children by priests.

At the same time, there has been increased immigration from
people of the Islamic faith to Europe ““ a pattern which, if
it continues, would lead to Islam becoming the major European
faith.

Is it a coincidence, then, that Pope John Paul II was the first
pope to step into a mosque in Syria with the intent of improving
relations with Muslims?

Or was it an attempt to convert Muslims to the Catholic faith to
compensate for the European Catholics not having enough
children?

As the election of a new pope draws near, a significant mutation
is upon the church.

The cardinals will be guided by the placebo of the Holy Spirit
to select the pope that they believe to have the best chance at
spreading the Catholic meme across the globe ““ while at the
same time keeping true to their conservative origins.

Marshall is a second-year graduate student in
biomathematical engineering.