On Sat, 11 Jul 2009 09:50:49 -0700, Darren New wrote:

> Jim Henderson wrote:
>> On Thu, 09 Jul 2009 19:11:02 -0700, Darren New wrote:
>> 
>>> In the best of worlds, both government and religion are in the same
>>> business.
>> 
>> Very true.  The fundamental difference is that the Government deals in
>> your life today, religion typically deals in your eternal life.
> 
> No, that's what I'm saying. Religions don't tell you about your eternal
> life. They tell you about what you have to do *today* to get your
> eternal reward. I can't think of any religion that tells you about your
> eternal life without telling you how to behave in this one.

But most of the major religions do use "eternal life" as the carrot to 
get you to follow the rules or directions of the leadership.  I'm not 
sure I understand what you're saying here, but I suspect we might be "in 
violent agreement" again. ;-)

> My point was that to break up a prisoner's dilemma situation, you can
> either increase the reward for cooperating or increase the punishment
> for refusing to cooperate. And government and religion are both in a
> good position to do one or the other of those.

Oh, I see....

Jim

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