Home______Enlightenment Gene?
As a meme, the culture for enlightenment is perpetuated through generations. As a gene, the biological capacity for it does not fare as well. People take to the idea of becoming enlightened but those who experience it are rare. This is because a gene for it does not contribute to evolutionary survival value. Intense identification with the ego promotes competition between individuals of the human species, while disbelief in it instills a perspective of existence as a game, and life and death as part of keeping score.
The situation for an enlightenment gene is rather like one for celibacy. (See Memes: Type X, etc,. 26 February 2004 and Memes, Genes, & God, 31 December 2003.) An individual who by biologic disposition prefers celibacy will have no offspring who share his preference. In the long evolution of humans if a person was genetically predisposed to enlightenment it would not have made him keenly competitive in the struggle to survive.
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