Peter: Nice comment on the Fortune piece. The word that stopped my eye was

“individualistic,” in the sentence: “Either way, such a trend, if

sustained, could drive human culture off its current market-driven,

individualistic, modernist course, gradually creating an antimarket culture

dominated by fundamentalism–a new dark ages…”

Hard to think of anything MORE conducive to individualism that the belief

that every person has an immortal soul, and has duties to his creator that

transecnd his duties to state or nation.

There is at least this much truth in the piece though: A few oddball sects

like the Shakers aside, nobody breeds like religious fundamentalists. My

wife used to work in a New York City fabric store patronized by conservative

Hasidim. She said it was unusual to see a female customer of child-bearing

age who was not pregnant. Similarly for conservative Muslims, Christians,

etc.

Someone, I forget who, has pointed out that if the main criterion of species

success is the ability of the species to reproduce itself, then what Mother

Nature wants for human beings is for us all to be religious fundamentalists