Religovirology

Meme Mechanic & Virology of Religion

My Friends

I am thankful to my friends Saber and Maryam who successfully lured me to start a journey to do what used to seem dangerously implausible from my point of view. My friends Chuck and Dee who have never stopped their kind support throughout the whole process of pre and post production of the book, from editing it line by line, giving me valuable advice. I shall mention particularly how much indebted I am with what Dee has done for me and for the preparation of the book. I feel absolutely privileged to have her support as the editor of the book. It was Dee who read the whole manuscript several times and corrected the errors and suggested many clarifications and stylistic improvements (of course the responsibility of any mistake or error that is left unchecked is solely mine). Chuck, kind and supportive as he always is, has done so much for this work to get ready for publication that words fail me to express. He knows subtle ways of making things happen and leaving his positive effects on anyone with whom he comes in contact. I, proudly, am one of those handful, lucky individuals in the exclusive circle of his friends who gets a substantial benefit of his wisdom. Sheri, my closest friend, played a pivotal role in the process by her emotional and intellectual support from the very moment that I put my very first words on paper till now. She is still supportive of my work as always. I am sure if anyone can live as close to a philosopher of ethics as I am living close to Sheri, one cannot possibly be more blessed, for she has not only helped me out when I came across a philosophical problem, but also she showed me many new ways of looking at ethical issues. She inspired me by her hard work and original ideas in countless occasions. I am forever grateful for keeping her close company.

Also my friends Jeff, Avinash (I call him my personal philosopher as in “family doctor” or in “personal lawyer,” since he, generously and kindly, comes to rescue my unborn ideas whenever I have asked him to) and Blake helped me significantly during our discussions on many difficult philosophical issues like time, causality, consciousness and many more.

My acknowledgement will never be complete if I do not mention my friends Farhad (who lives in Iran now) and Sohail (who lives in Canada now). For more than a year, we held philosophical discussions in our regular meetings we used to hold in Dubai and came to many interesting conclusions that later appeared in the book (like my thoughts on causality).

Last but not least, let me remember my deceased best friend Maziar Meisami. He had a profound influence on my ideas as well as on my personality, as a substitute for a wise, older brother-figure that I never had. It was in a long walk with him on a cold night along the Enghelab street about twenty years ago where I first thought of a model of religion as similar in behaviour to how a typical virus behaves (unbeknown to me, that model was proposed a year before when I was born in 1976 by Richard Dawkins; so I missed the honour by a slim margin!).

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