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Overcoming Bias Commenter's avatar

If you mean "shut all radars because aliens", its just an obviously poor choice.

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Eliyahu Ha-Navi's avatar

My original comment was regarding the possibility of a highly-cohesive, eugenic, and non-proselytizing religion/culture being the bedrock of a high-tech civilization. The example I gave was more on the illustrative side. Keep in mind that what allowed current secular Jews to develop their smarts was this exact thing: sticking to their economic niches, their non-proselytizing religion and procreating.

As to *ultra*-Orthodox Jews now in Israel: you may be right (to an extent, for now at least). However, long-term, the experiment that is running right now in Israel may bear fruits that are contrary to what you're saying. Religions are not always as rigid when it comes to survival. When time comes, and they become the majority, things will *have* to be at least somewhat different, or everyone perishes. There are already reports of some Haredim joining the military. Plus, it's always possible to have 5% of your people devoted to science and engineering, while the other 95% mainly studies Torah and keeps the social glue active.

We live in the age of automation, after all, but IMO it's better to be praying and studying as opposed to robbing convenience stores and burning cars.

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