According to Calvinism, everyone is born either saved or damned. How could such a belief ever have memetically competed with mainstream Christianity, with its straightforward motivational structure, where you go to hell or heaven depending on your actions? By causing its adherents to look for signs whether they are saved or damned, to discuss who is saved and damned, to defend their own understanding of themselves and their loved ones as saved.
The belief that people are (born?) fundamentally good or bad is secular Calvinism. Its adherents are endlessly motivated to look for signs that they’re good, to avoid signs that they’re bad, to discuss what it means to be good and bad and this is how it spreads.
According to Calvinism, everyone is born either saved or damned. How could such a belief ever have memetically competed with mainstream Christianity, with its straightforward motivational structure, where you go to hell or heaven depending on your actions? By causing its adherents to look for signs whether they are saved or damned, to discuss who is saved and damned, to defend their own understanding of themselves and their loved ones as saved.
The belief that people are (born?) fundamentally good or bad is secular Calvinism. Its adherents are endlessly motivated to look for signs that they’re good, to avoid signs that they’re bad, to discuss what it means to be good and bad and this is how it spreads.