Some cultural phenomena bear a striking resemblance to the cells of cell biology, actively preserving themselves in their social environments, finding the nutrients they need and fending off the causes of their dissolution.

A child raised on a desert island, alone, without social interaction, without language, and thus lacking empathy, is still a sentient being.

Not a single one of the cells that compose you knows who you are, or cares.

Wherever there is a design that is highly successful in a broad range of similar environments, it is apt to emerge again and again, independently - the phenomenon known in biology as convergent evolution. I call these designs 'good tricks.'

Has it ever occurred to you how lucky you are to be alive? More than 99 percent of all the creatures that have ever lived have died without progeny, but not a single one of your ancestors falls into that group! ... Not a single one of your ancestors, all the way back to the bacteria, succumbed to predation before reproducing, or lost out in the competition for a mate.

...but I also can't prove that mushrooms could not be intergalactic spaceships spying on us.

Religions have depended on the relative isolation and ignorance of their flocks, forever and this is all breaking down.