> I think there is considerable evidence that the inclusion of the belief in the existence of God and other similar aspects of religion that are distinct from (but part of the justification for) the behavioral elements you call "the good parts" are an important part of the memetic glue that holds the whole structure together.
The whole structure of what? Europe is largely godless yet the society holds together just fine. There's really no need to confound "treat others as you want to be treated yourself" with anything supernatural.
nobody's talking about legal contracts. the issue is of good will. the promise github has made is they would provide all kinds of hosting (git, gitsts, pages, whatnot). people move from other solutions to github because the github's promise (again, not a legal contract) is "we're better".
the other half the difficulty of running a business comes from making tacit promises and then acting annoyed that the other side holds you to them.
citation needed