Over the past decade several books and articles have appeared which purport to explain the “evolution of religion” as an adaptation, usually invoking group level selection as the source. These explanations nearly always depend on the fallacious assumption that if something evolved, it must be have been selected and therefore is adaptive. These explanations also [...]
Tags:accident·adaptation·byproduct·Charles Darwin·confirmation bias·design·evolutionary psychology·fitness·group level selection·hypothesis·Matt Rossano·methodology·Michael Ghiselin·natural selection·Panglossian·pleiotropy·storytelling·testing·theory
In Ars Poetica (“The Art of Poetry”), the great Roman lyricist Horace counsels against using gods to resolve thorny plots. The deus ex machina is simply too tidy and unbelievable. When gods swoop in to save the day, the mundane becomes sacred. Metaphysics to the rescue.
I was reminded of Horace’s enduring wisdom by two recent [...]
Tags:altruism·Andrew Delton·Ars Poetica·collective action·cooperation·deus ex machina·ethnolinguistic·free riders·generosity·group level selection·Horace·John Tooby·kinship·Leda Cosmides·Max Krasnow·prosociality·punishment·reciprocity·Robert Boyd·Sarah Mathew·Turkana·warfare
In the inaugural issue of Religion, Brain & Behavior, Jeffrey Schloss and Michael Murray examine the idea that belief in supernatural agents is adaptive because these agents are punishers: supernatural policeman if you will. This policing can have two effects. First, belief in supernatural punishment can enhance within group cooperation. Second, it can reduce cheating [...]
Tags:ancestral environment·Azim Shariff·cheating·cooperation enhancement·essentialism·free riders·Friedrich Nietzsche·functionalism·game theory·Genealogy of Morals·Jeffrey Schloss·Jesse Bering·Lee Cronk·Mario Brandhorst·Michael Murray·morals·neolithic·Paleolithic·punishment avoidance·supernatural punishment·supernatural surveillance
In a recent essay on the cult of David Foster Wallace, Nathan Heller notes that DFW’s mature work deals with the crisis of contemporary pluralism: “how to think intelligently and truthfully about the world when that world is full of intelligent and truthful people who adhere to irreconcilable schools of thought.” While Heller [...]
Tags:Alan Sokal·Catholic·confirmation bias·David Foster Wallace·evolutionary psychologist·fantasy·group level selection·group size·Jesus·language·Matt Rossano·Nathan Heller·natural law·Panglossian·parsimony·pluralism·Pope Benedict·postmodernism·resurrection·science·storytelling·supernatural selection·technology·truth·wish fulfillment
Over at the Evolution of Religion Project, Dominic Johnson comments on the first target article which will appear in what promises to be a fantastic new journal, Religion, Brain, and Behavior. Because the first issue has yet to be published, I will have to rely on Johnson’s summary:
Jeff Schloss and Michael Murray have written a [...]
Tags:Abrahamic faiths·Abrahamic God·adaptionist·biological evolution·Christianity·cooperation enhancement·cultural evolution·Dominic Johnson·Islam·Jeff Schloss·Judaism·Michael Murray·moral order·moralizing gods·nationalism·punishing gods·punishment avoidance·Religion Brain and Behavior·Rodney Stark·supernatural agents·supernatural punishment·supernatural punishment theory·unified theory
Several months ago I became aware of the “Evolution of Religion” project, which maintains a website here. I did not find it particularly interesting because it was immediately apparent that the project was designed to prove a particular point. We need look no further than the project’s subtitle to ascertain the a priori commitment that [...]
Tags:a priori assumptions·agenda·atheism·benefits·bias·confirmation bias·conflict of interest·costs·evolution of religion·Evolution of Religion Project·John Templeton Foundation·maladaptive·metaphysics·methodology·The Adaptive Logic of Religious Beliefs and Behaviour
Humans everywhere are inveterate storytellers. Because storytelling, in the form of narrative, is found in all cultures and is structurally similar — with agents and action linked together by causation — there is excellent reason to think this ability is the result of intense selection pressure and is not simply a byproduct of other cognitive [...]
Tags:adaptation·agency detection·ancestral environment·archetypes·byproduct·causal attribution·causation·cause·correlation·David Hume·effect·folklore·Immanuel Kant·information·language·Michelle Scalise Sugiyama·narration·narrative·social information·stories·storytelling·tales·theory of mind
There are a number of scholars who claim that “religion” evolved as an adaptation. What kind of adaptation? A group level adaptation. The story usually goes like this: at some unknown time during the middle or upper Paleolithic, certain groups of hominins developed proto-religious beliefs. These beliefs supposedly caused group members to dance, sing, and [...]
Tags:affinity·Barry Hewlett·Brian Wood·Claude Levi-Straus·cohesion·consanguinity·cooperation·extended kinship·fictive kinship·foragers·Frank Marlowe·group agonism·group competition·group level selection·group size·inclusive fitness·James Eder·Kim Hill·kinship·language·Lewis Henry Morgan·Magdalena Hurtado·prosocial·proto-religion·residence patterns·residential bands·Robert Walker·social structure·Thomas Headland·tools
In a recent post on group level selection and the evolution of religion, I observed that if we assume such selection was operating on human groups during the Paleolithic, three factors play a major role in determining which groups come out on top. These three factors are: (1) group size, (2) technology, and (3) language. [...]
Tags:altruism·art·behavioral modernity·cooperation·differential fitness·evolution of religion·group agonism·group competition·group level selection·group size·intergroup conflict·language·modern human behavior·ornamentation·Paleolithic·proto-religion·reproduction·Richard Klein·ritual·survival·symbolic thinking·technology·The Human Career·Upper Paleolithic
In a few days Jesse Bering’s new book, The Belief Instinct, will be published in the United States. It has already been published in the UK as The God Instinct. The title change seems a bit odd and the opposite of what one might have expected. Something like ninety percent of Americans believe in God, [...]
Tags:anthropomorphism·autism·cognitive illusion·Faces in the Clouds·Jesse Bering·neolithic·Paleolithic·shamanisms·Stewart Guthrie·The Belief Instinct·The God Instinct·theory of mind
