The Faith Instinct argues that a propensity for religious behavior is innate, meaning that such an inclination is present through heredity in the neural circuits of the mind. Does this seem a reasonable view, or have some readers never been aware of any such feeling?
Nicholas Wade
The Faith Instinct, Before the Dawn
I happen to agree with that argument, based on the ideas of Claude Levi-Strauss. Joseph Campbell’s extensive work on Jungian archetypes would seem to agree. The fact that we see similar themes in mythologies around the world suggests that this is “hard-wired” in our brains.
i do not understand why Betty equates religious behaviour and the references she names.
nor do i see religious behaviour as being “hard-wired”. such behaviour is not an attribute of religion or its neural circuits.
It’s not “hard-wired” that you believe in a certain deity – it’s in us to SEEK one. Just as children who pile up snow to build a “fort,” actually it’s a shelter, – this is also hard wired in our behavior as it’s been essential for eons – but now we do it for fun.
Religionists call our seeking a “god-shaped vacuum.”
I have always felt that this is a reasonable view, and if true of the highest significance. While I personally find the view attractive, I have no feeling as to whether evidence supports it.
This is a reasonable view.The seat of god is in the neural networks.
I believe that the key may be found in Emil Durkheim’s understanding of religion–Religion is the institutional form that provides ongoing validation of the unprovable moral assumptions upon which a society is built. Since these assumptions are by definition unprovable, they must be maintained as the society’s moral consensus by constant affirmation by the society’s moral-spiritual leaders, followed up by reward (and punishment for breaches) by the more coercive institutions of society such as the police, the courts, and general public opinion.
But keep in mind that many societies believe in atheistic forms of religion– such as Marxism, Freudianism, Buddhism, and, most numerous of all, the prevailing nationalism of one’s society.
“I swear there ain’t no heaven but I pray there ain’t no hell”—wasn’t that the line? That “innate feeling,” though proving nothing, sure seems universal. I’m a card carrying apostate ex-Catholic; but the day I’m running for my life pursued by fiends you bet I’ll be praying. And if not genetic, why so very very few examples until so recently of non-religious societies? It seems a stretch to ascribe religion’s universality and persistence to convergent cultural evolution alone.
The value of religion in establishing settled and trade-based societies in the first place seems apparent—and I thank Mr. Wade for introducing the notion to me. But thereafter? Once such societies were firmly established, wouldn’t the selective advantage of religion be quickly degraded? Does history provide ANY examples of the rise of empirical thinking which was NOT accompanied by a host of cultural advantages relative to more “superstitious” neighbors? And if empiricism does convey real advantage and yet religion persists nonetheless, then the basis of the predisposition to religion must be pretty rugged and deep—genetic, or mostly so. Making Enlightenment Europe seem almost—excuse my choice of word—miraculous. Absent a genetic basis, the “miracle” would instead be that it took 10,000 years of settled human society to get from storing your grandfather’s head in the pantry to reading this blog.
A ‘faith’ or moral instinct with a biological origin sounds plausible only in the absence of, or means of knowing the reality and function of a soul. If such a thing exists? The fact that this instinct is rather ambiguous suggests a limitation that neither science nor religion have either resolved or discovered a way to clarify or ‘transcend to the benefit of human progress. But if new material circulating on the web turns out to be authentic, that ‘ignorance’ of the soul may very soon be coming to an end. http://www.energon.org.uk
I’m afraid I haven’t had the opportunity yet to read the book – only excerpts and reviews, but there seems to be no mention of the role of one essential human characteristic that I think relates strongly to the formation of religion – hope, for lack of a better word.
A large component of religion is surely institutionalized, organized, formalized, ritualized hope; the optimism, belief or faith that things can change or be changed for the better, both for the individual and for a wider society. Hope or belief in the possibility of change (coupled, of course, with the ability to imagine such changes) is surely one of the driving, defining forces of mankind, that has taken us from cave to penthouse.
Hope must be an innate characteristic of humanity; life without hope is, I think, unimaginable. Thus the lack of hope in a person, depression, is so debilitating, and considered so detrimental to functioning successfully as a human.
In most religions, change for the better is aimed at through moral obedience, as well as, by definition, through intercession with a higher power. As Larry mentions, perhaps a mysterious, omnipotent, unknowable god is not actually essential to this (although an unknowable god can’t fail our hopes in quite the same way as Marx can…) and the question might be, ‘Why channel our hopes through an higher power?’ Is the intensity of hoping (and fearing), with both it’s unlimited possibilities and crushing disappointments, too much for us mortals, unless we share our beliefs, spreading the load and ultimately delegating final responsibility to an unanswerable god.
This point was very well argued in the book. The near universal attraction to religious practice is clearly innate in brain structure and explains why religious practice is so widely practiced, even by scientists.
Neanderthals, archeological evidence suggests, were not “wired” for religious belief and that probably figured in their demise.
I do agree.Previously I used to wonder what made the billions of us indians be controlled by religion so much that they some would even give their lives for it.But now I know why they are so bound to it even though most don’t even know the meaning of many of their practices.They are indeed controlled by a part of their brains that they cannot have access.
I have almost completed the book but do not think Hinduism is mentioned anywhere.This is probably because it is impossible to trace its ancient origin.But the antique religion is still deeply present in most parts and its study, I believe, is an ideal proof .
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What I wouldnt give to have a chat with you about this. You just blurt so many things that come from out of nowhere that Im pretty certain Id have a fair shot. Your site is great visually, I mean people wont be uninterested. But others who can see past the videos and the layout will not be so impressed with your generic understanding of this subject.
Mencken and Pascal Boyer argue convincingly the genesis of religion was a tawdry thing, based on (evolutionarily-psychology-significant) overactive human social psychology applying itself to personaless surroundings, attributing causality and will. People intuitively bought the cosmology and hoped to enter into exchange-relationships with these mysterious personas apparently active behind the scenes. Everything evolved from there. I believe this is more sound (and boring, and human-insulting, and hard to believe, and hence probably more likely true), than a group-selectionist argument about cohesion and tribal cultism. Did religion, from its pitiful origins, then link up with human tribal intuitions, moral psychology? Yep. Was it “adaptive”? I suppose so.