Hi darth_versive,

I'm new here and just starting to get my bearings. You wrote a couple
things in your recent post that fascinated me.

Perhaps the continuing prevalence of religion in human society today,
in spite of the increase in scientific knowledge, is a result of the
structure of our cognitive architecture, which may have evolved the
way it did because it gave our ancestors a competitive advantage to
believe in such things as gods and spirits, etc.

This seems to be the essence of your question: Religion exists because
we are "wired for it," and we are wired for it because it gave us some
kind of advantage.

That sounds reasonable to me, but I would ask something more: In what
way, by what mechanism, does a belief system (however it is obtained)
confer an advantage in terms of survival?

I am actually suggesting that, perhaps, religion is not to be
understood as simply a belief system. If we are "wired for it," and
that "wiring" has proved advantageous in some way, there must be some
material, practical explanation for the advantage.

Have you ever read about Wilson's ideas or about this particular
thesis before? I consider it to be much more in line with historical
and anthropological facts than Boyer's thesis.

DV

No, I'll have to look.

I won't contest the claim that religious thought has largely shaped the
history of mankind, but I'm skeptical that of your claim "The reason why
I think that people believe in God(s) is that our minds have been
hardwired, through the processes of evolutionary psychology, to seek out
simple and emotionally-comforting explanations for the complexities of
the world around us, and for getting around the hard facts of the human
condition." I just don't see the selective pressure from the comfort
perspective...especially since it appears to me that most religious
thinking creates more worries than not!

Our brains evolve
much too slowly...and so we're stuck with "stone-age" minds living in a
scientific age.

There's a lot to ponder in that statement. There can be no doubt that
our brains -- evolved for survival in a pastoral world -- are poorly
adapted for survival in contemporary urban spaces. On the other hand,
today's environment is very much a world that our stone-age minds
created. All the elements of it (and more to come) fully existed in
potential form "way back when." (Or else our brains are physically
different.)

Which brings us again to the question of religion. Is it possible that
religion has economic or survival value because in some way it helped
produce the modern world? A belief in deity, for example, encourages
humility. Humility, in turn, is a precondition to learning. And
learning is necessary to discovery, discovery to invention, and so on.

In other words, it may not be the belief itself, but its effect, which
is significant. Or not religion itself, but the utility of certain
behaviors.

As to your larger question, whether our "cognitive architecture" can
save us from ourselves, my guess is some people will be able to save
themselves because of it, but not everyone.

skeptickal1@yahoo.com (Skeptical1) wrote in message
news:<b9492359.0312271956.3bec859f@posting.google.com>...
darth_versive@yahoo.com (darth_versive) wrote in message
news:<8e0e3045.0312261941.520f4f5e@posting.google.com>...

There is nothing wrong with our Stone Age cognitive architecture. It
worked just fine for Einstein, Beethoven and Michaelangelo.

Problem is, it also worked just fine for Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot, and
now for Osama bin Laden, etc.

"nothing wrong with it"?

Religion is also a VERY powerful thing to keep groups together - and
humans,
when times are BAD, tend to gather and band together based on
similarities.
Religion draws them together. It's not so much a "beliefe in god" or
"faith." It's more a vehicle for bonding and banding together.

The long-term aim of this hypothesis is to help grease the skids for
the new Einsteins, Beethovens, and Michaelangelos, while throwing
roadblocks in the way of the new Hitlers, Stalins, and Pol Pots, etc.

And to do this, a better understanding of the nature of that cognitive
architecture, of the environment in which it arose, and of the
knowledge structures which arise from it is necessary, in my view, if
we are to have a reasonable chance of accomplishing this long-term
aim.

Most likely "the continuing prevalence of religion in human society
today, in spite of the increase in scientific knowledge, is a result
of"... the state of our pre-Stone Age (and actually declining)
education system.

Exactly. But our educational system was devised, and is implemented
by, people who possess this stone-age cognitive architecture, and who
subscribe, in large part, to these various religious views. If we
want to reform it, we need behavioral hypotheses which rest on an
accurate view of the nature of the mind. Hence the need for more and
better research on this score.

There was a posting to Usenet just a while back on the number of
people who didn't know that the Sun is part of the Milky Way galaxy,
or what that is, the number who thought the earth was only a few
thousand years old, who thought dinosaurs and humans shared the Earth,
and - quite shockingly - the number who thought the Sun revolved
around the Earth.

Yes. Like I said in my original post, "many people have predicted
that, along with the increase of scientific knowledge about the
universe in general, and about the nature and history of life and of
our own species in particular, and about the nature and development of
civilization, that various religions which originated before such
knowledge was available would tend to fade away and be replaced with
more secular, rationalistic or scientific ways of thinking, and that
such ways of thinking would be accepted by the majority of people in
the world. It appears that such predictions were widely off the
mark."

Obviously, if you raise kids to be dumb and docile and prey to mushy
sentimentality, then bible-thumping fundamentalism is what you get. It
is the neuron-rotting enslaved sentimentality of such minds that's the
problem, not mythological or spiritual conceptions as such.

Yes. But our cognitive architecture is at the root of the problem, in
my view. Like I said.

Those who raise their kinds to be dumb and docile have the kind of
cognitive architecture that leads them to tend to think this way.

their kids raise their own kids in the same way. To break the cycle,
we need behavioral hypotheses which are based on a more scientific
view of the mind--and that includes a recognition of the role of
evolutionary psychological processes in shaping our cognitive
architecture, in my view. And the role of that cognitive architecture
in shaping our knowledge structures.

DV

On 1 Jan 2004 14:55:51 -0800, darth_versive@yahoo.com (darth_versive)
wrote:

} Doktor DynaSoar <targeting@OMCL.mil> wrote in message news:<43t6vvkflgqgskjttfjdc5j3tp1katsmb8@4ax.com>...
}
} <snip
}
} > A case could very easily be made that the near ubiquitous development
} > of religion is a consequence of the mechanism of cognitive dissonance
} > (Festinger, 1957).
}
} > Confronted with an observable phenomenon and an unobservable/unknown
} > cause, the mind seeks to relieve the dissonance due to the unknown,
} > and creates a "known" primary force responsible for the phenomenon.
}
} Yes, but the mechanism of this near ubiquitous cognitive dissonance
} *itself* depends on the particular cognitive architecture of our
} species. That is, other hominid species, with different cognitive
} architectures, when confronted with similar observable phenomena and
} unobservable/unknown causes, would not have the *same* mechanisms of
} cognitive dissonance, which would not, therefore, lead them to develop
} the same sorts of belief systems, which would not, therefore, lead
} them to manifest the same behavior patterns. And the evidence that we
} have from paleoanthropology so far is that homo erectus, homo
} ergaster, Neanderthals, etc., did not manifest the sorts of symbolic
} thinking that we find in homo sapiens art, myth, ritual, etc. So the
} evidence we have so far is that their cognitive architectures were
} different than ours.

As I said, no one these days would seriously consider a "purely
psychological", what would fall under the "cognitive" realm, drive.
There is no mind without brain.

I mentioned Pribram's para-attentional
theory specifically because it covers the same ground with
physiological explanation.

The likely mechanism of cognitive dissonance, and of Pribram's theory,
is inhibitory activity of the anterior cinculate preventing an
automatic correlation between working memory and decision making, in
Pavlov's terms, between "what is it (or they)" and "what do I do about
it". This is essentially maintenance of focused attention, or
orienting.

That mechanism *is* ubiquitous among species we can consider
sophisticated enough to have a cognitive processing capability.

There is absolutely nothing about any of this that implies existence
of, much less the need for or the development of, a belief system.

} In other words, it's only nearly "ubiquitous" the way it is among
} those of our own species. The hypothesis I'm proposing here has to do
} with recognizing the existence of different cognitive architectures
} among different species, and of looking at our own cognitive
} architecture from the perspective of evolutionary psychology (among
} other perspectives).

I have a feeling what you're trying to propose as a "cognitive
architecture" is incompatible with evolutionary psychology. Anything
that'd support a belief system would require language to embody the
self-other differentiation in a meaningful way. A "cognitive
architecture" which incorporates language would exclude other hominids
due to their lack of, but then also preclude consideration of that
mechanism in prior species a priori. It would be a self-defining
exclusion, and therefore circular.

} And Festinger saying that "religion is the consequence of cognitive
} dissonance," which I say itself is a manifestation of our cognitive
} architecture, is just like me saying that "religion is a consequence
} of our cognitive architecture," with me just leaving out this
} intermediate causative mechanism. That is, Festinger may have been on
} the right track, but there's still more to the story left to be
} learned.

Certainly. Cognitive dissonance would provide the physiological
mechanism to attach affective significance. After all, if it were only
a matter of curiosity, and had no emotional impact, it'd hardly be
considered significant enough to be "religious". Beyond that, it
requires sufficient self-other differentiation, which I believe
requires language. Furthermore, to be religious, it would have to be a
social construct, and therfore require enough shared language with
others. Unless, of course, you'd like to include in "religious" the
individually experienced "spiritual". I've got no preference either
way.

} The thing to do, in my view, is to study just *how* the mechanism of
} cognitive dissonance (among other cognitive mechanisms) operates,
} within the context of studying more deeply the structure and
} functioning of our cognitive architecture (within the context of
} evolutionary psychology as well as within other contexts). And also
} to study more closely and systematically the various belief systems
} which arise from our cognitive architecture, and how they influence
} our behavior, with all this in mind.

I think perhaps it'd be more productive to study the mechanism and how
it can operate in any situation first. Once it's clear how more
mundane phenomena are handled, and commonality in processing among
them discerned, applying that to religion would either be a simple
matter, or would fairly clearly delineate what's missing in order for
such an extension to be valid.

A case could very easily be made that the near ubiquitous development
of religion is a consequence of the mechanism of cognitive dissonance
(Festinger, 1957).

DV,

It is a pleasure trading posts with you. The newsgroup format too
often makes "point-counterpoint" conversations seem like battles, when
neither party intended it that way.

Tonight, as it happens, I have no counterpoint to offer!

You are right to advocate "more and better research on cognition and
behavior, while keeping evolutionary psychological processes in mind
(among other things), so as to help us to avoid the most serious
threats to our survival as a species or to our modern civilization..."

And so I am at rest in our conversation (:^))

Except that, I must admit I don't really know what "evolutionary
psychology" is, or what its basic concepts are. I jumped into the
topic somewhat impulsively.

Regards,
Chesapean