{"id":507,"date":"2008-10-22T22:30:00","date_gmt":"2008-10-22T21:30:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/2008\/10\/boyer-on-the-evolution-of-religion.html"},"modified":"2014-11-13T23:06:52","modified_gmt":"2014-11-13T22:06:52","slug":"boyer-on-evolution-of-religion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/2008\/10\/boyer-on-evolution-of-religion.html","title":{"rendered":"Boyer on the evolution of religion"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

Just a quick heads up \u2013 tomorrow\u2019s Nature<\/span><\/a> will carry an article by Pascal Boyer<\/a> (at Washington University, and author of the 2001 book Religion Explained<\/span>). The PDF is up on his website: Religion: Bound to believe?<\/a><\/p>\n

In it, Boyer reviews some of the key cognitive biases that lead to religious beliefs. For example, our tendency to form \u2018social\u2019 bonds with inanimate or imaginary entities, the ritualization of cleanliness and, importantly, our \u2018coalitional\u2019 psychology:<\/p>\n

This coalitional psychology is involved in the dynamics of public religious commitment. When people proclaim their adherence to a particular faith, they subscribe to claims for which there is no evidence, and that would be taken as obviously wrong or ridiculous in other religious groups. This signals a willingness to embrace the group\u2019s particular norm for no other reason than that it is, precisely, the group\u2019s norm.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Boyer thinks that the \u2018byproduct\u2019 explanation of religion is the most probable, based on the current evidence:<\/p>\n

So is religion an adaptation or a byproduct of our evolution? Perhaps one day we will find compelling evidence that a capacity for religious thoughts, rather than \u2018religion\u2019 in the modern form of socio-political institutions, contributed to fitness in ancestral times. For the time being, the data support a more modest conclusion: religious thoughts seem to be an emergent property of our standard cognitive capacities.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

He concludes:<\/p>\n

The findings emerging from this cognitive evolutionary approach challenge two central tenets of most established religions. First, the notion that their particular creed differs from all other (supposedly misguided) faiths; second, that it is only because of extraordinary events or the actual presence of supernatural agents that religious ideas have taken shape. On the contrary, we now know that all versions of religion are based on very similar tacit assumptions, and that all it takes to imagine supernatural agents are normal human minds processing information in the most natural way. Knowing, even accepting these conclusions is unlikely to undermine religious commitment. Some form of religious thinking seems to be the path of least resistance for our cognitive systems. By contrast, disbelief is generally the result of deliberate, effortful work against our natural cognitive dispositions \u2014 hardly the easiest ideology to propagate.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Just a quick heads up \u2013 tomorrow\u2019s Nature will carry an article by Pascal Boyer (at Washington University, and author of the 2001 book Religion Explained). The PDF is up on his website: Religion: Bound to believe? In it, Boyer reviews some of the key cognitive biases that lead to religious beliefs. For example, our […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2091,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-507","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nBoyer on the evolution of religion<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Just a quick heads up - tomorrow's Nature will carry an article by Pascal Boyer (at Washington University, and author of the 2001 book Religion\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/2008\/10\/boyer-on-evolution-of-religion.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Boyer on the evolution of religion\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Just a quick heads up - tomorrow's Nature will carry an article by Pascal Boyer (at Washington University, and author of the 2001 book Religion\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/2008\/10\/boyer-on-evolution-of-religion.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Epiphenom\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2008-10-22T21:30:00+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2014-11-13T22:06:52+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Epiphenom\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Epiphenom\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/2008\/10\/boyer-on-evolution-of-religion.html\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/2008\/10\/boyer-on-evolution-of-religion.html\",\"name\":\"Boyer on the evolution of religion\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2008-10-22T21:30:00+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2014-11-13T22:06:52+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/#\/schema\/person\/98b4bf21daa886d9eb1d5f0e99643ad1\"},\"description\":\"Just a quick heads up - tomorrow's Nature will carry an article by Pascal Boyer (at Washington University, and author of the 2001 book Religion\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/2008\/10\/boyer-on-evolution-of-religion.html#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/2008\/10\/boyer-on-evolution-of-religion.html\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/2008\/10\/boyer-on-evolution-of-religion.html#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Boyer on the evolution of religion\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/\",\"name\":\"Epiphenom\",\"description\":\"The science of religion and non-belief\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/#\/schema\/person\/98b4bf21daa886d9eb1d5f0e99643ad1\",\"name\":\"Epiphenom\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/a9abb71dca9f11ec59b77b1fffa487fa?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/a9abb71dca9f11ec59b77b1fffa487fa?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Epiphenom\"},\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/author\/trees\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Boyer on the evolution of religion","description":"Just a quick heads up - tomorrow's Nature will carry an article by Pascal Boyer (at Washington University, and author of the 2001 book Religion","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/2008\/10\/boyer-on-evolution-of-religion.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Boyer on the evolution of religion","og_description":"Just a quick heads up - tomorrow's Nature will carry an article by Pascal Boyer (at Washington University, and author of the 2001 book Religion","og_url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/2008\/10\/boyer-on-evolution-of-religion.html","og_site_name":"Epiphenom","article_published_time":"2008-10-22T21:30:00+00:00","article_modified_time":"2014-11-13T22:06:52+00:00","author":"Epiphenom","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Epiphenom","Est. reading time":"2 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/2008\/10\/boyer-on-evolution-of-religion.html","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/2008\/10\/boyer-on-evolution-of-religion.html","name":"Boyer on the evolution of religion","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/#website"},"datePublished":"2008-10-22T21:30:00+00:00","dateModified":"2014-11-13T22:06:52+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/#\/schema\/person\/98b4bf21daa886d9eb1d5f0e99643ad1"},"description":"Just a quick heads up - tomorrow's Nature will carry an article by Pascal Boyer (at Washington University, and author of the 2001 book Religion","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/2008\/10\/boyer-on-evolution-of-religion.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/2008\/10\/boyer-on-evolution-of-religion.html"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/2008\/10\/boyer-on-evolution-of-religion.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Boyer on the evolution of religion"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/","name":"Epiphenom","description":"The science of religion and non-belief","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/#\/schema\/person\/98b4bf21daa886d9eb1d5f0e99643ad1","name":"Epiphenom","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/a9abb71dca9f11ec59b77b1fffa487fa?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/a9abb71dca9f11ec59b77b1fffa487fa?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Epiphenom"},"url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/author\/trees"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/507","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2091"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=507"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/507\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=507"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=507"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=507"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}