Have Humans Evolved to Believe in God?

[nabraxas]

Is God a singular, independent being? Or just an evolved projection of human's theory of what God should be? Slate's Jesse Bering finds himself asking these heady questions after an analysis of how humans, as a species, have developed to analyze and rationalize the mental states of others--human or not.

Understanding the Theory of Mind: How Humans Attempt to Make Sense of the Unexpected

If you've ever seen an unfortunate woman at the grocery store wearing a midriff-revealing top and packed into a pair of lavender tights like meat in a sausage wrapper, or a follicularly challenged man with a hairpiece two shades off and three centimeters adrift, and asked yourself what on Earth those people were thinking when they looked in the mirror before leaving the house, this is a good sign that your theory of mind (not to mention your fashion sense) is in working order. When others violate our expectations for normalcy or stump us with surprising behaviors, our tendency to mind-read goes into overdrive. We literally "theorize" about the minds that are causing ostensible behavior.

Humans Extend 'Theory of Mind' to Inhuman Objects

Many people remember fondly the classic film Le Ballon Rouge ("The Red Balloon," 1956) by French filmmaker Albert Lamorisse, in which a sensitive schoolboy—in reality Lamorisse's own 5-year-old son, Pascal—is befriended by a good-natured, cherry-red helium balloon. Absent dialogue, the camera follows the joyful two, boy and balloon, through the somber, working-class streets of the Ménilmontant neighborhood of Paris ... The plot of Le Ballon Rouge exemplifies how our evolved brains have become hypersocial filters, such that our theory of mind is applied not only to the mental innards of other people and animals, but also, in error, to categories that haven't any mental innards at all, such as ebullient skins of elastic stretched by an inert gas. If it weren't for our theory of mind, we couldn't follow the premise of the movie, let alone enjoy Lamorisse's particular oeuvre of magical realism.

We Even Get Angry at Our Cars

In particular, when inanimate objects do unexpected things, we sometimes reason about them just as we do for oddly behaving—or misbehaving—people. More than a few of us have kicked our broken-down vehicles in the sides and verbally abused our incompetent computers. Most of us stop short of actually believing these objects possess mental states—indeed, we would likely be hauled away to an asylum if we genuinely believed that they held malicious intent—but our emotions and behaviors toward such objects seem to betray our primitive, unconscious thinking: we act as though they're morally culpable for their actions.

How This Leads to God

What if I were to tell you that God's mental states, too, were all in your mind? That God, like a tiny speck floating at the edge of your cornea producing the image of a hazy, out-of-reach orb accompanying your every turn, was in fact a psychological illusion, a sort of evolved blemish etched onto the core cognitive substrate of your brain? ... Consider, briefly, the implications of seeing God this way, as a sort of scratch on our psychological lenses rather than the enigmatic figure out there in the heavenly world that most people believe Him to be. Subjectively, God would still be present in our lives. (For some people, rather annoyingly so.) He would continue to suffuse our experiences with an elusive meaning and give the sense that the universe is communicating with us in various ways. But this notion of God as an illusion is a radical and, some would say, even dangerous idea because it raises important questions about whether God is an autonomous, independent agent that lives outside human brain cells, or instead a phantom cast out upon the world by our species' own peculiarly evolved theory of mind. Since the human brain, like any physical organ, is a product of evolution, and since natural selection works without recourse to intelligent forethought, this mental apparatus of ours evolved to think about God quite without need of the latter's consultation, let alone His being real.

Sources:

http://www.slate.com/id/2283372/pagenum/all/#p2

http://www.theatlanticwire.com/opinions/view/opinion/Spotlight-Have-Humans-Evolved-to-Believe-in-God-6864

[Blood Trance Fusion]

That's a good read! Some might even be evolving to disbelieve as we come up with other, more solid theories.

My bit: I think the God concept and our concept of self is blissful ignorance and they've both given me huge despair and anguish as I'm currently working through ego death. A revolution of the human concept of life would be nice.

[bℓσωηG]

God and religion are two different things, many, many people were killed if they did not adopt a christian faith during the crusades...

God is very difficult to comprehend, the facets are so numerous and vast that our 3D wired brain cannot begin to fathom its complexity.

The human need to encapsulize God into an image to worship has seen love replaced with rules and dogma, fractal light replaced with human form lol, but i think a majority knows god exists, whatever form is adopted to make it easiest to understand.

[Blood Trance Fusion]

i think a majority knows god exists

No-one knows. A majority believe.

[bℓσωηG]

I mean ''inner knowing'', like an itch you cant scratch , a splinter in your mind ,so the propensity to follow religion makes sense to most.

Edited February 8, 2011 by blowng

[Slybacon]

God and religion are two different things, many, many people were killed if they did not adopt a christian faith during the crusades...

God is very difficult to comprehend, the facets are so numerous and vast that our 3D wired brain cannot begin to fathom its complexity.

The human need to encapsulize God into an image to worship has seen love replaced with rules and dogma, fractal light replaced with human form lol, but i think a majority knows god exists, whatever form is adopted to make it easiest to understand.

 

Thanks for that.

I actually have more of a belief in gods existence then I do in the keyboard I have in front of me. Your mention of fractal light is the only form I can relate with now. All other forms are archetypes in between.

[Blood Trance Fusion]

I mean ''inner knowing'', like an itch you cant scratch , a splinter in your mind ,so the propensity to follow religion makes sense to most.

 

Okay - that I agree with. Our inquisitive nature seeking "the answer", divinity being that catch-all answer for the mob.

Existential luxury.

[Slybacon]

Okay - that I agree with. Our inquisitive nature seeking "the answer", divinity being that catch-all answer for the mob.

Existential luxury.

 

Im not seeking "the answer"..... My life is in "the questions". To think in my current form I could comprehend "the Answer" would mean Im already wrong.....

[dworx]

that is very daoist sly. :-)

[qualia]

this reminds me of persingers god helmet

although debate still continues as to whether the results are accurate there seems to be at least some suggestion that a belief in god (or some divine presence) at least has links to biophysical origins.

reminds of this* article i read some time ago. i agree that most of the arguments for or against the existence of a god include in some way the judeo-christian belief in a single omnipotent deity. i think for an "evolved" look at "god" we need to dissolve these traditional views and start looking into other (quantum?) models of consciousness. if we can formulate a model for consciousness/awareness which isn't intrinsically locked into human (or other animal) biological processes then we can progress toward extending this model to other species (plants in particular), or even to exist in "space" itself (i.e. god mind).

*btw you should check out the rest of that blog too, lots of thought provoking material there.

Edited February 8, 2011 by qualia

[Blood Trance Fusion]

To think in my current form I could comprehend "the Answer" would mean Im already wrong.....

 

Only if your presumption of "the answer" precludes your comprehension of it.

.... hehe

[hutch]

No-one knows. A majority believe.

 

No...I know...and you can't tell me any different.......boy will you have some explaining to do one day

Edited February 9, 2011 by hutch

[Slybacon]

that is very daoist sly. :-)

 

this reminds me of persingers god helmet

although debate still continues as to whether the results are accurate there seems to be at least some suggestion that a belief in god (or some divine presence) at least has links to biophysical origins.

reminds of this* article i read some time ago. i agree that most of the arguments for or against the existence of a god include in some way the judeo-christian belief in a single omnipotent deity. i think for an "evolved" look at "god" we need to dissolve these traditional views and start looking into other (quantum?) models of consciousness. if we can formulate a model for consciousness/awareness which isn't intrinsically locked into human (or other animal) biological processes then we can progress toward extending this model to other species (plants in particular), or even to exist in "space" itself (i.e. god mind).

*btw you should check out the rest of that blog too, lots of thought provoking material there.

 

Isn't it fascinating how modern Quantum science bears significant correlations to the philisophical teachings of many of the great religions.

[qualia]

true,

although some people seem to take it a bit far, and presume that the phenomena which exist at the quantum level (i.e. entanglement) transfers to the world of classical mechanics. it simply doesn't.

oh and i think he christians missed the boat when it comes to actually understanding part of the reality in which they live. their certainly not doing themselves any favours with this intelligent design nonsense.

[botanika]

We are hardwired for spirituality as it's universal but a singular 'god' as we know it in monotheism is surely the biggest scam in history.

[hutch]

We are hardwired for spirituality as it's universal but a singular 'god' as we know it in monotheism is surely the biggest scam in history.

 

Nope....not by a long shot, that title belongs to the AGW scam...

[Blood Trance Fusion]

Scam or not it hasn't caused millions of deaths like monotheism, it's just turned millions of people more environmentally-aware.

[hutch]

Scam or not it hasn't caused millions of deaths like monotheism, it's just turned millions of people more environmentally-aware.

 

Very narrow view of a very important subject...to flippantly say fraud is okay because it has turned millions of people more environmentally-aware. Could that not have been accomplished honestly....I mean it is a great outcome but what about how we got there?

Sorry to high jack....

[lickapop]

God and religion are two different things, many, many people were killed if they did not adopt a christian faith during the crusades...

God is very difficult to comprehend, the facets are so numerous and vast that our 3D wired brain cannot begin to fathom its complexity.

The human need to encapsulize God into an image to worship has seen love replaced with rules and dogma, fractal light replaced with human form lol, but i think a majority knows god exists, whatever form is adopted to make it easiest to understand.

 

Who would have thought heh? I think that sums it up for me.

I just take a look around at the perfect design of plants and animals, how our planet hangs in the solar system at just that right distance/angle from the sun and ponder of a god.

I refuse to put a face to It, worship It through any religion or until It shows up with some explaining to do.

I often wonder if we are some science experiment for some kid god that goes to god school with other kid gods. Its kinda amateurish. The kid is seeing how far we push ourselves before we destroy ourselves...will he stop us in time?? I think kid god is bored. Moved onto another project.. left its pet here to watch us...and its pet is mean

[Slybacon]

Is human evolution helping us to realise god?

I feel that we are moving closer to god. Maybe that is the point of evolution. Despite Diablo's best efforts to keep us from that realisation. We are all experiencing reality for god, we are the product of light , shone through the hologram of the purist of energys. Can we take a peak at God's shadow? can God be revealed to us? Or can we only synchronise in harmony with Gods warmth as a product of an infinite fractal of possibilities?

[botanika]

Personally I think we need to move away from this idea of a god. Why put everything that is sacred in a box? We can better our future lives by discovering more about the underlying structure of nature which is very mathematical, accountable and accessible to everyone. With religion the future is in the past and there is no accountability. The dark ages in Europe was primarily because of the church's influence on learning. God is a way of controlling people for the benefit of only a rich elite. Its essentially taxation of the mind. I much prefer less corrupted spirituality that has many gods that relate back to nature. Sun god, moon gods, forest gods, dreamtime serpents etc that bind together people with both nature and a common mutual benefit.

Edited February 11, 2011 by botanika

[Slybacon]

Sun god, moon gods, forest gods, dreamtime serpents etc that bind together people with both nature and a common mutual benefit.

 

These are all archetypes or expressions of god. The rich elite use the illusion of god to control. One can never really comprehend god. There is plenty of room for multiple archetypes and expressions of god in my beliefs, but there is only really only one type of energy that permutes all and exists on all dimensions at once. There can only be one fabric that reality is painted on.

[CβL]

I'm sure that we can mostly agree that if there is a God; it would be far too much for us to directly comprehend. Based on that, how can you really know if there is a God? How can you tell apart a delusion of God from a knowing of God? The equivalence principle states essentially "Locally, the effects of gravitation (motion in a curved space) are the same as that of an accelerated observer in flat space." Similarly if a medicine has consistently the same effect as a placebo - we don't know if it had effect or not.

Furthermore, we all know the power of the mind to sincerely believe in delusions - yet most of us are sure that there are none in our own mind. I understand this, as once you think you have experienced retrocausality, you know something's up. Lastly, the ability of the mind to understand itself is limited - a complete explanation here: http://meta-religion.com/Mathematics/Articles/godel_theorem.htm

So, how can you know that your belief of God is not a delusion? I simply don't think it can be done. Essentially, existence of God is unknowable.

[botanika]

You can comprehend an awful lot about god because its a human construct. Our limit of understanding god is only limited by how much historical evidence we have about ourselves. There is no evidence god exists outside of the human construct. Anyway It doesn't matter whether god exists or not - It's the communal ritual that's important because that's what binds people together for mutual benefit, not the actual belief. Baseline, it's an evolutionary adaption and god or belief can be anything you or the group wants. That's why spirituality beliefs are alway changing and quite diverse but the core ritual mechanism is the same. We'll never prove or disprove god - that's not the point. I think the worship of god is tied into environments that provide sustenance and hero worship. Before Judaism 'heroic' people or leaders were called gods. I think hero worship needs to be addressed.

Edited February 11, 2011 by botanika

[CβL]

Hmmm, well if you define God as anything... Then I can't really say much more.

But there are humans who do not believe in a creator (Although they do believe in spirits to some degree). This tribe is a shining example: http://www.spiegel.de/international/spiegel/0,1518,414291,00.html

A choice quote - Living in the now also fits with the fact that the Pirahã don't appear to have a creation myth explaining existence. When asked, they simply reply: "Everything is the same, things always are."