Where does religion come from?

Originally posted by sonhouse
One thought, our intelligence enables us to see patterns in randomness when in fact nothing is there. Chimps, for instance, cannot imagine patterns embedded in randomness because they have no sense of mind, they cannot visualize internally the idea there might be an active mind behind everything they cannot understand. Their brains are just not sophisticate ...[text shortened]... gious feelings, they can finally grow up and be adults which as a race, we are not even close.

Setting aside that you have no idea what an animal does or does not comprehend (check out bears which sit and watch sunsets for example), what do you mean by this: Non believers have totally different internal brain scans from the totally religious. and what evidence do you have to support this totality of differentiation?

Originally posted by divegeester
Setting aside that you have no idea what an animal does or does not comprehend (check out bears which sit and watch sunsets for example), what do you mean by this: Non believers have totally different internal brain scans from the totally religious. and what evidence do you have to support this totality of differentiation?

The evidence came in the form of functional MRI's, it was shown on the program Through the Wormhole I believe. It shows different areas of the brain activated by believers, when praying for instance, vs non believers.

We can see the results of experiments with chimps that pretty much proves they have no theory of mind, that is, they can't comprehend the other person or chimp they are looking at is a thinking being like themselves. One experiment that gave evidence to that was first conducted on a 4 or 5 yo girl, where she was told to put on these two sunglasses, one opaque and the other dark but you could see through them. Then in front of her, they took those glasses and put them on two people and then the girl was told to ask for candy which was in the hands of the two people. So she immediately went to the person who was wearing the transparent glasses instead of the ones where they were painted over. They asked her why she chose the one she did, she said, He can see!

So the same thing with a chimp, put both glasses on him, one after another and he could not see through one but could through the other, then same thing, took the glasses in front of him, put them on the two people with candy in their hands and this time, trial after trial showed the chimp randomly selected the hands with candy with no regard for the fact one of the people could not see the chimp.

This was strong evidence for a lack of 'theory of mind', which says the chimp did not realize there was a mind behind those eyes.
Of course there could be other explanations but Occams razor says the simplest explanation is usually the correct one.

It is interesting that humans, when beliefs change, simply apply the same religious fervor to another belief system. There seems to be no civilization which ever "changed" their beliefs from theist to non-theist. Even when a government, such as the old USSR, endorsed Atheism it did little to change the peoples' theist beliefs. The "need" for something to believe in seems almost programmed into our DNA.

Originally posted by caissad4
It is interesting that humans, when beliefs change, simply apply the same religious fervor to another belief system. There seems to be no civilization which ever "changed" their beliefs from theist to non-theist. Even when a government, such as the old USSR, endorsed Atheism it did little to change the peoples' theist beliefs. The "need" for something to believe in seems almost programmed into our DNA.

Seems some of the European countries have adopted healthy levels of skepticism.

Originally posted by caissad4
It is interesting that humans, when beliefs change, simply apply the same religious fervor to another belief system. There seems to be no civilization which ever "changed" their beliefs from theist to non-theist. Even when a government, such as the old USSR, endorsed Atheism it did little to change the peoples' theist beliefs. The "need" for something to believe in seems almost programmed into our DNA.

Perhaps it is. There are many other things programmed in the DNA. Maybe that is why beavers build dams, bees build hives, birds build nests, etc.

The Instructor

Originally posted by RJHinds
Perhaps it is. There are many other things programmed in the DNA. Maybe that is why beavers build dams, bees build hives, birds build nests, etc.

The Instructor

So according to you, atheists have bad genes and those bad genes need to be culled from the gene pool. Perhaps with targeted euthanasia? Or would you just prefer genetic engineering to weed out the evil atheist gene?

Originally posted by sonhouse
So according to you, atheists have bad genes and those bad genes need to be culled from the gene pool. Perhaps with targeted euthanasia? Or would you just prefer genetic engineering to weed out the evil atheist gene?

I do not know enough about the genes to know the answer to that question. I'll have to exclude that from my instruction program for now.

The Instructor

Originally posted by SwissGambit
Seems some of the European countries have adopted healthy levels of skepticism.

There may be hope for us humans.😉

Originally posted by caissad4
There may be hope for us humans.😉

The hope is in the Lord Jesus the Christ.

HalleluYah !!! Praise the LORD! Glory be to God! Holy! Holy! Holy!

The Instructor

Originally posted by RJHinds
The hope is in the Lord Jesus the Christ.
HalleluYah !!! Praise the LORD! Glory be to God! Holy! Holy! Holy!
The Instructor

I guess your point is that religion comes from hope, not from reality.
Good point.

Originally posted by caissad4
I guess your point is that religion comes from hope, not from reality.
Good point.

The hope of a better reality through Christ Jesus.

The Instructor

Originally posted by RJHinds
The hope of a better reality through Christ Jesus.
The Instructor

But only hope.

Originally posted by caissad4
But only hope.

It is hope that is assured by the words of scripture in the Holy Bible.

The Instructor

Religion was invented to alleviate our fears of the unknown.
Even false hope (apparently) is better than no hope.

Originally posted by caissad4
Religion was invented to alleviate our fears of the unknown.
Even false hope (apparently) is better than no hope.

No hope is really bad. You don't want to go that route.

The Instructor