Why Has Religion Come To Dominate The Planet?

 The issue of why it's essentially impossible for an atheist in the U.S. to become a presidential candidate is tied to the nation's  hyper religiosity.    As I noted in my book, Atheism: A Beginner's Handbook,  a 2006 Univ. of Minnesota study ('Atheists Identified as America's Most Distrusted Minority')by Penny Edgell and associates found: "atheists now occupy the lowest rung of social respect for minorities in American society, lower than communists and Muslims."   Adding:

"A significant number of respondents associated atheism with an array of moral misbehavior ....and seemed to rest on a view of atheists as self-interested individuals who are not concerned with the common good."

This in turn  relates to how the religious meme itself has come to dominate nation after nation.  Why then has religious behavior occurred throughout time, in societies at nearly every stage of development and in every region of the world?  Even given religions are seldom concerned with the "common good" and more about how they can gain converts,  advance their own agendas and even leverage political power, e.g.

• The Sad and Sorry Spectacle Of Evangelicals All T...

I suspect there are two possible answers to this question which may or may not be mutually exclusive with one another:

1) Religion is a basic manifestation of a mind virus or meme which has flourished in human brains

2) Religion is a behavior favored by natural selection, and so has come to dominate the human cultural landscape because it confers some survival benefit or advantage.

Let's consider (1) to start. This is based on the meme concept (with the meme acting as an ideational mind virus) first articulated by biochemist Jacque Monod in his Chance and Necessity. On page 155 Monod writes:

"The human group upon which a given idea confers greater cohesiveness, greater ambition and greate self-confidence thereby receives from it an added power to expand which will ensure the promotion of the idea itself. Its promotion value' bears no relation to the amount of objective truth the idea may contain."

He goes on to note (ibid.):

"The might of the powerful armament provided by a religious ideology for a society does not lie in its structure, but in the fact this structure is accepted, that it gains command".

One may inquire here what religious ideology has been most successful worldwide over the past twenty years. Careful inspection will disclose that it's none other than Christian Evangelism or Fundamentalism. It has not only gained ground over Roman Catholicism in places like Central and South America, but in Africa as well. Its ideational benefits are huge, given its simplicity, and its recipe for (eternal) reward: "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ as your personal Savior" is intoxicating.

Indeed the only religious ideology that rivals it in converts is Islam, with its promise of eternal rest and succor provided one wages war against the "infidels" (which, coincidentally, include the Christian Fundamentalists)

Not surprisingly then, the most powerful and insidious memes (ideas-beliefs) are those dedicated to the spread of religious beliefs. If we seek to ask why one set is more successful than a rival set, then we need to look at what Monod, for example, calls their "infectious power". This power can be set forth in terms of three main attributes:

1) Performance value: What change does the meme or meme complex bring about in behaviors for the person who adopts it? (For Christian Fundamentlists, the most major change is that they are intent on spreading their "message" to others, pagans, unbelievers, in the conviction that must "save their souls". They believe that Christ enjoined them to do this and not to do so is to ignore his edict to "go forth")

2) Propagation value: How far and wide is the meme spread, and what means are employed to achieve this? (E.g. Islam in the past has invoked beheadings locally, and more generally "holy wars" or Jihads to force belief onto uncooperative populations. Christian Fundamentalists make more use of the threat of "Hell" to any indigenous groups that are reluctant to accept their "personal Savior")

3) Infectious value: How easy is it to infect other brains? What attribute of the meme facilitates the infection?

In the last case, say for the faith meme in general, part of its structure inheres in automatically warding off too close rational scrutiny. Thus, reason and rationality are either: a) demonized (as byproducts of "Satan") or, b) marginalized as inferior to faith.

Example: from a 1990 CNN program featuring Skeptic Paul Kurtz, the topic "Does Satan Exist?"

Phone caller (to Kurtz): "Of course you will say that Satan doesn't exist! But that's exactly what Satan wants! He doesn't want anyone to believe in him!"

And we see here, the Satan belief component of the meme is perfectly designed to limit and minimize any damage from Kurtz's skepticism. After all, if one doesn't believe in Satan, he has to be under the spell of Satan...in causing disbelief!

No one can say that these religious mind viruses don't possess a certain innate beauty!

While the theory of mass infection of human brains is very compelling, and indeed was revisited in the book, Thought Contagion: How Belief Spreads Through Society, by Aaron Lynch, it leaves open why a small subset of humans (atheists, other nonbelievers) aren't affected...or should I say, infected?

I suspect the likely reason is that their (mostly) scientific training provides an inoculation against the effort to infect their brains...by those trying to meet their convert quota. Because we have studied hard science for so many years we can easily recognize humbug when we see it. So, it washes off our ideational backs like a flu bug might for someone whose had the H1N1 vaccine.

Now, what about the second notion? This has recently been made popular in a number of venues, not least have been the claims for a "God gene" or - less dogmatically -that religious belief confers health and other benefits, against which I'd not necessarily complain. I just have problems accepting that religion necessarily "evolved" because it conferred essential benefits on early human societies and their successors. (I do think that ethics likely evolved and developed along lines favored by natural selection).

More plausible is that religious belief evolved along with blind optimist tendencies - as well as the ability to "see things that aren't there" (see the excellent book, Faces in the Clouds).   This ability is presumed to exist in one single brain complex, probably centered in the temporal lobes. We know, for example - as Monod points out in his book (p. 50, by reference to functional coherence in associated molecular cybernetic systems) that it is often very important that humans remain "dumb and happy" in the evolutionary scheme of the brain.

 The survival basis here is to reduce existential anxiety and probably a host of physical indicators (e.g. blood pressure) as well. But this is not to say anything real is doing it. Rather it is the believer's own beliefs manifesting as a kind of intangible opiate or narcotic. Not surprisingly, reckless uninformed optimism (as when people leap into the stock market because others are, believing they will succeed) and religious faith clearly emerge as symptoms of the same general brain defect that abhors reality.

This dynamic is widespread because this brain wiring defect is also widespread. A small percentage of humans (atheists ) lack it, but then they often lack the benefits as well. I wouldn't be surprised- given this, if atheists are found to have more depression, higher blood pressure, more general bad health indicators (poor lipid profiles, high c-reactive protein, etc). They might naturally show these because they suffer no delusions, and are fully cognizant of being orphans in a purposeless cosmos. To compensate for this painful existential awareness they might self-medicate in ways that the medical cognoscenti might not approve.  

An alternate theory has that a specific neuro-complex literally enables God as well as other proposed supernatural entities to abide in the brain.  This neural complex goes by the name of "orientation association area" or OAA, as defined by Andrew Newberg and Eugene d'Aquili in their book, 'Why God Won't Go Away: Brain Science and the Biology of Belief''.

Neurological measurements, i.e. from PET and SPECT scans, consistently showed electrical discharges spiraling down from the right attention area (right OAA) to the limbic system and hypothalamus “triggering the arousal section of the structure”. The authors’ test results and measurements revealed the activation of both the left and right association regions as their subjects focused on a religious artifact or object, say an image of Jesus. As assorted cortical thresholds were crossed, a maximal stimulation (given by spikes in the SPECT scans) produced a neural “flood” that generated feedback to the attention association area.

To make a long story short, the visual attention area of the OAA began to deprive the right orientation area (responsible for balance)  of all neural input not originating with the contemplation of the religious or devotional object. In order to compensate, and thereby preserve the neuro-spatial matrix (in which the self could still exist) the right orientation area had to default to the attention area focusing on the object.

In the words of the authors,  the religious object “is perceived by the mind as the whole depth and breadth of reality.”   This is a profound insight, and fully explains why it is essentially impossible to wean believers away from their objects of worship or devotion based on logic and reason alone. What has happened, in other words, is the subject’s whole existence and identity has become bound up with the focus of his brain’s OAA-  or more specifically – the right attention area’s focus which channels nearly all neural inputs to that region.  


Given this dynamic, the brain governed by the OAA will be singly directed to craft its own version of rationality to support its supernatural ideations.  This implies we simply cannot trust the rational expressions  of believers to be faithful accounts of reality.  

This is one reason the atheist philosopher A.J. Ayer - in Language, Truth and Logic-  insisted  on empirical support for any claims made.   As he writes (p. 158):


"The fact people have religious experiences is interesting from the psychological point of view, but it does not in any way imply there is such a thing as religious knowledge.   The theist - like the moralist- may believe his experiences are cognitive experiences, but unless he can formulate his knowledge in propositions that are empirically verifiable, we may be sure he is deceiving himself."

• 
  

Why aren't atheists' brains subject to OAA stimulation and domination?  A number of hypotheses have been advanced including that we have lack the "God gene" which makes the OAA effective.  Another proposal is that we are too trained already in critical thinking (and logic)  to be mesmerized by the OAA's  subversive appeals.   The converse is that most humans are unable - for whatever reason- to resist such brain influence, hence explaining the dominance of religious memes across the planet.

Who Are the Creationists Kidding On Abiogenesis?

The matter of the ultimate origin of life, the theory of Abiogenesis (which is often erroneously conflated with the theory of evolution) has been problematical for years. What is sought is a basic explanation for how fundamentally non-living matter could acquire the properties and attributes of life, including being able to reproduce. In principle this isn't that remarkable a stretch, since we already know there exist living entities at the "margins" - the viruses- which display no attributes of life until they become attached to a host. Once in a host, they can appropriate its cell machinery to churn out billions of copies of themselves.

 

All of this, of course, can be done without supernatural agency.

 

Alas, creationist Ken Ham’s Answers in Genesis (AiG) is  unable to swallow this and moreover is still upset that Neil deGrasse Tyson dared suggest life on earth started without the help of God. Tyson,  in one COSMOS episode,  honestly stated that the very origins of life “are not yet understood”. Because abiogenesis has yet to turn up any verifiable results—not that they have claimed any are verifiable—AiG is calling that evidence of a clear flaw. But what’s clear is that Tyson isn’t just a threat to creationists. Their big target is the reputation of science.

 

AiG , for example, continues in an attempt to discredit the science, saying:

“Abiogenesis has never been observed in experimental biology and violates the most fundamental law in biology, the law of biogenesis. Nevertheless, the authors of the review are confident there was a naturalistic chemical origin for life.” [Biogenesis is the natural law that life comes from reproduction by living things].

 

However,  in a remarkable find published in The New Scientist (Vol. 209, No. 2794, p. 11), two investigators: Kunikho Kaneko and Atsushi Kamimura, have made a remarkable breakthrough in devising a testable model that is able to replicate the Abiogenesis process. The two basically solved the problem of how a lipid-coated proto-cell can divide into two (displaying reproduction) when the genetic material replicates. Recall in an earlier blog where I showed the hypothetical proto-cell reaction wherein a self-sustaining coacervate droplet can use one or two basic reactions involving adenosine triphosphate (ATP) and adenosine diphosphate:

L*M + R + ADP + P -> R + L + M + ATP

ATP + X + Y + X*Y -> ADP + X*Y + X*Y + P

In the above, L*M is some large, indeterminate, energy-rich compound that could serve as ‘food’. Whatever the specific form, it’s conceived here to have two major parts capable of being broken to liberate energy. Compound R is perhaps a protenoid or lipid-coated proto-cell, but in any case able to act on L*M to decompose it. The problem with this earlier hypothesis was that such lipid-coated proto-cells lack the machinery to allow for easy division.

Kaneko and Kamimura solved this by taking their inspiration (for their model) from living things in which DNA and RNA code for proteins and the proteins catalyse replication of the genetic material. This goes back to biochemist Jacque Monod's concept that the organism is a self-constructing machine. Its macroscopic structure is not imposed upon it by outside forces, instead it shapes itself autonomously by dint of constructive internal (chemical) interactions. Thus in the Kaneko- Kamimura model one has a self-perpetuating system in which a cluster of two types of molecules catalyse replication for one another while also demonstrating rudimentary cell division.

In the Kaneko - Kamimura  (K-K) model, as with DNA, the genetic material replicates much more slowly than the other cluster molecules but also takes longer to degrade, so it enables lots of the other molecule to accumulate. Following replication of the heredity carrier the copies drift apart while the molecules between them break down automatically creating two separate entities (see image).

This is an exciting breakthrough but some further investigations are needed, specifically ways to circumvent the problem that (in real life) membrane lipids around an RNA molecule don't typically catalyse RNA replication. However, this isn't insurmountable, because all one need do (theoretically) is replace the lipids with hydrophobic peptides.

 

Basically what the K-K experiments show is that while abiogenesis hasn’t been directly observed it does provide  a materialist model that can account for it in a peripheral way. Since such a materialist model exists, it means that all supernatural explanations become redundant. If one therefore continues to use them, he commits the fallacy of ignotum per ignotius.

 

Thus to claim abiogenesis “has not been observed” (directly) – which is partially true, and then to say this proves the creation story is something that would raise the eyebrows of a kindergartner . Indeed it not only commits the fallacy of ignotum per ignotius, but also the fallacy of circular reasoning – since AiG and Ham are claiming that which they must set out to prove independently. Even if nothing existed for abiogenesis, they would be obliged to prove supernatural creation – they can’t use a naturalistic failure (in their mind) as positive “evidence” for their extraordinary claim.

 

More importantly the AiG claim that abiogenesis  “breaks the law of biogenesis”  is simply dishonest. The law of biogenesis (attributed to Louis Pasteur)  states that life cannot come from non-life, but Pasteur did not demonstrate that any such impossibility- only that it does not happen in everyday life. As shown in the K-K model it is at least possible that such can take place.

 

Now, add to that the Miller-Urey experiment. The Miller and Urey experiment basically applied an electrical discharge to a chemical brew resembling the Earth’s primitive reducing atmosphere. This brew included ammonia and methane, as well as hydrogen and water vapor. The effect of the discharge transformed the mix into a diverse yield of organic compounds. These included amino acids, as well as substances such as formic acid and urea that normally occur in living organisms.

The very fact so many organic compounds could arise is remarkable in itself, given the vast number of possible compounds that might have emerged. And while it is true that the discharge didn’t produce actual living cells, there is no reason – given enough time,- that a primitive pre-biotic cell in the distant past could not have emerged given the building blocks left behind

 

None of this was mentioned by Tyson, but it could have been and would likely have made the creationist crowd's heads explode even more. Also, they have had to work much harder to come up with any kind of  coherent response.

But what is most galling about AiG and Ham is the tacit assumption that their audience lacks basic scientific understanding which gives AiG permission to be “fact-free.”  Hence, they can peddle any balderdash that violates logic or science with impunity.  Meanwhile,  Neil deGrasse Tyson gives viewers a naturalist’s explanation for the world, and when he says science does not yet know something, this is not a sign of the failures of science, but instead a powerful example of the necessary honesty in which science thrives. The very fact that AiG sees the words “I don’t know” as a weakness shows the lengths of intellectual dishonesty they are willing to go to pull the wool over their followers’ eyes. (Though again, Tyson also could have shown more support for abiogenesis – such as by invoking  the Miller-Urey experiment- to make this less likely. Hence, one may also argue that AiG exploited COSMOS’ “loose” presentation in playing to a popular audience.)

Never mind, the hysterical  reaction from AiG  and Ham after nearly every COSMOS episode shows a position of pure panic. Neil deGrasse Tyson has become their biggest public enemy because he get primo air time every Sunday  on one of their (conservatives’)  favorite channels. Up to now, these clods haven’t come up with any series with similar gravitas that even FOX will accept – to compete with COSMOS – and this drives them batshit crazy..

 Ham (who not long ago got his head handed to him by Bill Nye in a web debate) just can’t accept that what he has is palpable bull crap while Tyson offers actual science. In addition,  Tyson make science accessible to all people with an open mind, and  he is likeable and non-controversial to boot.

 True, Tyson does not identify himself as an atheist (for obvious reasons), but it’s clear to a blind man he is one. Also, it doesn’t put our (atheist) noses out of joint because it  means he can reach across both sides of the aisle to a much  greater degree  than the late Chris Hitchens, or Richard Dawkins.

We atheists will take what we can get and if a naturalist universe can be delivered easily,  in bite- sized pieces by an affable showman like Neil Tyson, so much the better!

The Younger Demographic Abandons Religion - It's About Time!

As I've noted in earlier blog posts, religion is distinct from the belief in a transcendent Being. While the endless search for the latter is likely rooted in the brain, i.e. the brain’s orientation and association area(OAA) ,  see e.g. http://brane-space.blogspot.com/2014/01/peeling-back-layers-of-religious-brain.html

religions are cultural-social creations, arising from particular ethnicities and geography.

That is, while the brain and OAA engender the God-concepts which we embrace, these concepts are not dependent on having a religion.


Religion - by contrast- is an entirely human artifact generally contrived for the purpose of control of a population via mind viruses.  Religion has been described as a "reaction to the experience of the transcendent" - and this may carry more truth than all the religious books one could ever read in a lifetime. It means that at some phase religion short circuits itself by inveighing against the natural instinct for spiritual self-discovery in most humans. It means that religion's warp and woof is to filter out the transcendent so its power implications are dispersed into assorted secondary human channels or  "media" (e.g. priests, popes, rabbis, ministers etc.)  as opposed to being allocated to the individual to exercise on his own. (Which would allow him to become too much like the ancient Gnostics).

Thus, religion FEARS too much self-autonomy, independent thought and questioning which is why it often retains an absolutist stance regarding the nature of the transcendent- and has historically held out assorted punishments when it beholds any transgressions of concept, or "belief", i.e. for heretics:















Heretics undergo torture at the hands of the Inquisition, for their rejection of basic Catholic tenets.

The mind virus basis for most religions (except the impersonal) was first articulated by biochemist Jacque Monod in his book Chance and Necessity. On page 155 Monod observes:

"The human group upon which a given idea confers greater cohesiveness, greater ambition and greater self-confidence thereby receives from it an added power to expand which will ensure the promotion of the idea itself. Its promotion value' bears no relation to the amount of objective truth the idea may contain."

He goes on to note (ibid.):

"The might of the powerful armament provided by a religious ideology for a society does not lie in its structure, but in the fact that if this structure is accepted, that it gains command".

And indeed, we already detect this playing out on the national stage as a group of powerful religious interests, as embodied in 'Hobby Lobby' - seeks to have certain contraceptive provisions in the ACA overturned by the Supreme Court so that they do not have to comply. As Justice Elaine Kagan noted in one of her ripostes, "What next? Will another religion choose to reject vaccinations? Another choose to reject sex education? Where does it end?"

But this is the point given that the most powerful and insidious memes- mind viruses are those dedicated to the spread of religious beliefs.  The most pervasive as well as pernicious are those that hijack political or social power  using what Monod, for example, calls their innate "infectious power", or how easily they are spread.  (One reason one must always be wary of proselytizers in any form! They all clearly seek to enhance the "propagation value" of the virus)

All of this is why it's so gratifying to now learn that of those aged 18 to 35, three in 10 say they are not affiliated with any religion, while only half are “absolutely certain” a god exists. These are at or near the highest levels of religious disaffiliation recorded for any generation in the 25 years the Pew Research Center has been polling on these topics.

In fact, the numbers could be even more favorable, and they might be closer to 4 in 10 unaffiliated with a religion. Why? A clue is provided by columnist Tina Dupuy, who  observes. “When it comes to self-reporting religious devotion Americans cannot be trusted. We under-estimate our calories, over-state our height, under-report our weight and when it comes to piety—we lie like a prayer rug.”

So 'Muricans are too chicken shit to divulge their real leanings and predilections in many polls- namely those bearing ultra-sensitive topics like weight, religious belief etc.. So what's new?

Anyway, even more satisfying is that e very piece of social data suggests that those who favor faith and superstition over fact-based evidence will become the minority in this country by or before the end of this century. In fact, the number of Americans who do not believe in a deity doubled in the last decade of the previous century according to both the census of 2004 and the American Religious Identification Survey (ARIS) of 2008, with religious non-belief in the U.S. rising from 8.2 percent in 1990 to 14.2 percent in 2001. In 2013, that number is now above 16 percent.

If current trends continue, the crossing point, whereby atheists, agnostics, and “nones” equals the number of Christians in this country, will be in the year 2062. All of which is terrific, except that I will likely not be around to see it.

How did this turnaround from specious religious faith happen? Perhaps many reasons, including the emergence of the "New" atheists prepared to take on religionist bullies where and when they see fit - as opposed to cowering. And also the overreach of the religious politicos - as in the 2012 election with assorted nitwits talking about "legitimate rape" and other nonsense.

But it likely began even earlier. Political scientists Robert Putman and David Campbell, the authors of American Grace, argue that the Christian Right’s politicization of faith in the 1990s turned younger, socially liberal Christians away from churches, even as conservatives became more zealous. “While the Republican base has become ever more committed to mixing religion and politics, the rest of the country has been moving in the opposite direction.”

Nowhere is this being played out more than in the arena of abortion and contraception, and one can see again how the religious will likely overplay they their hand with this new round at the Supreme Court. Whichever way the Court rules, the non-affiliated demographic is likely to grow and that is a good and healthy thing for this nation!