There are two problems you have omitted. First, a minor but statistically significant distinction between two groups is only as important as the reliability of the classification into two groups and the reliability of the indicators for the traits measured. These are significant enough problems that, given the small size of the effect measured, that it may simply be an experimental artifact that disappears with better classifications into conservative and liberal. I mean, just two groups? Second, there isn't even the slightest hint of a mechanism for how greater flexibility (which is probably to be read as a proxy for "intelligence" anyhow) creates liberal politics. Attitudes are not policies, and politics are about policies. The whole schema is reminiscent of the failed attempts to cobble up some notion of an authoritarian personality as an explanatory factor. That is forgotten for good reason, and I fully expect these experiments are merely retracing a dead end. I've always known far more about the neuroscience than you think. The disagreement lies in the perceived implications. You would have it that a heterogeneous set of emotions that are sometimes (but sometimes not) deemed religious, somehow are involved in creating the heterogeneous set of cultural institutions arbitrarily called "religion" although they are also present in other social institutions as well. Talking about complexity of causation doesn't work. There is not even a hypothesized chain of causality! There certainly is no possibility of predicting the nature of religious institutions from human nature. A sensation of a presence can be interpreted as God? Religious, right? A ghost? Well, religious too, in a broad sense; right? A telepathic contact via ESP? Well, no, not religious, just bad science, right? It's up to you to explain how this isn't just a common enough psychological phenomena sometimes interpreted as a religious experience and others not, depending upon the learned cultural behaviors. And I'm sorry, I think you have gravely misinterpreted neuroscience experiments if you think they have demonstrated the existence of any state or experience that is specifically religious. For most people it's just learned behavior. That's why there are so relatively few conversions. And when there are mass conversions there is usually an element of compulsion, or a crassly material motive, or, in a few cases, a massive breakdown of all social institutions which necessarily incluedes the religious ones. That's why each religious institution will find the full range of psychological types, traits and experiences instead of a selection. Indeed, the conflict between the psychological needs of some believers and the social institution is a major cause of tension in these institutions, leading sometimes to splits or reformations. By your hypothesis, the religious insitutions express the psychological needs! Absurd. Why, what psychological states and experiences that are "religious" in the "religion" that is primitive medicine? There are some cultures in which religion as medicine is the vast bulk of "religious" observance. The claim that every culture has religion demands surreptitiously counting such debatable religion without examination. What religous impulse causes shamans to fake trances or surgery? There is about as much connection between religion as a social institution and its members' psychology as there is between a school and the students' psychologies. If anything, it's oppositional. The psychological phenomena you want to call religious are just human, sometimes called religious, other times not. They exist, are of interest, but are not causal to religious institutions. "Religion" is notorious for not being what it's founders' inspirations demanded. If the founders' religious experiences are of doubtful importance, how so the mere follower? No, no, no, no(most religions preceded scientific materialism,) and because social institutions are not human nature writ large. There are various religious ideas, but they are incredibly varied, so varied that calling religious tells us nothing significant. Psychological states, neither normal nor abnormal, do not cause religion. In this society some religious institutions appear to exist to fulfil some psychological needs but in very many other cultures, do not. There seems to be an unconscious agenda to somehow ratify "religion" as human nature. \No ideas in themselves are causal for any institutions, separable even in principle from social functions they fulfill. How specific do you think it has to be? Damage to Broca's are is different from damage to Wernicke's area, despite the overlap. There's nothing even that specific for religion. The specificity alleged for ibogaine is fantastic, but you had no difficulty in accepting that. The complicating factors you refer to argue against claims for ibogaine. And some kinds of rationality contribute to "relgiosity" too. And some kinds of irrationality that contribute to "religiosity" also contribute to non-religious behavior. All this screams correlation, not causation! The standard social science model is solid because it is based on a mountain of observations of religion, society, history, economics, on and on. The experiments in neuroscience with their shaky definitions equating heterogenous phenomena, unexamined assumptions, lacunae in chains of causation, may be set up as lab experiments, with chatter about controls etc. But is this Popperian emphasis on testability really good science? As to your other post, Steven Pinker in his latest book The Better Angels of Our Nature flatly declares that g, the general factor of intelligence, has been scientifically established. And that it is fifty percent heritable. It's not a problem for me because I think Pinker's a crank with a Ph.D. But his kind of science is the kind you're using.
Most studies of liberal and conservative psychology are exercises in bad science. Almost invariably an extremely liberal psychology professor is trying to confirm his paranoid bigotry and superiority complex, so he runs a poorly designed test on college students whose political opinions, if formed at all, still come from watching talk shows in the student lounge. Occassionally one will do a well-designed study and choke down the results, like how convervatives can think like liberals but not vice versa. But progress is slow when the studies are designed to boost a professor's self-esteem and please his colleagues and party guests instead of learning something useful. Always known? Isn't that reaching back past Locke's blank slate to the Platonic idea that our minds are formed elsewhere and then stuck in a human body? Do you think it's just a coincidence that you were pre-born with a knowledge of neuroscience on a planet where the disembodied souls of Xenu's army of psychologists is wandering around infecting people? I think you might need some auditing to see if you can reach Clear, perhaps even become an OT level IV. In any event, perhaps the discussion on religion's connection to the brain would benefit from noting that almost all societies have religions, and have had religions for thousands of years in one form or another. Repeated patterns of social behavior that don't seem to serve an immediately useful, logical purpose usually point to some innate wiring. Just about everyone on the entire planet plays games with sticks and balls from the time they can walk till they retire their big box seats at the giant sports arena. This likewise makes no logical sense, and indicates that the monkeys have an innate obsession with running, hitting, and throwing things. No one has yet found the neurological basis for ball obsession, but behavior indicates it must nevertheless exist.
That is but one study of many exploring the brain-basis of various beliefs (political, religious, etc). I agree that there are issues with that particular study, and cited it primarily because it was the most recent one I remembered. I should have selected a better study. However, this is rather tangential to the discussion, I'm sure with a little effort, you can find many more studies of greater methodological quality that provide evidence for the brain-basis of belief in general. I don't really feel up to searching for them today, and if that counts as a strike against me in the field of this debate I'll accept it. You mean, you've always known more about neuroscience than you've made evident? Well, okay...that doesn't change the fact that you seem to have some very fundamental misconceptions about it. You are correct that there is "no possibility of predicting the nature of religious institutions from human nature." I completely agree with that statement. However, there is absolutely the possibility of predicting religion from human nature. I've already clarified this: Jesus, Mohammad, and Vishnu are not inherent, the tendency to create and believe in things like Jesus, Mohammad, and Vishnu is inherent. That is what I've been saying this whole time! These are common psychological phenomena which are interpreted through learned cultural behaviors, hence, a psychological basis for religious belief! Is it just me or is this debate coming down to semantics? Again, you are repeating things I just said. I just cited the cognitive dissonance often caused by religion. This is not, however, adequate evidence against a psychological basis for religion; think again of the optical illusion example -- cognitive dissonance is caused when the imperfect perception of reality as created by our imperfect brains clashes with what's real. Why is that absurd? Religious institutions demonstrably do express many psychological needs: the need to belong to a group, the need for ritual and the control and reassurance it provides, the need to believe that there is something greater and more than ourselves and our natural world (and again, just because you haven't personally experienced this need doesn't mean that others do not experience it). The fact that some aspects of religious institutions are counter to psychological needs is evidence only of how imperfect is our psychology, not that religion is not based in psychology. You've negated your own question by qualifying the trances and surgeries of shamans with "fake." Have you not heard of self-delusion? Have you never met an alternative medicine addict, or a reiki therapist, or a priest who whole-heartedly believed in what they were practicing? Shamans, like any other religious/quasi-religious/spiritual practitioners can easily be frauds, but can just as easily be true believers. Again, you are projecting your own inability to believe onto everyone else. For many shamans and medicine men/women, they truly believe their trances are other-worldly, and that their magical cures work. And why shouldn't they? 80% of human desease and injury will remedy itself given time. A shaman who ritually drives out the evil spirits he believes are causing an illness will have an 80% success rate, which ain't too shabby. That is the correlation/causation fallacy in action. Recognizing that there is a psychological basis for religion is not. How many times do I have to say it? The specific religious institution is not a psychological phenomenon, that is not what I am arguing. The religiosity, or spirituality of the individual, which drives him or her and people collectively to create and believe in religion is a psychological phenomenon. The institution is the product of a psychological phenomenon. Well of course most religions preceded scientific materialism, scientific materialism hasn't been around that long. Whereas religion has. Interesting, isn't it, that logical thinking so often goes against human nature, and so much so that it is a skill which has to be learned. Religion, as far as anyone can tell, on the other hand, has been around for much, much longer. If it is not brain-based, then from whence did it come? You can't make something of nothing. They do not cause specific religions. They do cause religiosity and spirituality, or, at the very least, the tendency to be religious or spiritual. I'd love to hear some examples of religions from other cultures that fulfill no psychological needs. How is this contradictory to what I am saying? Natural human psychology contributes to religiosity. That is the point I am trying to make! Of course testability is good science. Testable hypotheses are a necessity of science. This is why String Theory is getting so much flack. It is a fantastic theory, but it is not testable. Social science is full of fantastic theories, and we can learn a lot from them, from their implications -- I want to make my position clear that I do think social science is valid -- but when the theories aren't testable they are limited. This is what makes it a soft science. Thanks a lot for calling me a crank...if in a roundabout way. I haven't read Angels of Our Nature, so I cannot know what qualifications Pinker gives that assertion, but if he declares it flatly as you say I would have to disagree. Intelligence, in my own personal experience as both a teacher and a researcher, is mutable. It is too complex and changeable to be adequately tested with the tools we have today. Like I said, IQ tests can tell us something of the picture, but they are unreliable and to call them incomplete would be a major understatement. Please don't assume that just because I cited a few of Pinker's theories and studies that I take his word as gospel and do not have my own ideas. That's just insulting.
Oooo... I think I just figured out on of Scientology's accidental (probably) hooks. It's got a bunch of mystic mumbo-jumbo and a bizarre creation story like other religions, and we know it adds the group-centric cult aspect along with the innovative use of lie-detectors, but it also has levels, and "players" keep trying to get to the next level where they get more power ups, stamina, and mana. The only significant difference between Scientology and WoW or Diablo is that the further you go in the game, the smaller your bag of gold is.
But "things" like Jesus, Mohammed and Vishne are not inherent because there are numerous cultures that do not have these kinds of figures. Animist religions, shamanism, Taoism, Buddhism, the Society of Friends (in its past anyhow, ) the cargo cults you yourself mentioned. If this psychological need was indeed inherent and indeed created religion, all religions would have something along those lines. But they do not. The families that converted to Islam to avoid paying the zakat had crass material motives, not the imaginary psychological needs you claim. The people who joined the Church of England did not need to belong to a group, did not need ritual, did not need to believe there was something there was greater than themselves. They merely needed to avoid trouble with Henry VIII's government. So far from religion being some mystical expression of innate human spirituality and religiosity, most religions are enforced by government. The ancient religions, such as those of Egypt, where there was a god-king, did not emerge because of innate spirituality and religiosity on the part of the people!Nor did the god-kings maintain their power because of a religiously inspired devotion. If the god-kings provided the proper mixture of services and sanctions to the various classes of society, they kept their power. And they had to share the booty from the religious worship. If they did not, no amount of spirituality could save them. Was Akhenaten inspired by his spirituality, or by the way a new god could expropriate the old gods' property? You and the people who have pushed these theories have simply ignored reality. As I recall, you specifically denied that irrational thinking was religiosity. The people who patronize shamans may have an irrational belief in the shaman's powers, but they have a crassly material motive in paying for his services. When a religion decrees hospitality and the sanctity of shrines, how do you somehow decree that the motives are a need to belong, as opposed to the need to go past a war of all against all, to adhere to morality as the road to simple survival? How could you possibly know that the true motive was the need to belong? Where does this notion of "collectively" create a religion come from? Most religions that fit the notion of religion you surreptitiously use have founders! You yourself mentioned Muhammad! There are tribal religions, animism, shamanism. These religions have very little to do with spirituality and religiosity of the sort you tacitly assume. The customs and rituals of these religions tend to do two things. First they promise very material benefits. Where is the spirituality and religiosity in that? Second, they offer supernatural justifications and sanctions for tribal customs that are matters of life and death in maintaining a functionisn society. Religion, like armies, use as best they can, psychological understanding and preexisting ideas (superstitions, for most of history.) Religion, like an army, is not caused by personality traits. The tendency of individuals to be religious or spiritual does not create a religion. Some people see Jesus after his death and it becomes a religion, other people see Elvis and it becomes a joke. You consistently impute causation without a shred of evidence, or even an argument for this. Cargo cults are not about psychological needs. Cures from shamans are not about psychological needs. What I hear you saying is that the innate human nature creates religion. Possibly the difference is a semantic one. As to testability, parapsychologists do experiments, complete with controls.
And confirm that I am correct in keeping my mouth shut when subjects go this deep, since threads like this also confirm just how ignorant I am.
Cargo cults do fill spiritual needs, plus they're very amusing. We should all celebrate John Frum day and build fake airports to encourage his return. As one of their religious leaders put it, John Frum is their Jesus. Oddly enough, John Frum's brother Prince Philip (who is likewise a divine supernatural spirit) married Queen Elizabeth II and occassionally exchanges gifts with his Polynesian worshippers.
I'm beginning to think you just will never get what I'm trying to say. The details don't matter. The fact that we are prone to believe in the supernatural is what matters, be it Jesus, Mohammad, Vishnu, Shamanism, Animism, and on and on. I've said this about a dozen times! And you are making unfounded claims, again based in the unsound logic of "I've never experienced it, therefor it doesn't exist." You have no way of knowing the individual motivations of people who believe or convert. You are assuming knowledge of the minds of people not only today, but of centuries and millennia gone by. I don't know where I did that. But to make my stance clear: irrational thinking is not itself religiosity. Much of the innate psychology that leads to irrational thinking also leads to religiosity. That was one possible motive I noted, I never said it was the only motive or a necessary motive for every individual. The need to belong is one innate psychological need religion fulfills. Besides, you're the one who is making presumptions about people's motives. Just a paragraph ago you were making claims about the motives of people who died hundreds or thousands of years before we were born! And yet people continue to believe in them long after the tribal society has faded. The numerous laws of hygiene in Judaism, for example, likely developed exactly this way, yet people continue to practice them despite being long-removed from the desert and dwelling in modern cities, because they believe them to be the law of god. Again, you are basing all your claims on two major logical fallacies, the first being that just because you have not experienced religiosity, it does not exist, and the second is the strawman misinterpretation of my argument: that the details of religion are inherent. Details are not inherent, believing is. The individual founder like Mohammad would get nowhere if people weren't innately capable of following his religion. I've given plenty of evidence which you refute without counter-evidence. Yes they are. Need for ritual, need for belonging to a group, need for control over an uncontrollable environment (which is also the foundation for superstition), etc. The scientific consensus is that there is a psychological foundation to behavior (including religious behavior). I am afraid that in equating this argument with parapsychology you stand alone against pretty much every legitimate neurologist and psychologist practicing. Again, your belief in the tabla rasa is severely outdated.
But they're a great opportunity to learn! I'd be very interested in other people's perceptions of this discussion!
^ I have contemplated wading into the choppy waters of this discussion a few times...but after reading your posts tsq I realize just how much of my degree that I have forgotten! I think this whole discussion has become very interesting...and if I feel I can add something I'll definitely try!
^I've actually found this conversation to be a great experience. stj has continually offered interesting and thought-provoking debate, and the thing hasn't spiraled out of control into a mess of insults and stupidity the way most web discussions on such contentious subjects between individuals who disagree are prone to do. The fact that he and I are having a civil debate while maintaining our disagreement has been great. If we continue this level of respectful debate, I think this would be a safe place for anyone to offer their perceptions.
I think stj is trying to undermine monotheistic Earth religions because he works for one of the Go'uld System Lords, probably Anubis but possibly Baal.
Agreed. TSQ, I've learned a lot from what you've posted, although I've not been able to read through it all because these intense forum type conversations are so difficult to follow (you need the "model" of the conversation in your head to really digest it well, by being one of the participants). Anyway, as a layman in this area, I'll simply say that I believe we are indeed hardwired for two things: leading and following. With following, we start by apprenticeship with our parents. Usually religion is introduced to children by their parents, and is the illustration of who the parents follow. As such, the hard-wiring is only part of it, where the rest is learned. When we were young, our parents were the benefactors of many things--food, shelter, love, attention, security, and guidance. When we're older we learn to forage for our own food and shelter, learn to cultivate love and attention from others, and manage security and guidance in a variety of ways. Religion gives security and guidance for those who crave it. When you see someone successful and happy and they attribute it to their religion, that it gives them a "special edge" over others, well... it's a curious thing. I'm sure Katie thought "maybe there's something to this Scientology" and for a while, gave Tom Cruise the benefit of the doubt. But over time she found she couldn't turn her mind and eyes away from the things that bothered her about it. She probably chatted with Tom about it, questioned him on a number of things, and got responses that were ultimately vague and evasive. "Honey, you need to be a level 7 to understand it and you're still a level 3. Be patient." "Sorry honey, I'm done waiting. This is a cult, I'm freaked out by it, and... please sign here."