Religious concepts promote cooperation
Effect seems to work regardless of a person's beliefs.
A belief in God may have promoted the evolution of cooperative behaviour, say Canadian psychologists. They found that priming people with religious concepts makes them more generous — regardless of whether they declare themselves to be believers.
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Comments
On reading this, I think it is the mood of the persons from the test experience that has the total influence. Though one fact must be obvious, it is not so clear(from my perspective-true)what the exposure to religious material has to do ubiquitiously wqith mood. I believe that it does, and that this test could ber conducted in another way if one assumed that religion is only a recent phenomenon in human history- of which the mysteriuos witness- assumed exisitance- is a new word.
I think the key words are "OPEN" and "CLOSED" -open -the world is open to doubt, closed the case is shut--and we are inclined as a natural ethic to lean towards, feel better at the open possibility.
Attaching a high priority, great importance in this realization -that even the past is open-we do not really know cave man was religious- to this fact in public education is essential...we have multiple words, circular meanings, i.e "a round circle" so that the individual gains a foot in his general comprehensions, and science is not dictatorial to human diversity and freedom.
Marvin E. Kirsh
http://www.marvinekirsh.com
http://www.authorsden.com/marvinelikirsh
Posted by: Marvin E. Kirsh | July 25, 2007 09:51 PM
Readers here may be interested in the "Comparative Religion and Apologetics" Group at this Nature Publishing Group Site.
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Here is some of the 1st paragraph of the profile of that group for anyone interested:
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Apologetics and comparative religion can sit side by side as branches in the study of religion and systematic theology, although some experience their thrust in religious studies or philosophy of religion courses. Some encounter them on the internet for the first time in a more populist and usually much less academic form.
As I see it, apologetics is primarily concerned with the protection of a religious position, the refutation of that position's assailants and, in the larger sense, the exploration of that position in the context of prevailing philosophies and standards in a secular society. Apologetics, to put it slightly differently, is concerned with answering critical inquiries, criticism of a position, in a rational manner.
Apologetics does not nesssarily require a commitment to and a desire to defend a position. For me, the core of my position is one of inquiry. With that said, though, the activity I engage in, namely, apologetics, is a never ending exercise.
Posted by: RonPrice | July 26, 2007 04:47 AM
This sounds to me as an unreasonable bunch of observations derived from the necessity to justify the belief in the existence of a god. Cooperation must have started in the very early stages of the evolution of humanoids and even prehumanoids. It even exists in an innumerable number of animal species.
The early groups of anthropoids that needed each other for the hunt had a feeling and a respect for cooperation. I doubt, well, I am certainly sure, that they did not discuss theology!
Posted by: Pau | July 27, 2007 12:13 PM
It is obvious that the priming received, either religious or laic, is culture-dependent. In other words, it is not the result of a normal physiological response to an external stimulus. Most likely, people not raised in society cannot be primed one way or the other. Thus, religion to promote cooperative behavior, this type of behavior must be possible in the first place, and therefore must be biological, not cultural, in nature. Once cooperative behavior appeared in evolution, religion and civic rules, prices and punishments, could potentiate it.
Second, this kind of data support, in my view, not only that religion may promote cooperation, but also that religion promotes the power network inside a given society. I understand power as everything that can influence our behavior, including concepts of good and evil. Cooperation is perhaps the most important kind of behavior that needs to be potentiated to maintain a society healthy and for its members being able of competing with those of other groups and societies and surviving. By appealing to a superior figure (God), the norms ruling social behavior of any given society, including the rules of fair cooperation, may remain unchallenged, thus fixing the social ways and relationships between the members of a given culture and tightening the relationships among the members of the society, group or tribe. This may result in a competitive advantage with other groups or tribes during evolution. The fact that priming with ideas of “civil power”, such as jury, or police, gives similar results regarding fair cooperative behavior also supports this hypothesis. Individuals more susceptible to be moved to cooperation by means of these power ideas may have contributed to the survival of their groups and tribes and enjoyed a reproductive advantage in the past.
Posted by: Jorge Laborda | July 28, 2007 03:34 PM
First, most biologists are baffled by human cooperation because it transcends the selfish-gene limitations on within-species altruism - only kin-based and reciprocal altruism can evolve by point mutations. Human societieis, however, are structured by formal systems of 'exploded' kinship and reciprocity.
Second - of course the necessary basis has to be 'biological' (isn't everything?)
Third - it is hard to understand why biologists and psychologists theorise about religion without considering the relevant anthropological data.
Fourth - the best interpretation of ethnographic data suggests a 'big bang' origin for culture in ritual.
Kinship, economic exchange, sexual modesty, marriage, language, religion, morality, and all the other cultural universals most probably originated in ritual.
Posted by: Charles Whitehead | September 11, 2007 02:17 PM
I want in this second part of my first posting to finish, as best I can, outlining my basic orientation to apologetics.
Critical scholarly contributions or criticism raised in public or private discussions, an obvious part of apologetics, should not necessarily be equated with hostility. Often questions are perfectly legitimate aspects of a person's search for an answer to an intellectual conundrum. Paul Tillich once expressed the view that apologetics was an "answering theology."(Systematic Theology, U. of Chicago, 1967, Vol.1, p6.)...and I might add "an answering system."
I have always been attracted to the founder of the Baha'i Faith's exhortations in discussion to "speak with words as mild as milk," with "the utmost lenience and forbearance." I am also aware that, in cases of rude or hostile attack, rebuttal with a harsher tone may well be justified. It does not help an apologist to belong to those "watchmen" the prophet Isaiah calls "dumb dogs that cannot bark."(Isaiah, 56:10)
In its essence apologetics is a kind of confrontation, an act of revealing one's true colours, of hoisting the flag, of demonstrating essential characteristics of faith. Dialogue, as Hans Kung puts it, "does not mean self-denial."(quoted by Udo Schaefer, "Baha'i Apologetics," Baha'i Studies Review, Vol.10, 2001/2) Schaefer goes on: "A faith/position that is opportunistically streamlined, adapting to current trends, thus concealing its real features, features that could provoke rejection in order to be acceptable for dialogue is in danger of losing its identity."
It is almost impossible to carry the torch of truth through a crowd without getting someone's beard singed. In the weeks that follow, my postings will probably wind up singing the beards of some readers and, perhaps, my own in the process. Such are the perils of dialogue, of apologetics. Much of Baha'i apologetics(my own system) derives from the experience Baha'is have dealing with a pluralistic society on the one hand and sharing the Baha'i revelation on the other.
We all have our absolutes which need to be tolerant assertions of preference rather than an invocation of the fires of heaven and/or hell. This is the case between the secular and much thought in the Christian revelation or, for that matter, between variants of Christianity or within secular thought itself. That is why, or at least one of the reasons, I have chosen to make postings at this site. In addition, this site invites debate.
Anyway, that's all for now. It's back to the winter winds of Tasmania, about 3 kms from the Bass Straight on the Tamar River. The geography of place is so much simpler than that of the spiritual geography readers at this site are concerned with, although even physical geography has its complexities. Whom the gods would destroy they first make simple and simpler and simpler. I look forward to a dialogue with someone. Here in far-off Tasmania--the last stop before Antarctica, if one wants to get there through some other route than off the end of South America--your email will be gratefully received.
-Ron Price, Tasmania.
Posted by: RonPrice | October 2, 2007 02:29 AM