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Author Topic:   Can Evolution explain this? (Re: The biological evolution of religious belief)
AdminNosy
Administrator
Posts: 4754
From: Vancouver, BC, Canada
Joined: 11-11-2003


Message 46 of 91 (167794)
12-13-2004 5:22 PM
Reply to: Message 45 by AdminJar
12-13-2004 5:21 PM



I noticed.
That might enable him to stay out of boot camp. Somehow though I doubt it.

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robinrohan
Inactive Member


Message 47 of 91 (167825)
12-13-2004 6:52 PM
Reply to: Message 10 by Coragyps
11-17-2004 8:17 PM


"Grandpa, after all, is just a man. But if great-great-great-grandpa was a real, live wolf, and is somehow still alive out there in the night, and gives our band advice on where the deer are... That unifies our bunch, separates us from that degenerate bunch of fox-people over there, and may even help explain why there are 2000 Christian denominations in the US today."
I believe that the idea of a after-life came rather late in the development of religion. Even the idea of the "soul" was a late development.

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nator
Member (Idle past 2170 days)
Posts: 12961
From: Ann Arbor
Joined: 12-09-2001


Message 48 of 91 (167860)
12-13-2004 8:44 PM
Reply to: Message 34 by arachnophilia
11-18-2004 4:33 PM


quote:
but i think they are perfectly well aware that we don't need to hunt, and we are not going hungry.
For cats, hunting isn't always associated with eating. It's engaged in for fun.
Cats are supremely adapted for their niche, which is why even wild cats can spend half the day sleeping.
Lots of leisure time is the sign of a successful species.

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arachnophilia
Member (Idle past 1344 days)
Posts: 9069
From: god's waiting room
Joined: 05-21-2004


Message 49 of 91 (168371)
12-15-2004 1:16 AM
Reply to: Message 48 by nator
12-13-2004 8:44 PM


yes, a good point. hadn't really thought of it that way.
i don't think it goes against what i'm saying though. they also do not need to hunt (we feed them). so fun, instinct, whatever, i think it's practices like this that probably originate religion.

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shackelfordster
Inactive Member


Message 50 of 91 (189732)
03-03-2005 2:11 AM


I agree, but I think there's a missing step, which is asking the question, "Why?" Sometimes it will be answered by observation (Why did the predators leave here? Because all the prey left). Sometimes, before complex systems of interaction are understood, it will be answered by conjecture (I am sick. Why am I sick? Someone must be causing it. There must be a higher power)

  
Brad McFall
Member (Idle past 5033 days)
Posts: 3428
From: Ithaca,NY, USA
Joined: 12-20-2001


Message 51 of 91 (233430)
08-15-2005 1:36 PM
Reply to: Message 42 by Fishbone79
12-13-2004 4:31 PM


Re: Darwin’s Cathedral
Groups measure symmetry. GC Williams raised the issue of the maths of adaptive unit. DS Wilson said religious groups can be thought unitarily such. I saw Wilson talk at Cornell in small room and I KNEW he had brought a better perspective than I got in class at CU but this is not one of theM. I think different 1-D symmetries instead might be testable via some protocol or adapted one to Shipley user’s guide (below) and that Wilson has seen correlation without separating out the cause credited to Williams. I suspect but do not know that electron and photon effects will be differentially extracted by such a measure but that is what I would guess if I was the one to DEFINE the term adaptive unit. I hope there is a mathematican around here who can say how group theory and covariance algebra might be connected?
Bill Shipley Cause and Correlation in Biology A User’s Guide to Path Analysis Structural Equations and Causal Inference Cambridge University Press 2000 p102
quote:
The basic steps are:
1. Specify the hypothesized causal structure of the relationships between variables.
2. Translate the causal model into an observational model. Write down the set of linear equations that follow this structure and specify which parameters (slopes, variances, covariances) are to be estimated from the data(i.e. that are free) and which are fixed(i.e. are not to be changed to accommodate the data) based on the causal hypothesis.
3. Derive the predicted variance and the covariance between each pair of variables in the model using covariance algebra. Covariance algebra gives the rules of path analysis that Wright had already derived.
The causal structure is thermostatic atomic orbital energy reconstructions that divide through gene expression the two different kinds of 1-D symmetry. The observational model will find phenomena in hierarchical thermodynamics and refer to obligate adaptations at least. I have not predicted the step into 3 as of yet. I might have thought about it qualitatively. I don’t know.
see also etc on EVC::
http://EvC Forum: What is the evolutionary advantage to religion? -->EvC Forum: What is the evolutionary advantage to religion?

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kavli
Inactive Member


Message 52 of 91 (281753)
01-26-2006 1:13 PM
Reply to: Message 3 by jar
11-17-2004 7:16 PM


Re: Some of your assumptions may be wrong.
I have a hard time believing what you said about the development of the eye in the presence of no light. Because the changes are totally random means that an eye could have evolved, however, it would not have remained. Yes, mutations are random, but they only remain a part of an organism if it somehow benefits the reproductive cycle of that organism. So I would agree with the first post in saying that if there were a world with absolutley no light, an eyeball could have evolved, but it wouldn't have remained. anything can happen with evolution, but only the traits beneficial to that organism's reproduction will be carried on.

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jar
Member (Idle past 394 days)
Posts: 34026
From: Texas!!
Joined: 04-20-2004


Message 53 of 91 (281754)
01-26-2006 1:23 PM
Reply to: Message 52 by kavli
01-26-2006 1:13 PM


Re: Some of your assumptions may be wrong.
I addressed the retention part in Message 7. Mutations seem to be pretty random within the limits of chemistry. Whether or not a trait is retained in a population depends on the filtering side of the TOE.
Two steps.
But whether or not a trait develops is limited by chance and the basic components possible.

Aslan is not a Tame Lion

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lfen
Member (Idle past 4678 days)
Posts: 2189
From: Oregon
Joined: 06-24-2004


Message 54 of 91 (281757)
01-26-2006 1:26 PM
Reply to: Message 47 by robinrohan
12-13-2004 6:52 PM


I believe that the idea of a after-life came rather late in the development of religion. Even the idea of the "soul" was a late development.
Provocative but extremely terse. How late is late? Could you give a brief outline of your theory of the development of religion? Do you think Homo Erectus was religious? Neanderthal? early Sapiens?
I think the experience of dreaming about deceased persons of significance to the dreamer would suggest that they lived on and the burials with objects would indicate that some notion of an after life was anticipated. So what do you imagine religion was like before the idea of an afterlife?
I don't know about H.erectus, but I think Neanderthal and Sapiens were religious and believed in an afterlife of some sort relating to the dream world and burial.
I think language and an ego (a self referential abstract model of the human organism/brain)are necessary for religion.
lfen

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iamaelephant
Inactive Member


Message 55 of 91 (282707)
01-30-2006 8:39 PM


Does anyone know if there have been any experiements done regarding the development of religion in the human brain? For example, if a group of people were isolated from any sort of religious influence, are they likely to develop their own version of God and such?
I have a hard time believing that the need for a God is a biological trait brought by through the process of evolution. It seems so much more likely to me that religion is merely a consequence of having developed an inquisitive mind. Just about every human being has a strong desire to know where we came from, why we are here and where we are going. If think religion has been developed and, more importantly, passed down through generations much the same as, for example, education. We are not born with either the desire or the ability to factorise quadratic equations, yet a very large number of people (at least in the Western world) are now able to do this.
Is this a sign of the evolutionary process, or a consequence of us having developed a consciousness and a longing to understand our world? To me, it seems obviously the latter.
For those who have a subscription to New Scientist, they recently published an article dealing with this very subject. Unfortunately I don't subscribe, but here is a link for those of you who do (or want to).
http://www.newscientist.com/...el/being-human/mg18925361.100

  
inkorrekt
Member (Idle past 6082 days)
Posts: 382
From: Westminster,CO, USA
Joined: 02-04-2006


Message 56 of 91 (305098)
04-18-2006 10:52 PM
Reply to: Message 4 by Percy
11-17-2004 7:18 PM


There is another world. this is not materialistic.
The basis and origin of religious belief lies in the inexplicable natural world.
Certainly not. Animals have no yearning for the supernatural. Only the human beings have it. What is conscience? This is not conscious awareness. How did this evolve? The question is what is driving serial rapists and murderers? What was behind the man who wanted to eat the body of the 10 year old girl? What was the driving force behind Mother Teresa's sacrifices? These are beyond naturalism. Intelligence is beyond the physical materialistic world.
If there was no light, then obviously, there was no need for an eye.
This message has been edited by inkorrekt, 04-18-2006 10:54 PM

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anglagard
Member (Idle past 837 days)
Posts: 2339
From: Socorro, New Mexico USA
Joined: 03-18-2006


Message 57 of 91 (305130)
04-19-2006 1:17 AM


About to explode
This topic is incredible, where has it been hiding?
I've read Jaynes's Origin of Conciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind and have a bit to say about it. It is a topic unto itself.
Cats leave food for their "masters" (hard to believe any cat thinks it has a master, in the way I understand it from the many I have owned). Maybe it is for all three reasons presented. As a gift, as a learning opportunity, and for random fun. Maybe, depending on the cat, it could be for all reasons at the same time. Who says the cats have to have only one reason for their behavior?
(one of my cats shit on The Origin of Conciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind, was this an attempt at literary criticism?)
Any mutation is theoretically possible, however, any mutation that requires an energy expenditure better be able to justify itself in the struggle for survival. Also evolution is small steps, not complete leaps to complex organs IMHREO (In my honestly reasonably educated opinion).
I would imagine someone would have to define "what is religion" before ascribing it to animals, or indeed the human animal (would you prefer ape, how about primate?).
Seems like in addition to defining what is religious belief, one must make some pretty overwhelming assumptions concerning what ancestral species may or may not be able to comprehend, possibly for quite a ways back.
After all, if religious belief is caused by a longing for a nurturing parent, that could go back to the first nurturing parent (dinosaurs and proto-opossums!?). Besides, who really is Dr. Dolittle? how does one know what a cat really thinks? (experential evidence may be somewhat revealing, but by its very nature is limited at present time)
What a topic. Let's rock.

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ReverendDG
Member (Idle past 4111 days)
Posts: 1119
From: Topeka,kansas
Joined: 06-06-2005


Message 58 of 91 (305132)
04-19-2006 2:13 AM
Reply to: Message 56 by inkorrekt
04-18-2006 10:52 PM


Re: There is another world. this is not materialistic.
Certainly not. Animals have no yearning for the supernatural.
how do you know this?
What is conscience? This is not conscious awareness. How did this evolve? The question is what is driving serial rapists and murderers? What was behind the man who wanted to eat the body of the 10 year old girl? What was the driving force behind Mother Teresa's sacrifices? These are beyond naturalism. Intelligence is beyond the physical materialistic world.
conscious is a contruct of the brain, how do we know? by testing on the brain directly. what is driving rapists and murderers is a chemical imbalance or a psychological defect or abuse. as for the caniblism its the same, psychological problems.
She didn't really sacrifice much compared to making others sacrifice things, what she learned to believe in caused many things. They are not beyond naturalism, you see them that way because you want them to be
Intelligence is beyond the physical materialistic world
umm no, we can see what causes brain function, we can see why things happen with the brain, Intelligence is a product of the physical
Arguing from the point that we don't know every little thing doesn't make those things come from some magical source

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anglagard
Member (Idle past 837 days)
Posts: 2339
From: Socorro, New Mexico USA
Joined: 03-18-2006


Message 59 of 91 (305151)
04-19-2006 7:23 AM
Reply to: Message 56 by inkorrekt
04-18-2006 10:52 PM


Re: There is another world. this is not materialistic.
If there was no light, then obviously, there was no need for an eye.
Strange how the intelligent designer had the eye develop in the embryo of blindfish, only to have it degenerate. Another trick to fool the curious and support the dogmatic?

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robinrohan
Inactive Member


Message 60 of 91 (305159)
04-19-2006 8:21 AM


Incorporeality
My theory is that religious beliefs developed as a result of the aura of incorporeality we carry around with us during all our waking hours. The quality of incorporeality is what defines the "supernatural." That which is supernatural is incorporeal. So if we are incorporeal, why shouldn't other things be incorporeal also?

"The whole of life goes like this. We seek repose by battling against difficulties, and once they are overcome, repose becomes unbearable because of the boredom it engenders."--Pascal

  
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