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Author Topic:   Do Animals Believe In Supernatural Beings?
Straggler
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Posts: 10333
From: London England
Joined: 09-30-2006


Message 1 of 4 (594080)
12-01-2010 3:32 PM


Do animals exhibit belief in supernatural beings?
OriginsNet Publications
http://www.originsnet.org/chimpspiritdatabase.pdf
If they do is this evidence in favour of the actual existence of supernatural beings?
Or does it point to the evolutionary origins and causes of human belief in supernatural beings?

Replies to this message:
 Message 2 by AdminModulous, posted 12-01-2010 5:17 PM Straggler has replied

AdminModulous
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Posts: 897
Joined: 03-02-2006


Message 2 of 4 (594094)
12-01-2010 5:17 PM
Reply to: Message 1 by Straggler
12-01-2010 3:32 PM


Would you like to debate the evidence for supernatural belief in animals? What evidence might look like and try to resolve one way or another what we can say we know about this topic.
Or do you want to debate whether animals believing is 'evidence in favour of the actual existence of supernatural beings?'. This last one is just a variant of the Peanut Gallery/Great Debate - but the former is kind of interesting.
And it'd be nice to see you stake out your position so people can argue against it.
I assume Misc topics in evolution is where you'd want it?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 1 by Straggler, posted 12-01-2010 3:32 PM Straggler has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 3 by Straggler, posted 12-02-2010 12:10 PM AdminModulous has not replied

Straggler
Member
Posts: 10333
From: London England
Joined: 09-30-2006


Message 3 of 4 (594171)
12-02-2010 12:10 PM
Reply to: Message 2 by AdminModulous
12-01-2010 5:17 PM


Do Animals Believe In Supernatural Beings
AdminMod writes:
Would you like to debate the evidence for supernatural belief in animals? What evidence might look like and try to resolve one way or another what we can say we know about this topic.
Yes. Let’s go for this. Do animals exhibit signs of belief in the supernatural? How could we recognise such beliefs? Is there any evidence to suggest parallels with primitive human beliefs? Are there any obvious similarities between the behaviour of animals and modern humans that could suggest animal religiosity of any description? That sort of line of discussion.
AdminMod writes:
And it'd be nice to see you stake out your position so people can argue against it.
OK. Prior to any real investigation of this at all I suspect that higher primates in particular may well exhibit basic signs of things like death rituals or ancestor worship. With regard to other less intelligent animals - I have no idea but I doubt it. And I don’t see how we could really tell. Does a dog bark at the moon because of some supernatural belief? I would be surprised if this was the case but I have no idea how we could ever possibly determine this without being able to communicate or examine directly comparable human behaviour.
In short I think the question posed in this thread is an interesting one, and one that I would hazard some guesses at, but not one I have formed a particularly strong position on. If it gets promoted and inspires any reaction in others then I would take it as an opportunity to consider the question in more detail.
AdminMod writes:
I assume Misc topics in evolution is where you'd want it?
I think this qualifies as a proper evidence based topic rather than ‘Coffee House’ or ‘Free For Al’ or anything like that. But I leave it to you to decide where best to put it beyond those comments.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 2 by AdminModulous, posted 12-01-2010 5:17 PM AdminModulous has not replied

AdminModulous
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Posts: 897
Joined: 03-02-2006


Message 4 of 4 (594419)
12-03-2010 12:04 PM


Thread Copied to Miscellaneous Topics in Creation/Evolution Forum
Thread copied to the Do Animals Believe In Supernatural Beings? thread in the Creation/Evolution Miscellany forum, this copy of the thread has been closed.

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