Religion and Society

Every society we know about, from primitive to highly sophisticated, has religion. Neo-atheists believe that religious belief is a parasitic behavior that is resource intensive and of no value at all to the people in a particular society, or to any society. In fact, the Neo-atheists believe that religion is actively harmful to individuals and societies, thus drawing the conclusion that religion in all its forms should be done away with.

However, recent research is leading to a different idea. Religion is now seen by many anthropologists as functional and critical to a society’s survival. The argument is that religions arose among early humans in part because certain pattern recognition modules developed in the brain that were beneficial to survival. The modules, which we still have, did indeed help with survival in primitive and dangerous settings, but they also meant we would sometimes see agency where none existed---think the coiled vine startling us because its pattern is similar to that of a snake. Carry that a bit further and you can see that thunder and lightning may also be seen as agency---the gods are angry.

The other part of the development of religion is that the research now indicates that religion is cohesive for groups, and that this cohesion is partly the result of the sacralization of events, actions, and beliefs. This sharing of sacredness binds people together, which has a positive outcome for the group’s survival and, if some recent studies are correct, for its happiness. If the group’s gods and norms condemn divisive or selfish behaviors the group becomes more cohesive by promoting “cooperation and trust within the group.” (The Righteous Mind, Jonathan Haidt)

The group that suppressed self-interest and selfishness within the group likely fared better than ones that did not. Specific religious practices conveyed little in the way of competitive advantage for individuals. But these practices may have enabled one group to compete more effectively with other groups, a process known in anthropology as group (as opposed to individual) selection, a concept Darwin himself had explored, and one which is currently receiving considerable attention from anthropologists.

“OK, you say---so what? I’m an atheist and will remain one and all this stuff about how religion developed in early human societies is meaningless to me.” (Disclosure: I fall into the atheistic camp, but weakly). Fine, but there’s more to the story. We have seen secular systems (most prominently, the large-scale communist efforts in the 20^th century) that were radically opposed to religion, devoting considerable resources and propaganda to eliminating it, all to no avail. Not only did their efforts to eradicate religion fail, the political systems themselves collapsed.

Most efforts to eradicate religion as a concept are relatively recent. Certainly since time immemorial individual religions have tried to overcome other religions, sometimes by war and sometimes by proselytizing. But nowhere and at no time has religion been completely eliminated. Atheist philosophers and scientists, like David Dennett and Richard Dawkins, respectively, are in the forefront of that effort, but certainly not advocating violence. Their works focus on showing how bad religions have been---a view that has some merit, but which is not relevant to my comments.

Now let me make a leap. I think that society, used in the general sense and including all individual societies from the very beginning to now, had to automatically produce religion. The philosopher Thomas Nagel, in his fine book, Mind and Cosmos, suggested that consciousness had to arise spontaneously because its foundations were embedded in the very fabric of matter/energy. I argue the same is true of religion---it had to arise, and it did, everywhere. Without it human society would not have developed.

Now one more leap. Like all religions, primitive or sophisticated, the main “Western” religions---Catholic, Protestant, Jewish---have emphasized shared moral structures within their groups. Since in recent history these three religions’ moral views were relatively similar, for a long time people in the US experienced a common understanding of moral order, with the concomitant social orderliness that went with that. Certainly not all aspects of that order were good, but it offered regularity, a strong sense of security, and a relatively clear picture of one’s obligations to others.

Then the 60’s arrived, along with a strong aversion to authority, hierarchy, tradition and of course religion. Intimately connected to these dislikes was a glorification of the individual, what amounted to a cult of the individual. The aversions and glorification contributed to the dissolution of the old shared moral order. As said, some of the change was definitely needed, but as usual with revolutions, the baby was thrown out with the bath water, resulting in significant undesirable societal outcomes.

More next post.