Humans hardwired for religion

General Academics Religion and Philosophy
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And, to add to the general confusion, there is this (dated 04 Sept. 2006):

The battle by scientists against “irrational” beliefs … is ultimately futile, a leading experimental psychologist said today.

“I think it is pointless to think that we can get people to abandon their belief systems because they are operating at such a fundamental level,” said Prof Hood. “No amount of rational evidence is going to be taken on board to get people to abandon those ideas.”

“But almost everyone entertains some form of irrational beliefs …”

'Luthon64

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I don’t entirely agree. And to be honest, I don’t see the point of such a statement.

I agree that there will always be some people that wouldn’t want to abandon any irrational beliefs, but there are also a lot of people that are willing and able to let go of some of them.

It is true that people are ‘hardwired’ to believe in weird things, but we are also hardwired to think.

That is exactly what the scientific method is about. It recognizes that people are prone to error and false notions and has mechanisms in place to prevent that from getting in the way of the truth. Our ability as humans to critically analyze ideas is exactly why we are able to rise above our limitations.

I know I sometimes act irrationally, emotion, sentiments and comforting habits are part of being human. But I know they are irrational. I also know where to draw the line, to separate harmless habits from more serious irrational beliefs that might have a negative impact on others.

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Not having access to his research, I really don’t know on what basis Prof Hood draws his conclusions, but, if the linked-to report is accurate, it is likely that he has sound reasons for voicing them. His observations also accord with a study in the US that was done which I read about some time ago - unfortunately I don’t remember which book it was.

The study was on the effect education has on superstitious beliefs. A group of first-year university students (about 300, as I recall) were given an assessment test at the commencement of a six-month course in critical thinking, said test gauging their degree of superstitiousness. The same test was given shortly after the completion of the course, and again two years later.

As one might expect, the level of superstitiousness dropped markedly between the first test and the second one. Significantly, however, the third test showed no difference from the first, and these were university students who are above the average national intelligence, who one might expect would be more amenable to retaining the acquired thinking skills.

The lesson to be drawn from the above is, yes, education alleviates sloppy thinking temporarily, but absent (positive) reinforcement thereof, people will tend to revert to their original ways.

And I have no problem with the way that science proceeds. One must remember, though, that science is a communal enterprise, not an individual one, in the sense that an individual’s sloppy thinking will be discovered sooner or later. That in itself is much of a deterrent against carelessness, but not an ironclad guarantee. Sure, separate ideas originate with individuals, but they are hardly representative of the totality of humans.

Much of our day-to-day thinking is such that we can get away with cerebral sloppiness. It doesn’t matter much whether I believe that fire will quickly burn me because of the high thermal gradient between the flame and my hand, or because the fire god doesn’t like being touched by humans. In either case, the effect is the same in that I am careful around fire.

So while science, through its methods, aims to transcend such functional thinking by attempting to trace back to the real nature of things, individual humans are generally happy to accept as valid without further question those ideas which experience has taught them seem to work.

'Luthon64

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Do you have any more details on the type of questions asked in these tests? And what sort of superstitious beliefs are we talking about here?

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The test itself was - again, as I recall - sketchily described, so I can’t say for certain. I do seem to remember that things like lucky charms, throwing spilled salt over one’s shoulder, the gambler’s fallacy (e.g. after throwing four sixes in a row with a die, a six on the next throw is less likely than, say, a three), and one or two other common modes of unreason.

I’ll have a look to see if I can find which book it is mentioned in. But it could take a while. :frowning:

'Luthon64

6

Well put.

Just a comment… I have an 11-year old son who will mostly trust my judgement and opinions on most anything.
As far as computer gaming is concerned, in which he is quite skilled, he tends not to accept everything I say, because (as you noted) his experience has taught him otherwise…

My concern is the areas where we don’t know that what we don’t know. I know this is not the best way to put it, but I’m sure you know what I mean.
If something like a parallel universe is proven to exist, it would change everything we know about religion, physics etc… We can only make decisions(religious/political/ethical etc…) based on what we know. Our superstitions are also mostly based on what we have been tought, and only when we acquire new knowledge, can we make a new assessment of our beliefs.
It has been my experience that phenomenon like deja-vue, sixth sense and the “gut feeling” and female intuition definitely has a place in everyday life. A lot of those might be coincidence, but they tend to be quite accurate at times… ???

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Thank you kindly. Following your comment, I think it could be ever so slightly improved to read

So while science, through its methods, aims to transcend such functional thinking by attempting to trace back to the real nature of things, individual humans are generally happy to accept as valid without further question those ideas which authority or experience have taught them seem to work.

The major problem in this context is that new knowledge very rarely prompts a person to actually jettison their superstitions. Instead, the new knowledge is either twisted to fit in with the existing preconceptions and beliefs, or simply denied outright and ignored. Children and youngsters are, of course, far less prone to this habit.

It depends what you mean by déjà vu, sixth sense, intuition, etc. If they are used merely as convenient labels for a range of psychological phenomena for which plausible naturalistic explanations have been proposed, then I take no issue with the above statement. If, on the other hand, these terms come burdened with their usual supernatural baggage, then we can discuss this further.

'Luthon64

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Sadly, I still haven’t been able to locate the report in question, but Nicholas Humphrey in Leaps of Faith (a most excellent book, BTW) describes a test of this kind given to ordinary people in the UK some years ago. The type of question asked was, “Do you think it is true that…” of several popular superstitions, e.g. “…you can know when someone is thinking about you?”, “…someone is about to call you on the telephone?”, “…certain people can communicate with the spirits of the dead?”, “…to tell a person’s character from their name or date of birth?”, and so on.

I’ll continue to look for that study.

'Luthon64

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Theistic evolution is an example of fusing the irrational with the scientific.