The Evolution of Religion, part two

The following is a continuation of the entry, “religion, evolution of,” from the Revised Edition of my Encyclopedia of Evolution, which will be published online by Facts on File in 2012.

Memes: The Software of Religion

The human brain has a desire to understand and explain things. The above experiences, such as a sense of disembodiment, will create a compulsion to explain them, an empty space just waiting for memes to walk in. One meme told people that there must be something beyond death. Another meme told them that there must be spiritual beings causing everything from the wind to the rising and setting of the sun. Another meme told them that their experiences of disembodiment and the tunnel were actual observations of a spiritual realm. Put these together, and the result is a primordial religion. The only alternative, to a prehistoric person, is to ignore the whole thing. The most successful people were those who figured things out, not those who ignored things. Even if the resulting beliefs were incorrect, so long as they enhanced the survival and reproduction of the believers, natural and sexual selection would favor them.

Human creativity is irrepressible, and it was inevitable that humans would couch their explanations of spiritual experiences in terms of mythological stories that addressed each of the brain phenomena, and that they would develop practices that enhanced the experiences. The stories had gods who made things happen. Religious practices were sometimes accompanied by altered mental states, induced by natural compounds (such as psilocybin in some mushrooms), sensory deprivation (as in a cave), ritual rhythmicity, or particularly vivid dreams. Religion fed on sexual feelings in two ways: adherents experienced sexual feelings both about their deities and about charismatic religious leaders. Religion made humans eager to follow charismatic leaders who claimed to have a connection with the gods. Humans had a desire to understand these overwhelming experiences, and religious memes satisfied this desire.

One of the most important religion memes is guilt. Throughout human prehistory and history, religious leaders have parasitized the human capacity for guilt to reinforce their power over the minds of their followers, and religion has been one of the principal means by which they have done so.

The Evolutionary Advantages of Religion

Religion would probably have been a local aberration in early human populations had it not provided some evolutionary advantage. In modern tribal societies, shamans who claim to have exceptional religious experiences have considerable social power, which can translate into greater resources and reproductive opportunities; no doubt this was also the case during the prehistory of Homo sapiens. David Lewis-Williams points out that this would be the same in the Lascaux cave as in modern charismatic Christianity. Religious leaders would gain the within-population fitness advantage that is necessary for natural selection. Once the trait was established or at least common within a tribe, this tribe would have advantages over tribes that did not possess it—for example, social cohesion and identity that allowed them to prevail in conflicts. Clearly any tribe that had a stronger religion could prevail in war over a tribe with less religious zeal. A tribe of religious zealots could always whip a tribe of religious philosophers. All of the people in the prevailing tribe, and all of the genes in their bodies, would experience a cascade of benefits.

Another possible reason that religious memes have proliferated is the instinct of biophilia. Humans have a natural passion for the beauty of nature, and for its green and flowering and chirping and roaring inhabitants. To pagans, it is the power of the gods and goddesses of earth and forest and ocean. To monotheists, it is the presence of God within the observer. Religion is not the only medium for this feeling, but it is one of them. Biophilia, and religious expressions of it, is an important force in helping people to love the places that are hard to live in, and has probably helped numerous individuals and tribes to persist through unspeakable hardships.
Although all Homo sapiens groups have religion, there was a striking development of religion when Homo sapiens encountered Homo neanderthalensis in Europe, and later when the most recent ice age forced Northern European tribes southward where they encountered disturbingly intelligent people that already lived in Southern Europe. Religion then functioned in tribal identity. Evidence for the tribal identity function is that there were geographical differences in types and styles of artwork—for example, different caves specialized on different animals, reflecting differences in established traditions.

There have been many different attempted explanations of the Cro-Magnon cave paintings. Some anthropologists say that the paintings were sympathetic magic to promote successful hunting. However, as David Lewis-Williams points out, the set of animals in the paintings is not the same as the animals that the people ate (for example, they did not eat bears and lions), and only 15 percent of the paintings show animals with spears. The paintings resemble animal visions that people might have seen during hallucinations. The animal paintings are often accompanied by geometric symbols that resemble the images seen during migraines. The animal images are not in their natural habitats, and appear to be floating, and sometimes lack hooves.
To the Cro-Magnon, as to many recent tribal peoples, the wall of a cave may have represented an interface between the outer world and the underworld. When the prehistoric people entered a cave, they were literally entering the underworld. In the darkness they would hallucinate from sensory deprivation, and possibly also from the high levels of carbon dioxide. Then when the lamps were lit, they would paint the images they had seen. Sometimes the artists would also paint their hands, leaving either positive or negative images of them, as a mark of direct contact with the underworld. Hand contact with the wall, and the process of spit-painting, were part of the overall religious experience. The visionary quality of the paintings is particularly evident in the deepest recesses of the caves, some as much as a kilometer underground, where quick sketches of many animals overlapped.

In addition to the individual religious experience, there was also a communal aspect. Religious shamans could gain admiration from their followers by taking them deep into the caves to see the evidence of their religious experiences. Meanwhile, the shallower reaches of the cave served as the assembly rooms for the general population, and it is in such places that the large, vivid images are found. The cave paintings may therefore have served to increase the social status and the fitness of religious leaders.

With the advent of civilization, religion was usually dominated by priests and kings and used as a way of controlling people. The power structure that provided an advantage of some people over others in a society could also allow one city-state to dominate another. This role of religion continues to this day. At the same time, there has been a parallel lineage of prophets who criticize social norms. In ancient Israel, for example, practically all the prophets were outcasts who lived in huts and caves and were sorely hated by the priests and kings. Governments still use religion as a tool of domination in some countries. In the United States, there are many large religious organizations that obtain a great deal of monetary and other kinds of support from their adherents, and these organizations have great influence on national and local politics. Religion is at least as much a tool of power and fitness opportunities as it was at the time of the Cro-Magnons.

Even though religion is not a single adaptation, its memes are closely enough tied together that they will probably all be with the human species as long as it exists. With a rush of Enlightenment optimism, Thomas Jefferson said in the early 19th century, “There is no young man alive today who will not die a Unitarian.” Evidently he was wrong.

Evolutionary Advantages of Religion for the Human Species

Something as apparently dysfunctional as fundamentalist religion would seem to have nothing to contribute to evolutionary success. But clearly any tribe that had a stronger religion could prevail in war over a tribe with less religious zeal. A tribe of religious zealots could always whip a tribe of religious philosophers, the Stone Age version of Unitarians and Quakers. All of the people in the prevailing tribe, and all of the genes in their bodies, would likewise benefit.

And there is another possible reason that religious memes have proliferated. The human mind desires the experience of beauty. While religion memes have fed the worst of human feelings and actions, it has also fed the best of them. We have a natural, and probably irresistible, passion for the beauty of nature, and for its green and flowering and chirping inhabitants. To scientists, this is an evolved human emotion Edward O. Wilson called "biophilia." To pagans, it is the power of the gods and goddesses of earth and forest and ocean. To monotheists, it is the presence of God within the observer. Religion is not the only medium for this feeling, but it is one of them.

It is easy to be inspired by the beauty of interesting landscapes, mountains and waterfalls and soaring birds and leaping whales and teeming jungles (so long as you are not actually walking through them and swatting the mosquitoes and pulling off leaches that fall on you like rain). But biophilia is an important force in helping people to love the places that are hard to live in. Consider these examples.

I taught a class at a field station one summer. One of my students was a young lady who grew up in western Kansas. The entire landscape of western Kansas is utterly flat and is devoted entirely to wheat. Granted, there are beautiful places in Kansas, but this was not one of them. I had just driven through this young woman's hometown to arrive at the field station. She said, regarding western Kansas, that it was the most beautiful place in the world.

I grew up in the San Joaquin Valley of California, which was beautiful at one time, before all of its natural wetlands were drained and almost all of its oak forests were cut down in the twentieth century, transforming it into farmland. In my childhood it seemed inexpressibly beautiful. It is a feeling I still get, if only a little, whenever I visit it.

Before we dismiss believing in the beauty of western Kansas or the San Joaquin Valley as delusion, let us briefly consider what humans have had to endure. Much human misery has come from the seeming indifference or even hostility of the environment. Floods, volcanic eruptions, droughts. But the successful humans were those that loved their lands zealously, no matter what nature did to them, and endured. Their religious memes may have told them that there were evil spirits in the storm winds, but the Great Spirit prevails to make the world into a cosmos in which we can continue to live. We love the land in which we grow up. This is biophilia. Biophilia has been one of our adaptations to survival. Enshrined within the memes of some religions, biophilia has helped to keep us going.

This essay is part of my new book Life of Earth: Portrait of a Beautiful, Middle-Aged, Stressed-Out World, published by Prometheus Books.