I think something related to “religion” might indeed be hard-wired into living human cellular structure (usually one would think of the brain, but I’ve found some science stuff that suggests things more general). There seem to be special areas of the brain, and special physiological processes more generally, that are engaged when living beings undergo the subjective experience of contact with the occult, paranormal, or even vivid dreams of a “religious” nature. A modest mundane starting point for looking at this would be to wire people up to polygraphs and record their “activities” while they sleep (perchance to dream?). People have done this, and have worked on far more ambitious investigations, and have even enrolled some ultra-skeptics that would actually (perhaps cynically) build careers as paranormalists in the process. There is an unpleasant possibility that certain corporations, religions, and government entities may have also circulated some disinformation in this area. But the evidence persists, however much in disagreement the various scientific (or pseudo-scientific) interpretations might be, that there is very real physico-chemical and electromagnetic “stuff” behind humanity’s tendency to reach for the unknowable. There is also evidence that this feature is not simply an anomaly, or fly-in-the-ointment artifact, that pops up here and there to trouble proper academic scientists and tidy housekeepers. Rather, it’s like a basic feature that might have power to influence behaviors of entire populations, and it thereby demands respect and serious compassionate study.

I think it would be inaccurate to call humanity’s natural reach for the heavens and immortality simply a “religious” tendency. “Religions”, “beliefs”, “faiths”, “cults”, and various secular “followings” might be outgrowths of reactions to the basic physiology, but do not necessarily promote much constructive understanding of the physiological psychology itself. And, as for the very real concern about the fear of death and its sociological consequences, there has been, and continues to be, a very real individual and collective need to seek improvements in our “constructive understanding”. With the rather chaotic heap of intellectual resources now at our disposal, churned out from a history chewed up with religion- and finance-associated strife, we seem to need a new and strong dose of fresh natural inspiration. Sachiko seems to be helping us look for that in life.

Patriotism is the last refuge of the scoundrel.
– Samuel Johnson.

Originally Posted By Mark Crawford
There are a couple of cautionary points that need to be made, however. The first comes from the very evolutionary perspective that you have articulated. If we are “hard-wired” biologically for religion or religious-like belief systems, then removing God in the name of Enlightenment will simply create a vacuum for secular ideology–the very thing that we have witnessed in the worst excesses of the French Revolution, communism, fascism and Nazism. If that is the case, the danger always exists that we may end up being no better off.

I don’t think we are hard-wired for religion per se – I just think it serves a purpose that our instincts drive us toward, but which is now far better served by humanism and science. Indeed (as my article says), using religion to satisfy these instincts is now counterproductive, even downright dangerous. Communism, Nazism etc. are basically just new religions, and very anti-humanist and anti-reason.

Originally Posted By Firefly
I think we’d all like to believe, along with Christopher Hitchins in “God Is Not Great,” that the moral impulse is innately human. Then someone like Charles Manson or Adolph Hitler or Josef Stalin comes along to remind us that it’s not.

I don’t think that proves the moral impulse isn’t innately human at all. As my article says, we have competing instincts that can sometimes led us astray, especially when given moral justification by something like religion (I think these people saw themselves as Gods, and created new religions).

not sure about the ‘beyond our senses’ but from experience (mushrooms ) I’d say yes, all life on Earth (“Gaia” to some) is somehow connected spiritually.

my belief is that the established religions are exploiting this sense/feeling, explaining IMO our relative willingness to succumb to religious “leadership”.

that said I think your “cautionary points” are well made.

on a different note, perhaps we need a better word than “atheist”. why should we define our point of view in the terms defined by ‘theists’?

Karl Marx obviously put his finger on something. Religion has been an opiate and an obstacle to almost all liberation movements, one that has been harnessed (usually by dominant elites, sometimes by new movements), to mobilize support and resistance. Of course, Marx was too deterministic and reductionist in thinking of it purely in class terms. Edward De Bono, in his book The Happiness Purpose, proposes a humanistic alternative to traditional religion, which he says evolved over centuries in order to help the great majority of humankind to cope with the generally miserable conditions they had to endure.

There are a couple of cautionary points that need to be made, however. The first comes from the very evolutionary perspective that you have articulated. If we are “hard-wired” biologically for religion or religious-like belief systems, then removing God in the name of Enlightenment will simply create a vacuum for secular ideology–the very thing that we have witnessed in the worst excesses of the French Revolution, communism, fascism and Nazism. If that is the case, the danger always exists that we may end up being no better off.

Second, atheists should always be prepared to turn their skepticism on themselves. Might there not be a spiritual world beyond our senses, that nonetheless “exists”, perhaps a parallel universe? Are we always better off with the arid theories of academic philosophers than with moralities and ethics that have evolved through practice over centuries? Even if expulsion from the Garden of Eden is explained in psychoanalytic terms as expulsion from the womb, why not honour that truth with a “story”? Why not look for the truth that traditional pre-scientific stories and histories contain? And if atheism hardens into an absolute and intolerant “belief” system, doesn’t it risk lapsing into self-contradiction?