Why We Believe in Gods - Andy Thomson - American Atheists 09

[ProfessorPlum]

Run time: 54:07 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1iMmvu9eMrg   Posted on YouTube: April 24, 2009 By YouTube Member: Views on YouTube: 0   Posted on DU: May 12, 2009 By DU Member: ProfessorPlum Views on DU: 726

 
Wow. Amazing lecture on cognition and our neural bases for religious responses. 54 minutes.

[TNDemo]

1. That's an hour long.

What's the reader's digest version? Or the bullet points?

[ProfessorPlum]

2. I'll try

We have evolved to be better at social relationships, and therefore we have capacities to imagine other people's thoughts and emotions, we have a strong imprinting mechanism, we look to authority figures, in times of trouble we return to caring figures . . . in effect, we are hard wired to believe in invisible authority figures.

I guess that's not a new concept. People have been talking in simple minded terms about "The God Gene" for a while. But this talk summarizes the actual hard cognition work that has been done in the area and combines it into a compelling picture of why we are creatures that (tend to) believe. Interesting, if you have some time later tonight.

[TNDemo]

4. Why do you think biology has made us this way?

There has to be a biological foundation since a belief in God spans many centuries and cultures.

[ProfessorPlum]

5. If you get a chance, watch the lecture - the presenter explains

it all in a Darwinian context that is beginning to cohere into one narrative. Our big brains, probably the result of sexual selection, makes us expert in dealing with other "beings". This is useful in a social context, but it also lets us imagine other beings - real and unreal - and that's where the mischief begins.

[RaleighNCDUer]

3. kick

to watch when I get home