Babbalanja
09-07-2007, 09:24 PM
I know this is old news and all, but I'm fascinated with Dennett's analysis of religion in evolutionary terms. The recent anti-religion books by Dawkins and Harris are fine in their own right, but Dennett's does much more than proclaim that belief in God is mistaken.
First off, I appreciate the fact that belief in God is treated as beside the point throughout the book. Dennett agrees that there are no persuasive arguments for belief in God, but the belief in belief is central to understanding his critique. The UK edition of the book puts Dennett's central metaphor on the cover: the ant climbing up the grass stalk because it's been infested with a lancet fluke that reproduces in a cow's stomach. This free-floating rationale doesn't do the doomed ant any good, but it's an evolutionary strategy that works for the bacterium. In the same way, the religion meme benefits from promoting human behavior that doesn't benefit humanity in the long run.
Just like the need to impress prospective mates makes bowerbirds construct elaborate (and otherwise useless) bowers, religion prompts sacrifices of greater or lesser value from believers: to avoid proscribed food, to pray several times a day, etc. The evolutionary strategy of a costly signal creates an inflationary spiral that ends up with believers committing reprehensible acts to demonstrate their faith.
And religion benefits (through the contributions and consent of the faithful) more than it suffers from such acts, so it never does anything more than halfheartedly discourage such behavior. However, the philosophical basis of these costly signals is still touted as virtue. No Jew or Christian alive is unaware of the OT story of Abraham and Isaac, in which such a demonstration of faith is presented as the paragon of human wisdom.
I have no problem with those who criticize religion on the basis of the fact that there's no Big Magic Guy. But Dennett's analysis (speculative though it is) assumes quite rightly that there are much more important psychological, cultural, and historical factors in the persistence of religion.
Are there any other readers here who appreciated Dennett's methodical reverse-engineering of the phenomenon of religion? His defense of the naturalistic perspective that religion abandoned in its transition from folk religion? His masterful thought-experiments?
First off, I appreciate the fact that belief in God is treated as beside the point throughout the book. Dennett agrees that there are no persuasive arguments for belief in God, but the belief in belief is central to understanding his critique. The UK edition of the book puts Dennett's central metaphor on the cover: the ant climbing up the grass stalk because it's been infested with a lancet fluke that reproduces in a cow's stomach. This free-floating rationale doesn't do the doomed ant any good, but it's an evolutionary strategy that works for the bacterium. In the same way, the religion meme benefits from promoting human behavior that doesn't benefit humanity in the long run.
Just like the need to impress prospective mates makes bowerbirds construct elaborate (and otherwise useless) bowers, religion prompts sacrifices of greater or lesser value from believers: to avoid proscribed food, to pray several times a day, etc. The evolutionary strategy of a costly signal creates an inflationary spiral that ends up with believers committing reprehensible acts to demonstrate their faith.
And religion benefits (through the contributions and consent of the faithful) more than it suffers from such acts, so it never does anything more than halfheartedly discourage such behavior. However, the philosophical basis of these costly signals is still touted as virtue. No Jew or Christian alive is unaware of the OT story of Abraham and Isaac, in which such a demonstration of faith is presented as the paragon of human wisdom.
I have no problem with those who criticize religion on the basis of the fact that there's no Big Magic Guy. But Dennett's analysis (speculative though it is) assumes quite rightly that there are much more important psychological, cultural, and historical factors in the persistence of religion.
Are there any other readers here who appreciated Dennett's methodical reverse-engineering of the phenomenon of religion? His defense of the naturalistic perspective that religion abandoned in its transition from folk religion? His masterful thought-experiments?