God didn't make man; man made gods

Kivaro

Is it me or is Atheism gaining traction in the mainstream media?

There was a very interesting article in the LA Times today about the unraveling of religion's DNA. Natural Selection was the driving force behind faith with love, attachment, hatred etc. all being hijacked by religion. Adaptive strategies e.g. morality, evolved throughout the ages because the practitioners survived using this mechanism in greater numbers than those who did not adapt.

A team of psychologists from Yale found that "found that infants in their first year of life demonstrate aspects of an innate sense of right and wrong, good and bad, even fair and unfair." At that age, children have no sense of religion; it was natural i.e. in their DNA, which evolved over the millennia because it helped to preserve humanity.

I love the analogy of god as the super parent, with the ability to protect us even after death. Child-like thinking.

Lot's more here:
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-thompson-atheism-20110718,0,5682260.story

MagicMarker

Kivaro wrote: »

A team of psychologists from Yale found that "found that infants in their first year of life demonstrate aspects of an innate sense of right and wrong, good and bad, even fair and unfair." At that age, children have no sense of religion; it was natural i.e. in their DNA, which evolved over the millennia because it helped to preserve humanity.

We don't need any kind of research to tell us what we already know. It's not as if children are ammoral monsters until they understand the concept of god and religion. Anyone who believes that is clearly a moron.

Dades

Yeah, the problem is religious people can always play the magic card.

God gifted those infants their morality, don't you know?

Zombrex

Kivaro wrote: »

A team of psychologists from Yale found that "found that infants in their first year of life demonstrate aspects of an innate sense of right and wrong, good and bad, even fair and unfair." At that age, children have no sense of religion; it was natural i.e. in their DNA, which evolved over the millennia because it helped to preserve humanity.

Good luck convincing a theist, they will just say God did it/put it there

God explains everything, which means he explains nothing.

smokingman

Pollyfilla, Pollyfilla, Pollyfilla, Pollyfilla, Pollyfilla, Pollyfilla, Pollyfilla, Pollyfilla, Pollyfilla, Pollyfilla, Pollyfilla, Pollyfilla, Pollyfilla, Pollyfilla, Pollyfilla, Pollyfilla, Pollyfilla, Pollyfilla....


:cool:

Kivaro

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I understand: there's no convincing the 'unconvinceables'.

BUT, articles like the one above on mainstream papers may increase the doubt of doubters. It's hard to argue against empirical evidence produced in these types of studies that prove that it was humans who produced gods and not the other way around. Not saying that they won't argue about it.

What's also enlightening/encouraging are the comments that follow these articles; approx. 1,200 comments within one day on this one.

bnt

Wicknight wrote: »

"If you understand the psychology of a Big Mac meal you understand the psychology of religion."
Andy Thompson

This article is by the guy you're quoting in your Sig: he probably wouldn't mind if you took the "P" out of his surname! He might not mind so much since he's an American, but in the UK adding a P can turn a Scotsman in to an Englishman ...

robindch

bnt wrote: »

This article is by the guy you're quoting in your Sig: he probably wouldn't mind if you took the "P" out of his surname! He might not mind so much since he's an American, but in the UK adding a P can turn a Scotsman in to an Englishman ...

Or a cartoon character:

antiskeptic

Kivaro wrote: »

There was a very interesting article in the LA Times today about the unraveling of religion's DNA. Natural Selection was the driving force behind faith with love, attachment, hatred etc. all being hijacked by religion. Adaptive strategies e.g. morality, evolved throughout the ages because the practitioners survived using this mechanism in greater numbers than those who did not adapt.

The article reads like a just-so story. (my intention isn't so much to knock science concluding evolution - as knocking newspapers trying to report science.)

If you start with the simple premise: anything which survives is fit then it's not hard to weave an evo-story around any attribute of humans you care to mention

Morality, which some see as imposed by gods or religion on savage humans, science sees as yet another adaptive strategy handed down to us by natural selection.

...predictable enough. So let's look..

Yale psychology professor Paul Bloom notes that "it is often beneficial for humans to work together … which means it would have been adaptive to evaluate the niceness and nastiness of other individuals."

A just-so story in waiting. Or is it?

In groundbreaking research, he and his team found that infants in their first year of life demonstrate aspects of an innate sense of right and wrong, good and bad, even fair and unfair. When shown a puppet climbing a mountain, either helped or hindered by a second puppet, the babies oriented toward the helpful puppet. They were able to make an evaluative social judgment, in a sense a moral response.

Indeed it is!

I'll remember to quote this particular piece of research the next time an atheist kicks the ball into "What about babies and idiots" touch. This reminds me of a piece of research (cited by no less that Richard Dawkins in his book The God Delusion) which concluded that people the world over - even primitive tribes who've had no contact with other peoples - share the same basic morality.

Common morality. Who'da thunk?

Dades

antiskeptic wrote: »

This reminds me of a piece of research (cited by no less that Richard Dawkins in his book The God Delusion) which concluded that people the world over - even primitive tribes who've had no contact with other peoples - share the same basic morality.

Common morality. Who'da thunk?

I'm confused. Humans in different tribes have the same basic primitive morality. So....

Oh, sweet Odin no... you didn't just misunderstand the implications of the above and suggest this, did you?

Zombrex

antiskeptic wrote: »

The article reads like a just-so story. (my intention isn't so much to knock science concluding evolution - as knocking newspapers trying to report science.)

If you start with the simple premise: anything which survives is fit then it's not hard to weave an evo-story around any attribute of humans you care to mention

True, but then you have to support this 'evo-story' with testable models.

Hence the "science" bit in science reporting

antiskeptic wrote: »

This reminds me of a piece of research (cited by no less that Richard Dawkins in his book The God Delusion) which concluded that people the world over - even primitive tribes who've had no contact with other peoples - share the same basic morality.

Common morality. Who'da thunk?

Evolutionary biologists, obviously.

robindch

antiskeptic wrote: »

Common morality. Who'da thunk?

Well, the genius William D Hamilton for starters.