__ EEvvoolluuttiioonn,, BBiioollooggyy & Society & Society Spring 2010 Newsletter of the ASA Section on Evolution, Biology & Society Volume 6, No. 2 Chair In this issue: 2009-2010 Essays by Robert Wilkes, David Franks Stephen Sanderson, UC-Riverside & William Wentworth Book Review: Lenski’s Ecological- Past Chair Evolutionary Theory: Principles and 2008-2009 Applications by Frans Kerstholt Rosemary L. Hopcroft, UNC-Charlotte Didactic Seminar on Neurosociology to be held at ASA in Atlanta, 2010 Chair-Elect New publications of Section 2010-2011 Members Jeremy Freese, Northwestern University ASA Sessions Secretary-Treasurer 2004-2010 Message from the Chair: Michael Hammond, University of Toronto The Exploding Evolutionary Analysis of Religion Council Members Alan Booth, Penn State University Stephen K. Sanderson (2009-2012) UC-Riverside Christine Horne, Washington State University (2008-2011) In 2007 I attended a conference in Hawaii Richard Machalek, University of on the evolution of religion. It was really Wyoming something. About 50 people gave (2009-2012) presentations and total attendance was about Alexander Lascaux, University of 100. The participants came from a variety of Hertfordshire, UK fields, in particular cognitive psychology, (2004-2010) anthropology, and religious studies (I was the J. Scott Lewis, Penn State—Harrisburg only sociologist). I only found out about this (2004-2010) conference two weeks before it began, and that was by happenstance. I had just finished Patrick Nolan, University of South the first draft of a paper using evolutionary Carolina (2008-2011) theories to explain the emergence of the world Newsletter editor and Webperson transcendent religions during the so-called Rosemary L. Hopcroft, UNC-Charlotte Axial Age, and I wanted to try my ideas out on www2.asanet.org/sectionevol/ this audience. Many of the participants in the conference were well-known students of religion, some of Evolution, Biology and Society Vol. 7, No. 1 Spring 2010 - 2 – whose works I had read. However, what I form a strong bond with its parents, its mother hadn’t been prepared for was the realization of in particular, because parents are needed for the very large amount of work that was being nurturance and protection in an ancestral done on this subject. The word “evolution” in environment filled with a wide range of the conference’s title had the same basic dangers. For Kirkpatrick, many religious meaning that it does in our section, that is, it notions are extensions or generalizations of the referred to both biological and social evolution. parent-child bond. Supernatural agents are A lot of the participants were seeking to seen as protectors from harm in much the way understand the cognitive structures in the brain that parents are. God becomes a haven of that underlie religious concepts and rituals. safety and a secure base. Kirkpatrick stresses This was part of my concern, although I was that God or gods are primarily substitute linking brain structures to the social evolution attachment figures for natural attachment of religion as well. So I left the conference with figures, i.e, for fathers, mothers, and other the knowledge that there was a considerable close kin. The feeling of a relationship with God amount of work going on by a wide range of or gods is most likely to be activated when an scholars. I was soon to discover that there was individual’s sense of security, safety, and in fact more – much more. I find this work freedom from anxiety falls below a certain exciting and would like to use this message to threshold as a result of natural attachments convey some of the ideas that are being being inadequate to life’s challenges. developed. There are also adaptationist theories of Two of the major scholars in this area are religion, such as that developed by the Pascal Boyer (2001; Lienard and Boyer, 2006) anthropologist Richard Sosis and his student and Scott Atran (2002; Atran and Norenzayan, Candace Alcorta (Sosis, 2003; Alcorta and 2004). Both are anthropologists who have Sosis, 2005). Alcorta and Sosis agree with the imported a great deal of cognitive psychology by-product theorists that there is no specifically into their work. Boyer and Atran are what are religious module in the brain. Religion has known as by-product theorists. They contend indeed been hitching a ride on other cognitive that religious concepts are not evolutionary mechanisms. However, for them these adaptations, but rather side-effects or by- mechanisms are not agency detection, but products of other cognitive structures that are rather ritualized communication. The capacity themselves adaptations. Religious concepts for ritualized communication is an evolved are extensions of certain of the brain’s adaptation in humans and in many other cognitive biases. The basic idea is that the animal species, but the specifically religious supernatural entities that religions postulate nature of rituals is uniquely human (Alcorta and are for the most part structured by our natural Sosis, 2006). Ritualized communication is intuitions concerning agency. Humans have adaptive because it enhances group cognitive adaptations for agency in the sense cooperation, and this in turn has individual that they recognize that persons and animals fitness benefits. have goals and use various means to attain Since Alcorta and Sosis do not envision the them. And humans have a very strong brain as having any specifically religious tendency to extend their natural intuitions architecture, their adaptationism might be about agency beyond persons and animals to regarded as something of a halfway point many features of nature, such as the sun, between the by-product theorists and other moon, or wind. They seem to have a bias to adaptationists, who do invoke a “religious assume that, if the wind blows, it is because neuroanatomy and neurophysiology.” Harris there is some agent that is causing it to blow, and McNamara (2007) are adaptationists in and to blow for some reason or purpose. this sense. They point to research showing that A slightly different evolutionary theory (also religiosity appears to be moderately to highly a by-product theory) has been suggested by heritable (they suggest a heritability coefficient Lee Kirkpatrick (2005), who draws on John of .28 to .72); to neuroimaging studies Bowlby’s classic attachment theory. Bowlby indicating that parts of the brain with a large contended that the human infant is primed to number of dopamine receptors, especially the Evolution, Biology and Society Vol. 7, No. 1 Spring 2010 - 3 – prefrontal cortex, seem to be associated with Atran, Scott. 2002. In Gods We Trust: The religious experience; and to pharmacological Evolutionary Landscape of Religion. New studies showing that the DRD4 gene correlates York: Oxford University Press. positively with different measures of religiosity. _____, and Ara Norenzayan. 2004. “Religion’s Brain neurochemistry is also invoked in the evolutionary landscape: Counterintuition, adaptationist positions of Michael Winkelman commitment, compassion, communion.” (1990, 2000) and James McClenon (2002), Behavioral and Brain Sciences 27:713- who specialize in the study of shamanism. 770. According to Winkelman, shamans have been Boyer, Pascal. 2001. Religion Explained: The found throughout the world and are universal in Evolutionary Origins of Religious Thought. hunter-gatherer societies. The shaman New York: Basic Books. performs a variety of activities: healing and Harris, Erica, and Patrick McNamara. 2007. “Is curing illness, divination, protecting and finding religiousness a biocultural adaptation?” In game animals, communicating with the dead, Joseph Bulbulia, Richard Sosis, Russ recovering lost souls, and protecting people Genet, Erica Harris, Karen Wyman, and from evil spirits and the practitioners of Cheryl Genet, eds., The Evolution of malevolent magic. Winkelman contends that Religion: Studies, Theories, and Critiques. the striking similarities among shamanistic Santa Margarita, CA: Collins Foundation practices all over the world suggests that they Press. derive from neurophenomenological structures, Kirkpatrick, Lee A. 2005. Attachment, and that these structures constitute the Evolution, and the Psychology of Religion. primordial basis for religion. McClenon points New York: Guilford Press. out that shamanic healing rituals typically Liénard, Pierre, and Pascal Boyer. 2006. involve a great deal of rhythmic repetition, “Whence collective rituals? A cultural especially chanting, singing, drumming and selection model of ritualized behavior.” dancing, which are able to induce altered American Anthropologist 108:814-27. states of consciousness and “anomalous McClenon. 2002. Wondrous Healing: experiences.” Such altered states are adaptive Shamanism, Human Evolution, and the because they can produce high levels of Origin of Religion. DeKalb: Northern Illinois relaxation and benefits for physical and University Press. psychological health. Sosis, Richard. 2003. “Why aren’t we all This represents only a small portion of the Hutterites? Costly signaling theory and evolutionary work now being done on religion, religious behavior.” Human Nature 14:91- but I stop here because space is short. I will 127. simply end by saying that a limitation of these _____, and Candace Alcorta. 2004. “Is religion evolutionary works is that there is usually not adaptive?” Behavioral and Brain Sciences much discussion of the socioecological context 27:749-750. in which certain kinds of religious ideas Winkelman,