Is the anthropological development of human symbolic thought evidence of humanity's creation of God?

Answer 1

There was a fascinating article last week in the NY Times Magazine on this topic called Darwin's God by Robin Marantz Henig. (See link below.)

Basically, there are several different theories out there on the development of religion in human society. As every society has religion, there seems to be an adaptive benefit to that.

Quoting from the article:

“Natural selection made the human brain big,” Gould wrote, “but most of our mental properties and potentials may be spandrels — that is, nonadaptive side consequences of building a device with such structural complexity.”

The possibility that God could be a spandrel offered Atran a new way of understanding the evolution of religion. But a spandrel of what, exactly?

Hardships of early human life favored the evolution of certain cognitive tools, among them the ability to infer the presence of organisms that might do harm, to come up with causal narratives for natural events and to recognize that other people have minds of their own with their own beliefs, desires and intentions. Psychologists call these tools, respectively, agent detection, causal reasoning and theory of mind.

Agent detection evolved because assuming the presence of an agent — which is jargon for any creature with volitional, independent behavior — is more adaptive than assuming its absence. If you are a caveman on the savannah, you are better off presuming that the motion you detect out of the corner of your eye is an agent and something to run from, even if you are wrong. If it turns out to have been just the rustling of leaves, you are still alive; if what you took to be leaves rustling was really a hyena about to pounce, you are dead.

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What does this mean for belief in the supernatural? It means our brains are primed for it, ready to presume the presence of agents even when such presence confounds logic. “The most central concepts in religions are related to agents,” Justin Barrett, a psychologist, wrote in his 2004 summary of the byproduct theory, “Why Would Anyone Believe in God?” Religious agents are often supernatural, he wrote, “people with superpowers, statues that can answer requests or disembodied minds that can act on us and the world.”

A second mental module that primes us for religion is causal reasoning. The human brain has evolved the capacity to impose a narrative, complete with chronology and cause-and-effect logic, on whatever it encounters, no matter how apparently random. “We automatically, and often unconsciously, look for an explanation of why things happen to us,” Barrett wrote, “and ‘stuff just happens’ is no explanation. Gods, by virtue of their strange physical properties and their mysterious superpowers, make fine candidates for causes of many of these unusual events.” The ancient Greeks believed thunder was the sound of Zeus’s thunderbolt. Similarly, a contemporary woman whose cancer treatment works despite 10-to-1 odds might look for a story to explain her survival. It fits better with her causal-reasoning tool for her recovery to be a miracle, or a reward for prayer, than for it to be just a lucky roll of the dice.

A third cognitive trick is a kind of social intuition known as theory of mind. It’s an odd phrase for something so automatic, since the word “theory” suggests formality and self-consciousness. Other terms have been used for the same concept, like intentional stance and social cognition. One good alternative is the term Atran uses: folkpsychology.

Folkpsychology, as Atran and his colleagues see it, is essential to getting along in the contemporary world, just as it has been since prehistoric times. It allows us to anticipate the actions of others and to lead others to believe what we want them to believe; it is at the heart of everything from marriage to office politics to poker. People without this trait, like those with severe autism, are impaired, unable to imagine themselves in other people’s heads.

Answer 2

I'd say that that was definitely the starting point of what has grown into religion. Man has always been inquisitive and was always looking for answers. When something was beyond their comprehension they would credit/blame it on such and such *spirit*. It helped them make sense of the world. Eventually, the idea of spirits evolved into the idea of gods. The further evolution to *One God* was really more a matter of practicality than anything else.

Answer 3

I'm not sure that symbolic thought is evidence of our creation of god in and of itself. I suppose it would depend on which symbols Are they religious symbols?

Answer 4

First. This was a neurological development, evolutionary biological development, not an anthropology development. Secondly; quite possible, but not yet certain.

Answer 5

Humanity didn't create God, God created Humanity !!!

Answer 6

are you talking about men rejecting God as their leader and creating their golden or silver Baal god, the "master" or "owner" of their earthly lusts? In that case I'd say yes, men did form an image of their own god after forgetting that God created them.

Answer 7

Yes.