Steven Pinker

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Steven Pinker

• Religion in the perspective of evolutionary
  psychology

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• Cognitive psychologist
• Harvard Professor
• Advocate evolutionary psychology and the
  computational theory of mind
• Opposed to the notion of bank slate of mind
• named by Time Magazine as one of the 100 most
  influential scientists and thinkers in the world
  in 2004
• named by Foreign Policy magazine as one of the
  top global thinkers

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Religious belief is universal? Why?

• Steven Pinker As a scientist, I like to
  interpret claims as testable hypotheses, and this
  certainly is one. It predicts, for example, that
  miracles should be observable, that success in
  life should be proportional to virtue, and that
  suffering should be proportional to sin. I don't
  know anyone who has done the necessary studies,
  but I would say there is good reason to believe
  that these hypotheses have not been confirmed.

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• Religion is not the best explanation for moral
  codes.  
• Religious claims there are worlds of
  incomprehensible wonder, power, and mystery that
  are accessible by clergymen only.
• The world is not by design. The perception of a
  just and moral world is an illusion.
• Darwin's theory of natural selection is the only
  theory that can explain this illusion of design.

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• Traits that are adaptations products of
  Darwinian natural selection,
• Traits that are by-products of adaptations
  (Religion)
• Vehicles are good for transportation. The
  by-product (CO) is bad!
• Why is our blood red? There is no adaptive
  advantage. It is not good for camouflage. Our
  enemies can follow us by the blood trail.
• Our blood is red because it is adaptive to have a
  molecule that can carry oxygen (hemoglobin).
  Hemoglobin just happens to be red when it's
  oxygenated.
• By-product? No advantage? Red makes us alert. If
  you are injured in a remote area, you expect the
  rescue team can follow your blood trail to locate
  you!

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• What role religion has played in our historical
  progress? Not good.
• Many humanitarian reforms were hindered by church
  authorities (e.g. the elimination of cruel
  punishment and the abolition of slavery)
• Fascism coexisted with Catholicism in Spain,
  Italy, Portugal, and Croatia.
• Many Nazis fused Nazism with Christianity.
  Holocaust was the extension and continuation of
  long history of anti-Semitism in Christian
  nations.
• Religion does not contribute much to our adaptive
  fitness and progress. But in the process of
  adaption, we created this by-product.

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Other evolutionary explanations

• Why do we like the photos of water?
• Our ancestors need water to survive.
• How about natural disasters caused by flooding?

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Other evolutionary explanations

• Why do we like the pictures of babies?
• Gene propagation
• But how about Van Gogh, Rembrandt, The Gates of
  Hell, The Burghers of Calais?