Origin Of Religion & Extremism
By Upali Gamakumara –MARCH 23, 2018
Upali Gamakumara
It is the general belief that religion is the backbone of discipline that helps creating a peaceful society. This assertion has been built on another belief that there is an omnipresent observer or a supernatural force who monitors a person’s good and bad deeds. It is also believed that the ‘force’ protects the man from disasters if he does right things which pleases the ‘force’ or punish him if he does wrong. These system of beliefs is the reason for above assertion. The supernatural force can be a personalized God or a phenomenon like “Karma”. Be it God or Karma, it is a belief, which cannot be tested for its authenticity.
The process of behavioral change from belief to behavior is a psychological conditioning process. Religion and culture are the two sources which provide ‘beliefs’. Following diagram depicts how this process works.
(1) Life experience → (2) Assumptions → (3) Guess → (4) Belief → (5) Attitude → (6) Behavior
Example:
Life experience: A boy sees a disabled person → (2) build assumptions about himself, others or the world → (3) Guess: Must have done a bad thing → (4) Belief: mother must be correct → (5) Attitude: we are right – they are wrong → (6) Behavior: us-them categorization leading to racism/extremism
This is a universal generic process. Here I have taken ‘mother’ as the example, as she is the first to implant beliefs in particular culture.
Origin of Religion
There are four mind functions responsible for origin of religion; ‘Hyperactive Agency Detection Devise’ (HADD), ‘Theory of mind’ (TOM), ‘Flight or Fight response’ and ‘Consciousness’.
‘Hyperactive Agency Detection Devise’ (HADD) is the most important one among all. Justin Barrett coined this defense system, which tells animals to suspect that ‘something is over there’ (Agent)behind strange physical happening in the environment. There is another defense/life-support system called Limbic System (LS), which is a more advanced system than HADD but not directly responsible for the origin of religion. The difference between HADD and the LS is that HADD signals to suspectsof an agency behind an unknown physical happening. Whereas LS signals to respond to a known change in the environment. If an unusual sound disturbs a sleeping dog, its response is different to that of a smell of a bitch in heat. HADD works in the first scenario, where suspicion comes first not knowing what it is. In the second scenario the LS identifies what the signal is and act appropriately. Scientists say that HADD is a valuable ‘devise’ inherited by all animals as a defense mechanism for survival. However, HADD is still considered as a theory as its existence is spatial and subtle.
Sometimes, ‘human-HADD’ suspects that agents have supernatural powers. For example, man believes ‘rain’ is an act of a supernatural agent. Especially early human beings believed that life threatening phenomena (or places) like lightning, darkness, huge caves, fire, and large trees are some of the places where such supernatural agents reside. They also thought that those agents can think. They thought when the agency gets angry, they instigate curse upon man. So, to keep the agencies pleased, people started offerings. Interestingly, man believed that Agents’ desires are analogical to peoples’ desires. Therefore, man sought to offer what the savage is greedy of. Burnt flesh, singing, dancing, and young women (virgin) were some of them. This is the origin of devotion which eventually evolved into religion.
Another interesting feature of Human mind is that it guesses what others have in their minds. This is called Theory of Mind (TOM). Theory of mind is the ability to attribute mental states—beliefs, intents, desires, pretence, knowledge, etc.—to oneself, and to others, and to understand that others have beliefs, desires, intentions, … (Wikipedia). Theory of Mind (TOM) is an extension of HADD. TOM believes both supernatural agent as well as human beings have this ability. For example, ‘He must be thinking that I am rich’, is such a guess.
Fight or flight response is another adaptation for survival. Flight or fight response is common to human beings as well. This is a simple behavioral system of all animals. That is, when an animal faces a life threatening challenge, it simply fights with it or flight from it for its survival.
Consciousness is the last but not the least responsible mind function for origin of religion. Though the brainiest animal next to the man is chimpanzee, man’s consciousness is far superior to that of chimpanzees. For example, a chimp cannot identify its own mirror image as of his own. This superior consciousness of man is the one that leads man to think and worry about uncertainties like death, illness and security of his life and of his children’s. No other animal is aware of these uncertainties. The fear for death comes to animals only when they face a life threatening event. Some mammals and birds weep when their loved ones are lost. This is a result of the function of the Limbic System – not of consciousness.
The super-conscious man resorts to another method of flying away at a threat: the religious belief. Think of a man who climbs a tree top to escape from a tiger. When his consciousness tells him that there is no escape from fight or flight, he starts to pray to a supernatural power for help. This way of flight comes from the combination of his TOM and Consciousness. Scientifically, it is hard to believe whether a religion can help him but psychologically it gives some confidence to stay alive until the danger vanishes.
