Is man 'programmed' to seek a 'god'?

[Angst]

No. But we are "programmed" to look for meanings and patterns, which often leads to religion. It's been observed in pigeons too, I believe, so there is no reason to believe we're unique in that sense. It's just that our imagination allows us to invent Gods where there in fact are none.

This following isn't enlightened, it's guesswork, but I'm sure you can work with it.

I think gods serve purposes other than answering questions about phenomena of life.

The different common acknowledgements of norms we assume, those we call cultures, have rituals present in areas such as social discourses or even social reciprocity. I believe there are thick links to a sort of common human withborn spirituality, which is inherently natural.

The millenia interactions a cultural event presents, even such a thing like a dance, is presented with a withborn code of conduct. There's a distinct feeling that happens inside you when you are acknowledging yourself being a part of a group. Be that biological, the dance of two itself presents a isolated universe of holism, with two parties 'getting it' and 'feeling part of each other' somehow by working together. This is being social, but I believe it's also being spiritual by you just getting the connection in your heart.

I merely thing that being inherently social and spiritual as a being, you invent holistic beings to represent the sensation of interconnectivity. Today, the sensation is diminished, but I think it's still there. Most people in the Western world have an agnostic world view while thinking 'there has to be something we don't know' anyways.

But I need words from an anthropologist, sociologist, philosopher, religious scientist or theologist on this. Can somebody make this thought collapse upon itself, and another guy build on it? I've thought about it for a while, but haven't had access to reading it, not knowing where to look. The OP was a great chance for me.

 

[katipunero]

This following isn't enlightened, it's guesswork, but I'm sure you can work with it.

I think gods serve purposes other than answering questions about phenomena of life.

The different common acknowledgements of norms we assume, those we call cultures, have rituals present in areas such as social discourses or even social reciprocity. I believe there are thick links to a sort of common human withborn spirituality, which is inherently natural.

The millenia interactions a cultural event presents, even such a thing like a dance, is presented with a withborn code of conduct. There's a distinct feeling that happens inside you when you are acknowledging yourself being a part of a group. Be that biological, the dance of two itself presents a isolated universe of holism, with two parties 'getting it' and 'feeling part of each other' somehow by working together. This is being social, but I believe it's also being spiritual by you just getting the connection in your heart.

I merely thing that being inherently social and spiritual as a being, you invent holistic beings to represent the sensation of interconnectivity. Today, the sensation is diminished, but I think it's still there. Most people in the Western world have an agnostic world view while thinking 'there has to be something we don't know' anyways.

But I need words from an anthropologist, sociologist, philosopher, religious scientist or theologist on this. Can somebody make this thought collapse upon itself, and another guy build on it? I've thought about it for a while, but haven't had access to reading it, not knowing where to look. The OP was a great chance for me.

the thing you call social discourse and social reciprocity run on a common a thread, or at least happen at a very basic and fundamental level which is on our very linguistic interactions. i have read somewhere that god is nothing more than a literary device or perhaps a semantic necessity. god is an imperative or an eventuality in thought and sentence construction anytime we weave a good narrative. works by chomsky and hausser are good places to start for a more detailed explanation.

stories that hold together societies and cultures are of divine authorship mostly because the real human authors fail so much at creative writing 101. they haven't the slightest concept of the media res and are stuck with using the linear progression in storytelling. thus, most stories have, by necessity, started with an idea of god.

 

[Kyriakos]

the thing you call social discourse and social reciprocity run on a common a thread, or at least happen at a very basic and fundamental level which is on our very linguistic interactions. i have read somewhere that god is nothing more than a literary device or perhaps a semantic necessity. god is an imperative or an eventuality in thought and sentence construction anytime we weave a good narrative. works by chomsky and hausser are good places to start for a more detailed explanation.

stories that hold together societies and cultures are of divine authorship mostly because the real human authors fail so much at creative writing 101. they haven't the slightest concept of the media res and are stuck with using the linear progression in storytelling. thus, most stories have, by necessity, started with an idea of god.

Should be noted that what god is from a human perspective is obviously a human idea, and what a god is in a detached "Being in itself" way is not dependent on outsider impressions of it.
But it works both ways: we only have the human idea(s), and the question i posed was if the idea of a god is innate, ie if we are programmed to have one. It does not matter to me if the idea is false in regards to a god existing, it matters if there is necessity for the idea to exist, and also if it goes back a long way, to prehistory.

 

[warpus]

Should be noted that what god is from a human perspective is obviously a human idea, and what a god is in a detached "Being in itself" way is not dependent on outsider impressions of it.
But it works both ways: we only have the human idea(s), and the question i posed was if the idea of a god is innate, ie if we are programmed to have one. It does not matter to me if the idea is false in regards to a god existing, it matters if there is necessity for the idea to exist, and also if it goes back a long way, to prehistory.

See, the thing is that you could call god anything. Let's call it Gnarb.

Do humans have an innate biologically programmed instinct to seek out Gnarb?

Well, what is Gnarb, you might ask? It's a powerful supernatural entity that means different things to different people. Since it is powerful it knows a bunch of stuff we don't about the Universe.

Looking at it like that, I don't think it's surprising that humans seek out Gnarb. Gnarb is the source of answers we don't have answers to - and we love answering unanswered questions.

 

[Kyriakos]

See, the thing is that you could call god anything. Let's call it Gnarb.

Do humans have an innate biologically programmed instinct to seek out Gnarb?

Well, what is Gnarb, you might ask? It's a powerful supernatural entity that means different things to different people. Since it is powerful it knows a bunch of stuff we don't about the Universe.

Looking at it like that, I don't think it's surprising that humans seek out Gnarb. Gnarb is the source of answers we don't have answers to - and we love answering unanswered questions.

Yes, i agree with you that the part about the omnipotence, or at least partial access to knowledge not human (yet, or ever) is a facet of the idea of a deity, at least if said deity is given such abilities.
But my own question was even more general than that, it was if the idea of a god (which unfortunately, as you pointed too, is different from person to person) was formed in historic years, in prehistoric years, or was there all along. Obviously the names of gods do not really matter in this question since it is the mere ability to conceive of such beings that is important.

Also god itself is not on the surface a complicated idea, by which i mean that it is not the outcome of a synthesis of simpler conscious founding blocks of ideas. A minotaur is a complex idea, it is the synthesis of a man and a bull. A god, though, appears to be something of a different kind, as an idea.

 

[warpus]

was formed in historic years, in prehistoric years, or was there all along.

Well, I think this also stems from the human need to answer questions about the unknown.

"Why did that volcano erupt and destroy our homeland?" "Why did the river flood?" "Why did our crops fail?"

It makes sense to assume that somebody is running the show, behind the scenes, if you don't know how the world *really* works. That means some sort of a powerful entity.. And there you have your god..

 

[Kyriakos]

This is very possible, if not utterly evident at least in some cases, but my own query is not why the idea was noted and given attention to (which can be answered like you did, eg natural elements being dictated by a god etc) but why the ability to have the idea itself exists. That is why it exists, independently of its utility. As an agnostic i have little utility for the idea of a god, but i have the ability to think of a god (without believing it exists outside of the idea). I am asking why i have this ability.

In my view it can either be because the idea of a god is important in some hidden way in the formation of the human psyche (Again i stress that i am talking about the idea, not the supposed reality or falseness of existence of a deity) or it was innate due to some determinism of the universe, which again may or may not lead to there being a deity after all. I wonder if animals have "ideas" of a god. They seem to be pretty much identifying higher entities with other beings, that exist, eg other animals, or humans.

 

[warpus]

This is very possible, if not utterly evident at least in some cases, but my own query is not why the idea was noted and given attention to (which can be answered like you did, eg natural elements being dictated by a god etc) but why the ability to have the idea itself exists. That is why it exists, independently of its utility. As an agnostic i have little utility for the idea of a god, but i have the ability to think of a god (without believing it exists outside of the idea). I am asking why i have this ability.

In my view it can either be because the idea of a god is important in some hidden way in the formation of the human psyche (Again i stress that i am talking about the idea, not the supposed reality or falseness of existence of a deity) or it was innate due to some determinism of the universe, which again may or may not lead to there being a deity after all. I wonder if animals have "ideas" of a god. They seem to be pretty much identifying higher entities with other beings, that exist, eg other animals, or humans.

Well, back then, there was plenty of utility.

The guy who could communicate with gods and/or understood how gods operate was usually a fairly powerful member of the community.

You see this in most (all?) early human cultures.. A shaman who claims to have links to the supernatural.. this leads into civilizations like Egypt, where the ruler of the land is a "god" himself, and medieval european civilizations where royalty has a link to the supernatural as well.

 

[Kyriakos]

Yes, imagine though there being use for the idea of a 1000-dimensional object, and a race worshiping it. Although it can be said that again we have some "idea" of a 1000-dimensional object (surely i do not mean an image of it, just a dot in our mental space which is formed about it) it is not important enough to warrant social phenomena created out of it.

 

[warpus]

I don't understand what you mean here or how it relates to what we were discussing, sorry

 

[Kyriakos]

I don't understand what you mean here or how it relates to what we were discussing, sorry

Sorry, i did not make it clear:

I meant that there are other strange ideas one can have, but they are of different kinds and we do not see social phenomena being built around them. If someone had the idea that he emanates beams from his body (this is a famous schizophrenic's case, studied by Freud)he could term them gods, or "divine rays" (as he did) but due to the nature of this idea there could not be much of a social phenomenon gathered around it, that is many people who could relate to it.
On the contrary the generic idea of a "god" is all-encompassing, which is why billions of people can have this idea, usually think they have the same idea as the next theist, and in reality have just something personal to themselves.

Whereas the 1000-dimensional object would again be a nearly impossible to conceive of object, but is so complicated that it cannot have the same relevance to human society. I am arguing that it is the simplicity (on the surface at least) of the idea that is termed "god" that makes it so important in human history.

 

[timtofly]

Sorry, i did not make it clear:

I meant that there are other strange ideas one can have, but they are of different kinds and we do not see social phenomena being built around them. If someone had the idea that he emanates beams from his body (this is a famous schizophrenic's case, studied by Freud)he could term them gods, or "divine rays" (as he did) but due to the nature of this idea there could not be much of a social phenomenon gathered around it, that is many people who could relate to it.
On the contrary the generic idea of a "god" is all-encompassing, which is why billions of people can have this idea, usually think they have the same idea as the next theist, and in reality have just something personal to themselves.

Whereas the 1000-dimensional object would again be a nearly impossible to conceive of object, but is so complicated that it cannot have the same relevance to human society. I am arguing that it is the simplicity (on the surface at least) of the idea that is termed "god" that makes it so important in human history.

How important today is most mythology? Knowledge usually comes from throwing off the old to reason in the new. There are a few exceptions.

Even steam had a very short "life" span as an energy source. In fact 10 year olds today probably only associate it as a place on the internet for gaming.

 

[Kyriakos]

Then again the idea of a god has not really been replaced by another idea, exactly because it is an all-encompassing one, and defining a type of idea by itself.

Even if the religions we now have die out in a few hundred years, the idea of god will still exist

 

[peter grimes]

Steam is still used every day all over the planet as a primary element of electricity generation:

A heat source (nuclear fission, coal, natural gas, diesel) is used to heat water above the boiling point. This steam is shunted through a turbine, which spins a magnet in the presence of electrical wire. Voila, electricity!

 

[warpus]

I meant that there are other strange ideas one can have, but they are of different kinds and we do not see social phenomena being built around them.

Yeah, it's because the idea of god is such a simple one, because it is a very vague and generic idea that different people interpret totally differently. (Just compare say.. BirdJaguar's ideas about god to MobBoss's to somebody who's Hindu)

If the question was "Is man programmed to seek God?" (implying the Christian God), the answer would be a resounding "No", because the god being asked about isn't vague anymore - he's defined.

So you have

1. Early man attempting to answer questions about his surroundings
2. It "making sense" that somebody powerful is in charge of the world/the universe
3. Religious leaders having power overpeople
4. God being a simple and vague idea

which all leads to an explanation as to why so many different cultures all have had some sort of a supernatural/god element in terms of an explanation of how the world works.

 

[Angst]

I'd like to point out that "the things I call social reciprocity" etc. are acknowledged terms in anthropology, but it's not my field, so I might be using it wrong.

Well, I think this also stems from the human need to answer questions about the unknown.

"Why did that volcano erupt and destroy our homeland?" "Why did the river flood?" "Why did our crops fail?"

It makes sense to assume that somebody is running the show, behind the scenes, if you don't know how the world *really* works. That means some sort of a powerful entity.. And there you have your god..

warpus, the idea of a deity is something else than an explanator to many people. God doesn't explain anymore in most of the Western world. Religion is a social phenomena, not a scientific one. I know that antireligious people attemp to frame deities as science in order to debunk them, but they're really going about it the wrong way. A deity is an idea in many other aspects than explanations and is entwined in so many parts of the human condition in its primitivity that I really don't think it's just a misnomer of volcanic activity.

Well, back then, there was plenty of utility.

The guy who could communicate with gods and/or understood how gods operate was usually a fairly powerful member of the community.

You see this in most (all?) early human cultures.. A shaman who claims to have links to the supernatural.. this leads into civilizations like Egypt, where the ruler of the land is a "god" himself, and medieval european civilizations where royalty has a link to the supernatural as well.

So you acknowledge the idea of a god has utility other than simply answering questions? Assertion of authority is one thing, a social one. There are other aspects of human codes.

What about rituals, common bonds, mating dances - the human spirit, so to say? The very same soul that most probably doesn't exist? Does this have nothing to do with a "gene" of belief and spirituality?

 

[warpus]

warpus, the idea of a deity is something else than an explanator to many people. God doesn't explain anymore in most of the Western world. Religion is a social phenomena, not a scientific one. I know that antireligious people attemp to frame deities as science in order to debunk them, but they're really going about it the wrong way. A deity is an idea in many other aspects than explanations and is entwined in so many parts of the human condition in its primitivity that I really don't think it's just a misnomer of volcanic activity.

These days, yeah, you are right, but I was talking about back when humans didn't live in cities yet.. before civilization, when humans (supposedly) started thinking about gods and the supernatural.

No need to get offended!

But what about rituals, common bonds, mating dances - the human spirit, so to say? The very same soul that most probably doesn't exist? Does this have nothing to do with a "gene" of belief and spirituality?

We are very ritualistic species, so yes, rituals make their way into all aspects of our life, but those all exist independent of the idea of god.

 

[peter grimes]

Religion is a social phenomena, not a scientific one.

Religion today is a social phenomenon, yes. But I think the likely explanation for why a belief in gods emerged in our evolutionary history is due to the idea of Agency. The classic explanation of Agency is that the person who attributed a rustling of grass to a tiger was more likely to survive to pass on the very genes that predisposed that behavior. The person who didn't seek agency in events didn't survive as often.

So gods are a byproduct of the tendency to find agency in the natural world. Just like Warpus explained. On an a basic level, trying to understand why the world is the way it is and the rules that govern is precisely a scientific phenomenon. At this stage gods had explanatory power.

The social aspects of gods are what we call religion. This actually has little to do with whether or not a group believes in gods or not - cultural traditions and such as you mention serve social tribal functions and just happened to be joined with the idea of gods.

What about rituals, common bonds, mating dances - the human spirit, so to say? The very same soul that most probably doesn't exist? Does this have nothing to do with a "gene" of belief and spirituality?

Rituals, mating systems, those would still exist even without the 'Agency Gene'. Spirituality and soul belief are, I think, a result of the AG.

 

[Domen]

Peter grimes:

Spirituality and soul belief are, I think, a result of the AG.

You invented this name - "AG" - ???

Warpus:

4. God being a simple and vague idea

God is not such a simple idea at all, at least for those who are not satisfied with simple answers.

and medieval european civilizations where royalty has a link to the supernatural as well.

Can you elaborate more on this?

To my knowledge royalty (or rather "political doctrine" of that time) only claimed that their power is legitimated by "God's will" or by God.

But it was not like they personally (as certain persons) being legitimated by God as rulers - it was more complex (i.e. the general idea of the existence of any supreme authority - hereditary royalty in most of European states - was legitimated by God / by God's will, according to those views).

Only as a consequence of the idea that hereditary rules are good (and considered as such also by God), it was assumed that this legitimation from God goes from king to his heir. So there were no any personal links of royalty to the supernatural - like it had been in ancient Egypt with pharaohs.

and we love answering unanswered questions.

Yes. And why we love it?

Well, I think this also stems from the human need to answer questions about the unknown.

"Why did that volcano erupt and destroy our homeland?" "Why did the river flood?" "Why did our crops fail?"

It makes sense to assume that somebody is running the show, behind the scenes, if you don't know how the world *really* works. That means some sort of a powerful entity.. And there you have your god..

But I don't think this view is completely valid.

For example today people who believe in God do it from different reasons than the ones you mentioned - that's because today people generally seek for answers of questions about the unknown in science (not in God), yet many of them still believe in God - so they must do this from different reasons.

Most likely one of the main reasons is hope, or desire, that death is not the end of human existence. Another reason is also seeking for sense in your life / meaning of life and seeking for advice on how to live, how to be a good person (which all or most religions provide), what values are important, etc.

These are the more important reasons. And I think they played a huge factor also back in ancient and even prehistoric times (since people then weren't intelectually inferior to us - they just didn't have that much knowledge). Probably yet Neanderthals asked themselves such questions...

See, the thing is that you could call god anything. Let's call it Gnarb.

Do humans have an innate biologically programmed instinct to seek out Gnarb?

Well, what is Gnarb, you might ask? It's a powerful supernatural entity that means different things to different people. Since it is powerful it knows a bunch of stuff we don't about the Universe.

Looking at it like that, I don't think it's surprising that humans seek out Gnarb. Gnarb is the source of answers we don't have answers to - and we love answering unanswered questions.

Yet Neanderthals believed in such "Gnarb" - a supernatural entity. They buried their dead in embryonic positions - which indicates that they believed in afterlife (when you place a dead body in embyonic position, it's more than obvious that you expect this person - or his / her soul - to be born again).

It is a proof that yet Neanderthals - a different species of humans than we are - regarded death as a beginning of new life!

 

[Angst]

These days, yeah, you are right, but I was talking about back when humans didn't live in cities yet.. before civilization, when humans (supposedly) started thinking about gods and the supernatural.

Don't you think gods were generally part of the human lifestyle/nature, even if the human was not asking for answers? That's what I'm wondering about. You seem not to think that, and I don't see why not.

No need to get offended!

I'm sorry if I made it appear like that, I'm really not. I just want to get enlightened on this, I'm really excited about human nature...

We are very ritualistic species, so yes, rituals make their way into all aspects of our life, but those all exist independent of the idea of god.

Did you read my last post about what I believed were spiritual actions in social situations? With two parties feeling holistic, where the whole world was the two? What did you think of that?

I think of a deity and spirituality as somehow entwined, even if the two are not the same.

Religion today is a social phenomenon, yes. But I think the likely explanation for why a belief in gods emerged in our evolutionary history is due to the idea of Agency. The classic explanation of Agency is that the person who attributed a rustling of grass to a tiger was more likely to survive to pass on the very genes that predisposed that behavior. The person who didn't seek agency in events didn't survive as often.

So gods are a byproduct of the tendency to find agency in the natural world. Just like Warpus explained. On an a basic level, trying to understand why the world is the way it is and the rules that govern is precisely a scientific phenomenon. At this stage gods had explanatory power.

The social aspects of gods are what we call religion. This actually has little to do with whether or not a group believes in gods or not - cultural traditions and such as you mention serve social tribal functions and just happened to be joined with the idea of gods.

That makes a lot of sense.

Rituals, mating systems, those would still exist even without the 'Agency Gene'. Spirituality and soul belief are, I think, a result of the AG.

But I'm still curious. Care to expand on this? Did human spirituality develop independently of the "agency gene"/god gene, if one such gene exists?

Why would I have a need to attribute a spiritual component of my primal desires when they could, technically, just be primal? Does being spiritual empower the mating rituals in themselves and ensure my participation? What primitive part of me wants me to embrace shamanism or animism while finding a mate and practice silly rituals to feel whole as one? Will it ensure me to bind myself to my bride, ensuring her spiritual-gene offspring existence? Does it bind myself with her through our genetic disposition - is my spiritual nature a nature or nurture? Am I born with a feel of connection with other humans, inexplicable, divine or spiritual? Or is it a cultural product?

I acknowledge, from your post, that spirituality doesn't equalize a deity. I knew that and didn't realize it while posting in here. But still... If the "spiritual" gene exists, why would that not lead to a development of a god? A god is, after all, a spirit, an idea - he's not a physical manifestation. He's a common agreement between more people which is loosely defined.

- Again, I'm sorry if I sounded offended, I'm asking these things because I want to be smarter.