Religiosity Is Inevitable In Human Beings. Here is Why
Religiosity is inevitable and has a lot to do with how humans are born. Due to our large cranial structures our newborns are born premature. The brain is not fully developed. For the next few years we are unable to do anything by ourselves. Other animals are up and running in just a few months.
For that elongated period humans are depended on a caretaker. A cry serves as a prayer for food, sickness, cleaning diapers and everything else in between. A godly hand our of nowhere comes into service to offer a solution. This is how religious thought is imprinted in our early non-fully developed brain.
Later on we invent fictional friends so we can have tea-parties with characters that are not there. This magical thinking is vital for our communication. We can talk about someone that is not present as if they were. We construct their image in our brain. This is how religious thought comes to be. This is how belief emerges. From that first magical hand that pops out of nowhere and translates our needs and wishes into action. Thus, our brain is growing in a way that reconstructs and invents reality based on belief.
Even if someone is not religious we still believe silly things. The greater example is love. There are billions if people on earth yet we believe that the few we meet can produce a special someone that we will love more than anyone else. We see those people entirely different even if they are just like everyone else whom we haven't come close yet. It is as big of a belief and irrational thinking as religion.
Another example is belief in the experts, no matter who they are. We believe for example in the big bag theory as described on TV with fancy graphics and all, without us even understanding the basics of physics. We believe the expert scientists as much as the religious folk believe the expert priests that tell them about God. Very few perform or can perform an experiment to verify the theory of Big Bang or even care to delve into it more. We are happy believing.
Belief evolves and changes faces but it stays pretty much the same. We just recycle the concepts in our minds depending on cultural and ecological developments.
I totally not believe this story as a reason why reliogisity (and the tendency to "believe in things and experts) has established.
I think it is much more plausible that people who believed in some higher forces had less doubts, had more comfort in their daily worries, had a kind of reason to accept their fate, and on the other side there were special people who confirmed those religious beliefs to the normal people. Call them shamans, priests, medicine men, whatever. Tribes with such a specialization in 2 casts - believers and people who confirmed the beliefs - were overall more easy controllable and thus more successful compared to tribes who had no clear vision or were doubtful on this and that. This evolutionay advantage led to the today pattern which might be even genomically imprinted or what you call as "inevitable".
BTW: Not all kids have imaginary friends, so to use this with regards to religion seems quite far-fetched.
Well what you said goes in parallel. It doesn't reject this premise. I merely making the point of how the push towards what you say, happened.
Misspelled or on purpose, I like it.
That's how we should really name it.
It was a misspell but I will leave it there. I am liking it now too
In a certain way we always have to believe in something, because we can never be completely sure of anything.
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Yes to some extend someone who is not religious can believe silly things, while not analyzing and question things. And probably the time living on this planet will not be enough to question everything and all. I tend to question everything although I will never succeed with everything, sometimes memory betrays you and in the beginning, someone gets well indoctrinated by silly parents, teachers and believers and thaught NOT to question. Indoctrination to believe! And it is wrong!
The main problems of believers are in my opinion:
Love is not a silly belief, so it is not an example. While falling in love is probably a chemical reaction, but must surely simple the desire to possess someone else for their own ego, love is sure a bond of trust and empathy. Three cases on my own, (okay I'm crazy), My parents, I'm in the retro perspective not sure if I ever loved them or if there is a certain level of love which could be applied. But let's see the love for my daughter, she causes me a lot of o trouble in my life (and also a lot of joy and questions, also questioning myself), but my feelings were so strong from the beginning and grew so exponentially, so I could say that I would probably do everything for here. And I know for sure that I do things for here I could never imagine I would do ever because I did it. With my wife it's different, the love to her grows because of the way through ups and downs together, because how she is, how she thinks, and the level I can talk with her. So she is not special to me because of a belief, she is special for me through experience. For both, I would kill the entire planet when necessary and for my daughter, I know for sure I would spare my life for hers.
In exchange, who tells me to love all persons on earth equal is very probably a liar and not even loving itself or want to deceive others.
Just my 2 cents on it.
I find these kinds of reasoning amusing.
They never start with, "we have this memory of being connected to something greater" and so we seek out that connection in our lives.
But, here in the west, we don't even believe in Qi, although it has been scientifically measured. We don't believe in meditations, we think it is for insane people on mountain tops, but its effects have been scientifically measured.
So, we go into this question with our hands tied behind our backs, and come up with all kinds of plausible sounding ideas without understanding the basis. Its like trying to explain thunder without ever having seen lightning.
What if those "imaginary" friends are actually real, just not visible? Especially by older people who have trained themselves not to see.
And, what if there was a God who you could, at first, feel a connection to, and then as you strengthened the connection actually communicate with and get to know?
But, "scientific" people tell people that's crazy talk.... and believe instead in the Big Bag theory... which should have been thrown out, because our universe shows to much structure to be started with just an explosion.
Totally agree that religiosity is inextricably linked to human nature. Different people can spell out different theories as to why and for what purpose (how, once it evolved, it got selected further down in evolution). Your arguments are mostly circumstantial but they do belong to a "convergent stream of evidence" in favor of a number of these theories, including yours