Post No.: 0496 Fluffystealthkitten says: Successful cultural memes don’t so much survive because they help the individuals who believe in or copy them (although that’d obviously help their transmission) but survive because they benefit the particular meme itself. … Read More
Post No.: 0477 Furrywisepuppy says: Is religion an effective mechanism for encouraging more moral and pro-social behaviours and for enforcing compliance with the social rules or norms within a group? Cooperation is the cornerstone for group cohesion … Read More
Post No.: 0439 Fluffystealthkitten says: Our ‘weak or non-moral evaluations’ are those evaluations that are highly subjective, such as what pudding, painting or piece of music is best, and we wouldn’t really be bothered if someone else differed … Read More
Post No.: 0417 Furrywisepuppy says: This post isn’t really about teaching people how to start a cult(!) Its purpose is learning about and watching out for some of the common signs of cults so that you or someone … Read More
Post No.: 0399 Furrywisepuppy says: Human rights don’t arise from genetic evolution per se – nothing in genetic evolution or ‘survival of the fittest’ even says that people must behave morally. Humans have genetic instincts for both compassion … Read More
Post No.: 0387 Furrywisepuppy says: Religiosity or spirituality is, generally, correlated with better health outcomes, such as lower levels of heart disease, stroke, kidney failure, hypertension, emphysema, some cancers, chronic pain and premature death overall. This may be … Read More
Post No.: 0349 Furrywisepuppy says: Credibility enhancing displays (CREDs) are behaviours that signal one’s belief in and commitment to something, such as to a religion. Examples that enhance one’s credibility include putting your own money where your mouth … Read More
Post No.: 0322 Furrywisepuppy says: In the industrialised world, religiosity has been on a marked decline, even in the USA. This may be because life has somewhat improved for many people overall over the past several decades, and … Read More
Post No.: 0304 Furrywisepuppy says: Post No.: 0283 discussed rituals and their personal effects on individuals. In this post, we’ll explore their social effects on groups… For groups – rituals can bring and bind people together in … Read More
Post No.: 0283 Furrywisepuppy says: The vast majority of people in the world currently affiliate themselves with a religion, whether they’re actively practising or not. Religion can be broken down into the beliefs (e.g. gods, afterlives, spirits and … Read More
Post No.: 0258 Furrywisepuppy says: Humans weren’t completely amoral before religion was invented. Other social primate relatives and mammals demonstrate what seem like compassionate behaviours and a sense of fairness too (although to a lesser degree e.g. chimpanzees … Read More
Post No.: 0247 Furrywisepuppy says: Religion is affiliated with commitment and family values, and therefore religiosity arguably makes a long-term mate more attractive – for women (commitment and fidelity) as well as for men (reducing the risk of … Read More
Post No.: 0217 Fluffystealthkitten says: Religions have had, and still currently have, a lot to directly say about sex and marriage norms across the world. Different major religions have different fertility rates, and other factors (e.g. poverty levels) … Read More
Post No.: 0203 Furrywisepuppy says: ‘Cultural group selection’ occurs because there’s inter-group competition. Group selection is basically natural selection but played out between groups rather than individuals. And via this inter-group competition, we developed ways to enhance intra-group … Read More
Post No.: 0162 Furrywisepuppy says: Sacred values or beliefs (special values or beliefs placed above the merely material, secular or profane) are considered non-tradable or non-negotiable – thus they violate rational cost-benefit rules. This is because they are … Read More
Post No.: 0153 Furrywisepuppy says: Anti-atheist prejudice or antipathy can sometimes result because a lot of people will only trust in a state leader (or any other person in a role where trust is particularly important) who holds … Read More
Post No.: 0120 Fluffystealthkitten says: Homo sapiens (who have been around for only ~200,000 years so far, or at least a number of this order of magnitude as the best estimate at the time of writing) only started … Read More
Post No.: 0113 Furrywisepuppy says: Following on from Post No.: 0023 about how science cannot always answer what we ought to do with the facts we find – philosophy, religion and politics attempt to answer the questions that … Read More
Post No.: 0096 Furrywisepuppy says: ‘Priming’ is a fluffy technique that involves exposing people to a prior stimulus (or prime) in order to influence their responses to a subsequent stimulus, without their conscious guidance or intention. In experiments, … Read More
Post No.: 0086 Furrywisepuppy says: Our instincts didn’t evolve to make a 1:1 accurate representation of the real world or the truth – they evolved for survival and reproduction success. So if misperceptions or lies don’t immediately kill … Read More
