The paper proposes that the evolutionary origin of religions is based on theory of mind as the product of interdependent division of labor between the forest specialist group (women and small children) and the woodland specialist group (men) in early hominins who lived in the mixed forest-woodland habitat. To complement each other’s work without interfering each other’s work, one specialist group had to recognize (imagine) that the other specialist group existed to think for themselves and to do different works. The result was theory of mind which is to recognize (imagine) that the others exist to think for themselves. (The forest-woodland groups became the hunter-gatherer groups for the Homo species in the savanna habitat.) Under existential pressure, hominins invented imaginary specialists as imaginary agents who existed to think for themselves and to do different works in imaginary division of labor to enhance survival chance. The result was religion with imaginary behaviors. Therefore, religion is defined as a set of beliefs and behaviors based on theory of mind that produces a shared imagination to enhance survival chance under existential pressure. This paper proposes that the religious evolution consists of the premodern imaginative religion for local society habitat starting from bipedalism, the modern rational imaginative religion for regional society habitat starting from the Axial Age, and the postmodern diverse rational imaginative religion for global society habitat starting from the Information Revolution. In conclusion, the religious brain is the imaginative brain, and the religious social behaviors are imaginary social behaviors. The religious evolution is the evolution of human imagination to enhance survival chance under existential pressure, such as the religious reinforcement of social bonds to enhance the survival chance of social group and the religious relief of stress and anxiety to enhance the survival chance of individuals.
Religion is broadly defined as a set of beliefs and behaviors based on a shared worldview that separates the sacred, or supernatural, from the profane [
Another theory of evolutionary origin of religions is based on theory of mind. According to Kapogiannis and Deshpande in the functional MRI study of the brains of both self-declared religious and non-religious individuals, individuals with stronger theory of mind activity were found to be more religious [
Theory of mind is to recognize (imagine) that the others exist to think for themselves, so it is closely related to imagination. Imagination is the mental ability to produce images, thoughts, and feelings independent of immediate input perceptions such as vision and hearing. Autistic individuals with problems in imaginative capacities and pretend plays are incapable of theory of mind [
As shown in the previous paper [
The imaginary behaviors derived from imagination are considered religiously as the spiritual behaviors which are supernatural and sacred separated from the natural behaviors which are profane. Natural in this paper is defined as un-imaginary. As a result, human behaviors consist of natural behaviors and imaginary behaviors, corresponding religiously to secular behaviors and sacred behaviors, respectively. Natural human behaviors are basically the great ape behaviors which do not have robust (explicit) theory of mind [
This paper proposes that religious neurosociology consists of religion type, religion formation, and religion learning. Religion types include social religion to maintain attachment to imaginary ingroup [
For religious evolution, different religions have been evolved in different religious habitats. This paper proposes that the religious evolution consists of the premodern imaginative religion for local society habitat starting from bipedalism, the modern rational imaginative religion for regional society habitat starting from the Axial Age, and the postmodern diverse rational imaginative religion for global society habitat starting from the Information Revolution [
This paper proposes that the evolutionary origin of religions is based on theory of mind. As described in the previous paper [
As described in the previous paper [
labor in terms of specialist groups, and different language capabilities. The human biological evolution includes the early hominins with the feet for climbing and walking and with the forest-woodland groups in the mixed forest-woodland habitat, the early Homos with the feet for climbing and walking and with the woodland-savanna groups in the mixed woodland-savanna habitat, the middle Homos with the feet for walking and with the hunter-gatherer groups in the savanna habitat, and the late Homos with the feet for walking and the hunter-gatherer groups in the savanna habitat. The human biological evolution is shown in
In this paper, religion is defined in terms of neurosociology [
Religion types include social religion to maintain attachment to imaginary ingroup and immune religion to maintain the imaginary mental immune system against adversities. Social religion is defined as the religion based on ingroup-outgroup [
[
Immune religion is defined as the religion based on the mental immune system. Immune religion is derived from the natural instinctive mental immune system which is analogous to the immune system [
Religion is defined as a set of beliefs and behaviors based on theory of mind that
countermeasure | adversity | purpose | countermeasure neurotransmitter | regulator |
---|---|---|---|---|
comforter | hardship | maintain durability | endorphins | dopamine antagonist |
hyperactivity | danger | maintain existence | adrenaline | serotonin agonist |
phobia | unfamiliarity-uncertainty | maintain tradition | adrenaline-glutamate | serotonin-GABA agonist |
produces a shared imagination to enhance survival chance under existential pressure. As a result, religion formation requires imagination and existential pressure. The additional requirement is ontogenetic ritualization [
The transformation from the natural instinctive behaviors to the imaginary behaviors requires imagination, existential pressure, and ontogenetic ritualization. For the attachment to ingroup, the existential pressure is vanished ingroup, including vanished kin, vanished home territory, and vanished home culture. It required imagination to have the attachment to imaginary vanished ingroup. The religious imagination is expressed by symbols, rituals, and imaginary (alternate) mental states [
For the mental immune system against adversities, the existential pressure is severe adversities, including severe hardship, severe danger, and severe unfamiliarity-uncertainty. It required imagination to have the imaginary mental immune system against severe adversities. The shared imaginary mental immune system against severe adversities requires ontogenetic ritualization. The imaginary mental immune system strengthens the mental immune system to enhance the survival chance of individuals. The two different sets of imaginary mental immune system are the imaginary supernatural immune system and the imaginary regulatory mental immune system [
The imaginary supernatural mental immune system is currently practiced by Abrahamic religions (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam), while the imaginary regulatory mental immune system is practiced by the Eastern religions (Hinduism, Buddhism, Daoism, and Confucianism) [
natural countermeasure | adversity | imaginary supernatural countermeasure | imaginary supernatural regulator | imaginary mental regulator |
---|---|---|---|---|
comforter | hardship | imaginary supernatural love | imaginary supernatural providence | imaginary regulatory meditation/balance |
hyperactivity | danger | imaginary supernatural savior | imaginary supernatural providence | imaginary regulatory meditation/balance |
phobia | unfamiliarity-uncertainty | imaginary supernatural authority | imaginary supernatural providence | acceptance of the unknown |
regulators. The imaginary supernatural love replaces comforter against severe hardship. The imaginary supernatural love is derived from imaginary companion during pre-juvenile age starting at weaning at the age of about 3. Without full maternal care, pre-juvenile is forced to initiate. Without sufficient maturity, pre-juvenile inevitably faces stress from hardship. The instinctive countermeasure against hardship is comforter to maintain durability. A common comforter is imaginary companion. Up to two-thirds of children between the ages of 3 and 8 have imaginary companions [
For the Abrahamic religions, the imaginary supernatural savior replaces hyperactivity against severe danger. For Judaism, the confirmation for the miraculous salvation is the miraculous salvation of Israelites from oppression and the deliverance into the Promised Land. For Christianity, the confirmation is the miraculous salvation through Jesus’ sacrifice and resurrection. For Islam, the confirmation is the miraculous salvation of Mecca to herald the advent of the Prophet Muhammad. The Abrahamic religions celebrate the miraculous salvations every year. Replacing phobia, the imaginary supernatural authority in power, laws, and traditions provides the phobia (fear) against moving to unfamiliar-uncertain way of life (sins). According to the Bible, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge (Proverbs 1:7). The imaginary supernatural authority is expressed as righteousness. For the Abrahamic religions, the imaginary supernatural authority (righteousness) is written in the sacred scriptures.
The imaginary supernatural providence (wisdom) as the religious regulator to regulate the religious immune system, and prevents overactive religious countermeasure against ubiquitous perceived adversity as in personality-mental disorders. Believing in the imaginary supernatural providence, a believer in the imaginary supernatural love looks beyond prevailing severe hardship to the coming of the imaginary supernatural love, resulting in the elimination of the overactive imaginary supernatural love against ubiquitous perceived hardship. Believing in the imaginary supernatural providence, a believer in the imaginary supernatural savior looks beyond prevailing severe danger to the coming of the supernatural salvation, resulting in the elimination of the overactive imaginary supernatural salvation against ubiquitous perceived danger. Believing in the imaginary supernatural providence, a believer in the imaginary supernatural authority looks beyond prevailing unfamiliarity-uncertainty (sins) to the coming of the imaginary supernatural authority, resulting in the elimination of the overactive imaginary supernatural authority against ubiquitous perceived unfamiliarity-uncertainty. The imaginary supernatural providence provides a way for delayed gratification.
The imaginary regulatory mental immune system is practiced by the Eastern religions (Hinduism, Buddhism, Daoism, and Confucianism). For the imaginary regulatory mental immune system, the countermeasures are basically the natural countermeasures to allow natural emotion to occur. The countermeasures against severe hardship and danger are natural comforter and natural hyperactivity, respectively. On the other hand, the countermeasure against unfamiliarity-uncertainty is natural rationality based on the rational brain which matures at about 25 years old as young adult. As a result, adults use mostly natural rationality countermeasure against unfamiliarity-uncertainty, while children use mostly natural phobia countermeasure against unfamiliarity-uncertainty. The Eastern religions with the adulthood mental immune system use rationality countermeasure against unfamiliarity-uncertainty, while the Abrahamic religions with the childhood mental immune system use phobia countermeasure against unfamiliarity-uncertainty [
For the imaginary regulatory mental immune system, the regulators are imaginary mental regulators to prevent overactive mental immune system. The imaginary mental regulators involve meditation and balance based on imaginary (alternate) mental states. For an example, one of the imaginary mental states is the concentration (focus) on a mantra as a form of concentration meditation [
Another imaginary mental regulator is imaginary balance. A good example of imaginary balance is the imaginary balance between yin and yang to keep harmony [
The imaginary mental regulator to control overactive rationality against ubiquitous perceived unfamiliarity-uncertainty is the acceptance of the unknown. Confucius said: “… Recognizing that you know what you know, and recognizing that you do not know what you do not know―this is knowledge.” (Analects 2:17) Buddha refused to speculate about gods and afterlife which were largely unknown.
This paper proposes that the origin of religion is derived from theory of mind. Theory of mind which is to recognize (imagine) that the others exist to think for themselves. According to a PET study, theory of mind activates the medial prefrontal node to handle the mental state of the self, the superior temporal sulcus to detect the behavior of other animals and analyzes the goals and outcomes of this behavior, and the inferior frontal region to maintain representations of actions and goals [
Theory of mind is to recognize (imagine) that the others exist to think for themselves, so it is closely related to imagination. Imagination is the mental ability to produce images, thoughts, and feelings independent of immediate input perceptions such as vision and hearing. Autistic individuals with problems in imaginative capacities and pretend plays are incapable of theory of mind [
According to the functional MRI study of cognitive and neural foundations of religious belief by Kapogiannis et al., the three psychological dimensions of religious belief are God’s perceived level of involvement, God’s perceived emotion, and doctrinal/experiential religious knowledge which functional MRI localizes within networks processing theory of mind regarding intent and emotion, abstract semantics, and imagery [
For social religion, the imagination in the religious imaginary emotional attachment to vanished ingroup is produced by the mental synthesis of the symbols, rituals, and imaginary mental states for vanished ingroup with the memories and historical records of vanished kin, vanished home territory, and vanished home culture. The end result of the religious imaginary emotional attachment to vanished ingroup is to strengthen the natural instinctive emotional attachment to existing ingroup that has shared vanished ingroup.
The intensive devotion to ingroup can reach mental peak. For an example, the devotion of sport fans to home sport team is the devotion to ingroup in terms of home territory. During sport events, sport fans can reach the frenzy state at the moment of winning. In the same way, the intensive devotion to imaginary ingroup can also reach mental peak. For an example, a study using functional magnetic resonance imaging scans in 19 devout Mormons demonstrated that nucleus accumbens activation preceded peak spiritual feelings by 1 - 3 second [
For immune religion, the imagination in the religious imaginary supernatural mental immune system is produced by the mental synthesis of the symbols and rituals for supernatural with the memories of the instinctive countermeasures and regulators in the instinctive mental immune system. The natural instinctive mental immune system consists of the natural instinctive countermeasures and natural instinctive regulators without supernatural. The end results of the religious imaginary supernatural instinctive mental immune system and the natural instinctive mental immune system are similar. The natural instinctive comforter against hardship such as in the case of the comforter manifested as the runner’s high after running (stress) for a long time [
For immune religion, the imagination in the religious imaginary regulatory mental immune system is produced by the mental synthesis of the imaginary (alternate) mental states with the memories of the instinctive regulators in the instinctive mental immune system. The natural instinctive mental immune system consists of natural instinctive countermeasures and natural instinctive regulators without alternate mental state, while the religious imaginary regulatory mental immune system consists of natural instinctive countermeasures and religious imaginary regulators. The end results of the religious imaginary mental regulators and the natural instinctive regulators are similar. The natural regulators against ubiquitous perceived adversities are similar to the imaginary mental regulators (imaginary regulatory meditation and balance) against ubiquitous perceived adversities. Meditation has been investigated to show the decreases in emotional interference by unpleasant stimuli and in the time to return to emotional baseline after stress [
In biological evolution, a most important factor in evolution is habitat. Different species were evolved in different habitats. In the same way, different religions have been evolved in different religious habitats. A most important factor in religious habitat is the size of religious involvement. Different religious habitats with different sizes of religious involvement require different religions. As human civilization advances, the size of religious involvement inevitably increases in the order of premodern local society habitat, modern regional society habitat, and postmodern global society habitat. As the religious habitat changes, an old religion may not change with new habitat, but the actual religious practice of believers in their daily life changes with new habitat willingly or reluctantly. This paper proposes that the religions consist of the premodern imaginative religion for local society habitat starting from bipedalism, the modern rational imaginative religion for regional society habitat starting from the Axial Age, and the postmodern diverse rational imaginative religion for global society habitat starting from the Information Revolution. The religious evolution is shown in
The premodern religion evolution started from the original of religions as described in the previous section. In the study using a suite of phylogenetic comparative methods to investigate the early evolution of religion of hunter-gatherer, Peoples, Duda, and Marlowe found the oldest trait of religion, present in the most recent common ancestor of present-day hunter-gatherers, was animism. Belief in an afterlife emerged, followed by shamanism. Ancestor worship and high gods who are active in human affairs were absent in early hunter-gatherer, suggesting a deep history for the egalitarian nature of hunter-gatherer societies [
With imagination through theory of mind, a hominin could construct an entire
imaginary world where all things had imaginary agents that were animated and alive, and could think for themselves. This imaginary world was the base of animism that believed that all things were animated and alive [
In the study by Peoples, Duda, and Marlowe, the belief in afterlife came after animism. While animism mostly and directly enhanced the mental immune system under existential environmental pressure, afterlife was mostly and directly enhanced ingroup under existential social pressure. The inclusion of imaginary vanished ingroup members in their afterlife increased the ingroup size, territory, and cohesion. Under intense existential social pressure, symbols, rituals, and alternate mental states were created as the imaginary embodied agents to provide particular powers by enhancing ingroup. Intense existential social pressure came from entirely different and intensely hostile outgroup. Intense existential environmental pressure was more prevalent than intense existential social pressure, so the religion of animism came before the religion of afterlife.
One possible example of afterlife is the burial site of Homo naledi. Home naledi’s fossils of at least fifteen individuals, amounting to 1550 specimens, have been excavated from in the Rising Star cave system [
In the study by Peoples, Duda, and Marlowe, the belief in shamanism came after animism and afterlife. Shamanism was essentially practiced by religious specialists (shamans) who specialized in using symbols, rituals, and alternate mental states to interact with the imaginary world (spirit world) to channel powers into this world [
One example of shamanism is Hmong Shamanism [
In the study by Peoples, Duda, and Marlowe, ancestor worship and high gods who are active in human affairs were absent in early humans, suggesting a deep history for the egalitarian nature of early human societies. Ancestor worship religion and high god religion emerged with the advent of the Agricultural Revolution. During the Agricultural Revolution, the advanced agricultural method allowed drastically improved the productivity to support population increases by more intensive use of the same piece of land. Consequently, the Agricultural Revolution led to large social group that became hierarchical with high rulers on the top. Large hierarchic societies required the high supernatural that demanded respect and obedient in the same way as the human high rulers [
The agricultural society faced intense existential social pressure and existential environmental pressure. The territorial expansions from large social groups destroyed the clear and stable boundaries among large social groups. It became difficult to maintain ingroup against outgroup, resulting in intense existential social pressure. Agricultural society required to stay in the same place, so it was more prone to the periodic local natural disaster, unlike the hunter-gatherer society that was free to move away from local natural disaster. The constant population pressure and the periodic natural disasters caused the deficient resource and security, so famine only became a common problem for agriculturalists [
Ancestor worship is defined as belief that the spirits of ancestors remain active in another realm where they may influence the living, and can be influenced by the living [
“High gods” is defined as single, all-powerful creator deities who may be active in human affairs and supportive of human morality [
The modern religion is the modern rational imaginative religion based on imagination-rationality. According to Max Weber, modernity is directly related to rationality [
Human capacity of reasoning in the frontal lobe of the neocortex for the rational
brain allows human society to develop rational system. The expansion of the rational brain in the neocortex accelerated in Homo erectus. Homo erectus emerged when the arid climate that intensified about 2 million years ago transformed a part of African into the savanna habitat. Due to the loss of tress to climb, the feet were evolved to the feet for walking and running only, and were not good in climbing trees. The previous Homo species, such as Homo habilis, still retained some body features for climbing trees. Due to the loss of the foods obtained from trees, Homo erectus were forced to hunt animals in savanna, resulting in the formation of the gatherer group to gather plant foods in savanna and the hunter group to hunt animals in savanna. The intake of highly nutritious meat allowed the energy-fat hungry brain to expand [
As a result, the rational brain in the neocortex expanded quickly. The rational brain produces rationality. Homo erectus used rationality to enhance their survival chance under existential pressure. With the expanded rational brain, Homo erectus was adaptable enough to migrate out of Africa and adapt to the various environments outside of Africa, and survived in many locations for a very long time between about 1.89 million and 143,000 years ago [
In the agricultural society, different local social group with different religious imaginations had different imaginary premodern religions. To enforce imaginary premodern religions in the agricultural society without clear boundary, the premodern religions became authoritative religions enforced by religious authorities against the religious contamination from other religions. Initially, each religion involved a local society [
The Industrial Revolution started in about 250 years ago. The Industrial Revolution replaced an economy based on manual labor by one dominated by machinery. The dramatic increase in productivity lifted most people from the poverty. The Industrial Revolution started in the mid-18th century and early 19th century in Britain and spread throughout the world. The Industrial Revolution has improved human living condition tremendously. Intense existential environmental pressure in the agricultural society has been greatly reduced in the industrial society. Without intense existential environment pressure, people get less religious, and irreligion has become more common in the industrious countries such as in the industrious and relatively homogenous European countries without high existential social pressure [
Postmodernity started from the late 20th century [
Globalization is derived from global interdependence and global information network. Global communication through information technology allows global interdependence in terms of global division of labor. Different countries specialize in producing different goods, services, and raw materials. Free competitive international trade benefits trading countries where each country develops its own “trade specialty” with comparative advantage in international trade. Free competitive international trade provides economic growth as shown in higher economic growth for the countries with free trade than the countries with protectionism. Today, very few products are manufactured entirely in a single country, and people consume products daily from all over the world.
The rise of digital media, especially the internet, has led to the global information network that allows people to spread news, art, music, fashion, and political movement globally, and communicate with people globally. Distance is no longer a big barrier in the spread of information. Globalization is derived from global interdependence and global information network.
In postmodern time, globalization is a norm, not a choice. In the world, there
are multiple different cultures, so globalization must involve global cultural diversity. Global cultural diversity with multiple different cultures does not appear to have the universal standards for objective reality, morality, truth, human nature, reason, language, and social progress. Such absence of the universal standards in global cultural diversity produces postmodernism [
When the religious involvement expanded from premodern local society habitat to modern regional society habitat, rationality was added to imagination to form the modern rational imaginative religion. In the modern rational imaginative religion, the rational thinkers did not abandon imagination. In the same way, when the religious involvement expands from modern regional society habitat to postmodern global society habitat, diversity is added to rationality and imagination to form the postmodern diverse rational imaginative religion. When people face existential pressure in various occasions in their lives, they need urgently rationality and religious imagination to enhance survival chance under existential pressure, and they do not have time and energy to pick and mix various options comfortably and leisurely as in postmodernism. As a result, the postmodern religion that helps people under existential pressure [
One example of the postmodern diverse rational imaginative religion is radical orthodoxy which is a branch of postmodern theology [
In summary, the paper proposes the evolutionary origin of religions, religious neurosociology, and the religious evolution. The evolutionary origin of religions is based on theory of mind as the product of interdependent division of labor between the forest specialist group (women and small children) and the woodland specialist group (men) in early hominins who lived in the mixed forest-woodland habitat. To complement each other’s work without interfering each other’s work, one specialist group had to recognize (imagine) that the other specialist group existed to think for themselves and to do different works. The result was theory of mind which is to recognize (imagine) that the others exist to think for themselves. (The forest-woodland groups became the hunter-gatherer groups for the Homo species in the savanna habitat.) Under existential pressure, hominins invented imaginary specialists as imaginary agents who existed to think for themselves and to do different works in imaginary division of labor to enhance survival chance. The result was religion with imaginary behaviors. Therefore, religion is defined as a set of beliefs and behaviors based on theory of mind that produces a shared imagination to enhance survival chance under existential pressure, such as the religious reinforcement of social bonds to enhance the survival chance of social group and the religious relief of stress and anxiety to enhance the survival chance of individuals.
Religious neurosociology combines neuroscience to study religious brain and sociology to study religious social behaviors. Religious neurosociology consists of religion type, religion formation, and religion learning. Religion types include social religion to maintain attachment to imaginary ingroup and immune religion to maintain the imaginary mental immune system against adversities. In religion formation, under imagination, existential pressure, and ontogenetic ritualization, the natural (un-imaginary) instinctive attachment to ingroup turns into the attachment to imaginary ingroup for social religion, and the natural instinctive mental immune system against adversities turns into the imaginary mental immune system for immune religion. Religion learning is through the imagination derived from mental synthesis. The religious evolution consists of the premodern imaginative religion for local society habitat starting from bipedalism, the modern rational imaginative religion for regional society habitat starting from the Axial Age, and the postmodern diverse rational imaginative religion for global society habitat starting from the Information Revolution.
In conclusion, instead of explaining religion by religion, religious neurosociology explains religion by neurosociology. Religious neurosociology and the religious evolution provide a comprehensive understanding of religion. In religious neurosociology, the religious brain is the imaginative brain modified in some cases by rationality and diversity, and the religious social behaviors are imaginary social behaviors modified in some cases by rationality and diversity. The religious evolution is the evolution of human imagination to enhance survival chance under existential pressure, analogous to biological evolution as the evolution of new biological trait to enhance reproductive success under evolutionary pressure.
The authors declare no conflicts of interest regarding the publication of this paper.
Chung, D. (2018) Evolutionary Origin of Religions and Religious Evolution: Religious Neurosociology. Journal of Behavioral and Brain Science, 8, 485-511. https://doi.org/10.4236/jbbs.2018.89030