The Biology of Religiosity (repeat)

What are the biological roots of our religious sense? What does it mean to have religious qualities deeply embedded in our human nature and imposed by our biology? Do we need them? What can we make of the fact that each of our decision's to be religious or irreligious is one of the most defining decisions of our lives yet may be due to a neurotransmitter hiccup or a genetic influence? What does it mean that some people's biology causes them to lose faith yet for others their biology builds their faith?

This is a repeat of Meetup held on 1/9. If you attended that event please do not request any RSVP for this event.

Why is religion correlated with a longer, happier life and fewer depressions? Is it illogical and unhealthy to be an atheist? Why is having a strong religious sense correlated with prestige and power in cultures all around the world? Is our religiosity an adaptive trait from an evolutionary perspective? Does biology compel even atheists to recognize the profound adaptiveness of religiosity?

The metamagical thinking of shamans and prophets appears to be associated with schizotypalism, an adaptive cousin of the debilitating and maladaptive mental illness schizophrenia. Is religious belief based on loose associations such as those that are common in schizotypals? How can we distinguish the greatness of prophets such as Abraham, Zoroaster, Jesus, and Muhammad from those who get it wrong like David Koresh, Jim Jones, and Charles Manson? What does "get it wrong" or "get it right" mean?

What does it mean when we learn that the same behavior that is valued and praised as religious ritual (principally, self-cleansing, food preparation, entering and leaving significant places, and numerology) is exactly the same behavior in people afflicted with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD)? Mild OCD behaviors are essential to succeed in school, in business, and in life, so is the mild form of OCD adaptive?

Did Martin Luther have OCD? Can it be that the most significant event in European history in the last millenium (the protestant reformation initiated by Luther) be associated with someone who today might be in therapy? Does it take a borderline mental person who gets it right to invent profound new ways of seeing the world? Do great advancements always require a form of religiosity or just imagination? Is there a difference between religiosity and imagination?

What does it mean that our religiosity is closely associated with the mental illnesses of schizophrenia and obsessive-compulsive disorder? Can religiosity be a highly adaptive form of being not quite mentally ill? Does that explain mental illness? Or explain religiosity? By treating those who are slightly mentally ill, are we potentially losing our ability to have great new prophets?

Do animal studies that achieve "superstitious conditioning" and "temporal lobe personality" in humans (a temporal lobe epilepsy associated with an increased concern with religious and philosophical subjects) suggest that the hippocampus is where the metamagical faculty of cause and effect is centered in the brain? Do our individual differences in this brain center account for much of our religiosity? What does it mean that genetic, hormonal, and other random factors affecting the development of one's hippocampus may cause the tenor of one's religiosity (including our irreligiosity)?

Is our religiosity simply a function our a special case brain developing in our heads under the influences of genetics, hormones, and life experiences (most of which are beyond our control)?

Here is an exquisite (but optional) video resource with Stanford Biologist Robert Sapolsky to contextualize and inform our discussion:

• In this profound and challenging hour and twenty minute video, Robert Sapolsky lays out the biological bases of religiosity:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4WwAQqWUkpI

Read my (CJ Fearnley) notes on Sapolsky's video (https://plus.google.com/u/0/104222466367230914966/posts/PkFLNEonRJH). Read dj Busby's notes on the video (http://astronasty.blogspot.com/2011/11/sapolsky-religion-lecture-dissected.html). Read Bret Wright's article in the Colorado Springs Independent on Sapolsky's take on brains and religion (http://www.csindy.com/coloradosprings/neurobiologist-robert-sapolsky-spreads-the-good-word-about-brains-and-religion/Content?oid=2652816). Read Josh Jones' review of the video (http://www.openculture.com/2014/12/robert-sapolsky-explains-the-biological-basis-of-religiosity.html).

The next two videos supplement the main video above informing this discussion. They add context and texture to Sapolsky's views, but are less substantial.

• In this short 4 minute video, Karen Song interviews Robert Sapolsky about his views on religiosity:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VEiD3N4zeyM

• In this short 8 minute video, Karen Song completes her interview of Robert Sapolsky and his views on religiosity:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Fm_09fPvR4

Read dj Busby's notes on a portion of this video (http://astronasty.blogspot.com/2011/11/atheists-nostalgia-for-religion.html).