## Metadata author:: [[@Hidden Brain]] publish_date:: reviewed_date:: ## Highlights - Speaker 1: And so it was only in the last 12,000 years that we started getting groups that bubbled up from beyond 100 150 people to 1000 10,000 people, and what that means is that it needed something more than just our genetic inheritance. It needed a cultural idea. I needed a cultural innovation to allow us to succeed in these larger groups. And so one of the things that me and my colleagues have been arguing is that religion was one of these cultural innovations. Speaker 0: Assim Sharif's research suggests that early humans could be convinced to cooperate if they thought that God was going to punish them. This psychological innovation allowed large societies to function effectively, [(Time 0:02:29)](https://www.airr.io/quote/63c1a8bd7f205624b603f6ab) - notes:: And what would happen if someone join the group with honor, and the desire to contribute sometimes even above their share, find others become those cheaters and leaches, and instead opt out of a group, decide to leave to try and find a group better suited to their idea of what a group should be - Speaker 1: So if you look at societies that were larger, that is, with more anonymous strangers, you tend to see these types of God's emerge more frequently in those societies, But you also see them emerge more frequently in societies that faced, say, particularly acute resource scarcity issues. So in a place where it's very, very important that you share water in trustworthy, equitable ways, you see these types of big Amish in punitive God's emerged there as well. And so there is this, yes, this correlation, as far as we can tell now, between the necessity of cooperation and the types of cultural innovation, the religious innovations that would be most effective at bringing it about, Speaker 0: what is the [(Time 0:13:11)](https://www.airr.io/quote/63c1ca317f205624b607e450) - notes:: Which stands to reason why polytheism in the Viking groups would have conflict and fight, versus being united under a monotheistic religion like those of the Christian nations in the divine right of kings - Speaker 1: me an example? So a lot of research has been done on these These small tribes like the Hansa, Um, and where the gods are there more like trickster spirits there. Neither Amish IND. Nor are they punishing the types of immoral behavior that would be necessary to get rid of in order to be cooperative, the gods are again small forest spirits or trickster spirits that don't have the power nor the punitive ability, nor the really concern for for these moral issues. Speaker 0: Now, of course, this view of religion comparing ancient hunter gatherer tribes with modern societies or measuring which God's produce What behavior? This kind of thinking can seem completely [(Time 0:14:43)](https://www.airr.io/quote/63c1cc4f7f205624b6082696) - notes:: Polytheism would have it to place your nuts and about quantity over quality - Speaker 0: You can see these patterns in the historical record. For example, ancient humans worshipped gods who could prevent natural disasters. But as the needs of society's changed, their gods changed to let us [(Time 0:24:41)](https://www.airr.io/quote/63c1cc987f205624b6082fd9) - notes:: Inheritance - Speaker 1: sex or if you do only use birth control. Which society looking down 123 generations is going to be better off? Well, the one that actually produced offspring became a larger civilization civilization that was able to out compete either in act of warfare or just through taking the resources of the other society. It's a competition between cultural ideas and cultural groups, such that those socially functional ideas tend to be preserved over generations. And so this is how cultural evolution works. [(Time 0:27:23)](https://www.airr.io/quote/63c1cd877f205624b6084d28) - notes:: Yahweh wanted his followers to spread like a virus and multiple within the confines of approved family values - Speaker 0: norms? Speaker 1: So this is one of the really great examples of how evolutionary theory can inform our understanding of religion. Things that were previously mysterious about religion now makes sense in an evolutionary perspective. So in evolution, there's this concept of costly signaling, uh, that you have a hard to fake signal, which serves as a reliable Q of something you're trying to demonstrate. So the classic example of this is peacock feathers. The male peacock has this beautiful plumage, which is a sexual display. And the reason it's an effective sexual display is because only the healthiest peacocks can have the large plumage because of how costly it is to other aspects of the peacocks [(Time 0:28:49)](https://www.airr.io/quote/63c1ce037f205624b6085d10) - notes:: A great argument to be made here about the declining monotheism and rising of pagan religions could be supported by since cultural impact of which religions become popular in western time based on means, and what are the needs that we’re currently experiencing causes transition, these needs: environ - Speaker 0: he showed, along with his colleagues at extreme rituals, often had a big effect on promoting moral behavior, not among the performers of the ritual but on observers. Speaker 1: Yeah, so one of the leaders in this type of extreme ritual researches is this anthropologist Demetrius. Single lots who's done this really interesting research on on fire walkers. And what you find is that when you have observers watching people undergoing these rituals, their actual heartbeats synchronize with the people engaging in the rituals. And the more you have that synchronization, the more they feel like they're part of a group. And so you ask. Well, why did fire walking emerge? Why did [(Time 0:35:34)](https://www.airr.io/quote/63c1d01a7f205624b6089703) - notes:: The unexamined life allows you to believe whatever you want to believe about your actions, without understanding the true underlying motive and outcome of those actions  - Speaker 4: in text like the opening shots philosophical texts, it is used to represent the reality that encompasses the entire universe. Speaker 5: Often Speaker 4: a text or a chant, a mantra will start with the syllable OEM, and I think the reason why that is, not only does it have the significance of standing for a particular God in his totality or her totality, but you have this column of sound that gives you a sense of vastness. I think it's sort of similar to what happens when you have [(Time 0:37:40)](https://www.airr.io/quote/63c301ce7f205624b62a5dee) - notes:: The bonding of men in groups who shared activity, especially with synchronization, such as marching/trooping  - Speaker 1: like freedom. We will sacrifice our nation. Thank Speaker 0: you. God bless Speaker 7: you. And Speaker 0: God bless America Speaker 1: will sacrifice the flag, flag, stay America and and in terms of the governmental institutions that can spread trust. One of the interesting things you see is that if you look across countries, those countries that report having the least importance of religion to their daily lives are the countries that have the highest faith in the rule of law. So those are the places where you trust the institutions like the bank or contract enforcement or the police or the justice system. Once you can set up those types of trusted secular institutions, well, that [(Time 0:46:16)](https://www.airr.io/quote/63c303d27f205624b62ab2c9) - notes:: Christianity - AirrQuote [(Time 0:47:31)](https://www.airr.io/quote/63c305387f205624b62ac6a9) - notes:: We sacrilize capitalism