I thought you’d all appreciate some SCIENCE from a REAL SCIENTIST for a change (and none of that silly computer science crap). And we’ll get to piss off some fundamentalists in the process, so it’s really a win-win situation for you this week. Can I get an Amen!?

Oh….wait….never mind.

This week’s post is based on an article I recently read in Science Magazine (the article is not a recent one by Science standards…people just don’t ever clear the magazines out of the designated break room). The article was entitled “The Nature of Belief”, and it convincingly argued something that every fundamentalist would become furious upon hearing:

Religion is a product of evolution.

The article points out evidence to this hypothesis from select passages from the book Six Impossible Things Before Breakfast by Lewis Wolpert (I myself have not read it but am trying to hunt down a copy to borrow). In his book, Wolpert points out how all belief systems evolutionarily come from the origin of the use and production of tools. By praying to God, a person feels like they have special control over a situation that is control-less (think natural disasters and looming death). This is turn provides optimism and hope. And since since survival is something that is programmed into our genes, then one could argue that the aspects of religion that promotes survival is evolutionary.

Let’s take a look at a computer program called Evogod (it’s not terribly clever name, is it?). Created by James Dow, the simulation takes the religious trait of wanting to give religious information to others and then views whether or not that would evolutionary have an effect on the human population. The simulation assumes that this religious trait is inherently genetic, and therefore will be passed on to offspring. The program then has these trait carrying individuals interact with those would did not spread “unreal information”. What resulted was this: in most situations, those who spread the “unreal information” went extinct. However, if the non-believers (or the ones without the religious trait) could be convinced by the believers (the spreaders of unreal information), religion flourished.

The idea that religion is a product of evolution is not strange, really. In many religions, those who are believers receive more assistance than those who don’t believe, making the survival and the ability to pass one’s genes into the future more likely. In addition, religion brings order, loyalty, and fear into a society; it’s and easier way to control a group, and again, groups who work together tend to have better survivability. You can fight off other groups for resources, easily protect new recruits, and make others less likely to leave the group. All of these are aspects of survival.

In essence, our evolution into Homo sapiens allowed for religion to occur. When we developed the ability to intuitively think about unobservable things, this led humans to many misconceptions. For example, it’s probably better to believe that tiger over there is going to eat you rather than to take a chance and see what it actually does. This may be a crude example of misconceptions and using a belief system, but hopefully you can see the connection to religion from here (granted it’s a leap, but everyone’s good at jumping to conclusions).

So evolution has made us superstitious. How unlucky for us. So here you go religion, you’re a byproduct of evolution. Now can’t we all just get along?

http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/GadgetGuide/Story?id=4941496&page=1
2007. Atran, Scott. Science Magazine 317(5837):456.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article628209.ece

We all have our moments. Moments when your brain suddenly catches up with your actions. Moments where you go, “Well, that was dumb.” Moments that I like to call “Duh” ones. Everyone has them. For most people, we shake our heads or roll our eyes, learn, and move on. For MOST people.

But then there are the select few. The few (well, that may be generous of me, but moving on) who are so dumb that you have no idea how they managed to get dressed in the morning. The ones who give humanity a bad name. These elite individuals have more dumb moments than a bus full of Valley girls at a math convention. You’ve probably heard of them. They’re typically referred to as “plaintiffs”. These people actually sue someone for their own stupidity.

And what’s even more shocking to me is that they frequently win.

Is it just me, or are we actually rewarding the sludges of our gene pool? It’s almost like, “Here, congratulations, you had no idea eating McDonald’s every day would make you obese and have heart problems and the early onset of diabetes. I can understand why. Who would have thought that eating 2342398734 pounds of salt, sugar, and fat would do that to you. Especially in today’s uninformed society. So, here have a shit ton of money. Because we’re sorry no one clued you in. But continue to eat the same way you are now. Please. Oh, and don’t forget to not exercise!”

The American idiots have shown Corporate America that we all apparently have the brain capacity of a 4 year old. And now they’ve taken it upon themselves to point out the absurdly obvious to us, since any fool can call a lawyer and sue a company for big bucks over the smallest of things. I feel like I’m being treating like 4 year old. Caution! Hot Coffee! Whoa there partner. What do you mean the coffee is hot? When did they start doing that? Good thing there’s a label, otherwise I never would have figured it out on my own.

Companies are now even providing Material Safety and Data Sheets (MSDS) on things that don’t need a MSDS. Typically, a MSDS is a form that tells you the chemical composition of a substance, its hazards, and how to properly take care of a spill. In most cases, this is a great thing to have. Would you know how to clean up a beta-estradiol spill? Probably not.

But I like to think I could clean up water on my own without a MSDS.

Oh my God! I spilled water! Quick! Clean it up with soap and water!

Hi all, and welcome to the Foolish Grin!  I want to take a quick minute to introduce you to the site.  So kick back, relax, and help yourself to anything in the fridge.

The Foolish Grin will be an occasional guest posting to its sister site, Abbr. Enth.  Guest posting times will occur when either A) Tristan doesn’t want/have time to write a post, 2) when I annoy him enough that he allows me to guest post, or 3) neither of us wants to contribute a post and I lose the coin toss.  Ok, 3 is unlikely as I never lose a coin toss.  Heads-I-Win-Tails-You-Lose mentality.  I will also post occasionally on my own, but I have a life.

So why the Foolish Grin, you ask?  Well, for two reasons actually.  We all have had moments where we’ve had to wear foolish grins, usually occurring when someone explains something completely obvious to us for the umpteenth time.  Or literally has absolutely no idea what they are talking about, but they outrank you so you can’t really point and laugh until they’ve walked at least 30 feet away.  We also have had moments when we’re the idiot babbling to the wearer of the foolish grin.  Either that, or the person you’re attempting to communicate with is a colossal moron and is doing that spacey nodding thing to you.  You know the one I mean (you probably did it all through high school like I did).  That’s probably more like it.

So I hope that I can enlighten and entertain you all while pointing out the obvious.  It’s no small task, but I have committed myself to it.  Until I get bored.

So welcome to the Foolish Grin.  Now get out of my fridge.  I mean it,  Travis.  Now.