What is the function of religion?

[Hegel]

Many atheists, following or walking in pace with Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, Dan Dennett and the rest (the "New Atheists" as they are called) seem to think religion is simply parasitic. It is conceived as just something that our brains are, due to some imperfection (evolutionary side products) are disposed to believe in. Religions are "memeplexes" without any proper function except spreading themselves.

But how plausible is this? Emile Durkheim and others have had a very different view of things: religion is essentially functional. And when you read the new atheists you recognize how they totally ignore the social and ritual side of religions; they view it only as cognitive "belief-systems". Evolutionary psychologist Jonathan Haidt has claimed (as have many others) that the individualism the the view of the New Atheists implies is at odds with psychological reality.

I have three questions:

(1) What are/is the function(s) of religion?

(2) Should someone who does not believe in the truth claims of organized religions (atheists in particular) change his/her view towards religion if it is accpeted that religion actually has beneficial function for a society that our secular age is in danger of destroying?

(3) How could these functions, if one remains thoroughly secular in one's ethics and thought, be implemented within a secular framework; should an atheist or a secularist develop a secular religion, and if so, what could it look?

[FifthElement]

(1) False hope

(2) Religion is destroying itself, no need for external help, it is self destructive concept to begin with

(3) No, there is no need for secular religion of any kind, see North Korea if ever in doubt.

Welcome to the forums

[Bad Wolf]

Religion is not functional at all. Everything that religion does, can be achieved through purely secular means. But there is one exception. One thing religion can do that secular organizations cannot, and that is: making good people do bad things whilst thinking they are good.

[Confused Ape]

In the documentary God On The Brain, Richard Dawkins said this -

DAWKINS: If you ask the question 'what's the survival value of religious belief?' it could be that you're asking the wrong question. What you should be doing is asking what's the survival value of the kind of brain which manifests itself as religious belief under the right circumstances.

The documentary ends with -

NARRATOR: What is beyond doubt is that the origins of religion are even more complex than had been thought. The science of neurotheology has revealed that it is too simplistic to see religion as either spiritually inspired or the result of social conditioning. What it shows is that for some reason our brains have developed specific structures that help us believe in god. Remarkably it seems whether god exists or not, the way our brains have developed, we will go on believing.

DAWKINS: The human religious impulse does seem very difficult to wipe out, which causes me a certain amount of grief. Clearly religion has extreme tenacity.

NEWBERG: Because the brain seems to be designed the way it is, and because religion and spirituality seem to be built so well into that kind of function, the concepts of god and religion are going to be around for a very, very long time.

Shamanism is an interesting belief system in this respect.

Shamanism - Hypotheses on origins

Shamanic practices may originate as early as the Paleolithic, predating all organized religions,[84][85] and certainly as early as the Neolithic period.[85] Early anthropologist studies theorise that shamanism developed as a magic practice to ensure a successful hunt or gathering of food. Evidence in caves and drawings on walls support indications that shamanism started during the Paleolithic era. One such picture featured a half-animal, with the face and legs of a man, with antlers and a tail of a stag.[86]

Archaeological evidence exists for Mesolithic shamanism. The oldest known Shaman grave in the world is located in the Czech Republic at Dolni Vestonice (National Geographic No 174 October 1988). This grave site was evidence of a female shaman.

In November 2008, researchers from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem announced the discovery of a 12,000-year-old site in Israel that is perceived as one of the earliest known shaman burials.

The kind of brain which manifested a belief in shamanism under the right circumstances might have been very been very useful back in the dim and distant past. Organised religion, today, however, doesn't appear to be very useful.

People are leaving organised religion in droves but this doesn't mean all of these people have become atheists. Many have adopted a Neo-Pagan belief system or opted for Quantum Mysticism.

[Foxaèr]

What are/is the function(s) of religion?

The function of religion is nothing more than to delude otherwise rational people into believing in that which there is no evidence to support its existence whereby ultimate control and power over the believers becomes the long-term goal.

Should someone who does not believe in the truth claims of organized religions (atheists in particular) change his/her view towards religion if it is accpeted that religion actually has beneficial function for a society that our secular age is in danger of destroying?

Absolutely not. The little good that religion provides is no argument in its favor when compared to how much suffering and violence it procures, especially since religion always makes the claim of being able to provide peace yet has failed to present it.

How could these functions, if one remains thoroughly secular in one's ethics and thought, be implemented within a secular framework; should an atheist or a secularist develop a secular religion, and if so, what could it look?

There is no such thing as a secular religion. It is a veritable contradiction in terms.

[Godlesspanther]

1. Different religions appear to have different functions. Compare for example the corner Methodist church in which the parishioners show up on Sunday mornings, maybe have a pot luck now and then and that's about it. Then look at the Amish in which the religion encompasses every aspect of the members' lives to the extent that they are isolated from mainstream society. Then look at the political aspects of the Sharia practicing Muslims and is that different from the political goals of the American fundigelicals? Not much, but there are differences.

One could talk about a sense of community -- but what about the monk in a monastery who lives in solitude? Purpose and meaning? What about the Zen Buddhists who turn that on its head? Absolute truth? There are groups that believe that absolute truth is for god only and the rest of us will never have it. The primary purpose of some religions is to get together and dance around singing "I'm so fucking superior, I'm so fucking superior, god loves me, god hates you, I'm so fucking superior."

I don't think that it can be boiled down to a single purpose that would encompass all religions.

2. Some activities of some religious groups do have some benefit for some societies, but the theological component has never been demonstrated to be necessary to perform activities that help people or the planet.

3. I agree with the North Korea example. Absolute devotion and blind obedience with or without a theological component is wrong.

[Hegel]

(2) Religion is destroying itself, no need for external help, it is self destructive concept to begin with

Destroying itself? Every society in human history has, until our secular age, been religious. You cannot be serious ...

(3) No, there is no need for secular religion of any kind, see North Korea if ever in doubt.

Well, that was not really what I had in mind .... I was posing the question that within purely secular framework something that religion guarantees easily is perhaps easily lost. Jonathan Haidt is making point like that.

And North Korean ideology is not, btw, fully secular: it has supernatural elements borrowed from Korean pagan religion.

Welcome to the forums

Fanks.

---

Religion is not functional at all. Everything that religion does, can be achieved through purely secular means. But there is one exception. One thing religion can do that secular organizations cannot, and that is: making good people do bad things whilst thinking they are good.

That's Steve Weinberg. Appreciate him, but here he's not honest. One can make good people do bad things also with purely secular political ideologies.

In any case, the claim that religion has no function is highly implausible, even if all those functions could be (good and bad) accomplished without the supernatural stuff.

Almost every society is religious, and religion is not just about stuff you get in mind when eating too much magic mushrooms. That's not an accident if you think by the evolutionary lines of Darwin.

[Whateverist]

(1) What are/is the function(s) of religion?

You are asking what positive role explains its prevalence in human societies everywhere. Good question. It is easy to identify faults with every particular manifestation. So the question is what it is we've gotten in return that has kept it in play so long? [I don't have the answer but it is a question that interests me.]

(2) Should someone who does not believe in the truth claims of organized religions (atheists in particular) change his/her view towards religion if it is accepted that religion actually has beneficial function for a society that our secular age is in danger of destroying?

Yes. We shouldn't be so hell bent on throwing out the whole thing until we've identified the 'baby' in the bath. At the same time, theists who come here to preach will find their critical thinking skills challenged and, sometimes, their faith as well. (Participation here is not mandatory.)

(3) How could these functions, if one remains thoroughly secular in one's ethics and thought, be implemented within a secular framework; should an atheist or a secularist develop a secular religion, and if so, what could it look?

Make up an ideal religion without all the bad parts? No need. Kurt Vonnegut already did that in his Cat's Cradle novel. Spiritually, I'm a Bokononist.

But seriously I have my doubts about deliberate attempts to manufacture religion. There may be existential value in religious experience of the Shamanic variety, but to have benefit to the society as a whole, that probably works best in a tribal setting. Perhaps we could scavenge a few useful bits from Shamanism for modern consumption. Wait, we already have access to peyote, 'shrooms and such like. The trick then is to provide settings where these can be taken in a sacred/serious setting rather than just for larks. Or maybe we should just go 'walk about' at some point in our lives. Or we could go camping alone on a vision quest with a little substance to put the mind in a different place. Perhaps there should be a recommended reading list for those who go seeking to prepare the conscious mind for surprises.

[Bad Wolf]

That's Steve Weinberg. Appreciate him, but here he's not honest. One can make good people do bad things also with purely secular political ideologies.

Why does everybody miss out the important bit? Religion makes good people do bad things whilst believing they are good. No political ideologies can make you think that flying planes into buildings, is a good thing.

Almost every society is religious, and religion is not just about stuff you get in mind when eating too much magic mushrooms. That's not an accident if you think by the evolutionary lines of Darwin.

And if you think by the evolutionary lines of Darwin, you would know that religion is obsolete.

[Confused Ape]

I've been doing a bit more research. There are still traditional shamans around today and they perform a very important role in their societies - healing. Depending on the the culture, shamans can have expert knowledge of medicinal plants but they use a lot of ritual while acting as 'doctor'.

I found a very interesting article in the Harvard Magazine - The Placebo Effec t - An ingenious researcher finds the real ingredients of “fake” medicine.

“What we ‘placebo neuroscientists’…have learned [is] that therapeutic rituals move a lot of molecules in the patients’ brain, and these molecules are the very same as those activated by the drugs we give in routine clinical practice,” Benedetti wrote in an e-mail. “In other words, rituals and drugs use the very same biochemical pathways to influence the patient’s brain.” It’s those advances in “hard science,” he added, that have given placebo research a legitimacy it never enjoyed before.

A study published online this past year in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences demonstrated that the placebo response can occur even at the unconscious level. The team showed that images flashed on a screen for a fraction of a second—too quickly for conscious recognition—could trigger the response,but only if patients had learned earlier to associate those specific images with healing. Thus, when patients enter a room containing medical equipment they associate with the possibility of feeling better, “the mind may automatically make associations that lead to actual positive health outcomes,” says psychiatry research fellow Karin Jensen, the study’s lead author.

Back in the dim and distant past when there wasn't much in the way of medical treatment, the shamans' rituals could have acted like a placebo. "... the survival value of the kind of brain which manifests itself as religious belief under the right circumstances" could be something to do with Paleolithic patients who believed the most had a better chance of recovering from ailments which it was possible to recover from. They passed on their genes more often than patients who didn't believe.