The Evolution of Religion

[pocaracas]

Similarities in texts of different religions mean that stories about god A have been adapted to fit god B.

Not necessarily. You need to show evidence of transmission. for that claim to be more than speculation or intuition. It could also be that A stories and B stories were seprately adapted from earlier C stories, or the similarities could be mere coincidence.

You tell me. What is more likely?
Consider geographical and temporal distances for both "texts".

Anyway, you then say that god gave the truth to Israel... isn't it much simpler, given all the similarities, to see this truth as arising from the "older traditions"?

I don't see how we could quantify which is simpler, and simplicity does not necessarily imply truth anyway.

Simpler, to me, in this case, is something that requires no supernatural activities and is in line with all the scientific observations of the world.

You want to have your god present itself to human kind somewhere in the far past; humans then build a number of pantheons of gods and he eventually comes back to lay the truth on people again....

Yes. Similarities between other religious texts and OT texts make perfect sense in the Biblical paradigm.

Even if these came before the bible?
How do you account for the differences, then?

I see naturalistic patterns. You see supernatural ones. I find my patterns more probable than yours.

Of course you do.

And of course you don't.
To you, magic is much more likely than non-magic.
To you, it is much more likely that the writings of these peoples are accurate representations of divine beings, instead of just mythological stories with no foothold in reality.
Am I wrong?

[John V]

To you, magic is much more likely than non-magic.

That's interesting. How do you reach that conclusion?

[Angrboda]

I think John's point is sound. Correlation of textual elements does not necessarily imply causation. One has to look to more robust evidence of transmission (such as the similar or same phrases appearing lifted from the Marcan gospel; I was told recently that one of the words in the Genesis account of Noah and the flood, relating to the building of the ark, is actually an Akkadian word — that would be fairly strong evidence that it may have been influenced by Akkadian flood stories).

I would point out that there are multiple explanations for the origin and function of religion in human societies, among them, the social cohesion theory that was earlier mentioned. Others include political control theory, artifact of neurology, Jungian archetypes (or anamnesis, take your pick), as well as your so-to-speak "cultural meme" theory, that religious ideas form popular memes that are repeated and change over time. I would suggest two things. First, not putting all your eggs in one basket, especially not prior to your pet theory being demonstrated by independent lines of evidence. I'm of the opinion that the neurology is primary, but that other mechanisms can be and are folded into the service of the neurological imperatives. Second, it would seem you are guilty of some circular reasoning here. You use similarity in mythic elements to evidence borrowing, borrowing to evidence cultural transmission, and then turn around and use that recently proven mechanism to explain additional similarities as being most likely explained by cultural transmission (which itself rests primarily on other textual similarities alone). This is thoroughly improper, and John is right that you need additional lines of evidence before you crown your hypothesis the explanatory champ.

Anyway. I should go.

[pocaracas]

To you, magic is much more likely than non-magic.

That's interesting. How do you reach that conclusion?

Simple: You label yourself as christian. Your interventions in this forum show that you believe that a deity exists. Said deity must interact with this world by some form of magic..... hence, my conclusion that you think magic is likely. It then follows that such a magical interaction of god and humans occurred thousands of years ago, imparting the human race with the knowledge of divine existence.... which then had to be passed from generation to generation by making the young one believe what the elders claim.
I propose that the spark which created the concept of the divine in humans wasn't so magical... Whatever it was, that concept has evolved from then on to become what we see and hear from religious leaders/followers and sympathizers.

---

I think John's point is sound. Correlation of textual elements does not necessarily imply causation.

Indeed.... That's why I then ask what is more probable?
There are many possibilities, but which one actually happened?
How can we, lacking a time machine, tell?

One has to look to more robust evidence of transmission (such as the similar or same phrases appearing lifted from the Marcan gospel; I was told recently that one of the words in the Genesis account of Noah and the flood, relating to the building of the ark, is actually an Akkadian word — that would be fairly strong evidence that it may have been influenced by Akkadian flood stories).

Yes, the flood story... another example of borrowing/adaptation.

I would point out that there are multiple explanations for the origin and function of religion in human societies, among them, the social cohesion theory that was earlier mentioned. Others include political control theory, artifact of neurology, Jungian archetypes (or anamnesis, take your pick), as well as your so-to-speak "cultural meme" theory, that religious ideas form popular memes that are repeated and change over time. I would suggest two things. First, not putting all your eggs in one basket, especially not prior to your pet theory being demonstrated by independent lines of evidence. I'm of the opinion that the neurology is primary, but that other mechanisms can be and are folded into the service of the neurological imperatives.

Well, it's not exactly a pet theory... It just popped into my head this weekend. Feel free to bash it into a wall!
It was simply an attempt at providing a naturalistic explanation to the origin and function of religion in human societies. One that, provided an average person's experiences on this planet, wouldn't make him think: hey wait a minute, there's no such thing as magic, so your theory must be wrong.

Second, it would seem you are guilty of some circular reasoning here. You use similarity in mythic elements to evidence borrowing, borrowing to evidence cultural transmission, and then turn around and use that recently proven mechanism to explain additional similarities as being most likely explained by cultural transmission (which itself rests primarily on other textual similarities alone).

Well, I didn't see it that way.
I saw it as follows:
Hypothesis: religions evolve.
Example of hypothesis in action: mythological borrowing.
Possible explanation for the evolution: the "cultural meme", political control (I believe I scraped on that one).

This is thoroughly improper, and John is right that you need additional lines of evidence before you crown your hypothesis the explanatory champ.

John just wants me not to discard his hypothesis, the one about magic, the one which, to me, is unlikely... very unlikely.

[John V]

That's interesting. How do you reach that conclusion?

Simple: You label yourself as christian. Your interventions in this forum show that you believe that a deity exists. Said deity must interact with this world by some form of magic..... hence, my conclusion that you think magic is likely.

You said that I find magic more likely than non-magic. However, as atheists frequently note, Christians only reject one fewer gods than atheists. In general I find natural explanations more likely than supernatural.

Your use of probabilities is fallacious. To say that an outcome is unlikely in general does not preclude particular instances of the outcome. It was unlikely that my lottery ticket last week was a winner. Yet, two people won. Atheists correctly use this logic when creationists use arguments based on probabilities.

John just wants me not to discard his hypothesis, the one about magic, the one which, to me, is unlikely... very unlikely.

Huh? I don't really care what you accept or discard.