“In sum, the great apes arguably man1 ifest at least some aspects of teleomechanical agency and mentalistic agency (Suddendorf and Whiten 2001);… — Scott Atran Animal Copy Share Image
“Because religious beliefs and experiences cannot be reliably validated through logical deduction or observational induction, validation occurs only by satisfying the emotions… — Scott Atran Faith Copy Share Image
“For my purposes, the differences among animistic, pantheistic, and monotheistic religions can be ascribed to differences in the content of beliefs in… — Scott Atran Faith Copy Share Image
“Around the start of the fourth year, the child begins to elaborate an understanding of metarepresentational agency: the child attributes intentional attitudes,… — Scott Atran Child Copy Share Image
“In religious thought, a person may ride a horse into the sky (Mohammed), ascend to heaven in a chariot of fire (Elijah),… — Scott Atran Afterlife Copy Share Image
“During the first year of life, a child acquires the concept of teleomechanical agency: the child is able to perceive an object’s… — Scott Atran Child Copy Share Image
“One such evolutionary system, or ridge, encompasses panhuman emotional faculties, or affective “programs.” These include the basic, or primary, emotions that Darwin… — Scott Atran Emotions Copy Share Image
“All religions, I claim, involve counterintuitive beliefs in supernatural beings. Moreover, such beliefs are systematically counterintuitive in the same basic ways. As… — Scott Atran Faith Copy Share Image
“Religious ritual invariably offers a sacrificial display of commitment to supernatural agents that is materially costly and emotionally convincing. Such ritual conveys… — Scott Atran Faith Copy Share Image
“Vengefulness signals that a breach in contract will not be tolerated at any cost, even at the price of the avenging individual’s… — Scott Atran Avenging Copy Share Image
“A closer look reveals that God may never have been wholly pleased with His most preferred creations in granting them the parts… — Scott Atran Copy Share Image
“Cultures and religions exist, and are explained, to the extent that they reliably express stucturally enduring relationships among mental states and behaviors… — Scott Atran Mental state Copy Share Image
“There are several types of comparative analysis for garnering evidence for an evolutionary adaptation: structural or behavioral resemblance in different phyletic lines… — Scott Atran Environmental problems Copy Share Image
“The individuals in a cooperative social group cannot afford to tolerate repeated defections by selfish “free riders,” such as those who hoard… — Scott Atran Generosity Copy Share Image
“Hamilton puzzled over the apparently altruistic self-sacrifice of worker bees in forsaking the opportunity to breed in favor of caring for the… — Scott Atran Evolution Copy Share Image
“In theocratic societies, adherence to fundamentalism may enhance the fitness of fundamentalists, as opposed to nonfundamentalists, because fundamentalists are more likely to… — Scott Atran Fitness Copy Share Image
“In the course of life, all such systems (i.e., the different evolutionary ridges) are somewhat functionally interdependent, as are components within each… — Scott Atran Course of life Copy Share Image
“If people literally applied counterfactual religious principles and prescriptions to factual navigation of everyday environments they would likely be either dead or… — Scott Atran Copy Share Image
“Everybody, whether they are religious or not, implicitly knows that religion is costly, counterfactual, and even counterintuitive. The more one accepts what… — Scott Atran Copy Share Image
“Then there are the secondary, mostly “social” emotions, such as anxiety, grief, guilt, pride, vengeance, and love. These may be unique to… — Scott Atran Emotions Copy Share Image
“All religions have core beliefs that confound these innate expectations about the world, such as faith in physically powerful but essentially bodiless… — Scott Atran Core beliefs Copy Share Image
