Kicking away the Godly ladder

If there's one topic that gets humanists excited it's religion. Odd, really, as we're supposed to have left it behind. But religion is more than a collection of superstitions, rules and peculiar habits. Religions have been integral parts of most past and current societies. Religion matters both for its influence on individuals and the way it shapes societies.

So here is a book that deals with the social dimension:
     Big Gods: How religion transformed co-operation and conflict.
     Ara Norenzayan
     Princeton University Press, 2013.

Norenzayan's thesis is that the great monotheisms became dominant because they enabled societies to become bigger and thus able to dominate their competitors. The imperial and expansionist histories of Christianity and Islam, though not of Judaism, certainly support this view though earlier large empires didn't seem to need it.

But, for me, Norenzayan's most interesting points relate to the step after monotheism. He says that strong state institutions, such as police, can substitute for the all-seeing Jehovah God. A few societies, mostly in Scandinavia, have outgrown God and their people behave well without his presence. They have, he says, "climbed the ladder of religion and then kicked it away".

In the UK religious belief is in free-fall but we have not achieved the Scandinavian Utopia. Perhaps the truth is a bit more complex than Norenzayan thinks.

God’s people: Reformers or stormtroopers?

Politics and religion are both ways in which humanity has tried to organise its collective life. The roots of politics lie in our need to make collective decisions and the desire of some people to have others follow their lead. This leads to a range of political forms from participatory democracy to tyranny and genocide.

The roots of religion lie in our tendency to believe that most events are caused by beings with desires (rather than physical processes) and our reluctance to believe that when a loved one dies then that person is gone for good. This leads people to believe in the existence of gods, spirits, ghosts, witches and saints and their involvement in deciding the weather, the harvests and our recovery from illness. Religion also leads to a variety of human behaviour from visiting the sick to torturing suspected witches and to such public displays as sung evensong and the Haj.

In short both are natural for us humans and neither has clean hands.

Does maths explain religious decline?

Last week three American academics got widespread publicity for predicting the continued decline of religion. A specific prediction "nearly 70% of the Netherlands will be non-a liated [to religion] by midcentury" was widely quoted.

So what, you might think. But the paper is more interesting than the press reports suggest.

The authors show that the decline in religious affiliation (as measured in national censuses) in four European countries follows a single mathematical form. They derive this form by assuming that religion and non-religion are two competing social groups - a view that seems ridiculously simple-minded - and explain the growth in non-religion by a drop in the perceived utility of religion. It seems odd, even offensive, to use the term 'utility' for social groups whose key differences are their opinions about truth. More significantly the authors do not explain why the utility of religion should have declined. They therefore provide no insight into the trends they document.

The interesting bit comes next.

The authors extended their mathematical model to cases where there was limited communication between the competing social groups. These models predicted the same processes of change but over a longer period. Even quite small amounts of communication between groups was sufficient to facilitate the decline in religious affiliation IF the utility of affiliation was falling.

This kind of modeling can contribute to our understanding of secularisation - but it will be essential to understand changes in the 'perceived utility of affiliation'.

The paper

A mathematical model of social group competition with application to the growth of religious non-afilliation.
Daniel M. Abrams and Haley A. Yaple of Northwestern University and Richard J. Wiener of the University of Arizona.

What we are really like - scientifically speaking

Two Canadian academics, James Cheyne of Waterloo University and Frederick Britton of the Centre for Inquiry (CFI), have just published a preliminary analysis of a large web-based survey of non-theists. They got responses from 2,563 people, most of whom were from the US (66%) or Canada (14%). The respondents were disproportionately well-educated, male and young.

The findings are interesting though generally unsurprising.

How people become sceptics
Cheyne and Britton found that nontheists generally came from at least moderately religious families and reached their sceptical views in late adolescence. Some experienced family hostility to their non-belief and, unsurprisingly, hostility was greatest in the most religious countries. However, the degree of family hostility was not correlated with the respondents’ own hostility to religion, ie there was no evidence of either reflex hostility nor of compromise of beliefs for family harmony.

An unrelated 2010 survey of 3,412 Americans by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life found that atheists and agnostics know more about religion than religious believers. This pattern remained even after correcting for factors like age and race. It’s reasonable to assume that they formed their views on the basis of their knowledge.

Most humanists, I suspect, think that they reached their views through study and logic and not, for instance, as a result of ignorance or adolescent rebellion. These data support this view.

Politics and morality
Back to Cheyne and Britton.

The nontheists were surprisingly similar in political and moral opinions – and surprisingly radical. Nontheists were politically liberal – except in economic matters. 91% described themselves as “left of centre”. (NB: That’s left of the American, not European, ‘centre’).

Their moral values were fairness, kindness, helpfulness and support for the rights of others. Self-described ‘humanists’ were particularly emphatic on these points.

They were not particularly patriotic, saw little virtue in loyalty per se or respect for traditions and established authority and they rejected the puritanical hostility to ‘carnal pleasure’ that is so common in religion.

Respondents generally followed the humanist ‘line’ on abortion, stem-cell research and euthanasia. These answers, plus support for evolution and concern about overpopulation and global warming, shows that nontheists generally respect science.

Non theists were concerned about religious fundamentalism and terrorism but had quite negative view about military readiness, war, the death penalty and police authority. Clearly they do not see state violence as an appropriate response.

None of this is remarkable to a British humanist like myself but I am pleased to find that these are also the attitudes of north American skeptics.

Attitudes to religion
Most nontheists were hostile to religion. Over 85% held that religious indoctrination of children without offering them a choice of viewpoints was a violation of their rights. The authors describe this as a “rather strong statement” which seems odd as it’s a natural implication of our support for the rights and autonomy of all people.

How ‘Atheists’ differ
The survey invited respondents to describe themselves by one or more of the terms atheist, agnostic, humanist, freethinker and sceptic. No definitions were offered for these terms. Relative to other non-theists, and especially to self-described agnostics, atheists were more likely to:
* Show hostility to religion
* Be confident in their beliefs
* Reject ‘spiritual beliefs’
* Express a ‘sense of gain’ regarding their views.
* Express anger and disgust at moral violations
* Endorse humanist attitudes to abortion, stem-cell research and euthanasia.

The authors speculate that the decision to label oneself an atheist or agnostic may be due to one’s personality type rather than indicating any significant difference of opinion. Atheists are more confident of their opinions and therefore more certain that religion is wrong and thus more hostile to it.

Conclusion
This research confirms generally humanists’ self-image as well-informed and rational people. The broad agreement on moral and political issues and the value of science suggests that should be a way to mobilize many more nontheists in support of the values they hold but may not know that they share with many others.

Why atheism will replace religion

Article from Psychology Today. Nigel Barber asks why do modern conditions produce atheism whilst underdeveloped countries have virtually no atheists?

Atheists are heavily concentrated in economically developed countries, particularly the social democracies of Europe. In underdeveloped countries, there are virtually no atheists. Atheism is thus a peculiarly modern phenomenon. Why do modern conditions produce atheism?

More developed countries, especially Europe, have higher levels of Atheism:

First, as to the distribution of atheism in the world, a clear pattern can be discerned. In sub-Saharan Africa there is almost no atheism (Zuckerman, 2007). Belief in God declines in more developed countries and is concentrated in Europe in countries such as Sweden (64% nonbelievers), Denmark (48%), France (44%) and Germany (42%). In contrast, the incidence of atheism in most sub-Saharan countries is below 1%.

Where people have more control over their lives Atheism is higher:

The question of why economically developed countries turn to atheism has been batted around by anthropologists for about eighty years. Anthropologist James Fraser proposed that scientific prediction and control of nature supplants religion as a means of controlling uncertainty in our lives. This hunch is supported by data showing that the more educated countries have higher levels of non belief.

Where social uncertainty (eg more affluent or better health care) is less more people are atheist: Why?

Atheists are more likely to be college-educated people who live in cities and they are highly concentrated in the social democracies of Europe. Atheism thus blossoms amid affluence where most people feel economically secure. But why? It seems that people turn to religion as a salve for the difficulties and uncertainties of their lives. In social democracies, there is less fear and uncertainty about the future because social welfare programs provide a safety net and better health care means that fewer people can expect to die young. People who are less vulnerable to the hostile forces of nature feel more in control of their lives and less in need of religion.

Where people have smaller families atheism increases:

In addition to being the opium of the people (as Karl Marx contemptuously phrased it), religion may also promote fertility, particularly by promoting marriage, according to copious data reviewed by Sanderson (2008). Large families are preferred in agricultural countries as a source of free labor. In developed "atheist" countries, women have exceptionally small families and do not need religion helping them to raise large families.

Professional psychological health cares means that people are more likely to atheists:

Even the psychological functions of religion face stiff competition today. In modern societies, when people experience psychological difficulties they turn to their doctor, psychologist, or psychiatrist. They want a scientific fix and prefer the real psychotropic medicines dished out by physicians to the metaphorical opiates offered by religion.

High sport spectatorship increases atheism and religion declines.

Sport psychologists find that sports spectatorship provides much the same kind of social, and spiritual, benefits as people obtain from church membership. In a previous post, I made the case that sports is replacing religion. Precisely the same argument can be made for other forms of entertainment with which spectators become deeply involved. Indeed, religion is striking back by trying to compete in popular media, such as televangelism and Christian rock and by hosting live secular entertainment in church.

In summary

The reasons that churches lose ground in developed countries can be summarized in market terms. First, with better science, and with government safety nets, and smaller families, there is less fear and uncertainty in people's daily lives and hence less of a market for religion. At the same time many alternative products are being offered, such as psychotropic medicines and electronic entertainment that have fewer strings attached and that do not require slavish conformity to unscientific beliefs.

Leave your comments below or contribute here.

References
Sanderson, S. K. (2008). Adaptation, evolution, and religion. Religion, 38, 141-156.
Zuckerman, P. (2007). Atheism: Contemporary numbers and patterns. In M. Martin (ed.), The Cambridge companion to atheism. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Humanists4Science Chairman responds to Madeleine Bunting in CiF, Guardian

In the Comment is Free Guardian on 15th April, David Flint, Humanists4Science Chairman has responded to Madeleine Buntings' article in the CiF Guardian section: 'God is attracting more debate than ever'. The New Atheists did not manage to dent the growth of religion across the world. Instead, they only fed our interest in it.

Bunting asks what progress have the 'New Atheists' achieved since the publication of Richard Dawkins 2006 book 'The God Delusion'. She says:

'the great mistake the atheists made is to claim that religion started out as a clumsy stab at science – trying to explain how the world worked – and is now clearly redundant. That misses the point entirely: religion is not about explaining how an earthquake or flood happens; rather it offers meanings for such events. When someone is killed in a car accident, western rationality is good at analysing how the brakes failed and the road curved, but has nothing to say about why, on that particular day, the brakes failed when it was you in the car: the sequence of random events that kill. This search for meaning is part of what drives the religious spirit.'.

David's response is in The Guardian 'Not all religious explanations of tragic events are harmless' - Instead of searching for such meanings, we humanists accept that the universe is unjust.

Leave your comments below.

A brief history of 2009 - New research into belief and non-belief by Tom Rees

Humnaists4Science committee member Dr Tom Rees Epiphenom blog has been very active during 2009. Here are some of his highlights....

Happy (Gregorian) New Year everyone! Let's kick off with a traditional round-up - 2009 was a great year for new research into belief and non-belief, and here's some of the highlights!

The highlight for me was my own paper. This added to the growing body of evidence that social conditions - particularly ones that increase feelings of insecurity - are a major reason why people turn to religion. A paper from Greg Paul also showed a link between religion and societal ill health. The Global Peace Index for 2009 was published, and the countries with the most atheists also scored the best.

Brain scans. Neuroimaging studies are starting to get under the skin of religious beliefs, and several this year showed the religious beliefs seem to tap into the neural pathways used for everyday life. For example, one showed that praying to God is much the same as interacting with another human.

We also learned that God wants the same thing as you happen to want, and also that people seem to create god in their own image. Sam Harris and colleagues showed that religious brains work in a pretty similar way to non-religious brains.

What are the effects of religion? Well, research this year showed that religion acts like an antidepressant, reducing anxiety over mistakes. We got some insights into the link between religion and homophobia, and found that religious prompts make people more obedient.

More highlights from 2009

Why is religion on the rise in so many countries by Dr Tom Rees, Humanists4Science

Dr Tom Rees is a committee member of Humanists4Science. This article appeared in New Humanist magazine Jan / Feb 2010. Click on the images below for detail.

How inequality makes people religious

Tom Rees and Gregory Paul have shown that unequal societies have greater religious observance and more social problems than more equal ones. Paul has shown this for developed countries and Rees for a wider sample.

The correlations are far too strong for this to be coincidence – some causal mechanism must be operating – but neither author has been able to identify it with certainty. We can, however, discover the mechanism by setting the issue in a wider context.

That context is provided by sociologists Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett in The Spirit Level: Why more equal societies almost always do better. Published earlier this year this fascinating book summarises hundreds of research studies. It shows that amongst the rich countries those with less income inequality do better than the rest with respect to community life, mental health, drug abuse, physical health, life expectancy, obesity, education, teenage births, violence, prison population and social mobility. Wow!

Moreover this does not happen because they have fewer poor people – the benefits apply at all income levels.

They also show that inequality is the main CAUSE of this litany of problems – not merely a correlate. This is shown by looking at the persistence of these relationships over decades, the fact that they apply both between countries and between US states and the lack of any plausible mechanism whereby, for instance, murder rates could increase income inequality and the lack of

Perhaps the most interesting element from our point of view is the mechanism they propose whereby inequality creates such problems.

The authors use well-established medical and psychological research to show that low social status is damaging to people’s physical and mental health and to performance on tests of skill. (This is not a uniquely human phenomenon as it’s also been shown in monkeys.) This explains the bad effects on poor and low-status people directly. There are also indirect effects as teenagers from poor areas respond to their sense of inferior status by anxiety about their looks and status, drug use, excessive food consumption, gang membership and demands for ‘respect’. Anorexia, obesity, early pregnancy and violence follow fairly directly.

Religion, of course, provides an alternative response. Teachings about God’s universal love may make low economic status more bearable whilst the support of a believing community helps both psychologically and in practical ways.

High levels of inequality make matters worse by giving almost everyone the sense of having lower income and status than the fat-cat bosses, sportsmen and ‘celebrities’ whose doings fill our papers and screens. Thus in highly unequal societies the bad effects apply to almost everyone – just what the sociological research shows.

In such societies religion is attractive to people at all levels of society as all are exposed to status anxiety. (But the attraction is obviously greater where the anxiety is greater.)

The evidence from The Spirit Level thus suggests strongly that religious observance, like the litany of problems listed above, is driven primarily by inequality.

There is also some evidence for religion as a cause. The US, for instance, scores even worse on several indicators than its inequality would suggest. It is also more religious. Religious beliefs may cause people to despair of attempts to improve society or even to favour policies, such as abstinence-only sex education, that make things worse. It can hardly be coincidence that religious influence on politics, belief in the imminent arrival of the Messiah and abstinence-only sex education are so strong in the USA.

Religion: Lessons from sociology

Those of you who heard Thinking Allowed yesterday will know that H4S member Tom Rees has shown in an academic paper that people in unequal societies are more religious than those in more equal ones, eg Americans are more religious than Swedes. Tom has built a statistical model that explains 60% of the variation in religiosity between countries. Inequality (and not, for instance, affluence) is the most important explanatory factor in this model.

That's academically interesting but what does it mean for humanists?

First, it confirms the humanist view that religion is a social phenomenon. It can be studied by psychologists, sociologists and anthropologists. Tom's research refines the older modernisation theory; that is, the idea that modern ideas and lifestyles undermine religious belief and practice. It shows that this happens because modernisation reduces inequality and, through social security and state medical services, personal insecurity. This links the high level of religious practice in the US with the weakness of its social security, Medicare and Medicaid services. Perhaps that's why fundamentalist US churches are so hostile to 'socialised medicine'!

Now this doesn't disprove the theological claims of religions but it does discredit the idea that the churches show God's working in the world. You would hardly expect God to be less active in Europe than the USA or to have become less active during the 20th century. (Then again, the ways of the Almighty are said to be mysterious ... though mostly by people who think they understand them!)

Second the research also refutes the so-called rational choice theory favoured by some American theorists. This theory claims that people have an innate need for religion and that differences in actual practice reflect differences in the effectiveness of religious organisations in marketing their services. Put crudely, these theorists believe that US churches are more successful than European ones because they are better at marketing. However the research shows that this theory "has no independent power to explain differences in religiosity across this international sample". This is academic-speak for "it's wrong". There is thus no reason to think that people have an innate need for religion (though they clearly have an innate capacity for it).

Third, the research confirms earlier findings that passionate dualism, ie strong belief in God, Hell and the Devil, is correlated with homicide rates. Now Hell and the Devil are violent ideas so it's very likely that it's these beliefs make people more violent, rather than vice versa. The prevalence of passionate dualism explains 25% of the international variation in homicide rates.

So the research shows religion to be a human response to difficult social conditions. Faced with the threats of an unequal society people seek the consolations of religion ('pie in the sky when you die') and the support of a religious community (pie on the table when you get sick). But it's also consistent with the view that religious belief contributes to those threats. Passionate dualism leads to murder whilst the absolutism of religious moralising blocks efforts to improve society. For instance, abstinence-only sex education inspired by American Christians contributes to rates of abortion and sexuallly-transmitted dieases.

In relation to social insecurity, religion is probably as much cause as consolation.

The poverty gap as a cause of religion

Tom Rees, a H4S committee member, was interviewed today by Laurie Taylor on Thinking Allowed, BBC Radio 4. the topic was his recent study on the social causes of religion.

You can listen to it on 'Listen again' (timings from 1.53 to 13.59min): http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00m1nlh/Thinking_Allowed_19_08_2009/

The episode is also downloadable as a podcast, available here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/series/ta/

For more details of the study, you could read the paper (available online), or even better join our Yahoo group and quiz him directly!

A religion of love?

Religious apologists such as Prince Charles often say that Christianity is "a religion of love". A recent survey by the Pew Research Center makes this claim look pretty sick.

A survey of 742 Americans last month found that 49% think it is 'often or sometimes justified to torture terrorist suspects to obtain important information'. In fact the situation is worse than that since only 25% think that it's never justified. (So much for 'western values'!)

Religion does make a difference but unfortunately for its apologists it's the wrong way. The proportion saying torture is often or sometimes justified are:

• 54% of those attending services weekly
• 51% of those attending monthly or less often
  
• 42% of those attending seldom or never.

In truth, religion may not be the real issue here. The big difference is really between Republicans (64% of whom support torture) and Democrats (only 36% of whom do so). American Christianity has to be seen as a social not an intellectual phenomenon. American Republicans go to church to affirm their support for tradition and support torture because they expect to benefit from it through US political and commercial dominance.

OK, it's probably more complicated than that. Americans probably have several other reasons for supporting torture such as support for state authority which is a positive value for conservatives but not for liberals.

What it's not is evidence that religion - even a religion allegedly based on the Sermon on the Mount - makes society better. Plainly, if it has any effect it is to make it worse.

The Biology of Belief at Sam Harris's Reason Project

In collaboration with colleagues at USC and UCLA, Sam Harris is completing a functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) study of religious faith, using both atheists and committed Christians as subjects to elucidate the 'Biology of Belief'.

More on this topic at Tom Rees Epiphenom.


Related Articles:

Harris, S., Sheth, S.A., Cohen, M.S. (2008). Functional neuroimaging of belief, disbelief, and uncertainty. Annals of Neurology, 63(2), 141-147.

Sacks, O. & J. Hirsch. (2008). A Neurology of Belief Annals of Neurology, 63(2), 129-130.

Van Biema, D. (2008). My Nose, My Brain, My Faith. Time. (Jan. 10).

Van Biema, D. (2007). What Your Brain Looks Like on Faith. Time. (Dec. 14).

Shermer, M. (2008). Adam's Maxim and Spinoza's Conjecture. Scientific American. (March).

GOD IN THE LAB, London Sat. 21st March - one day event by Center for Inquiry

GOD IN THE LAB, Sat. 21st March - book now!

Location: Conway Hall. 25 Red Lion Square WC1R 4LR,London

Details: Center for Inquiry, London meeting next Saturday 21 March 2009.

Description: A day with some of the World's leading scientific researchers into faith, many from Oxford University. We'll be looking at hearing voices, possession, etc. What goes on the brain of someone hearing voices? Come and see the MRI scans. Is religious belief hard-wired into us? Yes, says one of our scientists, and provides the empirical evidence.

One of our speakers was recently featured in NEW SCIENTIST magazine: Born believers: How your brain creates God.

A unique opportunity to hear and question those working at the cutting edge of this growing field of scientific research. Presented by CFI London and the Ethical Society.

To book, send a cheque payable to “Centre for Inquiry London” to: Executive Director Suresh Lalvani, Centre for Inquiry London, at the above address (Include names of all those coming). Alternatively pay by PAYPAL. Use the “Support CFI UK” button at www.cfiuk.org and follow the instructions. Or just show up! £10 or £5 concessions.

Start Time: 10:30 (for 11.00)
End Time: 16:00

Belief and the brain's 'God spot'

source: http://richarddawkins.net/article,3650,n,n with Comments (87+)

Reposted from:
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/belief-and-the-brains-god-spot-1641022.html

Scientists say they have located the parts of the brain that control religious faith. And the research proves, they contend, that belief in a higher power is an evolutionary asset that helps human survival. Steve Connor reports

A belief in God is deeply embedded in the human brain, which is programmed for religious experiences, according to a study that analyses why religion is a universal human feature that has encompassed all cultures throughout history.

Scientists searching for the neural "God spot", which is supposed to control religious belief, believe that there is not just one but several areas of the brain that form the biological foundations of religious belief.

The researchers said their findings support the idea that the brain has evolved to be sensitive to any form of belief that improves the chances of survival, which could explain why a belief in God and the supernatural became so widespread in human evolutionary history.

"Religious belief and behaviour are a hallmark of human life, with no accepted animal equivalent, and found in all cultures," said Professor Jordan Grafman (Biography), from the US National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke in Bethesda, near Washington. "Our results are unique in demonstrating that specific components of religious belief are mediated by well-known brain networks, and they support contemporary psychological theories that ground religious belief within evolutionary-adaptive cognitive functions."

Scientists are divided on whether religious belief has a biological basis. Some evolutionary theorists have suggested that Darwinian natural selection may have put a premium on individuals if they were able to use religious belief to survive hardships that may have overwhelmed those with no religious convictions. Others have suggested that religious belief is a side effect of a wider trait in the human brain to search for coherent beliefs about the outside world. Religion and the belief in God, they argue, are just a manifestation of this intrinsic, biological phenomenon that makes the human brain so intelligent and adaptable.

The latest study, published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, involved analysing the brains of volunteers, who had been asked to think about religious and moral problems and questions. For the analysis, the researchers used a functional magnetic-resonance imaging machine, which can identify the most energetically-active regions of the brain.

They found that people of different religious persuasions and beliefs, as well as atheists, all tended to use the same electrical circuits in the brain to solve a perceived moral conundrum – and the same circuits were used when religiously-inclined people dealt with issues related to God.

The study found that several areas of the brain are involved in religious belief, one within the frontal lobes of the cortex – which are unique to humans – and another in the more evolutionary-ancient regions deeper inside the brain, which humans share with apes and other primates, Professor Grafman said.

"There is nothing unique about religious belief in these brain structures. Religion doesn't have a 'God spot' as such, instead it's embedded in a whole range of other belief systems in the brain that we use everyday," Professor Grafman said.

The search for the God spot has in the past led scientists to many different regions of the brain. An early contender was the brain's temporal lobe, a large section of the brain that sits over each ear, because temporal-lobe epileptics suffering seizures in these regions frequently report having intense religious experiences. One of the principal exponents of this idea was Vilayanur Ramachandran, from the University of California, San Diego, who asked several of his patients with temporal-lobe epilepsy to listen to a mixture of religious, sexual and neutral words while measuring their levels of arousal and emotional reactions. Religious words elicited an unusually high response in these patients.

This work was followed by a study where scientists tried to stimulate the temporal lobes with a rotating magnetic field produced by a "God helmet". Michael Persinger, from Laurentian University in Ontario, found that he could artificially create the experience of religious feelings – the helmet's wearer reports being in the presence of a spirit or having a profound feeling of cosmic bliss.

Dr Persinger said that about eight in every 10 volunteers report quasi-religious feelings when wearing his helmet. However, when Professor Richard Dawkins, an evolutionist and renowned atheist, wore it during the making of a BBC documentary, he famously failed to find God, saying that the helmet only affected his breathing and his limbs.

Other studies of people taking part in Buddhist meditation suggested the parietal lobes at the upper back region of the brain were involved in controlling religious belief, in particular the mystical elements that gave people a feeling of being on a higher plane during prayer.

Andrew Newberg, from the University of Pennsylvania, injected radioactive isotope into Buddhists at the point at which they achieved meditative nirvana. Using a special camera, he captured the distribution of the tracer in the brain, which led the researchers to identify the parietal lobes as playing a key role during this transcendental state.

Professor Grafman was more interested in how people coped with everyday moral and religious questions. He said that the latest study, published today, suggests the brain is inherently sensitive to believing in almost anything if there are grounds for doing so, but when there is a mystery about something, the same neural machinery is co-opted in the formulation of religious belief.

"When we have incomplete knowledge of the world around us, it offers us the opportunities to believe in God. When we don't have a scientific explanation for something, we tend to rely on supernatural explanations," said Professor Grafman, who believes in God. "Maybe obeying supernatural forces that we had no knowledge of made it easier for religious forms of belief to emerge."

Tom Rees, H4S member has reviewed this research at Epiphenom.

Pakistan: Undermined by a toxic mixture

It's tempting to see yesterday's murderous attack in Lahore as just another Islamist atrocity. Another attempt by religious fanatics to take over a state.

And that's true but it's not the whole truth. The Pakistani people are the victims of an historical cocktail in which religion, nationalism, American and Russian arrogance, Indian rigidity and Saudi money combine to make a toxic mixture.

It's tempting to assume, as everyone else seems to, that this attack is the work of an Islamist group. It's plausible enough but one thing makes this stand out from most other Islamist attacks - the murderers all survived. They clearly made and executed well a plan for an orderly withdrawl under fire. Most Islamist 'terrorists' expect to, even wish to, die fighting Islam's enemies. Yesterday's gunmen had a quite untypical desire to survive.

To me - a person whose military knowledge comes mostly from novels - weapons, targeting and tactics all looked more like an operation by special forces than a 'terrorist' outrage. That, in turn, suggests state sponsorship of the attack but by which state?

Enough speculation. Islamist fanatics are the obvious candidates.

But where do they come from? Maybe they come from the North West Frontier Province, which has long had its own, tribal and religious, system of government and law. (It's as if we had agreed that Welsh councilors should be free to force everyone to attend chapel and sing in choirs. With beatings for those singing out of tune!)

This region, bordering on Afghanistan, provides a safe haven for Muslim fanatics of various kinds. This fanaticism has been encouraged by an unlikely set of supporters;

• Saudi Arabia has funded a network of religious schools, madrassahs, which fill the gap left by Pakistan's own educational system but teach only the Saudi's own fundamentalist brand of Islam.
• The Pakistan Security Service (ISI) which has supported Muslim fighters (muhjahadeen) in order to undermine India's control of Kashmir and, previously, Russian control of Afghanistan.
• The US, which also supported the muhjadeen against the Russians and whose policies in Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran and Palestine have persuaded Muslims who might have been friends that the US hates them.
  
• India, whose control of (most of) Muslim majority Kashmir has been a cause celebre for Pakistani nationalists. India should at least give the Kashmiris a choice.

For Pakistan's rulers, especially its military rulers, religion has been a banner to rally support against foreigners and radicals. The people are, obviously, Muslim. But they would not have given support to fanatical cults without the malign influence of foreigners and the cynicism of their own rulers. The greatest sufferers from this have been the Pakistani people and especially Pakistani women.

Yesterday's attack will alienate foreigners - us. Who now will visit on business or holidays? And in that way they will have succeeded even though no cricketers were killed.

Does atheism foster immorality?

One of the many strange accusations directed against atheists is that we wish to undermine morality. This seems absurd to most humanists since we are, mostly, rather ordinary and conventional. We may not obey the local religious food laws or attend Sunday/Saturday/Friday worship but we’re rather less likely than the religious to lie, steal or assault our neighbours.

So why do they say these things?

Let’s start by asking why people practice a religion. For most believers it’s because that’s how they were raised (a point I heard made by the then Archbishop of Canterbury in 1968!). It’s not because they sought the truth and found that this religion, rather than all the others, expressed it. They also enjoy the rituals (prayers, meditation, hymns, dances) in which they’ve been raised and the fellowship of the believing community.

But it’s hard to see why enjoyment of singing or prayer should lead to the sheer energy, and sometimes hatred, with which religions inspire their followers. The religious often say that their faith gives meaning to their lives and this, I believe, is the key.

There are two kinds of meaning, existential and moral (though they are related).

Religions offer answers to existential questions like: Why are we here? What's the purpose of life? Philosophically these may be category errors but they are, for some people, emotionally powerful. People do not only, or even largely, ask these questions out of curiosity but rather because they find life frightening and want reassurance that are reasons behind the arbitrariness of ordinary life. They are likely to feel most in need of answers when life is most frightening and arbitrary.

Religions also offer answers to moral questions notably: Why should I be good? Most people know that courage, kindness and loyalty, at least to their clan, tribe or nation, are good and that lying, theft and murder are bad. But bad things are sometimes convenient and profitable. Most of us are tempted, and we fear that others may succumb to temptation. It would be reassuring to know that, even if wickedness is rewarded on Earth it will be punished in a future life.

Most religions (including Christianity, Islam, and some forms of Hinduism and Buddhism) therefore promise a future life that is either spiritual (in heaven or hell) or earthly (following reincarnation). This future life provides a basis for divine rewards and punishments.

I believe that religious claims that atheism promotes immorality arise because the religious feel that they would behave wickedly if they did not have the moral meaning provided by their religions. (In fact I think they’re mistaken. In this I think better of them than they seem to think of themselves.) They therefore believe that undermining their ideas of moral meaning, which we do do, must necessarily make people immoral. Their desire – which we generally share – that people should behave morally drives their hostility to atheism.

Of course, there are issues on which Humanist morality really is different from that of the religious. There are various issues, notably about sex, death and personal freedom, on which we generally take positions to which they object. Doubtless this contributes to their feelings. But these aren’t usually the focus of their claims.

It’s likely that the religious anger against atheists has more than one source, but the issue of moral meaning must be a main one.

Woods! Hamilton! Obama! Let’s hear it for miscegenation!

What have the world’s greatest golfer, champion racing driver and liberal hope for the US presidency got in common? Well one thing is that they are all mixed race. All are products of miscegenation.

What a word. Who would care?

But it’s not long since many people, not just those of us of mixed race or having partners of other races, cared deeply. Miscegenation was illegal in Nazi Germany, in 16 of the states of the USA until 1967, and in South Africa until 1985. And in many other countries, including the UK, it was legal but widely disapproved of.

Most of the anti-miscegenation laws were based on the view that there was distinct white race and that it was better than other races. Scientifically speaking the first point is more than doubtful; there is more genetic variation within each so-called race than between races. The second point is equally hard to defend. It was, after all, members of the white race who invented concentration camps, atomic bombs and fascism.

Orthodox religion has, unsurprisingly, also been hostile to miscegenation. From the Dutch Reformed Church (known to English-speaking South Africans as the Much Deformed Church) to American fundamentalists like Jerry Falwell. As recently as 2000 the Bob Jones University – a Southern fundamentalist outfit – was unrepentantly hostile to inter-racial dating. Students who offended could be expelled. (BJU is, of course, the source of the Reverend Ian Paisley’s doctorate.)

These backward attitudes were not unique to the churches – indeed they were widely held by many westerners throughout the 19^th and early 20^th centuries. But they survived longest in these religious ghettos.

So let’s recognise the success of these, and other, products of miscegenation. Long may they prosper! And let’s hope we’ve seen the last of the prejudice that would have prevented their births.

(First posted 3 Nov 2008)