Desirability of religion and the non-cognitive function of misbeliefs

Konrad Talmont-Kaminski Marie Curie-Sklodowska U., Poland

Background Philosopher of science

Investigating superstitious, magical and religious beliefs and practices As cognitive, evolved phenomena Their relation to science and human rationality

PhD from Monash Uni, Australia Teaching in Lublin, Poland Fellowship at the Konrad Lorenz Institute for

Evolution and Cognition Research

Background Two developments make my approach possible The cognitive turn

1960’s onwards Positing mental mechanisms to explain behaviour Applied to religious & superstitious practices

Evolutionary explanations of human behaviour 1970’s onwards Ultimate vs. proximate explanations Behaviours as adaptive, byproducts, etc. Cultural as well as genetic evolution Applied to religious & superstitious practices

Background Cognitive Science of Religion

Pascal Boyer, Justin Barrett Religion as byproduct Evolutionary psychology Massive modularity Dual-process accounts of

reasoning Other approaches exist Approach pursued by me

Religion as a cultural adaptation that exapts/recruits existing cognitive byproducts

Dual inheritance theory Bounded rationality theory

Plan How can misbeliefs be adaptive? In what ways can misbeliefs be protected? What makes certain misbeliefs plausible? Why are some misbeliefs potentially

desirable? What effect does investigating misbeliefs

have?

Adaptive misbeliefs Misbeliefs can motivate adaptive behaviour

Fear of Fri 13th leads to avoiding train crash Coincidental Only significant if systematic

Possible systematic examples Magical contagion Religion

Adaptive misbeliefs Magical Contagion (Paul Rozin)

Cardigan example (Bruce Hood) Fear of ‘catching’ evil Invisible vehicles of contagion passed by

contact Very useful given bacteria & viruses False explanation, partly true (overgeneralised)

correlation Role of explanation?

Ideas of magical contagion motivate behaviour Ideas of magical contagion post hoc

explanation of behaviour Studied extensively by Paul Rozin

Misbelief explained as byproduct of cognitive heuristic

Adaptive misbeliefs McKay and Dennett, BBS 32.6 (2009) The “boy who cried wolf” problem

Misbelief in the face of counterevidence Misbelief unstable due to

counterevidence Can not be systematically adaptive

Disproved misbeliefs Rejected Reinterpreted

Contagion example Belief that you can catch evil not adaptive But, belief in contagion in general is

Protecting misbeliefs Misbeliefs can be protected against

counterevidence Talmont-Kaminski, BBS 32.6 & Teorema 28.3

(2009) Protected misbeliefs stable Can still motivate behaviour

Three ways to protect misbeliefs Content Social context Methodological context

Protecting misbeliefs Content of stable misbeliefs

Avoid content in direct conflict with experience Claim epistemic impediments

Invisibility – ghosts, Christian god Shyness – faeries Distant locale – dragons, Olympic gods Shape-shifting – Olympic gods Vagueness – New Age beliefs

Semi-propositional content (Sperber) Holy Trinity

Apparent problem Belief in the face of the lack of evidence

Protecting misbeliefs Social context of misbeliefs

Make investigation of misbeliefs socially unacceptable The sacred – religious and magical beliefs

Religious relics Respecting religious beliefs above other beliefs

Disparage curiosity Oppose rational criticism

Problem Stultifies progress

Protecting misbeliefs Methodological context of misbeliefs

Related to social context Limit development of science

Scientific theories Scientific methods/equipment Scientific attitudes

Problem Limited access to science

Not such an issue traditionally

Plausible misbeliefs Why believe without evidence?

Not really a problem Only problem with perfectly rational beings Boundedly rational beings will have systematic

biases Why believe without evidence the things we

do? Primarily: Due to the particularities of human

cognitive system Due to the particular heuristics humans use

Secondarily: Due to function of the beliefs

Plausible misbeliefs By-products of cognitive heuristics

Type I errors (Skinner) Error Management Theory (Haselton) Smoke alarm principle

Magical contagion (Rozin) Contagion heuristic

Cognitive science of religion Minimally counterintuitive concepts

(Boyer) Hyperactive agency detection device

(Guthrie) Enormous scope for further empirical

research

Desirability of misbeliefs What, if anything, is the

function of misbeliefs? Not to accurately represent the

world Protecting against disconfirmation

ensures truth of a belief is coincidental

Allows noncognitive functions to determine popularity of belief

Function must depend upon the behaviour motivated by the belief

Desirability of misbeliefs Several possibilities

Adaptive for individuals Costly-signalling (Sosis)

Adaptive for groups Prosocial behaviour (D. S. Wilson)

Adaptive for beliefs Memetic virus (Dawkins, Blackmore)

Not directly functional Simply a byproduct (Boyer)

Desirability of misbeliefs Which thesis about function is correct?

Need to investigate religion to find out Answer may be complex

Superstitions – byproducts Religions – prosocial exaptations (ancestral traits?)

Is religion is something desirable for us? Universally assumed by religious individuals

Dennett’s “Belief in belief” Need to investigate religion to find out Not necessarily even if an individual-level

adaptation Dennett’s question: Who thinks that their goal in life is to

have as many kids as possible? Issue is somewhat more complex, of course

Still, Dennett has a point

Investigating misbeliefs Even if religious is desirable

There is a problem Investigation of religion

Requires scientific attitude Maintaining positive effects of religious claims

Requires maintaining belief in those claims Which requires protecting those beliefs

Investigation of religion undermines its function Even if that function happens to be individually

desirable But to determine if religion is desirable we must

investigate it

Thank youKonrad Talmont-Kaminskikonrad@talmont.comlublin.academia.edu/KonradTalmontKaminski

McKay & Dennett, Evolution of Misbelief, BBS 32.6 (2009)

Talmont-Kaminski, Effective untestability and bounded rationality help in seeing religion as adaptive misbelief, BBS 32.6 (2009)

Talmont-Kaminski, Fixation of superstitious beliefs, Teorema 28.3 (2009)