Evolution is Cruel to Dawkins and Dennett
by MikeGeneJack Miles reviews Daniel Dennett's anti-religious book, Breaking The Spell. It is an interesting review, but I think Miles fails to fully extract a deeper message - contained within the review are two points that underscore the manner in which Evolution has been exceedingly cruel to Daniel Dennett and his tag-team partner, Richard Dawkins. Dennett relies on evolutionary psychology to explain the origin and existence of religion. And it looks like his partner, Richard Dawkins, will play up the same angle in his anti-religious book, The God Delusion.
All of this is ironic given that evolutionary biologist Jerry Coyne refers to evolutionary psychology as the "latest deadweight dragging us closer to phrenology." That Dennett and Dawkins have chosen such a flabby, albeit faddish, club suggests they possess a certain desperation to rid the world of religion. Nevertheless, for the purpose of this blog, let us imagine that their thesis is completely valid "“ there is no God and natural selection simply shaped our brains such that we are predisposed to accept the God delusion. Such a reality is a sad place for Dennett and Dawkins.
According to Dennett and Dawkins, millions of years of evolution have shaped human beings to be religious. If an alien species were to study humans, religious expression and belief would, in essence, be part of the human phenotype. And thus we see the first dimension of Evolution's cruelty to Dennett and Dawkins. In their quest to rid the world of religion, they have chosen to do battle with human nature. But not only do they struggle against something that evolution has produced, they appear doomed because they are still struggling against evolution.
According to Miles:
Fertility rates in the relatively secular blue states are 12 percent lower than in the relatively religious red states, according to Philip Longman in the March/April issue of Foreign Policy. In Europe, a similar correlation holds. As Longman writes: "Do you seldom, if ever, attend church? For whatever reason, people answering affirmatively . . . are far more likely to live alone, or in childless, cohabitating unions, than those who answer negatively." For the most secular cultures in the world, Longman predicts a temporary drop in absolute population as secular liberals die out and a concomitant cultural transformation as, "by a process similar to survival of the fittest," they are demographically replaced by religious conservatives.
A reproductive differential of this sort, of course, does not prove the truth of the patriarchal religion that Longman sees positively correlated with it, and Daniel C. Dennett would be the first to point this out. But the sense of siege that haunts the eminent philosopher's "Breaking the Spell" may owe something to a background anxiety that though his side, the skeptical side, may have the best arguments, it is dying out anyway.
In fact, Longman gets more specific than this:
So where will the children of the future come from? The answer may be from people who are at odds with the modern environment — either those who don't understand the new rules of the game, which make large families an economic and social liability, or those who, out of religious or chauvinistic conviction, reject the game altogether.
Today there is a strong correlation between religious conviction and high fertility. In the United States, for example, fully 47 percent of people who attend church weekly say that the ideal family size is three or more children, as compared to only 27 percent of those who seldom attend church. In Utah, where 69 percent of all residents are registered members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, fertility rates are the highest in the nation. Utah annually produces 90 children for every 1,000 women of childbearing age. By comparison, Vermont — the only state to send a socialist to Congress and the first to embrace gay civil unions — produces only 49.
Does this mean that the future belongs to those who believe they are (or who are in fact) commanded by a higher power to procreate? Based on current trends, the answer appears to be yes. Once, demographers believed that some law of human nature would prevent fertility rates from remaining below replacement level within any healthy population for more than brief periods. After all, don't we all carry the genes of our Neolithic ancestors, who one way or another managed to produce enough babies to sustain the race? Today, however, it has become clear that no law of nature ensures that human beings, living in free, developed societies, will create enough children to reproduce themselves. Japanese fertility rates have been below replacement levels since the mid-1950s, and the last time Europeans produced enough children to reproduce themselves was the mid-1970s. Yet modern institutions have yet to adapt to this new reality.
Current demographic trends work against modernity in another way as well. Not only is the spread of urbanization and industrialization itself a major cause of falling fertility, it is also a major cause of so-called diseases of affluence, such as overeating, lack of exercise, and substance abuse, which leave a higher and higher percentage of the population stricken by chronic medical conditions. Those who reject modernity would thus seem to have an evolutionary advantage, whether they are clean-living Mormons or Muslims, or members of emerging sects and national movements that emphasize high birthrates and anti-materialism.
And thus we see Evolution's Final Act of Cruelty imposed on Dawkins and Dennett. Rather than get distracted by arguing whether they are correct, consider, at least for this moment, what it means if they are correct. Evolution has given Dennett and Dawkins a reality where they do not "fit" - the majority of their fellow species believe in some form a religion. Evolution has shaped the human brain to be religious and evangelistic efforts of Dawkins and Dennett are not going to undo the blind watchmaker's handiwork - religious circuitry that exists within in our brains. Then comes the ultimate insult. Even if it is possible to "secularize" a population, this appears to be a fleeting, transient transitional phase. The fecundity of a population full of Dennetts and Dawkins plummets and this population finds itself with an inferior fitness compared to a population of Falwells and Robertsons. Evolution itself ensures that the religious mindset will persist. It's been doing so for millennia.
And therein may lie the most cruel irony of evolution. While it may make it possible for Richard Dawkins to be intellectually fulfilled, it also means that Dawkins, from an evolutionary perspective, embraces a world view that is maladapted to his biological essence and thus is nothing more than another evolutionary oddity whose lineage is a dead-end.
July 29th, 2006 at 12:49 pm
Poor Danny and Dickie…natural selection, it seems, has selected them for exitinction!
Comment by DonaldM — July 29, 2006 @ 12:49 pm
July 29th, 2006 at 12:50 pm
Just checked UD and found a nice tie-in:
Sam Harris has reviewed a book that has clearly terrified him:
His sense of paranoia stems from the naïve hope of secularists eliminating relgion, such that any serious public expression of religion is equated with "fascism." But it should not surprise us that religion would be more and more popular with youth, since more and more youth are being born in religious households (comparatively speaking). Since secularists find "meaning" in their careers and their amount of material possessions (a "reality-based" lifestyle), they will be much more likely to abort their offspring or put off having them until they can have one or two at most.
Comment by MikeGene — July 29, 2006 @ 12:50 pm
July 29th, 2006 at 1:21 pm
LOL!!! While some religious believers in the US do tend to have more babies than the terminally selfish (often materialist) crew, lots of religious people do practice birth control. It's the economy [stupid], as someone once said…
But then you'd have to add the number of other people's throw-aways that religiously-oriented people end up raising when the tally's done. I produced 2 genetic recombinations with my husband, then got it fixed (not a happy, healthy pregnant lady). Then I raised 5 throwaways and adopted 3 orphans. I'm a big believer in the already housebroken…
Anyway, for whatever lack of rules, regulation and general indoctrination in spiritually-oriented ways of dealing with the larger world, those who got none of it from their biological parents do tend to pick up on it right quick when someone cares to teach them. In my experience, of course…
Comment by Joy — July 29, 2006 @ 1:21 pm
July 29th, 2006 at 5:43 pm
So let's make a prediction in name of evolution: We won't see any darwinists around within 500 years or so, because they don't produce enough offsprings to survive. Their competitors, the believers, subtly and slowly will outnumber them with less or limited resources. And since the blind watchmaker is unable to see , he is not capable of distinguishing his worshipers and allow them to survive!
no design, no purpose, no evil and no good, nothing but blind pitiless indifference!
Only the fittest survives!
Comment by Farshad — July 29, 2006 @ 5:43 pm
July 29th, 2006 at 7:05 pm
From schools, silly. That's why it's so absolutely, utterly, important for Darwinian thought to win the day over the inanity of Creationist dogma in the battle for education - if they don't, all the little ones will grow up to be non-Darwinians.
Sometimes, in evolutionary theory, false beliefs can be "fitter" than true beliefs, it seems. Long live evolutionary theory!
Comment by Douglas — July 29, 2006 @ 7:05 pm
July 29th, 2006 at 8:15 pm
If "I got it from my parents" were the only force determining the religious beliefs of a population, there never would have been a Protestant Reformation, or a growth of secularism, or anything else. So, this whole thread is absurd. Among the bogus assumptions: (1) birth rates of a particular group never change (in fact, they can change dramatically within human lifetimes), (2) children of parents with religious views X never change to religious views Y, Z, etc., (3) church attendance does not vary systematically with a person's age, status as parents, etc. (4)
Dawkins and Dennett, despite numerous things that are arguable in their views, know this perfectly well, and so they won't see any reason to be worried by arguments based on these flawed assumptions.
I thought I had read something about this recently…google brings up the factoid from Answers in Genesis:
Knowing AiG, I can't promise this is completely accurate, but the Barna Institute is considered a pretty serious evangelical polling group, so there is where to go for a more realistic assessment of gain/loss rates.
Comment by Nick Matzke — July 29, 2006 @ 8:15 pm
July 29th, 2006 at 10:37 pm
Dear Nick,
It is the position of Dennett, Dawkins and yourself that are absurd. I am certain that Dennett and Dawkins will not be worried for reasons that have nothing to do with reason, as is usually the case.
One has to wonder why, and over how many years, it has taken "evolution" to shape human beings to be scientists. Until "evolutionary psychology" has explained "scientific beliefs" (e.g., evolutionary psychology), I see no reason to accept any explanation it may have to offer wrt to religious beliefs.
Comment by Mung — July 29, 2006 @ 10:37 pm
July 30th, 2006 at 4:57 am
Nick:
I agree. But Dawkins does seem to subscribe to the notion that "I got it from my parents" is the only force determining the religious beliefs of a population. That's one reason why he pushes hard about the nonsense of religion being child abuse. It may also explain why PZ Myers doubted Francis Collins conversion account.
Obviously, there are many variables at play that move in both directions. But if one believes that the "religious sense" evolved by natural selection, it must have some component of heredity. I should point out that I don't really think the atheistic world view is destined for extinction due to breeding. It's just that if religious people produce more offspring than non-religious people, evolution hasn't been very kind to Dawkins and Dennett.
Comment by MikeGene — July 30, 2006 @ 4:57 am
July 30th, 2006 at 5:10 am
Hi Mike,
"But Dawkins does seem to subscribe to the notion that "I got it from my parents" is the only force determining the religious beliefs of a population."
Indeed. How many times haven't you heard the following argument from one of Dawkins' fans: "Had you been born in Iraq, you'd be reading the Koran, and had you been born in India, you'd be a devout Hindu."
Comment by Krauze — July 30, 2006 @ 5:10 am
July 30th, 2006 at 3:20 pm
And this "religious sense", which I agree exists and probably in some very complex way can be thought of as a product of natural selection, is IMO equally in force for traditional religions as for evangelical atheists and devoted sports fans. In the UK, the conventional wisdom seems to be that rugby and soccer on TV are the primary cause behind the low church attendance there.
So the generalized "religious sense" is almost completely separate from survey statistics about people's religious persuation. IMO people probably stay equally religious regardless of what church they are or aren't in. It's just the focus that changes. So I am highly dubious about any attempt to take birth-rate patterns that emerged in the complex social changes of the last 50 years as saying anything about deep features of human nature that have been evolving gradually for at least 5 million years, or really more like 50 million years, if one considers the "religious sense" as an elaboration of the high sociality of primates, which one probably should.
Comment by Nick Matzke — July 30, 2006 @ 3:20 pm
January 2nd, 2007 at 12:43 pm
From Nick:
"So I am highly dubious about any attempt to take birth-rate patterns that emerged in the complex social changes of the last 50 years as saying anything about deep features of human nature that have been evolving gradually for at least 5 million years, or really more like 50 million years, if one considers the "religious sense" as an elaboration of the high sociality of primates, which one probably should."
From me:
If that is the case then why did you make reference to a statistical finding that purports to do just that?
"It is estimated by the Barna Institute that in this generation, two-thirds of the children from evangelical homes will leave the church after they leave home. For more information, see State of the Church: 2002 by George Barna."
Is not this statistic an attempt to make a correlation between a parents offspring and their childs "complex social change?" Are you not doing the very thing you've accused Mike of doing? I think so. If there is no valid statistic to link religious belief to our survivability then why on earth should you be allowed to make reference to a link between non-religious belief and its emergence in the offspring?
Comment by ID_comment — January 2, 2007 @ 12:43 pm