Natural Security: An Explanation of Our Biggest Threat

An Evolutionary Look at Religion

The book, Natural Security, described religion's function in society as "moral legitimacy to their cause (Juergensmyer, 2004)." I found this to be true with the history of my own religion, Catholicism. During the crusades, the Catholics tortured, martyred, and stole from the Muslims in a holy war. I think it is interesting the way Raphael Sargarin describes religion in an evolutionary context. He says, and I agree, that religion served the function to "inspire group commitment and individual action." So my question was sparked by how high rates of atheism are hurting evolutionary theories of religion which Sagarin mentioned on page 109. My question, If religion is advantageous to creating group unity, and we are a highly evolved species, why is atheism growing at such a fast rate?

My evolutionary explanation for this question is that religion may be a vestigial social organ. There is the possibility that in the past, group cooperation was more necessary with the help of others. In modern countries, individuals can now attain everything they need on their own because of advancements in technology.  Now that the trait, group cooperation, is no longer being disproportionate selected for, the possibility for the social organ to change from drift in areas where religion isn't an attractive force is great. It is important to include that this description of religion is not mutually exclusive with someone who believe in a specific religion. I feel that society in general tries to believe that science and religion are forces that are in a constant struggle for existence.

This connects to the overall themes in the book by explaining why most of our current conflict stems from, terrorists. Differences in thought processes have evolved separately and, in order to persist, "demoniz[ed] those with opposing views" (page 107). So now it is the very cohesive units that evolved to bring us together, religions, that are creating the current conflict and biggest threat we face as a species.