Further Reading:
human instinct by Robert Winston
Bantam Popular science
ISBN: 0553814923
'Wide-ranging and thoroughly entertaining' -New Scientist
Robert Winston is one of the country's best-known scientists. A Professor at Imperial College, University of London, and Director of NHS Research, his television series have made him a household name across Britain.
"From caveman to modern man" What stimulates that urge to press the pedal as hard as possible at traffic lights to make the fastest getaway? And how is it that so many people still hold religious views when the notion of an all-powerful being is irrational? All of these impulses are driven by our human instincts: sexual drive, survival, competition, aggression and our search for knowledge.
Few people have a problem with the idea that humans are descended from the apes. But while people believe that our general shape and structure are derived from other creatures, few consider, let alone accept, the psychological implications. Man not only looks, moves and breathes like an ape, he also thinks like one. It is back in our primeval past that we find the first clues to the understanding of our human instincts."
In this erudite and fascinating book, Robert Winston takes us on a journey deep into the human mind in search of the answers to these questions and many more. Along the way he takes a very personal look at the relationship between science and religion and explores those instincts that make us human.
Religion Explained: The Human Instincts That Fashion Gods, Spirits and Ancestors
by Pascal Boyer London: William Heinemann, 2001.
Reviewed by Benjamin Beit-Hallahmi, Professor, Department of Psychology, University of Haifa, Haifa 31905, Israel.
"This book is a milestone on the road to a new behavioral understanding of religion, basing itself on what has come to be known as cognitive anthropology...
The framework is cognitive-evolutionary and assumes that the brain is a machine operating according to rules developed through evolution. "Religion is about the existence and causal powers of non-observable entities and agencies" (p. 8), and is made up of "a limited catalogue of possible supernatural beliefs" (p. 11). This is a good starting point. This world of the imagination contains "serious" religious ideas, as well as ideas about Santa Claus, witchcraft and various popular magical practices. Psychologically, they are produced by the same processes."
The Triune Brain in Evolution : Role in Paleocerebral Functions (Hardcover)
by P.D. MacLean Publisher: Plenum US; 1 edition (January 31, 1990)
Language: English
ISBN: 0306431688
Eminent brain researcher and neurologist Paul MacLean, is the director of the Laboratory of Brain Evolution and Behaviour in Poolesville, Maryland. He has proposed that our skull holds not one brain, but three, each representing a distinct evolutionary stratum that has formed upon the older layer before it, like a mental onion. He calls it the "triune brain," and says that each of the three brains operate like "three interconnected biological computers."
The Reptilian Brain, or "R-complex" includes the brain stem and the cerebellum, and is the oldest brain. In animals such as reptiles, the brain stem and cerebellum dominate. For this reason it is commonly referred to as the "reptilian brain." It has the same type of archaic behavioural programs as snakes and lizards. It is rigid, obsessive, compulsive, ritualistic and paranoid. The seat of territoriality and aggression, it is "filled with ancestral memories." This brain controls muscles, balance and autonomic functions, such as breathing and heartbeat. It is active even in deep sleep.
The Limbic System is the primary seat of emotion. Physiologically, it includes the hypothalamus, hippocampus, and amygdala. MacLean sees a great danger here, in that this lowly mammalian brain tends to be the seat of our value judgements, instead of the more advanced neocortex. It had previously been assumed that the highest level of the brain, the neocortex, dominates the other, lower levels. MacLean has shown that this is not the case, and that the physically lower limbic system, which rules emotions, can hijack the higher mental functions.
The Neocortex contains the higher cognitive functions which distinguish Man from the animals. MacLean refers to the cortex as "the mother of invention and father of abstract thought." In Man the neocortex takes up two thirds of the total brain mass. Although all animals also have a neocortex, it is relatively small. A mouse without a cortex can act in a fairly normal way, whereas a human without a cortex is a vegetable.
The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins
Bantam Popular science
ISBN: 9780593055489 (from Jan 07)
Does God exist? In his new book, The God Delusion, Richard Dawkins lays down a persuasive argument that he cannot. It goes something like this: Any intelligence of sufficient complexity to be capable of designing anything, comes into existence only as the end product of a gradual evolutionary process. Such a super-intelligence as God would be, must be the end product of an extremely long evolutionary process. Arriving very late in the universe, God could obviously not be responsible for its creation.
This latest book by eminent biologist Richard Dawkins is a must read for anyone who questions that faith should be considered a virtue. Along with many revelations concerning the God concept, it has several chilling anecdotes that illustrate the iron grip that religion still holds in our modern world.
The God Gene: How Faith Is Hardwired into Our Genes
Author: Dean H. Hamer
Publisher: Anchor; Reprint edition (September 13, 2005)
ISBN: 978-0385720311
Dr. Hamer is a well qualified molecular biologist who studies the role of inheritance in human behavior. His controversial thesis developed out of a study he conducted on the topic of smoking and addiction for the National Cancer Institute. More than 1000 individuals took the standardized Temperament and Character Inventory test which includes questions that measure self-transcendence (an openness to mysticism).
With over 35,000 genes and 3.2 billion chemical bases in the human genome, he limited his search for the "spiritual gene" to nine genes known to produce monoamines (brain chemicals that regulate mood and motor control). He found what he was looking for in the gene known as VMAT2. "Those with the nucleic acid cytosine in one particular spot on the gene ranked high [in spirituality]. Those with the nucleic acid adenine in the same spot ranked lower."
Does this validate the central tenet of this website that spirituality is passed on genetically? Obviously, I wish I could say yes, but too many questions remain unanswered. To start with, he was looking for differences between his subjects. If spirituality is an instinct it must be universal: there must be a gene, or group of genes, present in all of us. Hamer wasn't looking for that, nor could he. Spotting differences doesn't require full knowledge of human genes, but to test for a universal tendency does.
Hamer notes that Human traits often involve the interplay of hundreds or even thousands of genes, so it is doubtful that our sense of spirituality is dictated by cytosine alone. Other genes or chemical bases are likely to be involved.
Readers with an interest in genetics will find this book interesting, bearing in mind that research into the Human Genome is still in its infancy. The function of about 10,000 genes remains a complete mystery. Science knows they make proteins, but has no idea what those proteins are, or what they do. Until they find out, the full role of genetics in spirituality will remain in debate.