tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6789188.post4349165927803775669..comments2024-03-27T17:15:37.606-04:00Comments on Triablogue: Survival of the misfits?Ryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17809283662428917799noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6789188.post-75092109741529356132009-10-27T15:04:07.867-04:002009-10-27T15:04:07.867-04:00I wonder on what basis Dawkins believes he is not ...I wonder on what basis Dawkins believes he is not deluded in believing that religionists are deluded.Jim Pembertonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01446388434272680014noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6789188.post-18972639982606076462009-10-27T12:53:37.410-04:002009-10-27T12:53:37.410-04:00Your premise is wrong. While true beliefs are gene...Your premise is wrong. While true beliefs are generally adaptive and false beliefs are generally maladaptive, this is not a necessary connection. This is evidenced by phenomena like <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Depressive_realism" rel="nofollow">depressive realism</a>. Based on the major suppositions of EP and evolutionary biology generally, it isn't the truth or falsity that evolution cares about (see <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolutionary_argument_against_naturalism" rel="nofollow">Plantinga's evolutionary argument against naturalism</a>), it is whether the belief promotes the fitness of the individual who holds that belief. False beliefs can promote behaviors which promote the fitness of the genes that the individual carries. Since the general trend is for adaptive beliefs to be true, then the onus is on evolutionary psychologists to explain why a false belief would be adaptive. This encounters some roadblocks because group selection has been relegated to the waste bin in modern evolutionary biology, though it is witnessing some resurgence with multilevel selection models advanced by people like David Sloan Wilson (who wrote a book, <i>Darwin's Cathedral</i>, explaining religion using this exact frame work). And group selection is the most obvious candidate for explaining something like religious belief that is very much a social phenomenon.<br /><br />Your best bet for criticizing evolutionary approaches to understanding religion would be to emphasize the dearth of empirical work on how religious beliefs promotes the fitness of the individual. And not the direct you're currently taking.Levihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12732774725401468854noreply@blogger.com