The belief instinct the psychology of souls, destiny, and the meaning of life

The primary idea Bering presents is that theological beliefs serve a crucial evolutionary and present us with an “adaptive illusion”, a useful trait that we humans have evolved over time. In other words, humanity is evolutionarily hard-wired for a belief in God. Why is this useful? The belief in a supernatural being that monitors and judges us always encouraged early humans who were:

impulsive, hedonistic, and uninhibited

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contrary to what many atheists tend to believe . . . at least some form of religious belief and behaviour would . . . probably appear spontaneously on a desert island untouched by cultural transmission.

atheism is more a verbal muzzling of God–a conscious, executively made decision to reject one's own intuitions about a faceless übermind involved in our personal affairs–than it is a true cognitive exorcism....This doesn't make us weak, ridiculous, or even foolish. It just makes us human.

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