Discussion:
A link between religion and the origin of civilisation?
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Lance
2015-04-14 11:54:08 UTC
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New Scientist has published some articles suggesting a link between religion and the origins of civilisation. Perhaps these are of interest to humanists?

see

http://www.colorado.edu/philosophy/vstenger/Folly/NewSciGod/Norenzayan.pdf
Dave Smith
2015-04-15 20:18:10 UTC
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Post by Lance
New Scientist has published some articles suggesting a link between religion and the origins of civilisation. Perhaps these are of interest to humanists?
see
http://www.colorado.edu/philosophy/vstenger/Folly/NewSciGod/Norenzayan.pdf
So God is being replaced by CCTV? :>)
Lance
2015-04-15 23:25:29 UTC
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Jeremy Bentham thought of it first - the panopticon...

Lance
Lance
2015-04-16 14:01:40 UTC
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Watching someone doesn't always produce good behaviour. It partly depends on whether the person thinks the watcher can force them to conform, and also on a person's willingness to defy authority, or the person's attitude to the watcher's demands.

An example. I can remember receiving an instruction at one place where I worked forbidding all males from wearing short trousers. I had never worn short trousers to work, and I had never seen a fellow (male) worker wearing short trousers. But after that instruction suddenly short trousers were visible everywhere. It didn't matter whether they wer noticed or not, I think people were simply rejecting the legitimacy of the demand. And indeed even religious people who think God is everywhere and all powerful sometimes break God's laws. Daniel Kahneman once suggested that a Catholic who believes God has not decided about a person's salvation until the very end would be more likely to behave badbly than a Calvinist who believes that God had already decided before he or she had been born because the only way a Calvinist can determine whether he or she is one of the elect is by behaving well...

At any rate I think there is reason to doubt that watching a person necessarily produces good behaviour.

Lance
Dave Smith
2015-04-17 08:25:04 UTC
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Post by Lance
Watching someone doesn't always produce good behaviour. It partly depends on whether the person thinks the watcher can force them to conform, and also on a person's willingness to defy authority, or the person's attitude to the watcher's demands.
An example. I can remember receiving an instruction at one place where I worked forbidding all males from wearing short trousers. I had never worn short trousers to work, and I had never seen a fellow (male) worker wearing short trousers. But after that instruction suddenly short trousers were visible everywhere. It didn't matter whether they wer noticed or not, I think people were simply rejecting the legitimacy of the demand. And indeed even religious people who think God is everywhere and all powerful sometimes break God's laws. Daniel Kahneman once suggested that a Catholic who believes God has not decided about a person's salvation until the very end would be more likely to behave badbly than a Calvinist who believes that God had already decided before he or she had been born because the only way a Calvinist can determine whether he or she is one of the elect is by behaving well...
At any rate I think there is reason to doubt that watching a person necessarily produces good behaviour.
Lance
Yes, there is no guarantee that being watched will produce conformity, but I think it generally makes it more likely.

Dave

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