Nah. When my dogs prayed for a treat, they got it. If I never gave them one except randomly, and they still prayed, then they’d have faith.
Now dogs do have a god, their owner. And cats have a god, themselves.
In general though, I know animals don’t have religion because animals of the same species don’t kill each other for no damn reason.
I look forward to seeing the experiments you devise to test this theory. Absent the ability to test it in some fashion, I’m not sure why you believe it is a “scientific theory” and not “idle noodling.”
Not true. There are and have been plenty of religions of the opinion that ‘we have our gods over here and you have your gods over there’; or of the opinion that nobody human understands the whole universe and there are multiple different valid ways of trying to. ETA: plus the ones who think everybody’s really worshipping the same gods that they are, just under different names.
– Whatever it is that religion’s doing in humans, I doubt we evolved it out of nowhere, and I wouldn’t be at all surprised if there are similarities to various aspects of it in other species – I’d be a lot more surprised if there aren’t. I have no idea how to scientifically test for this, however. And whether those aspects would amount to something that humans call religion is another matter; we didn’t evolve language out of nowhere, either, but that doesn’t mean that other species have exactly human language, though they certainly communicate.
I don’t think we can even clearly define what religion is in humans, for that matter.
Ayyyy-MEN, preacher!
I just told a friend that I must have cabin fever:
“I clicked on a discussion with the words 'MY” and “THEORY’ in the title.”
“Oh, yeah, you got cabin fever.”
“And the word RELIGION.”
“Oh, you got it bad.”
“Not just religion, but ANIMAL RELIGION.”
“Whaaaa…? Why would you… Oh, you need to get outside.”
It’s not even a scientific hypothesis . . . but since you’re being all scientific like,
I’d like some cites that ‘wild’ animal language (whatever that even is) and moral/social code are solely inborn and in no part learned.
Just to be clear, you’ve stuck yourself with a ‘no black swans exists’ position, a single black swan falsifies your hypothesis.
I think, rather, that the human need for getting knowledge from our society is fundamentally tied together with our disposition towards religion. That dependence on society makes fertile ground for religion, and religion is one of the structures through which we get knowledge.
Oh please. I have had cats. Clearly I was enslaved by them.
A religion is a hypothetically plausible explanation for observed phenomena whose cause is not readily apparent. Like a train passing the pasture. First, awesome fear of an unknown power, but when the cow gets used to it, it becomes theology.
Seems to me that what we call religion is at least three different things, serving three different functions in humans, often tangled together but sometimes found separately.
One of them is an individual experience of oneness with and/or connection with the universe as a whole, or with or through specific parts of it – this primarily emotional experience can be with what seems to be everything, or with a particular mountain or tree or field or body of water etc. It doesn’t rely on any group or structure, though people who have it sometimes create them around their own experience, and some groups and structures incorporate techniques of encouraging it.
Another is a sense of oneness and wholeness, similarly primarily emotional, with a community of other humans. That does require such a community, though it can be a small one.
And the third is a structure for attempting to explain the universe, for passing on knowledge and/or dogma, and very often for enforcing societal laws.
But I’m not sure the third on its own is religion, though religious movements do tend to increasingly incorporate it over time, and are often still considered religions even if the emotional core is gone entirely. A “hypothetically plausible explanation for observed phenomena whose cause is not readily apparent” isn’t a religion; it’s a hypothesis. That’s an equally good description of a secular hypothesis. And a ‘structure through which we get knowledge’ can be an entirely secular school, or library system, or code of human laws.
What’s the name of this train religion that cows have?
Religion is just a weakness of understanding of the world around us, to such an extent that we made up some shit to sort it into any kind of order, exert power, and dominate others.
Whereas animals clearly, profoundly, and intuitively understand the world around them, and to such a degree, that they clearly have no need for religion.
As for this…
“ Religion clearly serves a very important psychological and social need for humans. This surely must also be the case for feral animals.” This is a swing and a miss to me, right from the jump.
Yup, nailed it.
Cows especially when it comes to reverence for trains.
They certainly do.
This is not a scientific theory.
Unless he was wearing a lab coat and holding a test tube when he suggested it. That would make it scientific.
Chugga-chugga-chugga-chugga-chugga-chugga-chugga-chugga-chugga-chugga-chugga-chugga-MOOOOOH!- MOOOOOOOH!!! chugga-chugga-chugga-chugga-chugga-chugga…
Or it would make him a pharmacist.
A farmacist? That’s a scientist who studies farm animals, right?
Locomology.
The central tenet is the belief that after a cow dies, it is carried by a train to a place where its body serves the needs of others.
Hey wait…