Hostname: page-component-76d6cb85b7-2r2wp Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2026-07-14T17:26:01.964Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Why religion is better conceived as a complex system than a norm-enforcing institution

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 June 2014

Richard Sosis  and
Jordan Kiper
Richard Sosis
Affiliation:
Department of Anthropology, University of Connecticut, Storrs, CT 06269-1176. richard.sosis@uconn.edu jordan.kiper@uconn.edu http://www.anth.uconn.edu/faculty/sosis/
Jordan Kiper
Affiliation:
Department of Anthropology, University of Connecticut, Storrs, CT 06269-1176. richard.sosis@uconn.edu jordan.kiper@uconn.edu http://www.anth.uconn.edu/faculty/sosis/
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Although religions, as Smaldino demonstrates, provide informative examples of culturally evolved group-level traits, they are more accurately analyzed as complex adaptive systems than as norm-enforcing institutions. An adaptive systems approach to religion not only avoids various shortcomings of institutional approaches, but also offers additional explanatory advantages regarding the cultural evolution of group-level traits that emerge from religion.

Information

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Information
Behavioral and Brain Sciences , Volume 37 , Issue 3 , June 2014 , pp. 275 - 276
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2014 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable

References

Alcorta, C. & Sosis, R. (2005) Ritual, emotion, and sacred symbols: The evolution of religion as an adaptive complex. Human Nature 16:323–59.Google Scholar
Bulbulia, J. & Sosis, R. (2011) Signaling theory and the evolution of religions. Religion 41(3): 363–88.Google Scholar
Geertz, C. (1973) The interpretation of cultures: Selected essays. Basic.Google Scholar
Irons, W. (2001) Religion as a hard-to-fake sign of commitment. In: Evolution and the capacity for commitment, ed. Nesse, R., pp. 292–309. Russell Sage Foundation.Google Scholar
Johnstone, R. (1997) The evolution of animal signals. In: Behavioural ecology: An evolutionary approach, 4th ed., ed. Krebs, J. & Davies, N., pp. 155–78. Blackwell.Google Scholar
McKay, R., Harold, J. & Whitehouse, H. (2013) Catholic guilt? Recall of confession promotes prosocial behavior. Religion, Brain & Behavior 3(3):201–209.Google Scholar
Purzycki, B. & Sosis, R. (2009) The religious system as adaptive: Cognitive flexibility, public displays, and acceptance. In: The biological evolution of religious mind and behavior, ed. Voland, E. & Schiefenhovel, W., pp. 243–56. Springer-Verlag.Google Scholar
Rappaport, R. (1999) Ritual and religion in the making of humanity. Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sosis, R. (2003) Why aren't we all Hutterites? Costly signaling and religious behavior. Human Nature 14:91–127.Google Scholar
Sosis, R. (2009) The adaptationist-byproduct debate on the evolution of religion: Five misunderstandings of the adaptationist program. Journal of Cognition and Culture 9:315–32.Google Scholar
Sosis, R. (2011) Why sacred lands are not indivisible: The cognitive foundations of sacralizing land. Journal of Terrorism Research 2:17–44.Google Scholar
Sosis, R. & Ruffle, B. (2003) Religious ritual and cooperation: Testing for a relationship on Israeli religious and secular kibbutzim. Current Anthropology 44:713–22.Google Scholar
Wildman, W. J. & Sosis, R. (2011) Stability of groups with costly beliefs and practices. Journal of Artificial Societies and Social Stimulation 14 (3):6.Google Scholar
Xygalatas, D. (2013) Effects of religious setting on cooperative behavior: A case study from Mauritus. Religion, Brain & Behavior 3(2):91–102.CrossRefGoogle Scholar