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This article has been cited by the following publications. This list is generated based on data provided by Crossref.
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Norenzayan et al. review the available evidence and successfully synthesize many of the debates of the by-product and adaptationist camps on the evolution of religion. Although they acknowledge that Big God (BG) religions are one of many factors that foster large-scale cooperation, one of their central claims is that these religions promote internal harmony and higher fertility, thereby reducing competition within social groups. However, the evidence presented makes a compelling case that modern and ancient BG religions result in intragroup exploitation and conflict rather than “mutually beneficial exchange.” We discuss the implications of the terms “prosociality” and “cooperation” with regard to intragroup conflict in large-scale societies, and particularly in relation to intersexual competition.
Within-group exploitation and receiver psychology
In the target article, the ideas of prosociality and large-scale cooperation are used interchangeably and exemplified by behaviors such as participation in warfare, religiously motivated suicide attacks, and construction of monumental architecture (note that historically these have been exclusively male undertakings, a point that we shall return to later on). Although these activities require the coordination of numerous individuals to reach a common goal, they do not necessarily represent “mutually beneficial exchanges” or a symmetrical distribution of costs. Such coordinating efforts often have been achieved through coercion and exploitation: In antiquity, officers drawn from the aristocracy survived to write accounts of well-known battles, whereas armies of conscripts drawn from less privileged backgrounds died by the thousands (Gabriel Reference Gabriel2006). During the Crusades, the Papacy lured warriors into battle with the promise of salvation and pardon from supernatural punishment (Cohn Reference Cohn2011). Contemporary suicide attackers are enlisted and groomed by manipulative charismatic leaders (Atran Reference Atran2003), and the construction of monumental architecture in ancient Egypt was made possible by compulsory labor recruited from the poor peasant class (David Reference David1997).
Hence, much of the available evidence allows BG religions to be interpreted as opportunistic manipulations of receiver psychology by royalty, priestly elites, and other dominant groups, which sometimes are able to harness the collective efforts of large groups (see Soler et al. Reference Soler, Batiste and Cronk2014). In the animal world, a growing literature explores how individuals take advantage of conspecifics by exploiting preexisting perceptual and sensory preferences (e.g., Arnqvist Reference Arnqvist2006; Guilford and Dawkins Reference Guilford and Dawkins1991). In the case of religion, such biases include cooperation through costly-to-fake signaling (Irons Reference Irons and Nesse2001; Soler Reference Soler2012; Sosis Reference Sosis2003) or the social bonding experienced through synchronous, dysphoric, or euphoric rituals (Bastian et al. Reference Bastian, Jetten and Ferris2014; Fischer et al. Reference Fischer, Callander, Reddish and Bulbulia2013). Altough these arose in the context of small-scale societies where parochial altruism was a crucial adaptation, BG religions allow elites to exploit these biases to extract resources from lower-ranking group members. Although long-term exploitation will lead to either the extinction of the exploited class of individuals or the evolution of a defensive response (Ryan & Rand Reference Ryan and Rand1993), BG religions are a relatively new phenomenon. It may be that the cultural evolution of secular institutions that elbow out religiosity is such a response. Other possibilities are schisms, millenarian movements, and political revolutions: The Protestant Reformation, for example, was in large part a reaction to a BG religion in which elites received asymmetrical benefits by commercializing salvation and exploiting believers (Luther 1517/1915).
Fertility and intersexual competition
Norenzayan et al. point out that BG religions provide additional group benefits in the form of higher fertility (via a pronatalist orientation) and monogamous marriage. In the first case, the evidence does not permit such a conclusion; the studies cited compare fertility rates between BG religions and secular populations. The relevant contrast is between BG and non-BG religions, and we have no data to suggest, everything else being equal, that the former are more pronatalist or have higher fertility rates than the latter. With regard to the spread of monogamous marriage, it may be that such norms reduce conflict because they effectively obliterate choice for females and nonprestigious males. Across societies, data suggest that wealth increases male reproductive success (not female) and the effect is particularly strong in polygynous societies (Nettle & Pollet Reference Nettle and Pollet2008). Moreover, a salient aspect of contemporary BG religions (i.e., Abrahamic and karmic religions) is their overwhelmingly patriarchal nature. Not only are the religious elites of these traditions predominantly male, but many of their moral dictates are also specifically aimed at constraining women's autonomy and restricting female sexuality through taboos (Guterman et al. Reference Guterman, Mehta and Gibbs2007). In contrast, rates of paternal uncertainty around the world suggest that (1) there are contexts where females do choose to disperse their reproduction across males, and (2) that explicitly religious populations that follow a BG tradition seem particularly well able to reduce this possibility (see Anderson Reference Anderson2006).
Public morality statements by modern and historical BG religions are not uniformly aimed at fostering general cooperation or benefitting all group members on average. Relevant analytical concepts that can shed light on the implications of BG religions on fertility and intersexual competition include: differences in mate choice, ease of divorce, and punishment incurred for extra-pair copulations (which is often more severe for females). For example, in the Code of Hammurabi (mentioned in the target article) we find that although a woman who leaves her husband “shall be cast into the water,” a man who wishes to do the same must only financially compensate her to end the marriage. If a phenomenon associated with BG religions is increased group fertility and fitness, we suspect that such a distribution is highly skewed between the sexes (and across social classes). This is not to say that non-BG religions are dominated by gender equality norms – they may well not be – but this is a question that needs to be considered. The internal processes of BG religions appears to be focused, as mentioned earlier, on those activities that have historically been the exclusive province of males. Any results from those examples will necessarily leave out the role of half of the population. A closer examination of dynamics of intersexual competition needs to be part of any explanation of BG religion.