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While I was reading the New York Times this morning online, I stumbled across the article "Darwin's God," and I had a feeling that someone would bring it up in the forum. So I quickly checked out Serendip, and low and behold, Professor Dalke had already mentioned it.

While I was curious to see how Henig would explore how religion was affected by evolution, I was a little intimidated by the length of the article. But I pushed through it, and in the end I was glad I did. For someone who has had little exposure to religion in her life, I've always been slightly skeptical of it. But I found this article to be extremely interesting, especially the concept of God, or religion, as a "spandrel."

I took the concept of a spandrel to be something like a vestigial limb, except that spandrels seem to be used in reference to concepts or processes, and not in reference to physical attributes or characteristics, that's where I see the idea of the vestigial limb come into play. I found this distinction in itself, the idea that evolution distinguishes not only between physical attributes that promote a species' longevity, but also ways of thinking - the article mentions the cognitive tools of "agent detection, causal reasoning and theory of mind" - and particular concepts like God or religion.

In a way, I guess this might be kind of obvious, that the way we think has an effect on our survival, but the part about religion, that something so unconcrete and "useless" in evolutionary terms (in the sense that it takes up time and energy and can be a source of stress, not in the sense that it has no point or value, just to clarify) would be able to continue to exist throughout the development of the human species. Religion, or the concept of God, has not followed the same path as that of the appendix, an organ that we now consider to be vestigial. The appendix at one point in time was a useful and beneficial organ. But as humans evolved, it became less and less important and necessary. Now we only worry about it when it becomes inflamed and threatens to burst, thereby putting us in danger. Religion is not like the appendix because for whatever reason, evolution seems to have favored its continuance. It has not become a withered organ with no apparent function. Instead, it has become one of the most powerful tools and characteristics of human society. I wonder what creationists think of this idea that religion has continued to survive thanks to the generosity of evolution...