Book Review: The “God” Part of the Brain

15Apr07

In The “God” Part of the Brain, Matthew Alper presents his explanation for the abundance of religious beliefs in the world today and in history. The topic is fascinating, and so are the studies cited, but the conclusion is weak and alternative hypotheses aren’t explored. Short version: interesting and thought provoking, but supported by weak argumentation and sloppy thinking.

That’s not where the book begins, however. The first fifty pages or so recount the author’s journey into science, including brief overviews of several scientific disciplines. This part provides a kind of rationale for the book, but they’re largely irrelevant and contain some simplifications and incorrect statements, such as that the universe was ever a point of energy. Quite frankly, this part could’ve been condensed to five pages or left out without losing anything.

The book then moves on to universal behavior patterns, making the example of a planarian turning towards light. He then starts building his hypothesis on the principle that such traits must be genetic. But the situation isn’t analogous with humans. Humans are self aware. We can consciously choose to override many of our instincts. Alper fails to consider the following possible explanations for religion:

1. Religion is not a universal trait of humans but of cultures. Perhaps every sufficiently advanced culture develops a religion, and this will occur in alien species as well. Think of, say, law or economies. These develop in pretty much all sufficiently advanced cultures, but we don’t start positing that this is due to our “economical genes” and “justice genes”.
2. Religion is not genetic, but rather the accidental by-product of some other, genetic trait.
3. Religion abounds not because it’s a human genetic trait but because it motivates people to spread it.

As evidence for his hypothesis, Alper writes (p. 80), “As asserted by such men as Carl Jung, Joseph Campbell and Mircea Eliade, every world culture from the dawn of our species has maintained a dualistic interpretation of reality.” This would suggest that dualism is genetic, writes Alper. However, he fails to account for the fact that nobody’s assertions, whether they be Jung’s, Campbell’s or Eliade’s, are facts because they were asserted by them. If there’s no evidence, we shouldn’t believe it. In this case, there’s actually evidence to the contrary. As pointed out by other reviews, Buddhism is a religion that doesn’t cling to dualism.

The reason why the god part of the brain from the title might be an evolutionary advantage, according to Alper, is that our awareness of death causes a constant state of anxiety that, if not suppressed, will drive us crazy. If this were true, we’d expect atheists in general to be more anxious than theists. Does Matthew Alper, himself an atheist, experience this constant anxiety? Do atheist in general? I know I don’t. I’ve come to accept that death is the final station of the train of life. I rarely think about my mortality, despite being constantly bombarded with images of death and suffering. I don’t think I’m exceptional in this regard. Neither does Alper quote any studies showing this. It seems rather obvious that if Alper’s hypothesis is right, this can’t be the evolutionary rationale.

Why are there atheists, then? Alper devotes a chapter to the question, and concludes that atheists simply have a lower potential for their “spiritual function”, just like some people have a lower potential for sight and other genetic traits. This would suggest that we could observe who would remain atheist simply by looking for genetic differences. These would then be what Alper calls the “spiritually retarded”. None such are found. Also, the existence of deconverts, those who were once theists (often highly religious theists) but have since become theists. Alper therefore suggests that some simply choose to suppress this function based on environmental factos. As if that is possible on his view; his whole rationale for this spiritual function is that the anxiety based on our unique awareness of death will drive us crazy! Of course, most atheists aren’t crazy, just like most theists aren’t.

In a footnote (p. 183), Alper says that there’s a problem with atheism: it doesn’t possess its own rationale. Rather, it falls on the unreasonableness of other beliefs. He believes this new “neurotheology” can fix this problem. There’s plenty of reason to disagree. If theistic beliefs are false, atheistic beliefs must be true. We can’t establish the positive, 100% certain nonexistence of a god, but then again, what belief can we establish positively, with 100% certainty? None that I can think of. Not even the continued existence of the universe. Tomorrow, there might be nothing left of Earth. Is there any reason to suppose that Tellus will disappear overnight? None at all.

Even if atheism needed to be justified further, neurotheology might not be it. Theists can reply that if there is a god, it’s only natural that humans developed a capacity to experience it. Of course, the fact that religious experiences can be faked is good enough evidence that it doesn’t have to be so, even if we have an inherent spiritual function.

In the end, I’m unconvinced, but reading the book wasn’t for nothing. Would I recommend it to others? Nah, not if they were looking for a defense of atheism, anyway.

I’ve got something to say about the book’s style, too. I found some pieces irrelevant (e.g., the first 50 pages), and some points were repeated and repeated ad nauseam. For instance, the faulty assumption that any cross-cultural trait is genetic goes like a red thread throughout the book, and this mantra was repeated until I wanted to rip out pages that make mention of it.

Overall, though this review has been largely negative, the book provides a fascinating glimpse into the research being done on religious and spiritual (which Alper, correctly I think, chooses to treat as distinct) behavior. He quotes many interesting studies in the topic. Unfortunately, the conclusions he draws from them are sloppily reasoned and unconvincing. When Richard Dawkins uses examples from biology in The God Delusion, it shows that he knows what he’s talking about. When Alper does the same, it shows that he doesn’t always.

(Disclaimer: this review was solicited by a publisher; opinions are like 100% certainly truly totally my own (you know the boilerplate ). You can read other reviews here: Nullifidian, Daylight Atheism, Deep Thoughts, Atheist in a mini van, Friendly Atheist, Amazon and the official website.)

Filed under: atheism, book review, religion, theism   |  4 Comments