I don't know the science or thinking behind the title question Is religion a biological/genetic trait.
But I do now wonder...
I've been doing my best to be agnostic/atheist. It is what makes most logical sense to me, and also what helps me function. Yet the yearning to allow myself to believe in God is there at times. It just will seem intrinsically and intuitively logical that there is a god. I was Christian most of my life, so maybe the 20 years of conditioning hasn't worn off yet.
But I do wonder if something else is at play. Biologically, is it a natural instinct to be religious? One that has been passed on for a long time now?
I dunno, do you know anything about this topic?
Evolution is all about genetic changes and natural selection. It is through genetic changes and then selection, certain traits become part of species DNA. Religion has been major source of human social structure for thousands of years and therefore has acted similar to natural selection; divine and cultural selection, giving those who were more obedient to their religion, selective advantages. In some case, the reverse was also true, with the disbeliever genes eliminated. There is a type of funneling.
The question becomes did this selection process, by religion, concentrate our human genetics to favor the religious mind set, and thereby cause this to become engrained on our human DNA and natural brain firmware? Religion has been around at least 6000 year or more. Is that enough time to funnel the DNA into a base religious instinct/propensity, due to religious selection?
It depends on how long science think it takes the DNA/brain to change, based on repetitious behavioral selection; nature and nurture. All I was doing is applying the theory of evolution, to this long term behavior, that added it own unique selective pressures, over thousands of years. It is a valid science thesis.
I tend to belief we do have a religious instinct or propensity from all that training and selection. One thing it brings to the table is better development of the frontal lobe and imagination. Because we cannot prove gods and spirits as material things, provable by the five senses, we needed to make more use the frontal lobe, so we can exist more in the ethereal world of the imagination, where the apparent limits of the sensory world can be exceeded; innovation and art.
In science you have pure and applied scientists. The pure scientists deal with reality as is; no more and no less. It is stays sensory and seeing is believing. The applied scientists often has to be more inventive, of that which is not yet seeable by the pure scientists. It may only exist in theory. The Religious instinct provides the inner vision and faith in things not yet seen part of the material world. This is why art and architecture are part of most religions, expanding reality beyond what was here naturally; pure science. I am more of an applied scientist and have no problem going both ways; science and religion. Even this applied science of evolution idea of religious selection, is way to build a bridge for others to walk across.
