Transcript Devotional Unity and Coalitional Division: How Religion

Devotional Unity and Coalitional
Division: How Religion plays both Jekyll
and Hyde to Religious Tolerance
Predicts intolerance
Coalitional
division
Devotional
unity
Predicts tolerance
Ian Hansen
With thanks to
•
•
•
•
•
•
Ara Norenzayan
Jeremy Ginges
Sheldon Solomon
John Rector
Ilan Dar-Nimrod
Hakwan Lau
Religion is evil. Not only is it false,
but it will make you religiously
intolerant and violent
Why religion is bad, in a nutshell
• “Incompatible religious
doctrines have
balkanized our world into
separate moral
communities, and these
divisions have become a
continuous source of
human conflict.”
–Sam Harris, atheist,
author of The End of
Faith
An example of violent religiously
intolerant sentiment
“We are at war with Islam…
It is not merely that we are
at war with an otherwise
peaceful religion that has
been ‘hijacked’ by
extremists. We are at war
with precisely the vision of
life that is prescribed to all
Muslims in the Koran...”
–Pat Robertson, of
Christian Coalition infamy
Oops, actually that wasn’t Pat
Robertson. It was Sam Harris again
More wit and wisdom from Sam:
• “What will we do if an Islamist
regime…acquires long-range nuclear
weaponry? …In such a situation, the only thing
likely to ensure our survival may be
a nuclear first strike of our
own.”
BOOM!
Joking aside, Pat Robertson is still
scary
• “Maybe we need
a very small
nuke thrown off
on Foggy Bottom
to shake things
up”
--Pat Robertson,
on the 700 club
Seeker’s dilemma: should you adopt a religious or
non-religious worldview?
Nuked if you
do
Nuked if you
don’t
What predicts intolerance?
• Dogmatism, fundamentalism, exclusivity,
authoritarianism--“coalitional rigidity”
Coalitional rigidity
+*
*When controlling
for religious
devotion
Religious intolerance
What predicts coalitional rigidity?
• Prayer, belief in God, devotion to the divine,
devotion to one’s religious belief, intrinsic
religiosity—“religious devotion”
Coalitional rigidity
*When controlling for
religious intolerance
+*
Religious devotion
+
Religious intolerance
Incomprehensible Triangle
• Religious devotion has a NEGATIVE direct
relationship to religious intolerance, although
indirectly positively related
Coalitional rigidity
+
+
Religious devotion
-*
Religious intolerance
*When controlling for coalitional rigidity
Re-draw the triangle?
• Devotion and rigidity: two faces of the same
thing?
• These inclinations are very highly correlated
Coalitional rigidity
+
Religious devotion
+
-
Religious intolerance
The religious package is Janusfaced with regard to religious
intolerance
Religious
Tolerance
Religious
devotion
Coalitional
rigidity
Religious
intolerance
0
†
*
FULL SAMPLE
***
OTHER
†
NONRELIGIOUS
MUSLIM
BUDDHIST
*
HINDU
JEWISH
***
OTHER CHRISTIAN
**
ORTHODOX
PROTESTANT
CATHOLIC
Odds of blaming people of other religions for
the trouble in the world
Janus-faced on Scapegoating
2
Theism
Exclusivity
*
*
***
1
***
***
†
p < .1
* p < .05
** p < .01
*** p <= .001
Janus-faced on War and
Oppression
Independent relationship of religion variables to war and
oppression
0.6
Prayer
Exclusivity
Key:
milspend/gdp
milspend/cap
armsvol/gdp
armsvol/cap
Lack of
freedom
Refugees/cap
-0.6
Refugees/cap: Total refugees who fled the
country in 2003 (per capita)
Lack of freedom: Freedom House’s Freedom
score in 2005 (reversed)
Armsvol/cap: dollar volume of arms imports
and exports 2003 (per capita)
Armsvol/gdp: dollar volume of arms imports
and exports 2003 (as % of GDP)
Milspend/cap: military spending per capita
2003
Milspend/gdp: military spending (as % of
GDP) 2003
Bars represent independent unstandardized betas in separate logistic regressions with national rank in each X variable predicting
regular prayer or exclusivity while controlling for the other along with age, gender and national rank in GDP per capita.
Janus-faced on Anti-Pluralism
Regression coefficient (β ) predicting intolerance
0.8
***
***
***
0.6
0.4
0.2
Devotion
Rigidity
0
-0.2
-0.4
*
*
Buddhist Christian
Muslim
Other
Full
sample
* p < .05
*** p <= .001
Janus-faced on intolerance generally
Regression coefficient (β ) predicting intolerance
1
0.8
***
***
***
***
0.6
0.4
***
0.2
Devotion
Rigidity
-0
-0.2
-0.4
***
-0.6 ***
-0.8
Christian
Nonreligious
Buddhist
Other
Full sample
*** p <= .001
Political intolerance for Multireligious people,
Hindus, Muslims, Catholics, Jews and Atheists
Janus-faced even among Mormons
0.25
**
0.2
0.15
0.1
Religious
Devotion
Fundamentalism
0.05
0
-0.05
-0.1
-0.15
†
Mormon devotion and
fundamentalism
† p < .1
** p < .01
How is Janus-faced prediction
possible?
• The principle of transitivity objection
• If A = B and B = C, then how can A = ~C?
Answer:
• The principle of transitivity applies only to
“is exactly the same as”, not
“independently predicts”
What is the sound of one hand
clapping?
• Both processes complementary, but very
different—and when examined
independently of each other may predict
very different things.
Religious devotion
Religion!
Coalitional rigidity
Pragmatically pushing back
limits of altruistic love to a
manageable, qualitycontrolled ingroup
Rising to all-embracing
altruistic loving unity
Devotion and rigidity as two
complementary yet opposing processes
of adaptive ingroup favoritism
• Religious devotion: aids the imaginative
expansion of the boundary of moral
inclusion
• Coalitional rigidity: aids the pragmatic
hardening of the boundary of moral
exclusion
What about experimental
evidence?
Terror Management evidence:
What makes people hate others
also makes them like God
Control
Degree of Supernatural Belief
8
Religious
7.5
Mortaility
Salient
7
6.5
6
5.5
5
4.5
4
Belief in God/Higher Power
But it also makes them like Buddha
8
Neutral
Death
7
Column
3
Column
4
Column
5
Column
6
Column
7
Column
8
Column
9
Column
10
Column
11
6
5
Scale midpoint
=5
4
3
2
1
Buddha hears
prayers
Buddha/HP
hears prayers
0 Buddha/HP
answers
prayers
Evidence that
Buddha/HP
answers prayers
Belief in Buddha among Christians
and Shamanic Spirits
7
Death
6
Control (P)
Control (TA)
Scale midpoint = 5
5
4
3
2
1
Clairvoyance
Spirits exist
Spirits guide
And makes them more sanguine
about Islam conquering the West
N
N
Support for a Godly-Islam
-will-overthrow-thefaithless-West essay
Priming God-esteem increases
preference for pacifism over warrior
values
6.5
Estimated marginal means on
preference for anti-war essay
6.3
6.1
5.9
5.7
God esteem
Group esteem
Self esteem
5.5
5.3
5.1
4.9
4.7
4.5
Condition
Estimated marginal means for
authoritarianism and political intolerance
Priming God-esteem decreases
authoritarianism and political
intolerance
4.5
4
3.5
God esteem
Group esteem
Self esteem
Column 4
Column 5
Column 6
Column 7
3
2.5
2
Authoritarianism
Intolerance
This mirrors Ginges et al (2007)
Percent calling suicide attack "extremely heroic"
25
20
15
10
5
0
Prayer Prime
No Prime
Synagogue Prime
Theoretical implications
• Religion is not black and white
WRONG!
rigidity
+
+
devotion
liberalism
+
intolerance
VS.
+
+
atheism
+
tolerance
Think of things more in terms of
complementary colors
Tolerance
Intolerance
Think of things more in terms of
complementary colors
Coalitional rigidity
Liberal-mindedness
Think of things more in terms of
complementary colors
Religious Devotion
Irreligious non-devotion
Think of things more in terms of
complementary colors
Tolerance
Intolerance
With Janus-faced adjustment…
Religious package : Religious-devotion/coalitional-rigidity
Religious tolerance
and nonviolence
Religious intolerance
and violence
Non-religious package : Liberal-mindedness/irreligious non-devotion
Not all divides equally likely
Mother Teresa vs.
Christopher Hitchens
Texas vs. Sweden
Common
Common
Mohandas Gandhi vs.
Winston Churchill
Rare
A very common—perhaps
natural?—psychological divide
(Religious) Right
Left (Irreligious)
Psych tip for the Pentagon
How to get both Right and Left behind the
“War of Civilizations”
BOOM!
devoted
RIGID BOOM!
liberal
Pump up the Right with rigidity
ATHEIST
Pump up the Left with atheism
Burning question:
Aren’t some religions and
ideologies more tolerant than
others?
Watch the Muslims Part 1
(Malaysia)
Rankings and means of religious devotion, coalitional rigidity and religious intolerance in
each religious group
Religious Devotion
Coalitional Rigidity
Religious Intolerance
1. Muslim (6.67)
1. Muslim (6.15)
1. Muslim (5.67)
2. Christian (6.36)
2. Christian (5.51)
2. Christian (4.95)
3. Buddhist (5.07)
3. Buddhist (4.68)
3. Buddhist (3.93)
Muslims most intolerant
Watch the Muslims Part 2 (10
nations)
Rankings and means of theism, exclusivity and scapegoating in each religious group
Theism
Exclusivity
Scapegoating
1. Muslim (.99)
1. Muslim (.95)
1. Jewish (.34)
2. Hindu (.96)
2. Other Christian (.82)
2. Protestant (.254)
3. Other Christian (.95)
3. Catholic (.72)
3. Other (.247)
4, Catholic (.93)
4. Orthodox (.67)
4. Orthodox (.242)
5. Protestant (.89)
5. Protestant (.66)
5. Catholic (.236)
6. Orthodox (.80)
6. Jewish (.65)
6. Nonreligious (.223)
7. Buddhist (.73)
7. Hindu (.60)
7. Christian Other (.219)
8. Jewish (.71)
8. Other (.56)
8. Hindu (.17)
9. Other (.70)
9. Buddhist (.22)
9. Buddhist (.146)
10. Nonreligious (.12)
10. Nonreligious (.09)
10. Muslim (.142)
Muslims least intolerant
Review
Does religion contribute to war, oppression and
intolerance in the world?
--Likely, but it can also contributes to peace, freedom and
tolerance
Do more religious religions have more potential for
intolerance and violence?
--Yes, but also more potential for tolerance and nonviolence
Can religions be rank ordered by intolerance and
support for violence?
--Yes, but the rank ordering is very volatile and can be
turned on its head from one measure of intolerance to
the next, one country to the next, one period of history to
the next.
Chicken & Egg issues
• Coalitional rigidity pragmatically shadows
pro-social religious devotion?
Or
• Religious devotion gives people
memorable content to be adaptively rigid
about?
Pleistocene accident or proximal
psychological process?
• Are devotion and rigidity separate
processes that adaptively balance each
other?
or
• Does proximal stimulation of devotion
cause rigidity or vice versa?
Sociology vs. Psychology
• Even if religious devotion is
psychologically related to tolerance for the
individual, do sociological pressures
ensure that rigidity will overshadow
devotion?
Conclusion