| Author(s): | Engvild, Kjeld C. |
| Title: | Is "HADD" or "Search for Meaning" part of the faculty of language and cause for the ubiquity of religion? |
| Category: | published article |
| Length (pages): | 6 |
| Keywords: | hyperactive agency detection; search for intention; CHRNA7 function |
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| Abstract: | The most influential theory of the evolution of religion is that it is a side-effect of the evolution of a hyperactive agency detection device (HADD). HADD is probably a necessary component for language acquisition. Humans, especially young children, assume that there is intention and meaning to everything: sound combinations as words, and systematic changes in words as grammatical constructions. The urge to understand those meanings is necessary for learning language. Hyperactive agency detection may have evolved from the primitive agency detection or predator avoidance of most mobile animals. Predator avoidance of Drosophila is mediated by the nicotinic acetylcholine neuroreceptor gene Dα7. The several corresponding CHRNA7 genes of humans have evolved extensively within the last few hundred thousand years compared to the chimpanzee in a manner reminiscent of the evolution of the established language gene FOXP2. Hyperactive agency detection and search for meaning and intention may be two sides of the same coin, and the ubiquity of religion may be a consequence of the evolution of the faculty of language. |
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| Email: | kjeld.engvild @ gmail.com |
| Bibliography: | European Journal of Science and Theology 12(4):11-19 ? August 2016 |
| URL: | https://www.researchgate.net/publication/297211560 |
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| Submitted: | 10/06/2016 19:21:26 (DD / MM / YYYY) |
| Published: | 04/07/2016 15:10:29 (DD / MM / YYYY) |