Comments to "If Christianity or Communism were called diseases, would they then look for the chemical and genetic “causes” of these “conditions”?"

A person wrote in Facebook's Psychiatry and Clinical Psychology group:  "Psychiatrists look for twisted molecules and defective genes as the causes of schizophrenia, because schizophrenia is the name of a disease. If Christianity or Communism were called diseases, would they then look for the chemical and genetic “causes” of these “conditions”?
     Thomas Szasz, Hungarian psychiatrist

It seems that there are several contributions of biological nature to our social behavior.

1  Regarding Communism:

1.1  "We document a statistically significant and robust positive relation between risk aversion and the demand for redistribution that is also economically important. We show that previously used proxies for risk aversion (such as being an entrepreneur or having a history of unemployment) do not capture the effect of our measure of risk aversion but have distinctly different effects on the demand for redistribution." From Individual risk preferences and the demand for redistribution. Manja Gärtner, Johanna Mollerstrom and David Seim. Journal of Public Economics, v 153, September 2017, Pages 49-55. http://www.bipartisanalliance.com/2017/08/individual-risk-preferences-and-demand.html


1.2  There are several species in which inequity aversion has been measured, like common marmosets. http://www.bipartisanalliance.com/2018/02/inequity-aversion-is-observed-in-common.html

Or check this: Social inequality aversion in mice: Analysis with stress-induced hyperthermia and behavioral preference. Shigeru Watanabe. Learning and Motivation, Volume 59, August 2017, Pages 38-46, http://www.bipartisanalliance.com/2017/09/social-inequality-aversion-in-mice.html

Which is why some suspect that there is an "Evolutionary Origin of Empathy and Inequality Aversion" http://www.bipartisanalliance.com/2017/09/evolutionary-origin-of-empathy-and.html


1.3  Even in dictator's games, we try to avoid the taking version, and prefer the giving version: "Over 85% of the dictators in our experiment choose to play a giving game over a taking game when the payoff possibilities are identical and, on average, dictators are willing to sacrifice over 31% of their endowment to avoid taking." http://www.bipartisanalliance.com/2018/02/dictator-game-aversion-to-taking-is.html



2  Regarding religiosity:

2.1  there are good reasons to believe that religiosity is a substantially heritable trait. Good summary here: "The Future of Secularism: A Biologically Informed Theory Supplemented with Cross-Cultural Evidence" http://www.bipartisanalliance.com/2017/08/the-future-of-secularism-biologically.html


2.2  "In spite of increased secularization in American culture and a growing distrust of organized religion, religious involvement, personal religiosity, and spirituality are still viewed as highly desirable characteristics." Examining Social Desirability in Measures of Religion and Spirituality Using the Bogus Pipeline. Ann E. Jones and Marta Elliott. Review of Religious Research. March 2017, Volume 59, Issue 1, pp 47–64. http://www.bipartisanalliance.com/2017/08/examining-social-desirability-in.html

2.3  Being Atheist is linked to genes, which is a way to say than being religious is linked to the other genes. See The Mutant Says in His Heart, “There Is No God”: the Rejection of Collective Religiosity Centred Around the Worship of Moral Gods Is Associated with High Mutational Load. Edward Dutton, Guy Madison, Curtis Dunkel. Evolutionary Psychological Science, http://www.bipartisanalliance.com/2017/12/the-rejection-of-collective-religiosity.html



These authors are not saying that genetics make us more religious than not, or more redistributive than not, as an originally predetermined outcome... What they say is that being redistributive and religious was favored by the ancestors, and those with such behaviours reproduced better (more than the others), and are now dominant behaviors.

Of course, we don't know if that is a good idea or not, but we can discuss such theories, since they help explain observed behaviors.

Disclaimer: I am an Atheist (although I am not mad at religous people, I respect them).