Where Do Deity Concepts Come From?
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- Опубликовано: 13 мар 2022
- In this video I describe one framework from the Cognitive Science of Religion for understanding how concepts of deity developed and were transmitted. The paper I referenced at the end is accessible at this link:
www2.psych.ubc.ca/~ara/Manusc...
The other books I mentioned are for sale at the following links:
Pyysiäinen, Supernatural Agents
global.oup.com/academic/produ...
Norenzayan, Big Gods
press.princeton.edu/books/pap...
Other related publications:
White, An Introduction to the Cognitive Science of Religion
www.routledge.com/An-Introduc...
Whitehouse, The Ritual Animal
global.oup.com/academic/produ...
Slone & McCorkle, eds., The Cognitive Science of Religion
www.bloomsbury.com/us/cogniti...
When I left the faith of my deeply religious family, I always felt like they had kicked me out, or had ostracized me. They felt like I had abandoned them. I just wanted to stop believing and not exit our kinship group, but I see more and more why that was naive. I reported feeling like a "cockroach" when I went home, after I left the faith, and it was exactly because of this extreme discomfort with me being out of the kinship group, but physically in their home. I think that we all want to get a long, but I guess this stuff is pretty powerful.
So sorry you had such a terrible experience with the people who are supposed to be the closest to you.
@@maklelan Thanks a lot man.
I'm finally in therapy, and I'm healing, and I hope they've found a way to heal too. I do want to say it really helps to understand how very natural and human their reaction was. I don't think it was right, but it's helpful to understand where it's coming from, and how they likely understand it.
It's very hard to find straight talk from an expert on the subject. So I really appreciate it. Also I'm nearly done with the John Taylor book you recommended, extremely useful and clarifying models, and formalizations of things that I think I felt but couldn't carefully think about. So thank you so much for the recommendation as well.
These videos always feel like mental exercise to me. They work my vocabulary, my ability to track abstract concepts without relying on concrete models, and my ability to remember and distinguish many interrelated concepts as an argument juggles them and afterward.
These are all skills I think I already have to some extent, and the workout is revitalizing and, I think, a catalyst for their development. Thank you!
Compelling. Concise. Complex.
That has given me a deeper understanding of this topic and in record time.
Thanks, Dan.
Wow. Just, wow. This 18 minute video is the most succinct and complete explanations for this entire, complex topic I've ever seen. Last year I wrote over 100 pages to my religious family to try to explain all this same stuff (from reading mostly popular level books like Thinking Fast & Slow, Sapiens, The Righteous Mind, How Emotions are Made, etc) but you nailed down so much in this short video I honestly could just send them this, haha. I guess your TikTok script compressing skills really paid off!
this you tube channel is a gem!
KEEP DOING THIS KIND OF FORMAT!!!!
Thank you very much for this superb distillation of a huge amount of work! Brilliant content beautifully presented. This topic is part of the larger topic of the cognitive origins of agents in general and the subjective experience of one's own existence as an agent in particular. Graziano's "Rethinking consciousness" presents consciousness as the most efficient way evolved to connect different brain areas to model and respond to external reality, but stops short of your insights. This finally closes the loop for me. Thanks again.
Enthralling, had my attention the whole time. Great explanations
Great job, Dan! Thank you for the video!
This is just amazing. Thank you!
This is a wildly good video, thank you for it.
Great video, thanks for the great content!!
I’ve been following you for a few months now, Dan, but this 1 year old video just prompted me to join your Patreon. Love this kind of stuff since reading “Thinking Fast, Thinking Slow” and whatever Dawkins’ book about memes was called. So many questions to ask, but they’ll have to come in August after I take a big professional exam. Looking forward to discussing it all!
Fascinating video Dan!
I'm really glad to see you started a youtube channel, I'd love to see long form essays or larger deep dives from you if that's something you have the time for. I always love your perspective.
Needed this. Thank you
This is a really informative video. Thanks
I read faces in the clouds on your reccomendation! What an awesome survey
Excellent discussion.
"our hypersensitivity to the mental agents in the world around us".
Its just so rare to find anyone not mental.
Intriguing and thought provoking. Still trying to understand why teleological is a default and will try to listen and read more. Thank you.
This is fascinating
My wife passed away 9 months ago and you're not kidding about presence.
Hey I just found your channel recently and I'm really enjoying the content but I also wanted to tell you that I'm a little jealous that you can pull off either a beard or no beard at all. Some of us don't have the option, either one way or the other, and you should maybe take a moment and appreciate that from time to time.
I haven't watched this yet; I just started it a minute ago. But I'm already pretty confident that it's going to be at least interesting and probably informative and entertaining as well. Thanks for your work, sir
Good stuff!
Reminded me a lot of things described in "Religion Explained" by Pascal Boyer. Thanks!
Fascinating
Great video! It is conceptually dense. My recommendation would make shorter linked videos with each concept to increase quick apprehension. I think it will help with the transition from Tiktok for many of your viewers
I have binged on your content today. It was exactly what I needed. I appreciate your research. Listening to you has made me chuck frameworks that I have been holding onto that don’t intuitively feel correct. Which has allowed me to feel closer to God then I have in a long time. Language is a pretty useless tool when describing that feeling.
@Dan, thank you so much for your videos! This stuff is super interesting to me.
Do you have any recommendations for books or scholars who use these same or similar frameworks of cognitive and social roles, not of deity or religion, but taboos? I'm trying to learn more about how certain taboos have developed or what social or psychological purpose they may have initially served.
This is outstanding, Dan! Thank you for it. I'll be re-watching this A LOT. Do you think this theory plays along with Feuerbach's position? Again, outstanding! 👌
That pretty much sums it all up.
Love your videos! Learnt a lot! Sometimes it is too technical for me, like this video. Could you offer simpler explanations? Thanks!
comprehensive analysis. the effect of seeking and recognizing patterns and assigning agents to phenomena is indeed the reason for deity creation. it is ironic that the complex neurology of the standing ape is also a 'defect' forcing the animal to produce gods out of thin air.
Loved this. I wished I'd found your content a couple of years ago yet I'll always be very grateful to DiabloCritics and Dr. Kipp for introducing me to you.
The theory of social cohesion seems to be a framework in which to understand the popularity of the Mithrain Cult as one of Mithras' main roles in the lives of his followers was to oversee agrrements and pacts.
Lots of interesting stuff in this video. How much of those survival factors do you think is influenced by the existence of institutions? I imagine that a state / institution is more likely to align itself with a deity that promotes their aims / needs which would lead to more resources going into the maintenence of that deity worship.
Am I on the right track or am I missing something? I'm a writer and I've often found representations of religion in fiction to be pretty unsatisfying and over simplified so I'm hoping to broaden and deepen my understanding of religion throughout history.
I dont dispute any of this, but i dont think its the whole story. I can sense people after they die. Its always within a few days. The 1st time it happened i was around 17 years old. I was comforting my friend who had just lost her father. We were in her room and i suddenly felt his presence with us. It wasnt creepy, it was quite beautiful. I didnt need that emotionally, didnt need the kinship with him. Wasnt close with him at all. I have aince had that experience many times. Almost always within a few days of the death. What you say may be true, but it doesn't mean there isnt more going on.
Hey Dan. Love your content. It's super helpful navigating my faith crisis. Is it your understanding that ALL deities fit into this framework? Is there any historical information or other data providing evidence that ANY deity or deities, in fact, exist?
I think there is often a degree of overlap between concepts of deities and historical figures. For instance, if a deceased relative becomes treated like something approximating a deity, they had a real existence at one point that is frequently in some way a part of their representation as a deity.
@@maklelan Appreciate the reply Dan. So as far as data suggesting the existence of any supernatural being/god/deity, basically zero evidence appears to be what you're pretty directly implying?
@@LyfeUntethered I don't understand what you believe I'm trying to imply.
@@maklelan Just that there's no evidence any god exists.
@@LyfeUntethered He’s a Christian.
Speaking of language, id love to hear you talk about, 'taking gods name in vain'. And if things like curse words fall into that. Thank you for your hard work Dan!
Hi Dan- great channel! I vaguely recall watching a presentation by Robert McCauley and in there he quotes Boyer, saying something to the effect that "..., supernatural ideation (concepts) are parasitic, because morality and cooperation is something humans have always done,...". Does any of this ring a bell? That's assuming that the main function/purpose of big, punitive and moralising Gods are for moral instruction, cooperativeness and behavioral regulation (deterring bad behaviour).
Good call on growing the beard, Dan. Yep.
That was surreal, I bet you know of a good denial book. I am convinced that The Younger Dryas Impacts Theory is the causation of a large part of religious thought. I was fixated on the Iron Man poster, listening, and reminded of a quote from my book : "In Space the Phenomena would bring on a Angelic quality and when it entered into our Atmosphere it would change into a Demonic attribute.". Referring to the comet Sky Mountain casting out the adversary down as a bolide to the crater pit, all the while anthropomorphizing it into Iron/Nickle Man. Maybe, denial is subconscious, but is it? It has been almost eight years since I published it and the denial is astounding, I had no idea the resistance would be so silent. I would really like to hear your opinion of it after that video, want a copy? Thanks for the new word, teleological, researching it should help in describing the situation.
just saw your tiktok!
I am so looking forward to your video on homosexuality in the Bible!
Despite studying in philosophy of religion, I've, admittedly, not done enough on cognitive science of religion. Is this type of research grounded (I know that's a relative term) in the philosophical work of Plessner or Husserl?
Excellent presentation Dan. May I ask, do you write all of that out first, and then read it for the video?
Sometimes i will write out a script, but most of the time I've just organized my thoughts and then gone through a handful of takes trying to get it all down in one take. I'd probably save some time if I just learned to edit different takes together.
@@maklelan You have an amazing intellect. I love it. I’ve learned so much from you. Thanks!!! Dare I ask…r u part of the lgbtq community? I am, so just hoping u are. Hihihi I notice the watch band all the time.
@@Wiley799 Thanks for the kind words, Jeff! I am not a member of the community myself, I am just someone concerned for equality.
What are your observations on Jaynes' hypotheses around the bicameral mind and consciousness, in particular, what do you think of his ideas on the hallucinated voice(s) of gods?
I always say that deity and what we understand as religion today was the way in which early humans tried to understand the world around them because of the absence of scientific reasoning/understanding.
Also just as important is social cohesion and justice systems crested based on the beliefs
A lot of what you talk about in this video can be attributed to cults/high control groups. Thanks
If deity concept profiles are built by discourse after the initial perception(s) does that preclude any deities having actual existence corresponding with their profile in alternate realities or are they all necessarily fictions that disappear when not spoken of.
Great discussion, I'm sure that's about the way it is, partly. And pretty much only, I suppose, viewing the body as the cause of consciousness and not the other way around.
Which, based on personal experience, non-bs science and droves of "anecdotal" testimonial evidence available, is not the way I personally see it.
That was so fucking interesting!
Do you think there's a connection between these mechanisms in the brain and the experience of a parasocial relationship? (I feel like this question can be read as loaded with assumptions about deities or parasocial relationships being inherently bad so I want to be clear that's not what I'm going for)
I think it could certainly be related. One usually has to produce some kind of perception of reciprocity for the notion of a relationship to be present, and that would depend on cognitive dynamics associated with mental agents and the theory of mind.
so...cognitive biases and social constructs. I already knew this.
This is the most difficult theology class I have ever had.
I enjoy this subject but forgive me for asking an unrelated questions that sprung from viewing your video. I noticed you saying “Adonai” in place of the Tetragrammaton. Is there a way to know when to use Adonai instead of Elohim? Or are they interchangeable? Is it just preference? I’ve typically heard people say “Jehovah” when reading it. I don’t know what is correct to say. I do know it is uncouth to say “Yahweh” though.
When the bible uses Yahweh Elohim which in canaanite form literally means The gods of the council Yahweh, was likely the combination of two forms of understanding that were combined during the writing of many of the text between the 6th and 4th c BCE. There appears to be another, Qos, used by the Idumeans. I suppose this, like the trinity, created alot of question. So that Jews in late antiquity period substituted Adonai for the phrase and modern text put special cantonation marks that alert the reader to use Adonai.
The word Elohim takes on many forms in the bible but the way we should understand Elohim is that shifted meaning is a response to god-trimming, a process that IMO started in the Judges period as there was bias against the substrate canaanite gods. This continued during monarchal period when power was consolidated by eliminating the power of city states (Benjaminite city of Salem - the god of dusk - Urushalim). During the Assyrian phase as Israelite power shrank, their gods shrank within Judean culture until finally El (the father god) and Ashearh (the mother god) was eliminated and temple life was consolidated around the temple in Jerusalem. During these phase the Elohim go from a council of largely city-states gods under the mntn/sky god El the most high, to basically El, Asherah and the power/wisdom god yahweh, with lesser gods out on the periphery, and the Yahweh and his divine council, to Yahweh and his angelic council. In that context men of high pious status are consider the Elohim or Bene Elohim, which means the sons of sons of gods, essentially the same meaning as in Genesis Nephilim . . Execpt in Genesis its the sons of those other now disappeared gods.
To understand the problem we can throw Elohim, Igigi and Anunnuki into the same basket. During the rise of dynastic power initially there was a vast proliferation of gods as Sumer and later Akkad tried to expand into the territory of other gods. There were about in the legendary time of Abram 500 to 3000 gods. After the LBAC there was a general collapse of the system that supported all these gods, reduction was in the air. The canaanites had 70 gods, and these appeared to exist in Israel given the names in Judges, theophorics to gods we have no knowledge of. The beginning of Judges is the end of the LBAC. As we head into the period of Kings theophorics are either to El or Yahweh. Asshur followed Enum Elish, substituting Asshur for Marduk and Syncretizing dozens of gods with Asshur, essentially getting rid of those gods. When the Persian took over the system of Akkad and Sumer began to vanish and so did the need for city-state gods. So its not that the children of the gods disappeared in the levant, the god system was shrinking everywhere. There is a bit of a bounce back as greek and roman religion intermix. We see the same ohenomena in NW and central Europe, the Celts and Germanic cultures had hundreds of gods, but as the Romans start to centralize power these gods rapidly start to disappear. By the time christians start to move into the far reaches of Europe the overwhelming majority of substrate gods are gone.
Is there any video on where you explain then what you actually believe in? What do you think is reality? Do you think the universe is created?
From a dirt mound in Palmyra ,NY?
What's the difference between religion and culture? I used to associate the latter with social identity, but here you use it to refer to the former, I think.
Wow... so God is a small light gray square with a darker gray square on his head. Now I understand.
Knowing all this, how does one - or why would one - still decide to become a member of a particular religion or church?
Complex stuff, many here are saying. Somehow, though, as Dan speaks, don't you just get the feeling that you already knew it all, that perhaps you've had this all figured out since late childhood? For finally, isn't it all so blindingly obvious? If only Dan had come along earlier to put in such a tangible format.
Is morality then, a culmination of agent attributes over time that best served the group?
Then that culmination of attributes becomes the God agent who possesses them all?
So this would evolve as the group becomes larger. So attributes that the New Testament discussed, like, meekness, gentleness, love and charity were perhaps traits of previous agents we admired and bound them together and called it God?
If so, that’s an interesting thought.
OK, this might be a strange question, but, if Faith can be checked by answering the question "Do you believe, that (this?) God exists?", what could be the attributes of existence for a deity?
As an explanation: I once watched a quite bad video by stefan Molyneux, where he tried to argue, that the United States do not exist. He went through a lot of attributes of physical objects (distinct spatial and temporal dimensions, mass, etc.) and did show, that these attributes could not be unprobleatically associated with the United States of America, therefor, the US don't exist.
The problem that he entirely missed is, off course, that the attributes of existence for a physical object are different from those of an institution like a nation state.
No one needs to be able to correctly calculate the exact "mass" of the United States of America, as an existing nation, to distinguis it from Narnia, as an example of fictitious nation.
I heard Sabine Hossenfelder use a definition of existence, where she said "Things that are necessary for us, to explain consistent patterns in our perception, do exist" Do the deities as Dan McClellan explains them in the video above "exist"? Is there an "existence" of divinity, that is irreducable to evolutionary contingencies?
Are you still practicing Latter Day Saint? Should I return to the lds ? It’s been years I’ve even considered that.
Only answering you because I saw him answer on a TikTok earlier today. He is practicing. I think you should return if you’ve had the thought. There is so much softening in the LDS practice now. So much more acceptance if you know where to look. So many seeking connections and a God of love.
Do a deep dive into the history first is my suggestion. Life is too short to give everything to something so questionable
Considering we can create healthy community and meaning outside false religions that exploit people would be worth considering other options first
If you do a deep dive into the history, make sure to use reputable sources and to seek balanced answers. It's waaay too easy to "do your own research" and just end up reinforcing your own biases. Also make sure to separate the validity of the doctrines and revelations from the humanness of the people receiving and teaching them. Even divinely appointed leaders are still human and prone to make mistakes as they continue to grow and learn as well.
There is a problem with this analysis, in that agency is not something that is easy to detect if it is at a different level than you are operating at. For example, consider a conscious cell inside your body, trying to determine your agency. Suppose it has a good news network, so that it gets information from other cells about what's going on all over your body. But it's not "all knowing", meaning, it doesn't know everything you know, just a part, limited by its experience as a pancreatic cell. That cell could come to the conclusion that you don't exist, that it is all cells working together without any agency, and it might decide to become a cancer cell. It grows into a fine tumor. And later, when you go to the doctor to have a pancreatic operation, it will be shocked by the 'coincidences' of suddenly having a scalpel cut it out. How could this mysterious calamity have come about?
This parable is to describe that agency is very difficult to determine "from within", because of the fact that agency at one level decomposes into micro-agencies at a smaller level, and it is the coherence between these micro-agencies that determine the meta-level agency. So it is NOT ALWAYS A MISTAKE to attribute agency outside of individual human agency, and the idea of attributing agency to larger entities, like gods, is a model for this. It is also, I am sure, not incorrect, human collectives form agents with their own separate agency and deliberative consciousness, much as humans are formed from cells. That's what the notion of gods is all about, and the notion of the monotheistic God is taking this idea to the limit, imagining a gigantic ultimate-agent which is comprised of all the agents acting coherently together.
Man makes gods in his own image.
🤯
So, the optical illusion is not an optical illusion. If you take it and put it into photoshop and test the two gray shades, they are different. The Top reads as close to #90999b and the bottom reads as close to #7c8486 (Depends where you sample from). These are genuinely two different shades of gray that maybe prove a different point about our acceptance of narratives.
So when everyone says "there are no gods before me" I forget the bible verse. Those 2 says yes there's more?
Dan has a video about polytheism/monotheism in the bible and in part in his video "did god have a wife?".
I cheat. I go with the best possible deity. I say if you're going to believe in something, might as well believe in the best possible thing.
That's where this evolution of stimuli can lead.
16:06 Isaiah 41:23
My family name is the Spanish Lucero, “light bringer”, the morning star, Venus. I understand that it came from the Latin word for light bringer, “Lucifer”. How did it come to mean “the devil”.
Isaiah uses the term translated "Lucifer" as a sarcastic way to describe the King of Babylon in Isaiah 14:12. Many also read this scripture as a reference to the devil, so the name "Lucifer" stuck to our concept of the devil.
Animism?
This is a us-american perspective. In premodern, non-individualistic societies deities and religions had another important function: power legitimisation and stabilisation. You were born in a religion and society. you didn‘t choose or question it. Alain Supiot is good in making this distinction between modern and premodern religions.
I disagree entirely that I am presenting a "US-American" perspective. None of the scholars I cited here are Americans & I didn't say I was presenting all the functions of deity concepts in all times. I described the three most critical to the success of deity concepts in early human societies. You're describing the relationships of state power to patron deities. That's a later development.
Well, I love your explanation. It is great. But sometimes, not always, it sounds as a complicated way to explain a desperate need that many humans have of a deity in their lives. It is a need that consume all them and don't let them think with reason. They really don't care about deep explanations like this. They just have a deep need, a desperate need of a deity in their lives. It may sound a very intelectual explanation but maybe, MAYBE, it sounds like a intelectual way to avoid, or justify a deep need inside you of the existence of a deity in your daily life.
Exactly. Many plain language explanations exist, as he initially stated
Very interesting analysis. It seems that many people in the comments have derived from this video that God (or gods) is simply nothing more than a human construct that we've created and elaborated upon to fill some base psychological needs. However, I understand that you are an active Latter-day Saint, and I assume that that means you believe in God. I could be wrong in that assumption. I would like to hear, therefore, how you square this model with your own personal beliefs.
I find it difficult to believe that God has no basis in reality. I agree humans have created a lot of our own interpretations about who God is and constructed Him in a way that fits our paradigms. However, I find it difficult to accept that such stories would persist over such a long time with no supporting evidence and we naively just go along with it because we are told to by our society or we want to believe in something. Exodus talks about God appearing to Moses. That either happened or it didn't. Joseph Smith said he spoke with God and Christ face to face. It either happened or it didn't. I personally know people who have died and been resuscitated who say that they met angels and God. That either happened or it didn't. I'm convinced by the evidence I've seen that these things are reality and to explain it away as nothing more than human construct and elaborations (as some people here seem to be doing, not saying you're doing this Dan) is erroneous and doesn't consider the totality of the evidence and the fact that many people have described personal interactions with the Devine. Then that gets into another discussion about the believability of a persons subjective experience, which is a discussion for another time.
There are medical science explanations for the supposed visions people think they have in medical emergencies.. The hundreds of contradictions and errors, inconsistency and ridiculous process of creating the Bible prove it is a not a reliable book at all. Facts not feelings
I wouldn’t want to be your gospel doctrine teacher.😂
What's fascinating to be about this is that it effectively the refutes that popular assertion that, "we are all bon atheists until someone starts telling us lies." No one has to be told anything to develop a belief in the existence of a deity. This should, of course, be obvious anyway, given that the assertion produces an infinite regress.
An alternative explanation is that rational beings have thoughtfully examined the data and come to the rational conclusion that God is real. Just a thought…
Nice try...but no.
Data>Dogma, enter the Matrix.
I love the way you present the facts. You talk as good as THE Professor Jordan Peterson
He is an awful misogynist and not as intellectual as he pretends to be
I love your videos. But this presentation has a number of deep reductionist assumptions about things. They fit well with our current social regime. And they do get peer-review support. But they are ultimately based on our own social regime’s hegemonic colonial agenda, and they invite an impassioned response from people who reject someone trying to assert authority like this. I mean really, what moral authority do we have to, say, make assertions like this to some traditional African healer? Nevertheless, this is another great, highly professional video. Thanks! You’re awesome!
For being a card carrying member of a faith group, Dan sure does talk like an atheist, an awful lot. Maybe that's just a consequence of doing a dispationate study of religion, which many atheists have done and it's why they are atheist.
Honestly I heard the nomen " God" Somewhere when I was 7. So I went to the smartest person I knew, my Mom. And she told me What God was. So that settled it for me the past 58 yrs. 👍
As a member of said faith group, I love Dan's ability to objectively address the data without putting an explicitly atheistic "therefore" on it. The leaders of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints have consistently and repeatedly taught that, while we have very important truths in the Church, there's still more out there. We have an important but narrow view of truth. As such, being able to learn how human cognition might influence my views of God while still leaving room for my personal experiences with the divine is exciting and important to me.
Kind of an overcomplicated and long winded way to say what many sociologists, and other social scientists have written about in plain language and are basically the same reasons he mentioned in the beginning...humans desire spiritual beings for a couple reasons. Fortunately millions of people have overcome those challenges and realize there likely is no God or deities, and we are 100% responsible for creating a meaningful existence for ourselves, justice, and social norms.
Religion and deities are really easy ways to control humanity.
And why grow the humans if you don't want to improve the harvest 🧑🌾😋? 🤷
The problem with your explanation is that it's too abstracted from the phenomenon. I could do the same thing...
All deity concepts come from human experience. Your analyzing into "intuitive cognitive frameworks" and our projection of agency isolates out too much from what experience is to be the whole story. The REAL explanation is human experience, not just your isolated aspects of experience.
It's the same dumb move mathematical Platonists do except you do it with linguistics - your constructions aren't real, they are abstractions! Why do you think your abstraction is a better explanation than the actual psychological experience? From what point of view is it even from?
You'd have to qualify as to how it's "too" abstracted. But more importantly, he's discussing it within the framework within which he has studied. It would be like a high schooler saying an abstract mathematician has too abstracted a set of numbers by describing the axioms by which its built, since they're just used to algebra or calculus, for which one has been taught intuitively to understand such abstractions. Additionally, using mathematical platonists as an example feels both out of place and purposefully specific as to give a veneer of intelligence and reasoning based on some very, very obtuse knowledge of which you are aware. It doesn't come off as an intuitive counter argument since you're essentially utilizing jargon for which you are familiar, to a group which is not to be familiar.
@@metaleggman18 If you don't have the intelligence to either follow my reasoning or to reply to what I said, then go watch baking videos.
It's a shame this guy does his best to turn believers away from their faith.
I agree. I would really like to know more about his faith, however, I realize that is not the aim of his channel
That's not his agenda. If it happens, maybe the problem is with the faith to begin with.
Psychology as a weapon against the church? There is a huge immense gap between quantifiable science and tangential ,unlimited speculations. The scientific method does not mark out the thoughts of Australopithecus SO INSERT YOUR SPECULATION HERE.