Subsistence and ReligionWritten by Peoples, H and Marlow, F

Presented by Erin and Charles

Dependent Variable

• High God: “a spirit who is said to have created all reality and/or is reality’s ultimate governor. . . . [This] includes spirits whose sole act was to create the other spirits who, in turn, produced the natural world”

• Presence and type of high god, on a scale from less to more involved in the lives of humans:

• (1) Absent• (2) Present but inactive• (3) Present and active (or moral high gods)

Previous Research• High gods likely to be found where there is more jurisdictional complexity,

Economic complexity, and Broad measures of subsistence and social complexity

• Drought as a constant source of ecological stress• Archaeological evidence: • economic artifacts precedes evidence of religion (i.e. animal sacrifice)• Functional grave goods precede decorative religious grave goods• goods never appeared without surplus.• :::Strong evidence for a relationship between presence and type of high

gods and economic factors

Functions of a Moral High God• As society becomes more complex, population stresses create problems and

there is an increasing interdependence and need to cooperate to produce, manage, and defend resources

• Leaders of a society should find it useful to leverage the idea of a high god to promote cooperation,

• Reduce in-group fighting,• Reduce fissioning,• And Stabilize stratification, allowing for more population growth and domination

of smaller societies

Hypothesis 1• Interference of high gods should increase as productivity increases, defined

as mode of subsistence• LOW foragers, attain their own food, mobile tribes• MED horticulturalists, forage a bit, so have productivity like that of

foragers, but have larger populations and are sedentary, which exacerbates problems of large populations; ALSO foragers who relied on trade for >%50 of subsistence

• HIGH agriculturalists are large and very stratified, and sedentary• ??? Pastoralists, do not fit neatly into the continuum, more mobile than

foragers, but also more stratified; included mounted hunting to make the forager sample better approximate pre-agriculture

Hypothesis 2

• Interference of high gods should increase as population size increases.

• Used direct measure, unlike previous studies, which used stratification

(1) 10-999(2) 1,000-9,999(3) 10,000-99,999(4) 100,000-999,999,999

Hypothesis 3

•Interference of high gods should increase as social stratification increases

(1) Egalitarian(2) Wealth distinctions(3) Social classes/castes

•This is highly correlated with population size •Stratification and population size should be in a positive feedback loop, but population size should be the dominant variable

Others

Dependence on animal husbandry, growing crops, hunting-gathering-fishing

was analyzed to determine which is most influential.

Methods

• Used the Standard Cross-Cultural Sample• The SCCS is a collection of 186 societies selected from the World

Ethnographic Atlas that are designed to be a representative sample of the world’s societies in terms of geographic region, language family, and cultural area.

• These cultures are relatively independent, and reduce the problem of cultural diffusion explaining correlations

Hypothesis 1: Mode of Subsistence● The Data Supported the Hypothesis.

● High Gods present in all types of Subsistence Economy, but most likely to appear in Pastoral and Agricultural Societies.

● In all Subsistence types, greatest predictor was an increased reliance on animal husbandry.

Best Predictor: Animal Husbandry

• At 26% dependence on animal husbandry,There are almost exclusively moral high gods.

● Animal husbandry is the strongest subsistence-related predictor of High

Gods (Spearman’s ρ=0.429, p<0.0005).

• Below 25%, moral high gods are rare

Hypothesis 2: Population Size

• The presence of high gods and moralHigh gods increases as population sizeIncreases (Spearman’s ρ=0.387, p<0.0005).

Hypothesis 3: Social Stratification

• Twice as common in societies with social Classes than in egalitarian societies

• Hypothesis 3 supported

• When controlling for subsistence mode, population had more of an effect on stratification than vice versa

• This suggests that it is increased population that leads to stratification, and that stratification is the method of solving the collective action problems that are caused by larger populations.

Ordinal Logistic Regression●Subsistence mode and population size were significant predictors, while

stratification was not.

● When controlling for subsistence mode, population had more of an effect on stratification than vice versa

● This suggests that it is increased population that leads to stratification, and that stratification is the method of solving the collective action problems that are caused by larger populations.

Discussion● Result suggested that Animal Husbandry was a large force in promoting

existence of Active High Gods.

● Moreover, High gods in pastoral/Agricultural Societies were most likely to be morally supportive. But Why?

Foragers

• Foragers mostly Self sufficient and require less cooperative Labor.• Mostly Egalitarian, therefore resistant to the demands of a moral High

God.

Pastoralists• Pastoralists rely on their herd animals for almost everything:

• Situations often quickly become unstable (herds scatter) or dangerous (Ecological or Warfare).

• They have the most frequent warfare of all modes of subsistence. Increases need for Collective action.

• A group that cooperates and looks out for each other might have an advantage against others.

Agriculturalists

• Encounter many similar problems to Pastoralists, with the self generating wealth of Crops.

● Group size increases with increased food production. Drought, external threats and other problems creates a need for fissioning and when fissioning is not beneficial, stratification occurs.

• This stratification is hard to maintain in large populations, additional incentives needed for cooperation. Cue emergence of Authority figure, and Moral High Gods.

• Horticulturalists would benefit from high gods to solve similar group-action and cooperation problems as agriculturalists, but not nearly to the same extent

Success of the Moral High God

• Emphasis or creation of a Moral High God from leader would be useful for creating cohesion and cooperation in group.

• Less likely to question divine judgment• It would take care of free-riders without having to expend resources.• If failure occurs, they can shoulder the blame on the god.

Origin and Evolution• Belief in High god stemmed from challenged from subsistence types that

required cooperative action.• Used to facilitate and benefit high ranking individuals, who would in turn

benefit the group.• Eventually increased fitness of entire group, both within itself (pastoralists

watching out for each other’s herds) and between groups (warfare)• Eventually led to the transformation of human societies into higher levels

of collective, economic organization that sustained larger populations.