Gods Are Popular for the Same Reason Superheroes Are

Chinnamasta from India (left), Baron Samedi from Haiti (center), and Anubis from Egypt (right) are some absurd gods. Source: public domain images and markbenecke via Wikimedia Commons.

"All popular theology, especially the scholastic, has a kind of appetite for absurdity and contradiction. If that theology went not beyond reason and common sense, her doctrines would appear too easy and familiar. Amazement must of necessity be raised." - David Hume (The Natural History of Religion, 1757)

It wasn't until 250 years after David Hume said this that cognitive scientists discovered how necessary absurdity is for the success of religious narratives.

Absurd Gods Are Memorable 

In 2001, Pascal Boyer and Charles Ramble published a study (PDF) in which participants were invited to read a short story. The story contained characters and objects that were "counterintuitive," meaning that they defied fundamental expectations about reality. For example, some objects had psychological attributes (e.g., “objects that hide away when they are scared”) and some people lacked physical attributes (e.g., “a person who can be in two places at once”). Other concepts were merely unusual (e.g., “a man who could uproot a tree with his bare hands”) or entirely normal (e.g., “objects designed by engineers”).

After reading the story and taking a 5-minute break, participants recalled as many concepts as they could. Boyer and Ramble found that the "counterintuitive" concepts were recalled significantly better (a result that was unaffected by the participants' religiosity or their familiarity with the concepts).

Given that religions often use counterintuitive concepts, such as omnipresent gods and statues that listen to prayers, the authors surmised that our brains are hardwired to remember gods. Curiously, they also found that concepts that are excessively counterintuive are harder to remember because they lack real-world importance.

Statues that listen to prayers appear in many religions. Source: Cbill via Pixabay.

In other words, there is a sweet spot in which something is memorable but remains relevant, called “minimal counterintuitiveness.” For example, most gods have emotions and concerns that make them appear broadly human. Furthermore, most of the Jesus narrative is about mundane events (e.g., fishing or having dinner) with counterintuitive concepts sprinkled in between (e.g., walking on water, or turning water into wine).

“If we examine, without prejudice, the ancient heathen mythology, as contained in the poets, we shall not discover in it any such monstrous absurdity as we may be apt at first to apprehend.” - David Hume (The Natural History of Religion, 1757)

Boyer and Ramble’s experiment became one of the founding pillars of the “cognitive science of religion” – a new field of study that asks how our brains are hardwired to find religious ideas attractive – and it has been replicated many times, with further studies finding that counterintuitive concepts attract attention (see Pascal Boyer's book "Religion Explained") and are easily communicated between individuals.

Although there has been criticism of the research (PDF), the basic idea that unexpected entities are easier to recall is demonstrably true and it provides religions that employ such entities with a competitive advantage in the marketplace of ideas.

Superheroes, Talking Toys, and The Force 

Of course, the marketplace of ideas is populated by other counterintuitive concepts that are not part of religions. Almost half of Americans and a third of Brits believe in ghosts, and most people are entertained by ghost stories. 

One need only look at the movie industry to see how captivating counterintuitive themes are. Of the top 20 highest grossing movie franchises in history, 14 clearly include counterintuitive concepts (Marvel, Spider-Man, Star Wars, Wizarding World, Avengers, DC Extended Universe, X-Men, Middle Earth, Toy Story, Twilight, Shrek, Pirates of the Caribbean, Avatar, Transformers) while the other six are borderline counterintuitive or manifestly unrealistic (Batman, Mission Impossible, James Bond, Despicable Me, Fast & Furious, Jurassic Park).

Fiction writers have long been aware of our attraction to absurdity. Source: public domain images.

The success of these movies is testament to our attraction to absurdity. Whether it be Mickey Mouse, Superman, Greek myths, or religious texts such as the Bible and Koran, these stories never die because our brains are hardwired to remember them.

Of course, an attraction to religious ideas does not explain everything. People believe gods are real and worship them, but they don’t usually worship Dracula or Mickey Mouse. Academics call this the “Mickey Mouse problem," and solving this problem requires digging a little deeper.

Why Are People Attracted To Absurdity? 

The evolutionary reason for our superbeing fetish is difficult to pin down, but it helps to know what “counterintuitive” really means. Beings like Zeus and Superman have powers or attributes that violate deeply held intuitions that we have about the world. For example, we intuitively know that solid objects cannot occupy the same space, be invisible, or be in two places at once. We know that living things grow, require sustenance, and die, and we know that mindful beings move in accordance with their beliefs and goals.

The word "intuitive" means that all human beings figure these things out, without being taught, in the first few years of their lives if they live in a typical environment. So, when a god or superhero violates these intuitions, all human beings divert their attention, regardless of where they grow up. The question, then, is why?

Some theorists have suggested that we pay attention to counterintuitive beings because they can possess “strategic knowledge” about our lives, such as about our personal thoughts and secret transgressions.

However, this explanation is difficult to attribute to fictional characters on the big screen, or to mindless counterintuitive objects. Alternatively, if the “strategic knowledge” hypothesis just applies to gods, perhaps as the reason for our belief in them, it becomes difficult to explain the disinterested creator gods that appear in several African religions (i.e., who create the universe and withdraw).

In my own research, I suggested that “strategic knowledge” is part of a larger category called “fitness relevance.” Put simply, fitness relevant beings have a greater capacity to help or harm than beings that are not fitness relevant. Knowing secret information about people is part of this, but so are all the other counterintuitive abilities that could make a being or object especially useful or dangerous (teleportation, resurrection, shapeshifting, etc.). In several studies, I found that beings with counterintuitive abilities are perceived as a greater potential threat and benefit, and that this partially explains why they are remembered well.

Why Do People Believe in Gods?

To answer the deeper question of why people believe in gods and not Mickey Mouse, I conducted another study to compare people’s perceptions of religious and fictional beings. I found that gods are attributed more mind-based abilities (e.g., mindreading, answering prayers, etc.) and ambiguous abilities (e.g., omnipotence, controlling events), and are seen as more benevolent and ambivalent (combining benevolence with threat) than fictional beings.

Each of these traits, I concluded, can either motivate belief directly by being comforting (e.g., benevolence), or they can make it easier to convince yourself that a comforting belief is plausible (e.g., when ambiguity is present). The research therefore supported an “emotional explanation,” such as that religion is wishful thinking.

Thank you for reading. If you found this post interesting, please bookmark, share, and explore the site!