My focus for this commentary is simply to place Van de Vliert's conclusions in the context of my own field(s): religion as seen from a cognitive anthropology perspective. In short, Van de Vliert's conclusions are unsurprising. What makes them particularly interesting is the method employed.
Anthropology, perhaps more than other disciplines, does not always rely on “chains” of evidence: if one metaphorical link is missing, we do not necessarily discard everything that follows. Rather, we rely on “cables” of evidence, in which distinct bodies of evidence serve as mutually supporting strands (Lewis-Williams Reference Lewis-Williams2002, pp. 102–3). This is particularly the case when attempting to reconstruct pre- and early history from fragmentary evidence. Over the past decade, models for biological and cultural evolution have increasingly been used to provide one such supporting strand (see Barkow Reference Barkow2006; Sperber Reference Sperber1996). (Though recently popular, this approach has a long history. Margaret Mead [Reference Mead1964] argued that not only does culture evolve, but the unit of evolution can include “types of social organization, from the simple band to the modern nation-state” [p. 146].)
Van de Vliert suggests anthropologists such as myself consider the above article as containing “evidence for the validity of models of niche construction” (sect. 6.1, para. 5), but I would like to address a more specific implication. A crucial event in the history of religion is the emergence of state-level societies, associated with new agricultural techniques, vertical hierarchies, kingship, and new forms of religion (especially doctrinal religions) (Whitehouse & Martin Reference Whitehouse and Martin2004). At the risk of repeating an already well-known narrative, one of the most robust of the traditional explanations for why this happened is ecological: in the Tigris and Euphrates valleys (as with the Nile, Indus, and Yellow rivers), survival is disproportionately dependent on organized labor. The climate in the mid-fourth millennium BCE changed to a slightly cooler and drier environment. While mountainous regions still had ample rainfall for “wet” farming, lower altitudes could only be exploited with more intensive agricultural techniques, the most efficient of which being irrigation (see e.g., Nissen Reference Nissen1988, pp. 56–60). The labor necessary for intensive agriculture could not be sufficiently organized without centralized authority. Concentrating power in the hands of kings and priests may have decreased personal freedom for the majority (along with other costs associated with dense and sedentary settlement patterns), but the benefits of agriculture seem to have outweighed these costs.
Van de Vliert seems to have arrived at a similar pattern despite approaching it from a direction very different than scholars of religion. In less challenging environments, he sees differences in freedom between upper (in this case, richest) classes and lower (i.e., poorest) to be relatively small. In more challenging environments (colder or hotter than temperate), differences in freedom between classes are greater. This seems to parallel the differences between more egalitarian, wet-agriculture regions and hierarchical, dry-agriculture areas described by Nissen. In short, Van de Vliert has given the history of religions a supporting strand, and seems to have demonstrated that state formation in the fourth millennium BCE was simply a dramatic example of a more general pattern.
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My focus for this commentary is simply to place Van de Vliert's conclusions in the context of my own field(s): religion as seen from a cognitive anthropology perspective. In short, Van de Vliert's conclusions are unsurprising. What makes them particularly interesting is the method employed.
Anthropology, perhaps more than other disciplines, does not always rely on “chains” of evidence: if one metaphorical link is missing, we do not necessarily discard everything that follows. Rather, we rely on “cables” of evidence, in which distinct bodies of evidence serve as mutually supporting strands (Lewis-Williams Reference Lewis-Williams2002, pp. 102–3). This is particularly the case when attempting to reconstruct pre- and early history from fragmentary evidence. Over the past decade, models for biological and cultural evolution have increasingly been used to provide one such supporting strand (see Barkow Reference Barkow2006; Sperber Reference Sperber1996). (Though recently popular, this approach has a long history. Margaret Mead [Reference Mead1964] argued that not only does culture evolve, but the unit of evolution can include “types of social organization, from the simple band to the modern nation-state” [p. 146].)
Van de Vliert suggests anthropologists such as myself consider the above article as containing “evidence for the validity of models of niche construction” (sect. 6.1, para. 5), but I would like to address a more specific implication. A crucial event in the history of religion is the emergence of state-level societies, associated with new agricultural techniques, vertical hierarchies, kingship, and new forms of religion (especially doctrinal religions) (Whitehouse & Martin Reference Whitehouse and Martin2004). At the risk of repeating an already well-known narrative, one of the most robust of the traditional explanations for why this happened is ecological: in the Tigris and Euphrates valleys (as with the Nile, Indus, and Yellow rivers), survival is disproportionately dependent on organized labor. The climate in the mid-fourth millennium BCE changed to a slightly cooler and drier environment. While mountainous regions still had ample rainfall for “wet” farming, lower altitudes could only be exploited with more intensive agricultural techniques, the most efficient of which being irrigation (see e.g., Nissen Reference Nissen1988, pp. 56–60). The labor necessary for intensive agriculture could not be sufficiently organized without centralized authority. Concentrating power in the hands of kings and priests may have decreased personal freedom for the majority (along with other costs associated with dense and sedentary settlement patterns), but the benefits of agriculture seem to have outweighed these costs.
Van de Vliert seems to have arrived at a similar pattern despite approaching it from a direction very different than scholars of religion. In less challenging environments, he sees differences in freedom between upper (in this case, richest) classes and lower (i.e., poorest) to be relatively small. In more challenging environments (colder or hotter than temperate), differences in freedom between classes are greater. This seems to parallel the differences between more egalitarian, wet-agriculture regions and hierarchical, dry-agriculture areas described by Nissen. In short, Van de Vliert has given the history of religions a supporting strand, and seems to have demonstrated that state formation in the fourth millennium BCE was simply a dramatic example of a more general pattern.