The Evolution of God

Listening to the interview--haven't read the book-- he comes across as not very knowledgeable about world religions and not able to think through the logical conclusions of some of his ideas. Look for the sweeping statements like "across the world" and "everyone" when in fact he is referring to the middle class Western versions of only three religions.

For example, he talks at one point about how the idea of god evolved into a monotheistic god. That's really only true of the Judeo/Christo/Islamo-religions. I'm sure the nearly 1 billion Hindus might have a different opinion. I don't know enough about religions like Shinto, Sikh, Jain, etc. other than a wikipedia like basic knowledge to know where they fit in for sure.

Not to mention the Catholic evolution towards saints as almost lesser gods. Throughout the history of the Catholicism, the converting priests and nuns would take local gods and goddesses and bring them into the Catholic fold in one way or another. See Saint Bridget and Caribbean examples.

It also ignores the rise in paganism in Europe over the past few decades through the neo-pagans. I certainly have no love for the way the neo-pagans have Disneyfied Celtic and Teutonic religions, but the people who follow them do have an honest belief in a pantheon of gods and goddesses. Modern wiccans seem to have a god and goddess with some spirits, but I haven't studied them too much because again, I dislike how the new age followers of wicca have taken away all the cool parts. It's like listening to the muzak version of the Clash. :)

He also mentions religion becoming more "liberal" although he doesn't use that word. This completely ignores the rise of the evangelical extremists in Christianity and Islam.

It makes for a much longer title, but it would be more honest if the title were something like "The Evolution of the Abrahamic religions in Western culture."

Definitely is a fascinating book.

@Bob

The focus of the book is on the evolution of modern monotheism from the gods of the hunter-gatherers. The fact that a monotheistic idea of god evolves doesn't mean that it's the only idea of god that exists. But if your question is "how did X evolve" you focus on the evolution of the most derived traits. It isn't all that difficult for the average reader to draw a line from the idea of god in old polytheistic societies to that of god in modern Hinduism or neopaganism, especially when the book provides a broader context for how ideas of god evolve as people have had to adapt to a world in which you had to live peacefully with people who weren't your blood kin.

As for the evolution of more liberal religion - even the most bloodthirsty religious fanatics today have to work hard to find justifications for killing people. That's rather more liberal than the god in Judges who punished people for sparing a few on the enemy tribe's cattle.

I think the more important concept Wright has put out there again is the idea that 'a god/gods/godesses' are really just humanity's ideas in relation to it's understanding of the universe and the forces within it, like Joseph Campbell put forth in his famous books about religion/spirituality. As the human race's morality and ethics evolve to find a sustainable balance place for our species on the planet and universe so to the 'religions' that bubble up ever 100-500yrs or so each millenium. As self-conscious beings the old meme of following blind pure instinct per DNA instructions is gone but filtered through language, communication, group dynamics and ideas.

I tend to imagine that if the planet as a whole is a living being in the process of evolving, the mass consciousness of humanity would be it's swirling mind and our spaceships it's tendrils reaching out to explore it's surroundings. But like a cell turned cancerous we can kill our body before it can mature. The mind of god is the mind of man.
If fractal pattern holds in nature as we see in math, then bit of evolving intelligence in our solar system is but a fragment of conscious intelligence dotted around the infinite universe, like one brain cell in the body.

But I'm not purporting that mass collection of consciousness is an all knowing seeing god that created itself or a universe outside of itself. I tend to think the cosmology of Hinduism/Buddhism fit fine with physics, cosmology, astrophysics and the such because their understanding of spirituality doesn't require an initial cause but understanding a never ending cycle which the later Western understanding of infinitely expanding contracting universes which might possibly exist in a higher dimensional plane where our 'universe is but a buble in the froth of energy/time isn't a knew concept for those religions or ideas.
Magic is just the unintelligent interpretation of nature. Using a quantum computer and random subatomic particle probability waves to solve problems or store and manipulate date is 'magic', just the silliness of using incantations, voodoo, prayers and objects is now dismissed and instead understanding of the real matter, math and energy used.