Apes and God - or at least, religion

The great apes are funny creatures in that they challenge Homo Sapiens exceptionalism. Most of our most cherished talents they have to some degree. Now there is a provocative interview in Salon.com with Barbara J. King about what gorillas can tell us about God - or at least that is the way the editors bill the story. Take a look, it's interesting (you may have to click through as a guest, but I think you can view it). Here are the first two questions:

Why would an anthropologist who studies apes be interested in religion?

I think religion is all about emotional engagement and social action. And we can get a whole new read on the evolutionary history of religion by asking the kinds of questions that we ask of language and culture. We can see that way back in our past -- literally, millions of years ago -- some practices are visible in the archaeological record that reflect the deepest roots of religion. And apes today are pretty good stand-ins for those very early human ancestors. So when I go to the National Zoo in Washington, or spend time in Kenya looking at monkeys, what I see is very social. It's about emotional connection that's at the very ancient roots of religion.

So you're not saying that the great apes you study are religious -- or have spiritual lives -- but they show behaviors that are required if you're going to develop religion.

That's right. I'm not suggesting that apes are religious. In fact, I have to say that, because Jane Goodall, who is such a renowned and loved figure for her chimpanzee studies, has said very provocatively that chimpanzees may have an incipient sense of religious awe. For example, when she comes upon them looking at a waterfall -- something in nature that is amazing -- they're riveted. She's wondering what's going through their minds and if they may be spiritual in some sense. That's a fascinating idea, but that's not my approach. I don't look for things in apes that are religious. I look at how their behavior relates to the very foundation of what later became religion. For me, the question turns on how I understand religion. I want to be very careful to differentiate between what we think about religion today and how it evolved. I'm really talking about the earliest origins of religion, which was a social and emotional process.