The Use of Supernatural Entities in Moral Conversations as a Cultural-Psychological
Résumé
Social behavior in most human societies is characterized by the following of moral rules explicitly justified by religious belief systems.These systems constitute the diverse domain of human sacred values. Supernatural entities as founders orwarranty of moral principlesmay be seen as a formof "conversation stoppers," considerations that can be dropped into a moral decision process in order to prevent endlessly reconsidering and endlessly asking for further justification. In this article we offer a general naturalistic framework toward answering the question ofwhy supernatural entities are so attractive in moral argumentation. We present an explanatory model based on the phenomena of multiple channels of moral reasoning, the suspension of epistemic vigilance, and relevance assumptions through the attractiveness of the sacred, moral dumbfounding, and the expression of social coalitionary commitment. Thus, in light ofmuch of current cognitive theory, sacred values make sense as basins in the evolutionary landscape of human morality.
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