Religious instinct

The virtual universality of religion in all known human cultures has led many scholars to conclude that it must be part of our native endowment, that it is instictive. In other words, we are born with religious instinct, which will eventually lead to the establishment of religion as a fundamental social institution once our culture evolves past a certain level.

Observations

There are no religious rituals observed in animals, including our close relatives, Chimpanzees and other apes; though chimps were observed to have sometimes collective excitements for no reason. The burial rituals were first established by archaeological work among Neanderthals some 50,000 years ago. Carl Jung (1875-1961) first noticed the collective unconscious, which is the residue of what has been learned in humankind's evolution and ancestral past. In this portion of the psyche reside insticts, potential for creativity, and the spiritual heritage of mankind. The religious instinct is apparently part of our racial collective unconscious, which dictates our behaviour without our knowing.