Religion is a hell of a product.
Priceless to most users. Highly scalable. Very sticky. Low variable cost. High switching cost. Fanatical promoters.
People have consumed religion the world over for millennia. Billions of users. In 2022, the top four religions are used by 76% of our global population (Christianity has 2.3 billion users, Islam 1.9 billion, Hinduism 1.1 billion, Buddhism 500 million).
Why has religion been so successful? And what does it mean that the fastest growing group in the 21st century is actually the nonreligious, which stands at 1.1 billion and counting?
What is Religion?
Keeping with the “religion as a product” perspective, we can see a common set of features across all religions: 1) A definition of meaning. This can be a god for the “theist” religions typically found in the west, or a state of being for the non-theist belief systems more commonly found in the eastern half of our society. 2) A followable path towards that meaning. Once a religion has its “god” or “state of being” endpoint figured out, it needs to light a path to help users head towards that spiritual goal. This is typically done by recommending how to live a life, i.e. the ten commandments. 3) A reminder system to help users remember features #1 and #2. It’s easy to forget what you’re aiming towards and how to get there. Religions use books, traditions, foods, clothing, symbols, and more to constantly remind users what they should be doing.
This feature set can be seen in every religion, or at least every successful one.
To finish answering “what is religion,” we need to look at which problem religion solves for an individual person.
How Does Religion Help a Person?
Religion helps because being a living human is confusing. We each know that we don’t actually know what we are and what’s going on here. This inherent confusion creates a stressful state of existence.
By providing a “highest-level” definition of meaning + a direction to follow + a reminder system to help you lead a life that is relevant to that meaning, religion helps reduce that existential anxiety. And reducing that anxiety feels good. Reducing that anxiety creates room for hope, opening the door to freedom, creativity, and to the pursuit of meaning.
Let’s look at more empirical observations to understand religion’s helpful role. Research shows that people who adhere to religion experience less depression. From the linked study, “60% [of participants] report less depression and faster remission from depression [with more religious practices]. In contrast, only 6% report greater depression.”
However, using a relationship with god as an antidote to depression is becoming more difficult as belief in god quickly declines. American’s belief in god is down to 81% in 2022 from 87% just five years earlier in 2017. You’ll notice in the graph below that not only did it plummet by 6% over the past five years, but we have data showing that belief in god has been consistently above 90% for quite a while, and likely above 95% for centuries before that. We’re in the midst of a significant spiritual destabilization. It probably comes as no surprise to you that times are a changin, but looking at the data helps confirm that suspicion.
As it currently stands, there’s no good alternative for the waning value of god. I couldn’t find a study or graph to explicitly support the following hypothesis, but it seems that as our gods become less compelling, we consume more pills to help us cope with the loss of meaning and accompanying anxiety.
Antidepressant use in the U.S. has grown from 10.6% in 2009 to 13.8% in 2017. That’s over 1 in 10 Americans who consume antidepressant medication on a regular basis, and counting.
If this hypothesis is true, then replacing religion with antidepressants is a bad trade off. It’s bad because religion is directional, in other words it provides followers with something to aim towards. Pills are directionless, an empty god.
And so here we are, with out of date religions that are losing their efficacy and shitty replacements. What’s next?
What Does the Next 1,000 Years of Religion Look Like?
As a small note, I’m not convinced that the word religion will stick.
Regardless of the word we use, the problem that religion aims to solve is as relevant to humans in 2022 as it was to humans in the year 202. And it will likely be relevant in 20,222 as well. We have progressed in so many amazing ways and understand so much more about our reality than we did 2,000 years ago, but we have the same spiritual needs. That is to say, we still need a definition of meaning, a direction to aim for, and a reminder system to help us stay the course.
So how do we upgrade religion?
Well, we need to reimagine the three features in order to make them valuable for a 21st century mind. We should start with the first feature, a definition of meaning, since the second two features are in support of feature number one. Reimagining the first feature requires that we reinvent the “ultimate power,” whether that’s a god or a state of being, to be a more compelling and therefore helpful concept.
In my personal life, my working feature #1 is the idea of “understanding everything.” I find the idea of existing in a state of complete existential understanding a compelling endpoint. I also like that this definition of meaning fits the scientific narrative over the last 5 centuries in which we’ve worked more systematically than humans ever have before to understand the true nature of our circumstance.
My definition of meaning aside, once we have a collective definition of meaning we like- whether we call it a god, a state of being, a mix of the two, or something else- we can build the next two features: a path to pursuing that meaning and a reminder system to keep us on track.
An Internet-Native Religion
Christianity, the most successful religion by user count, uses “scripture” to share its ideas.
Scripture is a central component to Christianity’s reminder system. Without the ideas of Christianity written down, the religion would rely on word of mouth to spread its ideas. That’s a way less reliable way to scale an ideas-based product. Getting Christian ideals on paper was huge for the success of the religion.
In 2022, if you wanted to spread a new religion, the idea of writing down the spiritual ideals still seems like a good one. However, would you write them in the same way?
While the exact history of who wrote which parts of the bible is unclear, it’s evident that it was written over some centuries by many different people.
If writing a religious text in 2022, you’d similarly want to leverage many different writers around the world to make the most representative text possible. With the internet, you could imagine a global open-source project aimed at generating a new spiritual book.
Let’s assume this new book is written and people want to conform parts of their lives based on this book’s teachings. You could imagine another part of this new reminder system being “internet-native clergy.” In other words, in Christianity you go to a building called a church to engage with the “religious professionals” called clergy to get help along your spiritual journey.
Imagine a decentralized group of people that are well versed in the new religions’ ideals and who are incentivized to help other people engage with the religion. For example, if we collectively decided that we want to get more people understanding our new definition of meaning so that they can help in its pursuit, it could make sense to incentivize these internet-clergy by paying them per message exchanged about the religion. With the internet and features of web3 like oracle networks, it becomes possible to incentivize and securely reward this kind of behavior.
You could also imagine events similar to Sunday church happening digitally in a metaverse like environment. Let people the world over connect over their shared spiritual interest in a creative digital setting.
You could also imagine a more dynamic scripture where the recommendations about how to live a meaningful life update as we learn more about our reality. What’s relevant to do today might not be relevant tomorrow, and our spiritual guidance system should reflect that.
The point is, there are many elements to religion, from the foundational definition of meaning to the reminder system, that need to be reimagined for the 21st century.
Once we do that, we can enjoy the benefits of existential hope once again.
What’s Next
Next up I’ll review what I’ve written of the society series so far, exploring how our economy, government, and religion relate to each other. I’m focusing on these first since they are the big three incentive systems. We’ll look at how their relationship with each other could be improved to create a more relevant society.
See you next Sunday. xo,
Michael
Ideas congruent with my own, pleased to find you on Substack. I think the coming revolution in religion will affect our species more than a scientific one, because of the focus and meaning. As a network designer, I suggest changing the books in the pews, keep the traditions, bricks and human mortar. -- Dwight