In a magisterial survey from pre-history to mass society, from birth to the afterlife, from football fans to terrorists, Harvey Whitehouse offers a compelling, ambitious and testable theory of why we human beings devote so much time and effort to activities with so little instrumental benefit.
Harvey Whitehouse is a leading anthropologist whose research focuses on the role of ritual in the evolution of social complexity. One of the founders of the cognitive science of religion, his publications include Religion, Anthropology, and Cognitive Science (co-edited with James Laidlaw; 2007), Mind and Religion: Psychological and Cognitive Foundations of Religiosity (co-edited with Robert N. McCauley; 2005), and Modes of Religiosity: A Cognitive Theory of Religious Transmission (OUP, 2004).