Shamanism as a Biogenetic Structural Paradigm for Humans' Evolved Social Psychology

Abstract

The features of shamanism found cross-culturally identify the foundations for a biogenetic paradigm. Similarities of shamanic ritual with chimpanzee displays involving ritualized bipedal charges, communal vocalizations and drumming point to the hominid ritual foundations and community dynamics from which shamanism emerged. Hominid collective rituals expanded over human evolution in enhanced capacities for mimesis, music, and dance, factors selected for as part of an enhanced behavioral and symbolic capacity for ritual participation. Ritual practices produce changes in consciousness and experience of self that reflect access to basic structures of consciousness, exemplified in out-of-body experiences. Shamanism engages our innate psychology to produce symbols, reflected in concepts of animism, animal spirit identities and powers, and animal totemic groups. This innate psychology of shamanism is based in symbolic processes produced by the cross-modal integration of innate processing modules for the natural world (animal species) self-representation, inference of mental processes, and identification with social references.

Full text

Shamanism as a Biogenetic Structural Paradigm for Humans’ Evolved
Social Psychology
Michael Winkelman
Arizona State University
The features of shamanism found cross-culturally identify the foundations for a biogenetic paradigm.
Similarities of shamanic ritual with chimpanzee displays involving ritualized bipedal charges, communal
vocalizations and drumming point to the hominid ritual foundations and community dynamics from
which shamanism emerged. Hominid collective rituals expanded over human evolution in enhanced
capacities for mimesis, music, and dance, factors selected for as part of an enhanced behavioral and
symbolic capacity for ritual participation. Ritual practices produce changes in consciousness and
experience of self that reflect access to basic structures of consciousness, exemplified in out-of-body
experiences. Shamanism engages our innate psychology to produce symbols, reflected in concepts of
animism, animal spirit identities and powers, and animal totemic groups. This innate psychology of
shamanism is based in symbolic processes produced by the cross-modal integration of innate processing
modules for the natural world (animal species) self-representation, inference of mental processes, and
identification with social references.
Keywords: shaman, ritual, evolution, alteration of consciousness
There has been a longstanding recognition of remarkably similar
ritual healing practices worldwide, generally labeled as shamanism
(Flaherty, 1992; Narby & Huxley, 2001). These cross-cultural
similarities recognized by Eliade (1951/1964) helped diffuse the
concept of shamanism. The shaman was someone who entered into
ecstatic states in order to interact with the spirits on behalf of the
community. A death and rebirth experience, magical flight, animal
allies, and personal transformation were also attributed to sha-
mans. Eliade considered the shamanic ritual a “spectacle un-
equaled in the world of daily experience” (Eliade, 1951/1964, p.
511), an inclusive worldview embodying cosmological, ecologi-
cal, and communal relations, as well as the spiritual and healing
activities of these societies. Shamans defended “life, health, fer-
tility, the world of light, against death, diseases, sterility, disaster,
and the world of darkness” (Eliade, 1951/1964, p. 509). The ritual
involved vigorous dancing, drumming, and singing, accompanied
by the local community who encircled the shaman. Eventually the
shaman collapsed or reclined, and entered into the spirit world in
a soul journey to communicate with the spirits and obtain their
cooperation.
The worldwide commonalities in ritual healing practices that
Eliade proposed were confirmed by empirical cross-cultural re-
search (Winkelman, 1986, 1990, 1992). Quantitative analyses of
data from a representative worldwide sample establish the cross-
cultural presence of similar ritual healing practices in the premod-
ern world. These virtually universal patterns of ritual behavior and
belief in foraging societies include (from Winkelman, 1992,
2010a):
• the combined role of the preeminent social, political and
spiritual leader;
• a charismatic nighttime ritual with all of the local com-
munity;
• selection of the neophyte shaman that involved a premon-
itory illness or dreams;
• shamanic training in a vision quest that involved pro-
longed solitude in the wilderness;
• initiatory processes involving the experience of a death by
animals and the rebirth of the initiate in which the animals
reconstructed a new person, incorporating themselves into
the shamans;
• shamanic powers derived from special relations with an-
imals, including personal relations with animal spirits and
a belief in the ability to control animals and to transform
into an animal;
• alteration of consciousness through ritual technologies
(austerities, fasting and sexual abstinence, dancing, chant-
ing, singing, extensive drumming, and frequently psyche-
delics);
• a magical flight, soul flight, or in modern terms, an out-
of-body experience or astral projection;
• ritual activities focused on healing and acquiring protect-
ing from spirits and evil shamans;
• theories of illness involving lost souls, sorcery and the
negative influences of spirits;
• the belief the power of the shaman to cause illness and kill
magically; and
• the reputed ability to control weather and to physically fly.
Winkelman’s (1990, 1992) cross-cultural research also revealed
a universal pattern of ritual practice that reflects the persistence of
core features of shamanism in more complex societies. These are
shamanistic healers who share features of shamanism involving
the alterations of consciousness in community rituals to interact
Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Michael
Winkelman, School of Human Evolution and Social Change, Arizona State
University. E-mail: Michaeljwinkelman@gmail.com
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with spirits for healing and divination. Shamanistic healers are a
social universal—all societies have institutionalized practices for
alteration of consciousness to engage spirits in rituals for healing
and divination.
The Shamanic Paradigm
The worldwide distribution of spiritual healing practices mani-
fested in shamanism in the premodern world and the persistence of
their basic features in shamanistic healers worldwide today reflects
biological bases that involve biogenetic roots and an innate human
psychology (Winkelman, 2002, 2009, 2010c). These cross-cultural
similarities provide an ethnological analogy (Winkelman, 2010a,
2010b), a shamanic paradigm based in the empirical cross-cultural
features of shamanism. This shamanic paradigm provides a frame-
work for inferring evidence of shamanic practices in the past,
helping to identify and interpret the evidence for prehistorical
ritual activities (e.g., during the Upper/Middle Paleolithic revolu-
tion 50,000 years ago or more [Winkelman, 2002; Clottes &
Lewis-Williams, 1998]).
A biogenetic structural paradigm is derived from the homolo-
gies of the cross-cultural similarities in shamanic practices with
basic principles of human biology and psychophysiology, provid-
ing a neurological understanding of an ancient natural religion.
The neurological underpinnings of shamanism underlie Eliade’s
characterizations of shamanism as involving community rituals
performed to enter ecstatic consciousness to engage the spirit
world. Winkelman (2010a) characterized the biogenetic bases of
these features as based in:
• community rituals as processes for communication and
social integration, exemplified in dance and music, and
evoking dopamine and endogenous opioid mechanisms;
• ecstasy, an innate mode of information functioning (the
integrative mode of consciousness) that reflects integra-
tion of ancient brain processes into the frontal cortex; and
• spirit concepts as reflecting fundamental structures of
consciousness and innate processing modules, particularly
involving the symbolic representation of self and social
others through the metaphoric utilization of an innate
capacity for conceptualization of animal species.
Biogenetic approaches permit identification of deeper roots of
shamanic activities by examining homologies of shamanic ritual
with primates’ ritualized behaviors (Winkelman, 2010b, 2010c).
The similarities in the chimpanzee maximal displays and shaman-
ism reveal the evolutionary roots of human ritual functions, while
their differences illustrate the factors involved in the emergence of
shamanic potentials over hominin evolution.
Biogenetic Origins of Human Ritual
The study of animal behavior and its social functions provides
much more valid conclusions about their cognitive capabilities
than inferences regarding their beliefs. The study of animals’
ritualized behavior (displays) illustrates their integral role in social
lives of vertebrates, the basic system of group communication and
coordination (d’Aquili, Laughlin, & McManus, 1979; Laughlin &
d=Aquili, 1974). Ritualized displays have social signaling func-
tions, a signal of readiness for social behaviors. Displays generally
involve deliberate use of genetically-based behaviors to signal
intentions to other members of the species. Animal displays in-
volve signaling functions that are based in partial behavioral
enactments that express an animal’s intents (i.e., baring the teeth to
indicate a threat of biting).
Ritual involves a variety of adaptations, but is, in many cases,
technically an exaptation (Gould, 1991)—the use of a prior adap-
tation (a capacity to engage in a behavior) for a new adaptive
function (communication). Rituals provide information that allows
for coordination of the behavior by making an animal’s internal
dispositions available to other members of the group in a behav-
ioral signal that is the initial behavior of a sequence of possible
actions. By displaying intentions, animal rituals facilitate cooper-
ative behaviors, synchronizing individual behaviors into socially
coordinated patterns by facilitating the flow of information. One
bird that raises its wings in a readiness to flee predators makes the
possible need for such action available to others.
Hominid Ritualized Displays
A widespread aspect of ritual communication among mammals
involves drumming; Randall’s (2001) analyses of drumming be-
haviors across species indicate that drumming is not merely sig-
naling but is also a manifestation of vigilance, fitness, competi-
tiveness, and a readiness to act. Chimpanzees engage in collective
drumming, accompanied with complex vocalizations that ethnol-
ogists have called choruses and carnivals. Drumming, vocaliza-
tions, bipedal displays, and charges are the basis of the most
complex of chimpanzee ritualizations, the maximal display, a basic
mechanism for group integration in chimpanzee society (De Waal,
1997). The dispersal of the troop during the day optimizes foraging
opportunities but requires the reintegration of the group at night for
security. This is achieved by the maximal display by the alpha
male, who begins the vigorous display with loud calls and drum-
ming on the tree selected for the nightly reunion. These ritual
behaviors are mechanisms for reintegrating the dispersed society
into a single group, with the loud vocalizations by the alpha male
providing an auditory beacon for members of the group to con-
gregate. As the troop reunites, each must submit to the alpha male
or risk attack— hitting, biting, beating, and stomping. Once sub-
missive, the animals join together in the safety of the tree in a
vibrant chorus. These displays continue into darkness, intimidating
predators and provoking a release of tension.
Van Lawick-Goodall (1968, 1971) observed similar displays in
“rain dances” among wild chimpanzees, manifested in a rhythmic
stagger, swaying from foot to foot, hooting, beating of branches,
and aggressive bipedal charges in response to thunderstorms.
Reynolds & Reynolds (1965, 407) described “chimpanzee carni-
vals” involving group chorusing, calls, drumming, and collective
outbursts that most commonly occurred at night and lasting several
hours. Earlier descriptions of these “carnivals” noted that they
might last all night on moonlit nights, and with such ferocity of
drumming and vocalizations that they produced awe and trembling
in nearby humans. These dynamics are also found in other chim-
panzee behavioral routines such as in response to the presence of
other groups, who elicit drumming, throwing of objects, hooting,
and vigorous displays (Goodall, 1986, pp.134, 491). Chimpanzees
similarly protect their territory through group shouting, pant hoot-
ing vocalizations (loud calls), and aggressive displays with fast
drumming produced by jumping up and down on a tree buttress
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and beating on them with hands and feet (Arcadi, Robert, &
Boesch, 1998).
These displays have multiple adaptive functions (summarized
from Winkelman, 2010c):
• creating an auditory beacon to facilitate reintegration of
the group for protection;
• establishing a group hierarchy that protects the group and
individual by reduction of violence;
• producing emotional synchrony within the group;
• releasing frustration and tension; and
• expressing a group identity, exemplified in the shaping of
vocalizations to mimic alpha males.
The components of these “rain dance” activities and “carni-
vals”—aggressive displays involving bipedal charges and shaking
of branches, drumming and emotional vocalization—are wide-
spread among the great apes (Geissmann, 2000; VanLawick-
Goodall, 1968). Displays of other great apes include kicking;
stomping; shaking branches; beating on the chest, ground, or
vegetation; and jumping (Geissmann, 2000). These homologies
across the great apes indicate that similar behaviors were also
characteristic of their common ancestors with the humans, the
hominids. These behaviors fulfilled similar functions, including
intergroup communication, especially communicating emotional
states and enhancement of group cohesion and unity (Geissmann,
2000; Hauser, 2000; Merker, 2000, 2009). Their structural and
behavioral similarities indicate that these activities are a reflection
of an ancient hominid disposition to engage in overnight collective
ritual manifestations.
Homologies of Chimpanzee Displays and
Shamanic Ritual
Features of shamanic ritual that are homologous with chimpan-
zee displays identify preadaptations for shamanism found in the
matrix of ritual activities of our hominid past. These basic neuro-
psychological structures and social psychological functions of
hominids also were the foundational neuropsychology of our hom-
inin ancestors. The basic features of hominid displays that have
homologies with shamanic ritual include (Winkelman 2010c):
• alpha male ritual displays that integrate and emotionally
bond the community;
• night-time performances, often overnight and involving
bipedal displays; and
• drumming, emotional vocalizations and group chorusing
like music.
The basic features of chimpanzee ritualizations shared with
other hominids indicate that humans have deep biogenetic dispo-
sitions to engage these collective ritual behaviors involving vocal-
izations, drumming, dancing, and charging displays that function
to integrate the social group, an emotional communication system
that enhances group integration.
The significant differences between chimpanzee rituals and sha-
manic rituals reveal features of hominin evolution that enabled
shamanism to supersede the baseline of hominid ritualizations. The
music and song in shamanic activities reflects an expansion of the
preadaptations manifested in primate vocalization systems, sharing
their functions to communicate emotions and enhance group inte-
gration. The dramatic enactments of ritual were expanded in hu-
man’s evolution of the mimetic capacity and its expressive func-
tions. Other differences in the evolution of shamanism include:
prominent alterations of consciousness and their cognitive proper-
ties; beliefs relating animals to personal powers and social identity;
rituals of healing; and mythic systems of explanation (Winkelman,
2010a).
Mammalian Bonding and Ritual Processes
A core aspect of shamanism emphasized by Eliade was that
ritual was on behalf of the community; communal integration
generates physiological responses that are key aspects of shamanic
healing. Shamanic activities engage the activation of dopamine
and opioid responses that enhance social cohesion (Winkelman,
2010a, 2013). These responses involve aspects of ancient mam-
malian bonding mechanisms based in neurobiologically mediated
forms of attachment evoking the release of endogenous opiates.
Kirkpatrick (2005) shows the roles of these biological attach-
ment processes in the psychosocial aspect of religion, reflecting
adaptive responses of a biogenetic system which evolved to meet
the need of maintaining proximity between infants and caregivers.
These primordial attachments based on affectional bonds that
provide a secure basis for the self are extended to a broader
community through ritual practices that exapt these biological
systems to broader functions of providing feelings of comfort and
protection. Our innate drives for affiliation and bonding based in
processes that evoke opioid mechanisms are integrated through
ritual practices to promote a biopsychosocial synchrony among a
broader group.
Shamanism evolved as a response to expand the roles of attach-
ment and cooperation from the mother-infant dyad to provide
collective adaptations. Our mammalian attachment capacity was
expanded in an exapted adaptation or coopted adaptation that
enabled the ritual extension of the attachment system and its
adaptive effects on well-being. The capacity of the mammalian
attachment system is extended through exaptation to enhance
levels of cooperation and integration in even larger groups through
ritual. The innate emotional dynamics underlying the infant-
mother attachment relationship is exapted in the positive emotional
valuation of the protective group leader; this enhances group
cooperation, a transference of the attachment system dynamics to
enhance intragroup cooperation. Weingarten and Chisholm (2009)
further contended that the supernatural agent premise provided
additional mechanisms for intragroup cooperation, with concepts
of deity used to supersede the capacity of a single alpha male to
enforce group cooperation. Deity concepts facilitated extension of
the mammalian bonding capacity to bond larger social groups,
exceeding the limits of kinship.
Mimesis as an Expressive System
Human rituals extend features of primate rituals, an ability to
communicate through the intentional use of behavior to convey
meaning. These primate expressive systems expanded in the evo-
lution of mimesis, a body-based system for the expression of
intentions (Donald, 1991). Mimesis and its associated communi-
cative capacities of music and dance constitute an ancient source
of hominin practices, where shamanic technologies of dance and
music facilitated emotional and cognitive communication and en-
hanced bonding with others. These communicative systems of
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dance and music provide for the expression of ancient aspects of
the personal and social self, as well as technologies for the alter-
ation of consciousness.
Behavioral enactment capacities were precursors for human
expressive capacities that involve mimesis, the ability to intention-
ally represent through imitation. This provided a prelanguage
expressive system in early hominins (Donald, 1991, 2006). This
preverbal communication is through bodily movements, gesture,
facial expressions, rhythm, affective expression, and melody. Mi-
mesis underlies body-based expressions found in contemporary
society (i.e., play, drama, theaters, social ceremonies, mime, mu-
sical performances, and rituals).
Mimesis is a conscious behavioral production of metaphor
through gesture and imitation, an enactment that requires a map-
ping of body actions onto an imagined context. Body metaphors
express meanings through analogical reasoning processes involv-
ing the body and its ability to mediate between the sensory do-
mains and domains of meaning. The most fundamental schema for
analogical transfer involves the body’s ability to act, an innate
neurologically-based body schema that provides a common basis
of both somatic and symbolic levels of reality (Laughlin, 1997;
Newton, 1996). Mimesis enables the entrainment of the body with
external rhythms in the abilities of dance and music which evolved
as an interrelated set of capacities that exploited the full body
capacity related to the inherent rhythm of bipedal movement
(Merker, 2000, 2009). Donald (2006, p. 16) proposes mimesis was
at the basis of a coevolution of our capacities for cognition and
culture, providing a “a single neurocognitive adaptation . . . [for]
mime, imitation, gesture and the rehearsal of skill.” These dramatic
expressive manifestations of dance, music and ritual provide dis-
tributed cognition. The use of bodily movements as symbolic
communication embodied in mimesis enhanced group coordina-
tion by building on the most basic animal display behavior—
isopraxis—in which animals automatically imitate each other’s
behavior.
Donald (1991) proposes that an archaic level of culture based on
gestures, dance, pantomime, and imitation emerged in cognitive
evolution of humans. This was provided by mimesis that was
expressed in group ritual dances that involved vocalizations imi-
tating the sounds and behaviors of animals. Shamanism exploited
these ritual communicative capacities through prolonged periods
of dancing enactments combined with chanting, singing, and other
vocalizations that induced alterations of consciousness. Freeman
(1995, 2000) characterizes the last half million years of human
evolution as based in the adaptations made for enhanced social
communication, especially in music and dancing, the quintessen-
tial technology for understanding other minds, a biotechnology for
enhancing group formation. Rhythmic dancing, marching, clap-
ping, and chanting were central aspects of ancient socialization
processes that integrated body and the motor and somatosensory
systems in a way that intrinsically link the individuals into a
cooperative community. The rhythmic motions and emotional
vocalizations (music) enhanced cooperation as nonverbal commu-
nication systems for bonding of groups beyond the family.
Alcorta (2006) notes a cross-cultural feature of ritual involves a
focus on adolescence as the most significant part of the develop-
mental cycle for ritual transmission of religious beliefs and behav-
iors. Ritual indoctrination is a natural part of adolescence devel-
opment because it is an experience expectant period for learning.
A basic structural feature of all religions involves the presence of
music in community rituals that elicit emotionally significant
experiences of the sacred. Adolescent socialization uses these
rituals to focus on redefining the initiate’s social roles and identity
to fit societal expectations. Sacred processes provide secular so-
cialization, a psychosocial transformation into adult status. Pro-
longed intense initiatory rituals that engender great pain help
increase the individual’s commitment to the group and its long-
term cohesion.
Because of delayed brain development in areas involving emo-
tional control and regulation, adolescent is in a period of more
intense emotional reactions and responses, which must be orga-
nized and controlled within cultural patterns. And because of
delayed development of some brain circuitry, adolescence is a
period during which the human’s brain development is still sub-
jected to powerful shaping influences from the culture, social
relations, and physical ecology. Ritual was the primary mechanism
through which this cognitive and emotional socialization took
place. Crucial brain interconnections developed during adoles-
cence are engaged by rituals that control emotional inputs and the
management of personal and social life. These adolescent devel-
opments play a central role in the integration of emotional capac-
ities with socially mediated cognitive processes. This is the reason
for the association of collective ritual practices with this period
expectant period of development, providing cultural models and
social identifications under conditions of heightened suggestibility
for personality formation and development of superindividual col-
lective identification. Given the necessity of such collective per-
sonality formation for the effective functioning of large hominid
groups, hominin evolution involved the acquisition of various
skills that extended the capacities for group bonding.
Dancing and Mystical Experience
The dramatic bipedal charging displays of chimpanzees are a
limited capacity compared to human dance. These capacities for
dance emerged as an evolutionary by-product of some of human-
ity’s most unique features, bipedalism and long-distance running,
including endurance running (Bramble & Lieberman, 2004, p.
345). This capacity for running also apparently contributed to the
emergence of spiritual experiences, a by-product of the capacity of
long-distance running to alter consciousness (see Jones, 2004).
This is recognized in the “runner’s high,” which has features
typical of mystical experiences, including: positive emotions such
as happiness, joy and elation; a sense of inner peacefulness and
harmony; a sense of timelessness and cosmic unity; and a connec-
tion of oneself with nature and the Universe (Dietrich, 2003).
Jones characterizes the ultrarunning high as a result of the
extreme activation of the autonomic nervous system and the sat-
uration produced by the simultaneous activation of both the sym-
pathetic and parasympathetic nervous system. Simultaneous acti-
vation of generally separate functions results in an overload of
brain areas responsible for general orientation and attention, visual
integration, emotional processing, and expression of verbal-
conceptual phenomena (to paraphrase Jones, 2004, p. 44). This
results in a cessation of normal cognitive processes producing a
sense of ineffability and disintegration of the self. Prolonged
running provokes the release of the opioid, adrenaline, and nor-
adrenaline neurotransmitters, and endocannabinoids (anand-
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amide), which produces psychoactive effects similar to the THC of
marijuana (Dietrich & McDaniel, 2004). Sands and Sands (2009)
proposed that selection for long-distance running in Homo subse-
quently selected for a form of spirituality, a “horizontal awareness”
or biophilia that operated through existing neurobiological reward
systems, producing mystical experiences through enhanced acti-
vation of the opioid and cannabinoid systems.
Rossano (2009) proposed ritual alterations of consciousness
exercised selective during human evolution, an important environ-
mental feature because of unprecedented increases in levels of
social complexity during the Upper Paleolithic. Demands for in-
tegration of larger groups that exceeded kinship boundaries were
met by social rituals that reduced innate aggressive tendencies by
enhancing social-bonding mechanisms (Rossano, 2009). Hayden
(2003) attributes the evolution of shamanism to relations between
resource stress and intercommunity ties, where ritual capacities
enhanced the abilities to forge close emotional bonds that en-
hanced survival through facilitating alliances. The adaptiveness of
ritual lies in the creation of a sense of a common group identity
that helps to overcome the natural tendency toward maintenance of
in-group boundaries that exclude outsiders. Shamanic rituals
helped forge commonality through ritual alteration of conscious-
ness that produced a sense of unity with others.
Altered Consciousness as the Integrative
Mode of Consciousness
Eliade considered the ecstatic condition to be a hallmark of
shamanism, specifically the soul flight or magical flight when the
shaman left the body and traveled to the spirit world. The near-
universality of institutionalized alterations of consciousness and
the cross-cultural and near-universal distribution of the soul flight
reflects their basis in human biology (Winkelman, 2010a). Sha-
manic soul flight reflects a general pattern of the modification of
consciousness by the extreme activation of the sympathetic ner-
vous system to the point of exhaustion and collapse and the
resultant rebound into an extreme parasympathetic condition, a
recuperative state of the body characterized by extreme relaxation
culminating in sleep and unconsciousness that restores homeo-
static balance. This response is accompanied by a shift from left
hemisphere- to right hemisphere-dominated processes, eliciting a
variety of endogenous healing responses.
There are further similarities of the brain conditions produced
by a variety of activities and agents for altering consciousness.
Conditions such as long distance running, physical and emotional
shock, extreme fasting, ingestion of a variety of natural substances
and ritual procedures such as drumming, chanting, music, and
dancing elicit an increased theta brain wave coherence. This nat-
ural response involves what I call the integrative mode of con-
sciousness, a model that originated in the work of Mandell (1980).
This theta wave model of altered consciousness is supported by
research on the brain wave properties of hypnosis, dissociation,
psychedelics, meditation, and dreams (see Winkelman, 2011, 2013
for a review of the literature).
This common brain response underlying diverse agents and
procedures involves systematic brain discharges that originate in
the serotonergic connections between the limbic system and brain
stem. These synchronous patterns originating in the hippocampal-
septal-reticular raphe circuits reflect stimulation of the linkages
between the attentional mechanisms in the behavioral brain re-
gions (reticular formation) and the emotional brain (the
hippocampal-septal area). This produces ascending brain wave
discharges that synchronize these levels of the brain by projecting
discharges into the frontal lobes that are manifested in high voltage
slow-wave EEG activity (especially theta, 3– 6 cps waves). These
discharges enhance integration of information from evolutionarily
earlier structures of the brain (the preverbal structures of the
R-complex and paleomammalian brain per MacLean, 1990) into
the frontal brain. This integration of information from the prever-
bal brain structures into the frontal cortex is why this is an
integrative mode of consciousness. This integration is why these
experiences are often characterized as providing understanding,
enlightenment, a sense of unity, oneness with the universe, con-
nection with others, and personal integration.
Psychedelics are a paradigmatic case for understanding the
nature of the integrative mode of consciousness within the general
action on the serotonin, a neuromodulator controlling diverse brain
processes (Winkelman, 2007). Vollenweider and Geyer (2001)
found the principal effects of psychedelics involve the cortico-
striato-thalamocortical loops that reduce the sensory gating sys-
tems of the lower brain structures, leading to a flood of information
into the higher levels of the brain. These dynamics are primarily
the result of serotonin disinhibition and the consequent loss of its
inhibitory effects on dopamine and the mesolimbic structures. This
release of the dopaminergic system enhances the activity of lower
brain structures, particularly the thalamic area that gates informa-
tion ascending from the peripheral nervous system (Passie, Halp-
ern, Stichtenoth, Emrich, & Hintzen, 2008). These effects are
reflected in high-voltage synchronized theta wave discharges.
Shamanic processes for accessing the integrative mode of con-
sciousness involved an exaptation of dreaming. Shamanic prac-
tices engaged dreaming because it is a mammalian adaptation that
provides for information integration and consolidation in a visual
symbolic medium. The centrality of dream to shamanic cognition
was found around the world in the shamanic concept of “the dream
time.” Shamanic rituals inevitably engaged dreams because rituals
were typically overnight activities which inescapably engaged the
dream process in tired participants. Accessing dream experiences
was a deliberate intent of shamanic practice, utilizing dream incu-
bation practices to enhance transmission of those cognitive pro-
cesses. The significance of this mammalian adaptation for shaman-
ism involves the innate function of dreaming to produce memory
and information consolidation during sleep. Shamanic visionary
experiences and dreams engage ancient representation capacities
of presentational symbolism.
These properties of dreaming engage imagetic communication
processes based in unconscious, nonvolitional, affective, and psy-
chophysiological information (Baars, 1997). This information sys-
tem integrates information from somatic, psychological, and cog-
nitive levels through visual images and analogical processes.
Shamanic visions are based in synesthesia of corporeal, visual, and
auditory sensory modalities in a presentational symbolism inherent
in the meanings of the visual images (Hunt, 1995). Presentational
symbolic systems provided ancient mechanisms for representation
and contributed to new forms of self-awareness that produced a
transcendence of ordinary awareness and new forms of identity.
Shamanic functions in the integrative mode of consciousness in-
volve an expansion of consciousness from the physiological bases
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from which it arose, exemplified in the shamanic exploitation/
exaptation of the dream capacity and its innate integrative pro-
cesses to provide solutions to problems.
Soul Journeys as Self and Extrapersonal Cognition
Shamanic activities also exploit this visual symbolic system to
produce special forms of awareness that transcended the embed-
dedness of biologically-based bodily consciousness. The mimetic
foundations of shamanism and its body-based epistemology was
superseded in the evolution of the capacity for the soul jour-
ney—an out-of-body experience—a form of self-awareness expe-
rienced as apart from the body. The signature alteration of con-
sciousness associated with shamanism, the soul journey or magical
flight, shares fundamental similarities with contemporary spiritual
experiences and astral projection, as well as with near-death or
clinical death experiences and some psychological disorders in-
volving abnormal self-representation. These similarities reflect a
common biological basis for these experiences, innate psycho-
physiological structures that are hard-wired (Winkelman, 2010a).
Hunt (1995) proposed that soul journey engages a visual sym-
bolic capacity, the same capacity for nonverbal imagestic symbol-
ism involved in dreaming. These experiences reflect imagestic
awareness of the body perceived within the context of the social
capacity to take the role of the other as a model for the self. This
social capacity involves interactions in which one constructs per-
ceptions regarding one’s self based on information obtained by
monitoring the perceptions regarding one’s self expressed by sig-
nificant social others. Hunt proposes that the shamanic soul jour-
ney involves this capacity to take perspectives of others toward
one’s self and to project this self-perception within the modality of
presentational symbolism.
The soul flight shares features of anomalous body and self
experiences involving: a lack of unity to self, perception of the self
in a location different place than the physical body, and perceiving
the world from a perspective different than that of the body
(Metzinger, 2009). Metzinger notes that these anomalous self
experiences reveal properties of the proto-concept of the mind.
Blanke (Blanke & Mohr, 2005; Blanke et al., 2005) attribute such
experiences to a functional disconnection between parietal and
frontal areas of the brain, which enables the experience of the body
traveling through space without the constraints of the physical
body.
Metzinger proposes that visual representation of one’s own
body from a perspective different from the physical body has
adaptive features derived from the separation of cognitive capac-
ities from the physical self-model. Mental clarity associated with
these experiences reflects activation of the brain’s transient func-
tional modularization that enables the brain’s information process-
ing systems to differentially distribute functions across different
aspects of the self. When physical trauma terminates somatosen-
sory input, higher cognitive functions involving attention, agency,
volitional processes, and problem solving are integrated by other
self aspects. Near-death experiences exemplify the functioning of
higher cognitive processes after the incapacity of the physical
body.
Metzinger proposes that out-of-body experiences reveal the
primordial nature of self and consciousness that led to a dualist
perception of reality, the conclusion that consciousness exists apart
from the physical body. These experiences of one’s self as a
soul-like entity are the basis of a neurophenomenological arche-
type, reflecting a neurological potential that is at the core of
experiences with the integrative mode of consciousness. Soul
flight experiences reflect elementary features of human conscious-
ness involving a self-awareness and modeling that exceeds the
primitive body systems. These processes enable a transcendence of
the present moment, a displacement of consciousness to predict the
future. Arzy, Molnar-Szakacs, and Blanke (2008) illustrated that
this capacity for mental time travel is an evolved capacity for
anticipating future events, reflecting selection for mental process-
ing that aids decision making.
The extrapersonal functions of dopamine are key to out-of-body
experience, which exemplify context-independent consciousness,
experiences of people and places removed from the physical body
(Previc, 2009). These self-cognitive functions of the soul flight
apparently have a basis in the complementary functions of dopa-
mine and serotonin: the right hemisphere and its serotonergic and
noradrenergic systems inhibit the left hemisphere and dopamine
(Previc, 2009). But an end effect of psychedelics such as LSD and
psilocybin is the disinhibition of dopamine, releasing its cognitive
functions. Previc (2009) reviews evidence that dopamine is key to
the functions of advanced intelligence and cognition and is in-
volved in processing information related to events in distal space
and time. Context-independent abilities, to experience and think
about things other than the here and now, were expanded within
shamanic ritual activities.
Alterations of consciousness played a central role in the evolu-
tion of the capacity for learning. The processes of unlearning are
mediated by the neuromodulators stimulated by ritual and bonding,
especially oxytocin, dopamine, endorphins, and serotonin, and
especially vasopressin, the mechanisms by which basic mamma-
lian bonding processes were extended to larger groups (Freeman,
1995). The normal adaptations for cumulative learning reach their
limitations or can fail under catastrophic change or major life cycle
changes such as adult transition, which require a conversion in the
nature of self and social meaning (Freeman, 2000, p. 149). The
need for radically new structures requires processes that can dis-
solve existing meaning structures and replace them with new ones.
This unlearning can be achieved by transmarginal inhibition, a
collapse due to extreme stressors that can also result in a complete
loss of prior learned associations and even personal identity. The
stress induced collapse and loss of former behavioral patterns as in
“brainwashing” allows for new learning to replace previous pat-
terns. Freeman notes that these breakdowns allow for the persis-
tence of general knowledge, motor skills, language abilities, and
personal memories, while dissolving social attitudes and values.
The ritual provides social guidance to reshape the person to new
attitudes and expectations.
Animal Relations in Shamanism and Social Evolution
The shamanic alterations of consciousness produced by diverse
methods produced experiences that connected our ancestors with
the environment in a relationship in which they felt an intimate
connection with nature. The self-identifications with the broader
universe, particularly personification of the sentient cosmos, is a
fundamental feature of shamanism. This notion of the spirit world
is represented in the concept of animism, that nature is embodied
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with spirit entities. While this animistic postulation of spirits has
been attributed to cognition regarding anomalous psychological
phenomena (i.e., dreams, spontaneous out-of-body experiences),
animism is best understood as a consequence of transferences
across innate processing modules (Winkelman & Baker, 2008).
Animacy is a universal human tendency because it is an adaptive
feature of human cognition based in a hypersensitivity to the
presence of an animate agent. Spirit concepts reflect a blending of
the capacities of perceptions of nature with those for awareness of
self and social others.
Bird-David (1999) portrays animism from the perspective of the
innate perception of powerful presences that are understood as
super persons. The relationships established with the animistic
super persons are reciprocal, in which one both receives benefits
and privileges and to whom one has obligations met through ritual.
Shamanic rituals provided mechanisms for creating and honoring
these relationships, ritually enacting these persons. These relation-
ships give rise to a greater sense of the interconnectivity among
community, the ecosystem, and the cosmos that is a hallmark of
animism. Identity with animals in nature has many manifestations
in shamanism, especially in animal species that are conceptualized
as significant aspects of shamanic power and identity and collec-
tive totemic identities.
Imitation of Animals in Shamanism
A nature-oriented awareness was basic to shamanic develop-
ment, a vision quest alone in nature which was a fundamental tool
of personal growth. Shamanic initiates spent prolonged periods of
time, sometimes for months or even years, largely alone in the
wilderness. It was there alone in nature and in the presence of
carnivores that the shaman engaged in an archetypal engagement
with death, the death-and-rebirth cycles engendered by the real
fear of death at the mouths of carnivores. There in nature shamanic
initiates had the opportunity for developing relations with animals
that were considered to be the source of power. Development of
relations with animals, specifically relations of allies with animals
and animal spirits during visionary experiences, was a basis of the
shaman’s power of being able to control them.
Central aspects of shamanism involved animals: the shaman was
believed to be killed by animals in a death-and-rebirth initiatory
experience, the shaman’s power was derived from animals; the
shaman was believed to be able to transform into an animal, the
shaman enacted animal behaviors and sounds in rituals, and
the shaman was thought to be able to control animals for
purposes of bringing them to hunters. Shamans had special
rel ationships to ani mals, intervening with the master of the
animals and leading hunts and making sacrifices to appease the
spirits of the animals killed for food. Shaman’s powers were used
to call animals to waiting hunters, and, when necessary, secure
their release from the powers of nature. The killing of the animal
was also accompanied by sacrifices to the animal’s spirits to atone
for their loss, giving thanks for the sustenance that they provided
for the humans.
The hunting of animals was necessarily linked to selection of an
enhanced capacity for mimesis because imitation of animals is
central to success in hunting through the ability to engage in
deception through imitation. Central aspects of hunting involve
adoption of behaviors of animals themselves, exemplified in imi-
tation of animals as a form of disguise and lure. Hunting activities
also involve a shamanic practice: that of acquiring power over
animals. Knowledge of animals’ habits and behaviors was key to
deception and imitation, mimicking of the vocal calls of animals to
attract them or to cover one’s own noise.
Hunting and killing of animals reflects central concerns of
shamanism. Killing large animals was a life-risking activity, one
where the hunter struggled with his and the animal’s violent
emotions (also see Hodgson & Helvenston, 2006). The real risk of
death from animals must have accentuated the fear of attacks from
animals. The management of these emotions was central to sha-
manism, where the shaman both made ceremonies to appease the
spirit of the killed animal, as well as managed issues of human fear
of death. This human fear of death was a central feature of
shamanic development, embodied in the death-and-rebirth phe-
nomenon central to development of the initiate.
The practices of imitation used in hunting necessarily contrib-
uted to a greater sense of identification with animals. This enact-
ment of the “other as animal” in hunting deception and pursuit
produced identification with the animals. Imitation of the behavior
of some of the most significant features of the environment—
animals—provided a template for broader representation skills.
Furthermore, the shamanic impulse to understand the environment
in human and animal terms, and conversely the self in terms of
animals and their powers, contributed to the rerepresentation that
is key to symbolic behavior.
Animacy and the Self: Animal Powers, Guardian
Spirits, and Totems
While the basic assumption of unseen spirits may be the exten-
sion of a hyperactive agency detection device, spirit assumptions
and characteristics are reinforced by humans’ innate capacities for
social intelligence. This involves our ability to infer the mental
states of others and the ability to use that information and our own
self-qualities as bases from which to infer and predict others’
future behaviors. This is an intuitive “theory of mind,” the attri-
bution of mental states to others and the modeling of their thoughts
and behaviors. Such attribution processes are the basis of animism
and the world of spirits, who are attributed a range of capabilities
that mirror human attributes (Winkelman & Baker, 2008). What-
ever qualities of personified qualities of cognition, personality, and
intentionality may be intrinsic to nature, their perception by hu-
mans is modeled on the perceptual templates intrinsic to human
perceptions.
The natural tendency to attribute internal dispositions and purpose
to others is also unavoidably attributed to nature. The universality of
spiritual beliefs reflects this adaptive tendency, which was exapted
into populating nature with spirit beings who operated with the same
features as humans. This tendency to assume the presence of an agent
is combined with other innate faculties for self and other representa-
tion to produce the broad range of features typically associated with
concepts of spirits (Winkelman & Baker, 2008,Chapter7).The
projection of humans’ self-qualities to the unseen, as well as nature, is
an inevitable consequence of our psychological and social develop-
ment; spirits are a natural epistemology involving the inevitable
projection of human models of the self.
Shamanic relations with nature also involve conceptualizations
of self and society through the representations provided by animal
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species. The personification of nature embodied in animism facil-
itates the reciprocal process, the naturalization of the person. The
same projective processes that underlie animism are used to recip-
rocally internalize into the person the qualities found in nature,
specifically those of animal species. Evolutionary psychologists
recognize that humans have an innate natural history module, an
intrinsic ability to recognize and categorize species of animals (see
Mithen, 2006; Winkelman, 2010a for discussion). Shamanic prac-
tices engage this specialized innate capacity for recognizing “spe-
cies essences” and incorporating those qualities of animal species.
The differences among animal species provide a universal system
for creation of meaning through analogy. The use of animals in
social and cognitive modeling is one of the most fundamental
aspects of metaphoric and analogical thought (Friedrich, 1991), a
universal human system for expression of meaning and creation of
social and personal identity through the exaptation of the innate
module for animal species categorization. Our innate capacity to
classify the animal world is extended to other domains, exapted for
vital functions of self and social representation. These aspects of
shamanism reflect an intrinsic ecopsychology. Animal species and
their qualities and behaviors provide a natural template for differ-
entiating self internally (psychological structures and traits) and
making public one’s social identity.
Shamans’ personal powers are conceptualized in terms of ani-
mal spirits, engaging humans’ capacity for internalization of oth-
ers, using animals as the others which can give us power, identity,
and affect our well-being. Shamanic practices involving animal
allies and guardian spirits involve the capacity to incorporate the
qualities of others into the self, an innate tendency to internalize
the qualities of others in personal identity. Animals also serve as a
template for society in the practices of totemism where animal
species are an innate template for conceptualizations of our lin-
eages and tribes, organizations that extend society into transfamil-
ial dimensions. Animal species and their variant qualities are the
natural template within which human psychological and social
development evolved.
This ability to recognize intrinsic features of species and to transfer
this knowledge to other domains is exemplified in the shamanic
animal guardian spirits that provide representations of self. Uses of
animals as aspects of the self are illustrated in the guardian spirit
complex (Swanson, 1973). This involves the acquisition of a special
relationship with a specific animal species that serves as a model for
self-development and personal qualities. This self-development is
based in the incorporation of the powers of the animal as part of one’s
own personal powers. Swanson characterized the guardian spirit com-
plex as a form of adult role development where personal and social
choices for life are guided by the qualities of animal species that one
receives as a guardian. The qualities of the animals provide the ideals
for individual psychodynamics and social behavior, a basis for diverse
self-representations and a more complex self to mediate a hierarchy of
personal and social goals. Similar group dynamics are found in
totemism.
Totemism: Nature Relations as Group Identity
The symbolic application of nature to group identity is found in
the practice of totemism. These group-oriented religious practices
that Durkheim identified as the origins of religion, are manifested
in practices of ancestor worship, where the group’s ancestors and
deities are represented by an animal species, referred to as a totem.
This view of totemism derives from the work of French sociologist
Emile Durkheim (1915) and anthropologist Claude Levi-Strauss
(1962). Durkheim characterized the widespread practices in which
an animal species was used to represent a clan, a descent-based
kinship group. Central worship activities of the clan involved
ceremonies for promoting the well-being of the totem species and
enhancing the fecundity of the totem. In these special rites, normal
prohibitions on the consumption of the totem are suspended for a
sacred meal that allows the individual to incorporate the power of
the totem.
While noting a variety of different phenomena called totemism,
Levi-Strauss (1962) identified commonalities underlying the many
different systems and beliefs in which human clans are associated
with specific animal species. In totemism, social groups are iden-
tified in terms of the animal (or plant) species considered unique to
their kinship groups. This animal identification, a “connection
between the relation of man to nature and the characterization of
social group . . . postulates a homology . . . between differential
features existing, on the one hand, between species x and y, and on
the other, between clan a and b”(Levi-Strauss, 1962, p. 13).
Totemism involves establishing a metaphoric or analogical rela-
tionship between two domains, one derived from the animals or
other natural groups (species) and the other involving human
social groups, which are conceptualized in terms of the species
models provided by the natural world, a homology between animal
species and human groups. Animal species represent the distinc-
tive qualities of different social groups, a natural symbol for less
easily distinguished human groups. The group identity provided by
the animal species identifies the clan and its members.
Totemism and guardian spirit relations exemplify innate nature
relations that distinguish humans and their groups through the
attribution of characteristics derived from the natural world. Per-
sonal and group identity and intergroup differences are conceptu-
alized through models provided by animal species. Totemism is a
natural product of human thought, reflecting concepts of the nat-
ural world that are structured through properties of innate modules
for classifying significant distinctions in the natural world.
Religion as an Adaptive Social Mechanism
The concept of totemism was central to the approaches to
religion of Emile Durkheim, who proposed that there was some-
thing adaptive about religion. In contrast to the intellectual views
of religion as a delusion, Durkheim presented the view that reli-
gion had important functions in society, exemplified in totemism.
His analysis of totemism among Australian groups showed how
the religious worship of the totem was fundamental to the consti-
tution of society. His functionalist approach saw totem as a mech-
anism that helped assure the survival of the social group through
its ability to organize social life. Totemism provided a symbolic
representation of society, embodied in the concept of the clan
totem, which provided concrete symbols of the abstract social
groups. Ritual behaviors provide the context for powerful emo-
tional experiences that contribute to the formation of group iden-
tity and commitment. The integration of symbolic behavior and
sacred representations allow those sacred symbols to organize
behaviors, particularly behaviors that constitute the moral rules
that bind people together in a community. Religious beliefs, no
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matter how false or irrational, can be adaptive if they help produce
a moral order and orient human communities toward common
purposes that help assure survival and reproduction. Religions may
have a secular utility independent of their sacred claims despite
their logical inconsistency or inaccuracies.
Wilson (2002) suggests that the need to adaptively coordinate
human behavior led to the emergence of social institutions for
conflict resolution, particularly religious institutions with moral
codes that obtain their power from a concept of the sacred. There
are a number of group level adaptation processes that can allow
religion to contribute to overall survival of a group. Religions can
be adaptive in facilitating competition with other groups. The
moral rules also created powerful group obligations, producing
exceptionally cooperative and unified moral community that has
advantages in interactions with other groups. These perspectives
on group adaptation help to explain why there are different norms
for within- group morality and the norms for moral conduct with
respect to other groups. This unified community was more effec-
tive in cooperation within group interactions that enhance compe-
titions with out-groups.
Wilson proposes the adaptive nature of religion as “unifying
systems.” This unifying function of religion is reflected in its Latin
root “religio,” which means to unite or bind together, reflecting the
role of religion and producing an integrated community. This
perspective on religion as a unifying system allows us to examine
its adaptive aspects in the same terms used to identify adaptive
aspects of other animals’ social groups.
The social integration roles are exemplified in the magico-
religious functionary, the priest, who appear universally in societ-
ies with a primary reliance on agriculture and hierarchical political
systems (Winkelman, 1992). Priests are leaders of kinship groups
that have the responsibility for organizing ancestor worship or
other collective rituals such as totemism. Priests organize society-
wide rituals to integrate community groups into larger political
entities. Priests typically acquire the position by virtue of inheri-
tance or social class, the reigning member of the lineage who also
occupies the role of the chief priest. Priests typically exercise
control over considerable economic resources, and hold important
political positions either as consultants or as the supreme political
leader such as chief and king. Priests generally hold formal judicial
power, ruling on everyday disputes, as well as life and death
decisions.
Conclusions: Situating Shamanism in the Context of
Evolutionary Psychology
The worldwide premodern shamanic practices and the persis-
tence of their core feature in shamanistic healers demand an
explanation in the context of evolutionary psychology. The con-
cept of psychological adaptations posits the existence of innate
information-processing circuits that have the function of respond-
ing to specific kinds of information units with functional behav-
ioral output that can provide an adaptive solution to a survival
problem (Confer et al., 2010). The characterization of a behavior
as an adaptation is not based on the specification of their genetic
bases, but rather in terms of their “complexity, economy, and
efficiency of their design and their precision in effecting specific
functional outcomes . . . The demonstration of specialized func-
tional design provides some of the most compelling forms of
evidence for adaptation. Identifying the genetic basis of a trait is
neither necessary nor sufficient for demonstrating that the trait is
an adaptation” (Confer et al., 2010, p. 120).
The complexity of shamanic behavior and its similarity across
cultures attests to the presence of underlying psychological mech-
anisms. As with all psychological mechanisms, shamanic practices
depend on environmental input for their activation, development,
and manifestation. Collective overnight musical events with con-
sciousness modifying technologies are part of human processes for
individual integration into broader social groups.
Most evolutionary psychologists attempt to explain such fea-
tures of religious cognition as a by-product of the evolved mind, a
spandrel without adaptive value (Atran, 2002). They consider the
psychological architecture that produces religious thoughts and
activity to result in prior adaptations that are exploited by religious
systems. Bulbulia (2006) instead takes an adaptationist approach,
recognizing in religious behavior elegant functional mechanisms
that resulted from natural selection. He proposes that we under-
stand specific elements of religious cognition as spandrels of other
systems that served nonreligious adaptations that were exapted for
other purposes through use of the supernatural premise. This
assumption of animism is an extension of the heightened sensitiv-
ity to predators (hyperactive agency detection device). Human
evolution augmented this adaptive assumptions of an “unseen
other” with other projective assumptions—the social other, the
dominant other, the all-seeing other. Religious concepts of super-
natural causation are the consequence of bundling together a
number of specific psychological systems in an adaptive way to
address the demands of more complex social situations than those
selection processes that led to the original adaptation. For example,
religious systems have exapted aspects of our psychological archi-
tecture in using concepts of supernatural beings with omniscience
to police the adherence to social norms and contracts.
This view of religious behavior as an aspect of the social mind
provides an understanding of it as adaptations that selection is
targeted to enhance social behaviors. The role of dominance hier-
archies in social life makes religion a prime area for exaptation of
innate social thought modules. Shamanic ritual activities are nec-
essarily an exaptation of ancient adaptations. The deep phyloge-
netic origins of shamanic impulses are attested to in the substantial
homologies with the maximal rituals of chimpanzees and other
hominids. Shamanism reflects expansions on products of natural
selection that are manifested in chimpanzee ritual functions, in-
cluding: inclusive and protective integration of the group, hierar-
chical integration of society, and reduction of conflict. Hominin
evolution extended the hominid adaptations in areas of: increased
social organization (hierarchy formation, alliance formation)
through the metaphoric extension of animal representations for
enhanced social, personal, and cognitive representations); ex-
panded cognitive processes which exceeded the body-based modes
of knowing, exemplified in the out-of-body experience; and heal-
ing processes.
The supernatural world is an arena in which capabilities for
coalition formation were exapted for expansion of social networks
and social support. This formation of alliances is central to sha-
manic practices of the vision quest, spirit powers, guardian spirits,
and spirit allies. Collective shamanic rituals provide integrative
functions for the group consciousness, synchronizing group and
individual cognition through use of the analogical cognitive pro-
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cesses engendered through ritual, mimesis, and symbols. These
symbolic enactments provide cultural programming of neuronal
structures, an adaptive tool that has been called “the theater of the
mind” (Laughlin, McManus, & d’Aquili, 1992). Since rituals
involve socialization processes linking individual and collective
identities, it might also be called “the theater of the social self.”
This theater of self and mind autorepresentation was expanded in
shamanic ideology with the reciprocal introjection of innate rep-
resentation systems for the natural world and those of the social
domains, especially through exaptation of representations of ani-
mal species for self and societal differentiation.
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Received February 7, 2015
Accepted April 29, 2015 !
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