ABSTRACT
The evolutionary and social approaches to psychology are intertwined and complementary; neither is definitive nor exhaustive. With the development of human culture, it is clear that evolution has moved into a new phase. The New Testament scholar, Gerd Theissen, has offered a helpful analysis of the similarities and differences between biological and cultural evolution. The aspect of culture that has been most vigorously debated from an evolutionary perspective is ethics. The arguments about evolutionary ethics have become increasingly sharp and sophisticated, and there is growing clarity about the disputed issues. Most recent evolutionary theories of religious thinking assume that a religious view of the world makes use of elements that evolved in other cognitive domains, but integrates them in the service of a new approach. Seeing the evolutionary process as fulfilling God's creative purposes seems to involve some kind of assumption of evolutionary progress, and evolutionary progress is a highly controversial notion.
