ABSTRACT
So far in this book, the discussion has mainly concentrated on the history of religion, both ancient and modern. In the course of this work, I have shown how religions evolved from primitive animisms to polytheisms to monotheisms to highly sophisticated and increasingly abstract forms of belief in the supernatural. In this and the next chapter, however, I digress from religious history to consider some closely related secular views of the dual nature of reality held by students of philosophy and psychology. At the outset of this chapter it is important to note that the evolutionary sequence exhibited in religious history continues even into these supposedly naturalist and secular endeavors. The argument I make in these two chapters is that ancient dualism continues to influence even these two approaches to understanding human nature.
