Fascinating though winemaking is, I would like to go back to the origins of god stories.

Although the details are controversial, there may be at least a grain of truth in the "bicameral mind" theories of the late psychologist Julian Jaynes (earlier typo corrected in edit).

http://www.julianjaynes.org/overview.php

His core hypothesis is that earlier peoples regularly experienced hallucinations, which they took to be authentic communications from beings outside of themselves. And so, when today we read stories about people talking with, as opposed to just to, their gods, these stories are, for Jaynes, accurate accounts of typical happenings.

I confess that I didn't like Jaynes' theory at all until I read, and to some extent came to terms with, Mr Walker's posts here at UM.

I think that a personal psyche is, for everybody, a constructed object, and that there is more than one way to build a psyche that adapts effectively to the demands of the real world. Hallucinations occur to everyone. Current fashion is to ignore them, or separate them from "ordinary" experience into a category of "special" experience, beginning in childhood.

But what if you didn't? The problem with "hearing voices that tell you to do things" is what the voices tell you to do, more than whether there is really anybody else speaking. If the voices tell you to drown your children, then you have a problem. If the voices reliably tell you the winning stock market picks, however, then what problem do you really have?

Jaynes suggests that "hearing voices" was the regular mechanism for reflection at some point in human development. Gods were the characters whose voices the hallucinations were supposed to be. Only for the last few thousand years, in his view, was a more interior reflective style the accepted cognitive fashion.

Even today, with frank hallucination held in low esteem, there remain reports of the compelling impression of external sources for internal productions, for example

There is no scientific discoverer, no poet, no painter, no musician, who will not tell you that he found ready made his discovery or poem or picture - that it came to him from outside, and that he did not consciously create it from within.

- William Kingdon Clifford, "Some of the conditions of mental development," Lecture to the Royal Institution, London, 1868, in Lectures and Essays by the late William Kingdon Clifford, L. Stephen and F. Pollock, eds., Macmillan, London, 1886, 49-73.

I have been thinking about a post like this for a while. The difficulty is that it is inherently provocative to say that someone is hallucinating. Where Jaynes comes in is, whatever the shortcomings of the particulars of his theory, he provdes learned precedent for the idea that there is such a thing as authentically adaptive chronic frank hallucination.

Before I get jumped on, let me say that I mean hallucination in its narrowest sense: a compelling sensory experience without a corresponding physical stimulus. I do not think that Mr Walker is mentally ill, not even a little bit.

If any part of Jaynes is right, then Mr Walker would have been the very portrait of not merely health, but outright normalcy at another time. "Illness" is a biological issue. Nothing much has happened biologically to our species in the past few thousand years. What is "illness," then, probably hasn't changed. "Cognitive style," however, may be another matter.

That is not what Mr Walker wants to hear. Perhaps he will have patience with a plodder like me, with no guiding voice, reduced to piecing puzzles together one bit at a time.

Well first of thank you for your expressed tactfulness which was demonstrably clear in your post made with the knowledge that it might be provocative but trust me it was not. You were not condescending and only expressed a hypothesis without claiming it is the truth even if for you it has the possibility of having the greatest validity. Also you did it all without writing off spirituality or its adherents as imagining things. The hypothesis is of course certainly seemingly more valid to someone with a scientific mind.

Since coming to UM it seems many people have experiences which are not voluntarily. That is auditory and visual hallucinations, no matter how mild, are experienced by others without them even attempting to reach into the spiritual world. It is such a foreign concept to me because the only time I have felt the Spirit of God is when I am actively seeking it and then allowing it to work through me. For many years my life was a spiritual vacuum without any experiences. I have also had spiritual experiences too when actively delving into astral, remote viewing, thought projection, and the like but then again never involuntarily.

Oh I have seen things, nothing I would consider as God or sent from Him, I have heard my name called out once or twice which sounded like my mother, but nothing from God again. My wife has heard me call her name out loud once when I was merely thinking about calling out to her.

I have never had voices tell me what to do though and it seems to me a totally foreign concept of any type of spirituality that I am aware of. It seems to fall into the domain of mental illness or demonic oppression or possession. I do believe through faith though that God has spoken to people purely through His voice. In Mr Walkers case the angels have talked to him and appeared visible with witnesses noticing them. Not the first time I have heard of angels being seen and among us. My dad has seen a less human like and more spiritual type of angel and as always they are described as being around seven feet tall. Other cultures have also had visitations from a plethora of beings. Even animals that talked or appeared mystical in some way or another.

I also have endeavored into the artistic nature of things and some of the experiences of artistic expression and creation when it comes to composing poems or stories seems fantastic at times but falls short of any spiritual experiences I have had. Poems will also not make physical objects move seemingly on their own unless of course the poems are runes with magical properties perhaps.

With all my personal experiences out of the way I have stated a pure sociological view at the beginning of this thread of how religions developed. It did not delve into as much detail as Julian Jaynes' view which falls under a neurological hypothesis but I really have a problem believing that religions developed from auditory hallucinations or as Julian Jaynes proposes, schizophrenia. If he had claimed actual visual hallucinations then I could more easily accept it.

I find religion if developing as part of the rise of human consciousness rather to be a product of the consciousness itself interacting with the mind. That is to say it is more likely that it did evolve from the same part of the brain where are appreciation for art and creativity comes from. As I stated before it falls short of the spiritual experiences I have had but art though comes quite close. Listening to music can be almost like, if not, a definite religious experience. Combine that with the fact that music is one of the chief components of most religions regardless of the cultural context. Art is also a component though some religions lack both. Then there are texts.

As someone can fall into this near ecstatic state of admiring music , visual art, combined with the power of language, and the awe of it all then perhaps then spirituality, or a sense of it can then be developed. In other words it is more likely we imagined spirituality rather than it spawning from schizophrenia. That is my personal view at least without any faith or a belief in God diluting it.

I do though believe in God and spirits and here is my personal theory, not supported by any scientific measure, but only developed through studying various cultural beliefs, legends and mythologies. In my world view all the spirits not from God are demonic but I will leave that at the door too because it is hard to recognize at times using my world view what is angelic and what is demonic. It is the natural tendency for the Christian to label that is not seemingly directly related to Christianity as being demonic. But in my personal view some things Christians experience are demonic and then there are pagan contexts which might appear as sacred.

Take the case of Biddy Early from Ireland and Don Pedrito Jaramillo from Northern Mexico and South Texas. If interested research them for I will not speak long about them but they were faith healers who, while not famous for it, also made a few predictions. Biddy Early as a child was 'into the fairy' and inherited her use of herbs and poultices from her mother but took it to a higher level by combining it with her faerie lore or what some consider knowledge given to her by the faerie whom she saw and talked to as a child. Don Pedrito Jaramillo came into faith healing after an injury well into his middle years after self healing himself and in his case he did hear God speak to him in his dreams which is not exactly an auditory hallucination but prophetical dreams but I could be off the mark. Both of them, just two of many faith healers world wide, had many people seeking them out, visiting their homes, at all hours of the day and night for help. They never accepted money and left payment of non-monetary items at the discretion of the one being healed, advised, or helped for their services went beyond just faith healing. While the Catholic Church condemned Biddy Early, even though she encouraged people to remain faithful Catholics, Don Pedrito Jaramillo said he word doing God's work and is remembered as a Saint among the mainly Catholic Mexican population of South Texas and some parts of Northern Mexico even though he is not officially canonized as a Saint.

Now someone who came and claimed they had healing powers today and then turned around and expected money would be considered charlatans but these two faith healers were considered the genuine article in the eyes of many since they never accept money and lived among and as peasants. They were not interested in converting others to any type of religion. They were not out to make a profit. They did have intuitive knowledge of others who might come to them who were skeptical and would make it know to the skeptic that they were not true believers. They also had foresight with what was ailing others or what their situation was at times before even being told. Remember these were mainly people who traveled long distances on foot or horseback who know one in the region would have been able to tell them anything of their situation. This cannot be deduced to schizophrenia or charlatanism but where did their powers come from?

Is it all the power of the mind or spirituality?

I also believe that various cultures experience spirituality differently is because spirits have their very own cultures as well. That is why Ireland has the faerie, not the small sprites, but the ones who can appear as humans or human like. The Native Americans had human type characters as well as the Buffalo Woman who is said will return one day. The Aztec had legends of an actual man known as Quetzalcoatl who once walked the earth and was said would also return one day though that prophecy has expired already. The Christians have Jesus. The Dorian invaders of the Peloponnese were said to be the sons of Heracles returning to take revenge against the people who had driven them from the land previously. In their reclaiming of the land them and their descendants became the first kings and queens from Lydia to Rome according to legend. The first Mesopotamian kings and queens were also said to be divine. Now were these people just charlatans or schizophrenic? In my view they were highly spiritual. While I did not differentiate some were also also politically motivated such as the Dorians and Sumerians who also built nation states and religious systems. But if you connect those most ancient characters to the more recent ones like Biddy Early and Don Pedrito Jaramillo it is easy to imagine had these latter ones had any politico-religious motivations they could have easily been deified under new religious systems of their very own. In the end though I do differentiate those who are government minded and interested in securing personal wealth between those who are neither. Clearly to me one is demonic and the other is more questionable as far as the source of their spiritual powers. This of course is my other view of how religions started since for me personally it is always good to have more than one view on anything. Not because one might be wrong, oh no, but because they are just different thought streams and how boring would it be to be stuck in one thought all the time without seeing the possibilities, the what ifs, or just different perspectives using the same mind. Of course even if one does not agree with other views it is still advisable to develop and understand them just to have a greater sense of understanding.

I have never seen any indication that the guests were drunk. In fact, the master of the banquet states, "Everyone brings out the choice wine first and then the cheaper wine after the guests have had too much to drink; but you have saved the best till now." That clearly indicates that no one had had "too much to drink." It also indicates a distinct difference in the quality of the wine which would be difficult to do with mere grape juice.

The marriage is when one becomes part of the Bride of Christ. What if they find themselves in a dead faith? It is the cup and the wine therein at the Last Supper that is symbolic of the Spirit. 'They have no more wine' and His response was 'Why do you involve me? My time has not come.' That time is the breaking of the bread, His body crucified, so the Spirit would be released for all to have, the living waters, the ones that allow us to never thirst again, the wine in the chalice at the LS.

Take the empty containers, our bodies, fill them with water, belief, and He will turn them into wine, His Spirit dwelling within us. That is how the best wine is served last for it is the goal of the whole of the New Testament for the believer. To accept the Spirit to become one with our spirit through the Word. It was His first miracle and one that is still occurring through this imagery.

Do I believe it really happened? Ya. Do I believe if the wine was fermented or not? Maybe.

No offence taken eight bits.

In fact, as part of my investigation into my experiences, i read a number of academic treatise on a similar theme.

I cant honestly remember if i read this book but it is familiar. This is the reason why i acccept inerspaces explanation for many peoples experiences. i am sure that people, for a variety of reasons, environmental and medica,l experience realities which are so true as to be indistinguishable from the objective reality around them.
At the risk of sounding as if i believe myself to be unique or special that simply cannot be the case with at least some of my experiences because of a variety of circumstances surrounding them including inndependent witnesses to the observable facts as stated.

Your position, of course, is predicated on the belief that a god like entity (or one in physical contact with humanity at least) does not exist and thus the events i and others describe are physically imposible. I accept that as a valid point of view, especially as you have no experiential evidence to cause you to believe otherwise. Do you also feel the same way about the many psychic and paranormal interactions which many human beings describe? Ie as well as being no god ther is no physical possibility that things like accurate precognition, esp or obes can be valid experiences?

Of course, given my own experiences, my belief is that at least some of the many recounted religious and psychic events described by witnesses over the many years of human history actually occured within the objective reality of the world/universe, an as the writer points out, it is the mood/belief structure of the people and societies which has altered, rather than the events them selves.
Scientific rationalism is a wonderful thing but it does tend to create an almost pathological blindness to things not presently encompassed by science. To compensate for the almost universal human curiousity in such areas the entertainment industry has increasingly concentrated on story telling around such themes. This tends to emphasise the compartmentalisation of the paranormal from the real world by making it more of an entertainment, than the almost daily reality it is for some people.

While i cant personally vouch for this, I have read that one such show "medium"is based on the real life experiences of one psychic and her work with police departments.. however most peole would just assume it is another piece of pure entertainment, with no underlying reality or validity at all.

First, I am relieved that my post gave you no offense.


That's not quite correct. On the larger question, I am agnostic, and on your specific experiences, you and I have discussed many of them.

Our basic situation is that I accept the literal truth of what you report (so the events are not impossible, on the contrary, I believe they happened), but we differ on the interpretation of the events. We also differ about whether that difference is a matter of interpretation .

If my position is predicated on anything, it is that there is a conspicuous "godlike entity" in plain sight, that is, you. And so, yes, I am reluctant to overlook the god whom I would see if I were there, in order to posit the workings of another god whom I cannot see.


Putting aside patent fraud, which is not our present concern, then I do believe that people in general, not just you personally, systematically underestimate what can be achieved by natural means. And by "people," I include many scientists, too.

The chronicle of human abilities, and other animals', too, is not yet completely written, in my opinion. But what is already written is impressive, and does, again in my opinion, adequately account for much of what is credibly reported.

Coming back to the topic of the thread, there is the curious phenomenon, noted by Clifford, that personal achievements are so often attributed to other "helper" beings. You would say that that is because there are helper beings. I suspect a psychological mechanism at work, and that what appears to be a personal feat is a personal feat.

I think that god-stories arise out of that mechanism, but I do not pretend to understand why attribution of one's own works to someone else would be so widespread, and so tenacious.

And to you, "what appears to be a personal feat" isn't the appearance at all. It is the helper beings who are apparent.

Comparison of notes is often the beginning of understanding. Agreement takes a while.

If i understand you rightly 8 bits you are basically saying that i am the god, and that through some personal/human qualities not yet identified and some aspects of our universe also not yet identified, i manage all the feats i have experienced by myself.
Why you would think this more likely than that god may exist in physical form is not clear to me and is, i suppose, a part of your own world view.

I assume that would mean that at least some other humans are capable of accurately seeing the future, of accurately reading others minds, of seeing things up to thousands of miles away, and the other, witnessed non religious but paranormal experiences i have had.

It does beg the question why some humans are able to do this while others are not.

However there are some things about this idea which make sense. I have often considered that many of my paranormal experiences relate to accessing human minds through a form of telepathy. There is also the fact that these experiences, while always accurate are very sporadic, and spontaneous. They are often in response to a strong emotional plea from someone for help.

When testing students in my classes for basic psychic abilities it is obvious that most have none at all. Some appear able to receive information, while others can broadcast it. Only when you get those able to receive and to broadcast is there anything like a measurable difference in accuracy, but if you get the right combination of people then they can often read each others minds quite accurately. Ive had a number of students over the years who, like me, can see accurately the cards another is looking at or the symbols they have drawn and visualised.

So yes for some years i considered this possibility. (That the abilities and experiences all come somehow from within)

Two real difficulties prevent me from accepting it. One, i dont comprehend how a human who is caught in the linear time stream could possibly see, accurately, future events. This would seem to require a consciousness which is capable of both existing and communicating across time and space or perhaps more accurately, instantaneously through time and space. If we ever find the human consciousness is capable of this i may have to change my mind.

The second is that with all the will in the world i have never been able to make the slightest physical differnce in the material world No psi balls, telekinsis, pyro technics in the least.

However, whatever is creating my miracles can physically manipulate both matter and energy in ways which can be physically observed by others than my self. Now it is conceivable that my subconscious or other parts of my mind does allow me to do this, but i tend not to think so. Why? Because i can create full lucid dreams and control them through linking my conscious and subconscious minds. Thus i can dream, be fully aware i am dreaming, have total control of the dream and during my conscious day i can plan the characters, setttings and plots which i will dream that night.

Then i go into a dream state and live that dream. At all times i am fully aware of the difference between dreaming (or subconscious visualisation) and being able to see external/real objects.. Thus i cant see why i would not be aware when i was dreamng/ hallucinating creating sub conscious visualisations during the day.

In fact, i am totally incapable of consciously visualising anything. I can not create consciously in my mind even a simple square or circle, and i have talked elsewhere about how i discovered that other humans had this capability. All my thought processing/thinking takes either a linguistic form or something indescribable. For example when i "see" a lost object, i dont visually/ in my mind, see it or its surroundings at all, i just know where it is and will tell the owner where to find it. Eg "your mobile phone is in the blue bag on top of the lockers." To me this suggests that the thought is placed into my mind fully formed as thought transference, rather than verbal or visual imagery.

So if i can manifest, fully formed, the image of an angel, its very strange, given that i can't consciously create the mental image of a very simple object. It also begs several other questions like; how i could manifest the form of an angel when i did not even know that they took that form, Or how the angel in my mind could create enough light to draw the attention of others, or to light up objects impossible to see on a dark night, and which i deliberately went out to check in the morning as part of the process of working out just what i had experienced.

I have never just believed or accepted my experiences. I have spent most of my life trying to find the most logical and rational explanations for them,but i do appreciate your thoughtful observations and continued patient tolerance.

However, whatever is creating my miracles can physically manipulate both matter and energy in ways which can be physically observed by others than my self. Now it is conceivable that my subconscious or other parts of my mind does allow me to do this, but i tend not to think so. Why? Because i can create full lucid dreams and control them through linking my conscious and subconscious minds. Thus i can dream, be fully aware i am dreaming, have total control of the dream and during my conscious day i can plan the characters, setttings and plots which i will dream that night.

MW this is not a miracle, let me elaborate .....remember our senses provide us with a variety of forms or, they are the primary channels which provide us with stuff to think about ....dreams, imaginings and visions also provide alot of input ..( perhaps a bit of research on arsitotle would be to your liking.......)

you are also leaning heavily on bias IMO ( which is your attitude persepctive or the filter that is firmly in place... )

we have to use great caution when we use experiential data as the basis of our thoughts because as you can see there are many sources ( imaginings, dreams, visions etc) they are not reliable (actaully our senses are the least reliable purveyors of 'truth' for lack of a better word...

experiencial data really just helps us put 'experinces' to good use...one has to be aware of the paradigm within which they are operating from is it coherent, is it viable does it have good pragmatic output?

i do not see you asking these questions......'logic is only as good as the one applying it....."

another tibit on 'truths ' as 'matters of fact'... they are the derivatives of the definitions of the systems that they come from....they arent' static....2 plus 2 is 4 because that is how we have defined it based on cultural need.....Few understand this about math....so how can there be 'truths' something to think about..........

I'd add that we can't be objective( even though for us we think we are ) because we have a limited field of view that is in motion ( in essence we are the actors in our own dramas or plays if you will)

ok supra. and this applies to other people who claim my manifestations possess no concrete objective reality.

One simple question. How come at the same time i saw my first angel ,which manifested in a bright light in my front garden, my parents, who were inside saw the same light. They had no idea what it was and asked who had driven in through our front gate. I told them a truck had turned round in the driveway( the only thing i could think of which might convince them, given the brightness of the light.)

Please explain how my mind managed to manifest a light physically bright enough to light up many square metres and to be visible from inside our house.

This is the nature of the experiences i deal with. I just wish people would stop thinking im so thick that I would keep claiming possible subjective experiences as objective ones. There is no known scientific explanation for a cylinder of light physically manifestingso that it is visible by others, lighting up the area, and telling me it will perform physical changes in my body, then doing so.

If it was in my mind, other people could not have observed it. And no, we did not live anywhere near a marsh. lol

That must have been quite an experience.

The most applicable experience from my own life that I can think of is a close friend fighting a demon on the astral plane and awakening with scars from it. I was at her house and awake during this time. Those scars were not there beforehand.

Yes it was both a life changing and life defining moment.

I spent a lot of time trying to find a non supernatural/paranormal explanation for it, but nothing quite fit, when all variables were taken into account.
Later, additional experiences helped me understand it a little more ,and slowly come to an appreciation of what was happening in my life.

Although i have continued to try and find answers (it was seeking answers to a similar but less demonstrably objective experience which first brought me to UM several years ago), it is fairly obvious what this experience was not, and that is an hallucination or delusion.

man wasnt sure how they came about, or how this whole world was created. so they assumed some greater being must have done it. because science was Really limited at the time. plus this was an easy explanation that didnt require alot of thought or explaining to do. but after a while, ALOT of people started buying into it. and it became a massive religion.

So, I see you don't believe in God or vampires but you do believe in UFO's . . . now now Agent Mulder!

yeop. i believe in things i can see in pictures, watch on videos, read about in government documents, look at radar.
why, dont you? im not sure why you wouldnt.

(vamps and god are muuuuuch more different than ufo's. i hope you know. the gov doesnt have programs to study vamps or god. they focus on Real things)

You surely don't believe what the government allows you to believe do you?
Yeah, flying saucers, space invaders.

bahahaha
oh my goodness, are you mental? you dont know what youre talking about. read up on some project blue book there chief. and maybe youll see why the ufo is classified 2 points higher than the Hbomb for their studies.
the gov KNOWS ufos are real. never said anything about aliens. but they Know ufos are real, thats why they study them. unlike fictional things, such as god or vamps.
next time do some research, and you wont look so foolish.

I believe you..........for Ive seen one...gary and I both did..it was fast..how that thing shifted so fast was unreal...we watched it shift from one end of the sky to another and then back again....I can never get that pic from my head

then i envy you. i wish i could see one, and figure out their means of momentum or speed. and how they can stop on a dime basically, and go the other direction.

Not
http://www.doomsdayguide.org/UFO/ufo_hoaxes.htm

The strangest thing about it was...afterwards..gary and I went for a nap, I was still living at my moms house lol...I woke up from a dream panic...I woke gary up too, I was a bit shaken, he asked me wha..I said...I dreamed I was standing at the bottom of my moms gardnen and looked up and saw the UFO...Garys face drained...and for a few secs he never said anything.

He then told me, he had a dream, and in his dream was me at the bottom of my mothers gardnen looking up, always looking up...and he saw what resembled aliens...I didnt see them, he did...

we were in the same dream, only looking at different things....now that was WEIRD!!

Excuse me for derailing your thread, sorry.
I have come to understand that God is the conscience of our Universe, not a personified being / deity
In order for us to grasp a tiny understanding of this overwhelming principle, it needs to manifest, through us to our Earthly plane.

well, these are several from tens of thousands of ufo reportings, if they could report ufos since the time of man, we probably would have millions, and before we could cgi anything or build a plane, seeing was definitely believing


how are you so adamant?

There have been people having and speaking/writing of spiritual experiences for much longer than reporting UFOs (and if not, certainly just as long). The only thing that's changed much is the fact that now, since science has become so dominant in western culture, many people assume that anyone who has any sort of spiritual experience is just insane, because there's no "scientific" explanation for it other than that. As you just said, "seeing was believing" in ancient times. And plenty of people did some seeing.

So how are the two that different?

yeop, people have been seeing ufo for the last 2000 years. and possibly longer. i wish there were More records of them as well, from ealier on.
the bible has some nice ones though
and it REALLY makes me laugh, when people believe in god, and the bible, but choose to ignore these types of things

not quite. theres a HUGE difference when i pilot sees something in the sky and persues it, and radar tracks it, and if people get pics or vids of it, then someon hearing a voice inside their head. that Conviniently, no one else can hear

God came to be when man realized the Sun.

from there , with the realization of personal power and agenda , it grew like a weed.

"spiritual experiences" such as hearing voices in the head are ignored by scientists these days because, simply, the person could be a schizophrenic. Also, the time long before having spiritual experiences simply did not understand these mental illnesses. Even the mouldy bread which they made when damp, a fungus grew, the name escapes me, but it makes people insane. There are so many explanations.

Talk about adamant

how so? he basically just answered the question perfectly.
the voices in your head, are just hard to believe...by anyone really.
beasides, as ive stated before, theyres a Big difference between ufos and god

So, I am adamant when I discuss the topic of God here, but no one else is when they bring up UFO's within this thread?
Am I missing something here? Look everyone is entitled to their thoughts and beliefs and to try to explain them the best they can, to endlessly just say "no. you're wrong" without putting up any kind of intelligent recourse is just wrong.
It was done to me on the vampire thread and now here.

yes, you are adamant. but hes not. he was just explaining how people hearing voices in their head can be explained with science. i dont think they said None of those 'spiritual experiences' are real. they never said 'youre wrong'. so im not sure why you brought that up. people just STRONGLY disagree with you on certain things. like if someone believes in vampires. or believes in god, but ufos for w/e twisted reason.

Okay, I apologize for all of this.
My stance on vampires remains though.

In my opinion the idea of divinity arose out of two things:

1) The desire of Man to overcome mortality

2) The need to explain things that seemed unexplainable

To explain point 2:

We are pattern-matching animals. When we see something happen we assign a cause to it, and we assume the cause is what we think it is and will always be the same for the same event. But sometimes our assumptions of cause are incorrect.

Man developed a sense of an afterlife (as a cure for the fear of mortality), but we cannot conceive of this afterlife being vastly different to the life we have (there was no knowledge of 'difference' to draw from). We still 'exist' in this afterlife much as we do in this one. This provided a sense of afterlife continuity in that deceased ancestors were conceived as being more or less 'present' in the living world, and could conceivably be discoursed with and even influence (still) the material world we inhabit.

Now let's assume, in this primitive tribe of hunter-gatherers, one of these ancestors-spirits was a notable person, a successful hunter who has died. Times are tough. The tribe, remembering this notable hunter (if he was fairly contemporaneous to them) or having his feats passed on in legend/story, start 'asking' this successful hunter to assist them in finding food. Lo and behold, they stumble upon a watering-hole just as a herd of elk (or some game animal) are drinking. The hunt is successful and there is food for all and to spare.

Naturally the tribe thanks their helpful ancestor-spirit who 'assisted' their hunt. The pattern is matched. They now ask (pray) to the ancestor-spirit whenever they want a successful hunt. They remember the successes but conveniently forget the failures.

God has now begun.

this is the one i always choose, and the one that makes the most sense.

Agreed. God is in a sense, the product of evolution. As the mental faculties developed, so did our ability to question the nature of reality. Primitive man began to attribute things they could not understand to something outside the self. Even the ancient cave drawings have depictions of odd spirit type creatures. The God of the Israelites, is the God of ALL faiths IMO, and has revealed Himself to everyone at different times.