Discussion points for the 4 stories (as these points emerged in class--September 16th):

1) children absorb beliefs based on trust

2) animism--other animals, as well as plants and mountains and the sky and rain, have personalities or spirits analogous to humans:  why one could think there is evidence for this

3) intimate relationship with nature

4) immanent understanding of the divine versus transcendental understanding of the divine

5) the idea of humans ruling the rest of nature

6) the question whether a culture has a distinction between science and mythology.  How does that distinction arise?

7)  What counts as evidence?

8) A living being versus a corpse:  why seeing that difference might constitute evidence, barring contrary stories, that there's an afterlife:  why too one could say there's evidence for reincarnation

9)The big question (s):  Given that people in each of the four cultures believed the story of their culture on trust, and could see some evidence for their story, is there any reason to privilege the scientific story over the other stories?  Do we want to say the scientific story is true, and the others are false?