This article just triggered a memory from 15 years or so ago when I read BF Skinners "Walden Two". A novel by a scientist, go figure.

No Proust reference? Madeleines have quite the opposite effect of Axe body spray.

I just read a really fascinating book that covers a lot of this territory, called Brain Rules. I think the author is local? Don't remember though...

I'm sure Golob doesn't mean to imply that the operant-conditioning response develops more slowly in straight women than in everybody else. Maybe he's discovered the existence of some tribe of people, other than the frat boys who adorn themselves with it, who actually enjoy the stench of Axe body spray.

For this gay man, that horrid stench has been an emetic for many years.

Associative memory preceded intelligence!? It operates deep within the brain and is thus able to interject itself into our consciousness!? That you see consciousness as an separate observer somehow distinct from basic memory function reveals that you need to be reaching out to students/faculty in the relevant fields before submitting your columns. You're probably a couple of important decades out of touch with this one.

I need to point out that "the real source of religion" would be very complicated, not as simple as one psychological theory... I imagine you meant "the real source of superstition".

Religion is really complicated (which is why it's fun to think about), and includes a whole lot more than just superstition (such as ethics, history, identity, etc etc). Come on, Science, you know that!