Craig R. Vander Maas

Dr. Vander Maas is interested in finding answers to the big questions of existence, namely the meaning and purpose of life and the existence and nature of God. He believes that it is through science and reason alone that we learn about the nature of reality. However, science does not address questions about the meaning of reality or how we should live our lives, for example questions of morality. That, he believes, should become the primary purview of religion.

Throughout the history of humankind morality (which predated religion) and religion evolved. Vander Maas has written about a continuum of morality in his book Evolution of Morality and Psychopathology of Evil, which suggests that people range from psychopathy on one end of the continuum (people who lack empathy, a conscience, and care only for themselves) to people who are amazingly altruistic and who are deeply concerned about all of life. The majority of us are somewhere in the middle of this bell curve. The evolution of morality is of crucial importance as it is self-centeredness, selfishness and greed that is responsible for the great majority of problems in the world, such as global warming, poverty and income inequality, war, and violence.