Would someone raised without exposure to religious views nonetheless come to believe in the existence of God, an afterlife, and the intentional creation of humans and other animals? Many scholars wouid answer yes, proposing that universal cognitive biases generate religious ideas anew within each individual mind. Drawing on evidence from developmental psychology, we argue here that the answer is no: children lack spontaneous theistic views and the emergence of religion is crucially dependent on culture. Would an individual never exposed to religious ideas -such as Edgar Rice Burrough's character, Tarzan, who was raised by apes after his first birthday - nonetheless come to believe in God, an afterlife, and the divine creation of humans and other creatures? That is, do core religious beliefs emerge spontaneously in the course of development, even in the absence of cultural support? If one classifies religion as yet another cultural invention, akin to agriculture or writing, the answer to these questions is plainly no.
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