inference & uniformitarianism.

While I’m not quite a naive Popperian, I do think testing some unique predictions has been found to be a must to establish which theories are correct. I will continue to believe that it isn’t a confirmed science yet, still on par with some others attempts that ultimately failed and I don’t dare mention here.
I’m sure this is not what you want to hear, but you can always take comfort that I’m not a peer and understand the real deal. I’m just a random blogger that passed by. It will be interesting to see how these ideas develop, though.
Oh, and thanks for all the time taken.

show that there is a universal conception which underlies all the textual nuances and variations across cultures.

Yes, I understand that it is a difference between suggesting universality now, and suggesting that it originated at some specific point in time. But I can’t see how we can track this back in time and establish some sort of universality in us as humans and possibly related ancestors and test it.
Changing the environment would be another possibility, of course. I think some are working on it.

I DEFINED RELIGION VERY CLEARLY ABOVE IN REGARDS TO WHAT I MEAN.

You don’t have to shout. I just didn’t see the how your vague definition of “mental conception” could be compliant with evidence for that “the vast majority of humans have been ‘religious’”. Of course, I read that as the ‘vast historical time of humans’, since I assumed we are studying it as “universal nature”. Perhaps that was a mistake.
And it was in that light you should see my attempt to define observable characteristics of religion to establish its “universal nature”. You offer later that religion is “a supernatural set of beliefs compelling to individuals coupled with ritual practices and spanning communities and generations”, which I missed.
If that is your definition, you are correct, I still can’t make it out to be intelligible as a foundation to establish “universal nature” in say the last 100 000 years which should cover humans as we know them.
You yourself discuss conflations with secular and “non-supernatural movements which overlap with religions”. So here we need an account of the supernatural nature, ie written sources. And I discussed rituals, which apparently isn’t enough to distinguish religion, as I supposed.
So I’m still stuck with Moran’s observation that there are many similar human activities, and that it isn’t necessarily an old and/or persistent phenomena.
I’m sorry that you feel I am playing instead of trying to seriously engage these ideas. Part of the reason is probably that I don’t have the necessary background by far. Another part is perhaps that I didn’t format my naive exploration in form of humble questions which I see Moran did. Other parts I think I leave to you.

please don’t respond to the xtian.

Sorry, I usually don’t respond to trolls. I probably had my narrow analytic parts of brain in gear.

though not all societies have been slave societies. the vast majority of humans have been ‘religious.’

Not if we are talking evidence AFAIK – I don’t think we have evidence regards slavery and religion going far back in history. Your characteristics have probably been there, but so have the characteristics for slavery. Some phenomena said to be religious (burial analogs, revisits of dead) are present in animals – is that religion?
If you mean that religion has been more ubiquitous in societies, perhaps. But as not all free persons have been slave owners, not all persons have been religious.
I doubt slavery and religion have the same threshold for use, when we are comparing frequencies. Slaves kills slave owners to get free, non-religious doesn’t kill priests to be exempted from church. There is usually only one slave system in a society. Et cetera.

slavery is specified by a simple set of characteristics, just as xenophobia is. it’s a general term. religion as i’m talking about exhibits specific characteristics.

Again, I’m not satisfied with the motivations for claiming religion as different (as given here). Can you be more, uh, “specific”.
Really, what was simple about slavery? Many forms, important for the communities, for trade, and for power, et cetera.

the tendencies which make one receptive to religion are probably heritable.

And that differs from the tendencies that makes one receptive to slavery or examples in Moran’s list, how?

I do hope that this is “Good News” for you also.

FWIW, citing a religious text and claiming a specific religion is a solution to others problems in a general discussion is rude.

I’m skeptical of all attempts to identify genetic components to human behavior.

Though I don’t have Moran’s basis in evolutionary biology, I’m tentatively skeptical as well.
For one, I don’t see the difference between other behaviors and religion. For example, slavery can emerge “due to the structural nature of the human mind and how it processes information” as well. The psychology of ranking order, out-groups specifically to the extent that “the others” aren’t human, and aggression, seems to be old mechanisms.
Now, when I describe the “universal nature of most” slavery, you may balk. After all, sexual slavery and thralls are very different. But, it seems all countries have succeeded in making slavery unlawful and mostly gone.
I’m not satisfied with the motivations for claiming religion as different (as given here) or necessarily persistent.
I prefer to think of it as a moral choice, as for slavery.

europe is post-christian, but not not secular.

Perhaps we have a confusion of definitions here. AFAIK secular means worldly, or religiously neutral. Many forms of supernaturalism, as beliefs in souls or astrology’s ‘instant and personal action’, are non-religious.
So I would say that Europe as a whole is post-religious, but not atheistic. And note that EU is explicitly secular, as most European nations.