Why are people inclined to praise or fear the unknown? Human beings are inclined to "praise" the unknown, and are often afraid of the unknown. This inclination has led to the creation of mythology and many gods. To this date we are still carrying this habit on our daily lives. 


"Oh, look at these crop circles, aliens must have created them!"
"Oh, he can bend the spoon! He must have psychic power!"
"Nah, earth must be standing over the oxen horns, otherwise it would fall down!"
"It makes sense! You adjust your balance with the wrist band exerting bioenergy! Here I come!"
"I can gain 6 pack with this Nano-Ultra-Mega-AB-Shaper. It has "nano", so it must be working, no?"
"Since we are surrounded by energy, some chosen ones might bend it right? We call it reiki!"
"Since you have a BS degree. You must be a heck of a genius! Now can you please answer this question of geography/history/so on?" (I usually encounter such questions from ignorant people. They regard me as Mr. Know it all, as they don't know what university infact is.)
and most striking example of all is God of the Gaps.


To further exemplify my claim, Wikipedia quotes God of the Gaps as a variant of argument from ignorance.


  The term God-of-the-gaps argument can refer to a position that assumes
  an act of God as the explanation for an unknown phenomenon, which is a
  variant of an argument from ignorance.[9][10] Such an argument is
  sometimes reduced to the following form:
  
  
  There is a gap in understanding of some aspect of the natural world.
  Therefore the cause must be supernatural.
  
  
  One example of such an argument, which uses God as an explanation of
  one of the current gaps in biological science, is as follows: "Because
  current science can't figure out exactly how life started, it must be
  God who caused life to start."


But this answer is rather specific and not satisfying for me. I think there lies a cognitive bias that drives human beings to prefer to praise/fear the unknown over showing reasoning and critical thinking when we are faced to the unknown. 

Update: This scene from The Gods Must Be Crazy is spot on! Don't miss it :)

Questions


Does scientific research support the claims made above about the importance of this tendency to praise or fear the unknown?
Is there an exact term for this tendency? Is Occam's Razor the right term for this?
What does scientific research tell us about why humans have this tendency?
In the book "Six Impossible Things Before Breakfast: The Evolutionary Origins of Belief", Wolpert (2007) discusses the evolutionary origins of belief.

Although I haven't read it yet, abc news reviewed the book.


  Wolpert argues that our wide range of beliefs, some of which are
  clearly false, grew out of a uniquely human trait. Alone in the animal
  world, humans understand cause and effect, and that, he says, led
  ultimately to the invention of tools, the rapid rise of sophisticated
  technology, and of course, beliefs. Even the earliest humans
  understood that many events that shaped their lives resulted from
  specific causes. Therefore, there must be a cause behind every event.
  
  ...
  
  We want to believe there is a reason for it all, and that leaves
  us predisposed to believe in some things for which there is little or
  no evidence. If a certain belief makes sense out of an otherwise
  senseless event, then it must be true, right?