Where does the desire to believe in higher powers come from? How do religious ideas arise, and why does faith continue to play such an important role in the life of a person of the 21st century? The book of the French anthropologist Pascal Boyer describes the phenomenon of religion from the standpoint of evolutionary psychology. The scientist finds the background of beliefs and religious rites in the principles of the work of human consciousness. One by one, he refutes the common "theories" of the origin of religion - it arose to explain incomprehensible natural phenomena and personal experiences, it comforts, it ensures social order - and reveals to the reader the amazing features of the structure of our mind.