Twenty-five years in: Landmark empirical findings in the cognitive science of religion
Open accessAbstract
Religious studies' collective advocacy on behalf of diversity and inclusion stands in poignant contrast to its persisting exclusionary ethos (within most quarters of the field) concerning questions of method.A legacy of prohibitions in religious studies about who can study religions and about how they must proceed when doing so has tended to curb innovation.Born of protectionism or special pleading or outright religious impulses, such prohibitions have skewed the field in favor of the idiosyncratic over the recurrent, of the idiographic over the systematic, and of the interpretive over the explanatory.My long-standing interest in the promise of the cognitive sciences for studying religion has been, in part, to redress those imbalances.Redressing imbalances, however, does not involve dismissing the idiosyncratic, the idiographic, or the interpretive, but only suggests, first, that they are not the whole story and, second, that greater attention to the recurrent, the systematic, and the explanatory will enrich -not eliminate -our understandings and our inquiries.The first of those two propositions follows from the second.My aim in this paper is to substantiate that second proposition.
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CSR scholars nowadays are largely in agreement that while cognitive theories are necessary, they are hardly sufficient for explaining the phenomena of religion.
“Moreover, CSR scholars nowadays are largely in agreement that while cognitive theories are necessary, they are hardly sufficient for explaining the phenomena of religion (McCauley 2018).”
From DEBUNKING ARGUMENTS GAIN LITTLE FROM COGNITIVE SCIENCE OF RELIGION (2021) · cites this paper as McCauley 2018
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DEBUNKING ARGUMENTS GAIN LITTLE FROM COGNITIVE SCIENCE OF RELIGION
Launonen, L. (2021) · Zygon: Journal of Religion and Science · doi:10.1111/zygo.12683 · Cited by 12 · see citing works
“Moreover, CSR scholars nowadays are largely in agreement that while cognitive theories are necessary, they are hardly sufficient for explaining the phenomena of religion (McCauley 2018).”
BackgroundA computational perspective on faith: religious reasoning and Bayesian decision
Rigoli, F. (2020) · Religion, Brain & Behavior · doi:10.1080/2153599x.2020.1812704 · Cited by 12 · see citing works
“…proposing that religious beliefs arise primarily for explaining salient aspects of life and reality (e.g., Andersen, 2019; Barrett, 2000; Boyer, 2001; Guthrie, 1993; Hogg et al., 2010; Iannaccone, 1998; McCauley, 2018; Schjoedt et al., 2013; Stark & Finke, 2000; Taves & Asprem, 2017; Tylor, 1871).”
BackgroundDo Thor and Odin Have Bodies? Superperception and Divine Intervention among the Old Norse Gods
Taggart, D. (2019) · Religions · doi:10.3390/rel10080468 · Cited by 5 · see citing works
“…and building on here, given its potential for enhancing knowledge of Old Norse religion and the cache it has in CSR, where it has been accepted with little correction among those employing it and conducting overviews of the discipline (e.g., Lawson 2017; McCauley 2017; Slone 2004; Tremlin 2005).”
BackgroundAnxiety Enhances Recall of Supernatural Agents
Swan, T. B., & Halberstadt, J. B. (2021) · International Journal for the Psychology of Religion · doi:10.1080/10508619.2021.1898808 · Cited by 9 · see citing works
“Taken together, these effects suggest that anxiety should incline people to attend to and remember god concepts, which some cognitive scientists propose sow the seeds of religious belief and devotion (Boyer, 2001; McCauley, 2018; Sperber & Hirschfeld, 2004).”
BackgroundThe Gods as Latent Causes: A Statistical Inference Theory of Religion
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The 7E Model of the Human Mind: Articulating a Plastic Self for the Cognitive Science of Religion
Geisshuesler, F. A. (2019) · Journal of Cognition and Culture · doi:10.1163/15685373-12340069 · Cited by 2 · see citing works
A vallás kognitív elméletei: Áttekintés
Lajos, S. (2018) · Magyar Pszichológiai Szemle · doi:10.1556/0016.2018.73.3.4
Szocik, K., & van Eyghen, H. (2021) · New approaches to the scientific study of religion · doi:10.1007/978-3-030-63516-9_9
- Authors
- McCauley, R. N.
- Corresponding author
- McCauley, Robert N.
- Venue
- Filosofia Unisinos
- Published
- 2018-12-18
- Volume
- 19
- Issue
- 3
- ISSN
- 1519-5023 (ISSN-L)
- 1984-8234
- OpenAlex
- W2905172469
- Cited by
- 8
- References
- 119
- Citations by year
- 2024: 1 · 2021: 4 · 2020: 1 · 2019: 2
- FWCI
- 12.00
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- diamond
- doi.org
- Licence
- cc-by
- Locations
- Filosofia Unisinos (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Arts and Humanities › Philosophy › Study and Philosophy of Religion
- Social Sciences › Health › Religion, Spirituality, and Psychology
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Experimental and Cognitive Psychology › Philosophy and Theoretical Science
- Keywords
- cognitive science of religion, methodological pluralism
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