Minds and Gods: The Cognitive Foundations of Religion PDF
Preview Minds and Gods: The Cognitive Foundations of Religion
Minds and Gods: The Cognitive Foundations of Religion TODD TREMLIN OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS Minds and Gods This page intentionally left blank Minds and Gods The Cognitive Foundations of Religion todd tremlin Foreword by E. Thomas Lawson 1 2006 1 OxfordUniversityPress,Inc.,publishesworksthatfurther OxfordUniversity’sobjectiveofexcellence inresearch,scholarship,andeducation. Oxford NewYork Auckland CapeTown DaresSalaam HongKong Karachi KualaLumpur Madrid Melbourne MexicoCity Nairobi NewDelhi Shanghai Taipei Toronto Withofficesin Argentina Austria Brazil Chile CzechRepublic France Greece Guatemala Hungary Italy Japan Poland Portugal Singapore SouthKorea Switzerland Thailand Turkey Ukraine Vietnam Copyright(cid:1)2006byOxfordUniversityPress,Inc. PublishedbyOxfordUniversityPress,Inc. 198MadisonAvenue,NewYork,NewYork10016 www.oup.com OxfordisaregisteredtrademarkofOxfordUniversityPress Allrightsreserved.Nopartofthispublicationmaybereproduced, storedinaretrievalsystem,ortransmitted,inanyformorbyanymeans, electronic,mechanical,photocopying,recording,orotherwise, withoutthepriorpermissionofOxfordUniversityPress. LibraryofCongressCataloging-in-PublicationData Tremlin,Todd. Mindsandgods : thecognitivefoundationsofreligion / Todd Tremlin; forewordbyE.ThomasLawson. p.cm. Includesbibliographicalreferencesandindex. ISBN-13978-0-19-530534-0 ISBN0-19-530534-5 1. Psychology,Religious. 2. Thoughtandthinking—Religious aspects.3. Faith. I. Title. BL53.T682006 200'.1'9—dc22 2005023088 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 PrintedintheUnitedStatesofAmerica onacid-freepaper For Dicksie, who waited patiently—and believes. This page intentionally left blank Preface Thankfullythereisnoneedtousethispreface—asissooftenthe case—asanapologyforyetanotherbookonagiventopic.Thefield todaybeingcalledthe“cognitivescienceofreligion”isindeedyield- inganumberofscholarlymonographsandcollections,butthefield istooyoungandtooexpansivetohaveyetbeenadequatelyrepre- sentedorsummarized.Ifanything,thereisanunderabundanceof availablereportsforpeoplewishingtobecomefamiliarwiththis fruitfulnewapproachtohumanreligiosity.Furthermore,thebest andmostrevealingworkcurrentlyinformingthefieldisfoundin theformofexperimentsummaries,conferencepapers,andjournal articles—arichyetdisparatebodyofmaterialseldomseenbyany butthemostcommittedprofessionals. Thesefirstwords,then,invitestudentsandscientificallyliterate readerstoencounterthecognitivescienceofreligionatalevelthat is,hopefully,bothclearandengaging.Thisbookismeantasanin- troductiontosomeofthefield’smajorthemes,theories,andthink- ersaswellasfreshanalysessuggestedbyongoingresearch.No doubtthosealreadywellversedinthecognitivescienceofreligion oritsmanytributarieswillfindmuchheretocriticize(coverage thatistoobrief,analogiesthataretoorough,generalizationsthat aretoobroad),butthediscussionpurposelyaimsatoutlineandim- plicationratherthaneruditionandnovelty.Thestorytoldhereis abouteveryone,soitoughttobeeasilyfollowedbyanyone.Like- wise,itoughttoprovokenotonlyinterestbutalsointrospection. Towardthatend,thestyleofpresentationisdeliberate:thecognitive perspectiveonreligionisbestcommunicatedthroughinstances viii preface of common human behavior rather than through complicated theory and jargon. Take as an example one impetus for this book: Dick Miller, myfather-in- law,isremarkableinanumberofways,butonefrequentlynotedbyacquain- tances is how, in his mid-seventies, he continues to operate a one-man tree- trimmingservice.WhileDick’sworkandmineareworldsapart,itisobvious (I’vehadoccasiontoassisthimonseveraljobs,carryingequipmentandchip- pingbrush)thattreetrimming—and,moretothepoint,Dickhimself—pres- entsaperfectexampleofthetypeofmentalabilitiesfeaturedonthefollowing pages.Inthecourseofcuttingbranchesorfallingtrees,Dickhastocalculate such difficult vectors as the fall line of the trunk: the direction based on cut angleandstructuralbalance,thedistancebasedonheight.Gettingthesemea- surementsrightisrathercrucialwhennearbyhomesandpropertyareatrisk. Dick manages this consequential task with nothing more than vision and in- tuitivejudgment;noelaborateinstruments,notrigonometrycarefullyworked outonpaper. Yet trigonometry certainly is being done, and with great speed and accu- racy (Dick has had no more than a couple near misses in over thirty years of fallingtrees).Justhowsuchmentalworkissoefficiently—andsonaturally— carriedoffispreciselythetypeofquestionthoseofusstudyingthemindfind worth asking. Experience alone is clearly not the answer. In Dick’s business there is no allowance for trial and error. Moreover, no two jobs are the same; a new set of variables must be weighed each time. So the answer must be relatedtotheoperationofthebrainitself.Dick’sskillilluminatesoneofmany innate processes of human cognition, in this case an arithmetic (based on spatialrelationships)aseffectiveastheexplicitproceduralformulaslearnedin school.Similarillustrationswillcolorthisbook’sdiscussionof“minds.” As to the talk of “gods,” Dick serves as an exemplar as well. For just as Dick looks upward and calculates the dimensions of a tree, so too he looks upwardandconcludesthatthereisadivinebeingthatcaresaboutlifeonearth, knows whatwe humansthink,andmakesspecificdemandsonourbehavior. ForDick,theexistenceandcharacteristicsofasupernaturalbeing(inhiscase, asupernaturalbeingexpressedinChristianterms)comeasnaturallytomind asdoesthetrajectoryofthelimbheisabouttocut.Dick’sbasicunderstanding of god is as automatic, as intuitive, and, it turns out, as innate as the mental maththatsupportshislivelihood.Thepointofthisbookisthatknowledgeof tree trimming and knowledge of gods are not unrelated; both have natural cognitivefoundations.Unearthingthesefoundationsisourproject. Concentratedfocusontheprocessesandproductsofhumanthought,an enterprise today engaging the efforts of a broad group of researchers, is a noteworthy academic development. The recognition that the brain lies at the center of the human world—as organizer and interpreter of incoming infor- mation, as constructor and communicator of outgoing ideas—is revolution- preface ix izing the humanities and social sciences. In fundamentally restructuringtra- ditional understandings of human thought and behavior, cognitive science is bringingprovocativenewinsightsandmethodstotraditionalareasofspecial- ization, including anthropology, archaeology, linguistics, philosophy,psychol- ogy, sociology, and others. It also offers a powerful theoretical framework for compilingatrulyinterdisciplinaryknowledge. The scholarly inquiry into religion is no exception. Cognitivesciencehas beguntoimpactthisfieldofstudywithequalforce—andjustintime.Oldand largely unsatisfying approaches to the uniquely human phenomenon of reli- gion are being replaced by testable explanatory techniques adopted from the natural sciences. As a result, we now have powerful new answers to long- standing questions about the origin and persistence of religious thought, the processes governing the acquisition and transmission of religious ideas, and the relationship between religion’s ubiquitous features and its cultural varia- tions. Iamdeeplyindebtedtothosewhointroducedmetothecognitivescience of religion, as well as to those who have since become my colleagues in the field. First among the former is Tom Lawson, who not only ushered me into theworldofthemindanditsimplicationsforreligiousstudiesbutalsomany others working in the field. That a cognitive science of religion now exists is dueinnosmallparttoDr.Lawson’sprofoundscholarlyvision.Theforeword hehasgraciouslycontributedtothisbookcommendsitself,andIamhonored by its presence. Individuals who fall into the latter category include Justin Barrett, Pascal Boyer, Brian Malley, Luther Martin, Bob McCauley, IllkaPyys- ia¨inen,JasonSlone,andHarveyWhitehouse. Ialsothankthoseindividualswhoreadandcommentedonearlyversions ofthisbook,inparticularTomLawson,TimLight,LutherMartin,JasonSlone, andBrianWilson.SpecialappreciationisextendedtoStaciDoty,whoworked tirelesslyonthemanuscriptandprovidedinvaluableassistancewithformatting and other irksome tasks. Finally, I thank Cynthia Read, executive editor at OxfordUniversityPressforhermanykindnesses,JuliaTerMaat,andallofthe folksatOUPfortheirdiligentworkonmybehalf. Note: Portions of the discussion laid out in chapter 6 (including the tables foundtherein)werefirstpresentedinashortessaytitled“DivergentReligion: A Dual-Process Model of Religious Thought, Behavior, and Morphology” in MindandReligion:PsychologicalandCognitiveFoundationsofReligion,editedby HarveyWhitehouseandRobertN.McCauley(AltaMiraPress,2005).
Description:The list of books you might like
