The Cognitive Science of Religion: Themes, Theories and Methods
THE COGNITIVE SCIENCE OF RELIGION: THEMES, THEORIES AND METHODS
FINAL ESSAY
1) What does it mean to claim that religion is an aggregate phenomenon?
People tend to sum up everything around them to make an initial order from the very beginning of human existence. However, that's a really difficult pursuit as there are things around us, which are either beyond our understanding or so complex as to the phenomenons, that there's no possibility to label them in a simple way or put them into a nice box and be eternally happy that we have established the major order and we then understand our lives.
Religion is a beautiful example of such a complex phenomenon, one which permanently resists our constant attempts and our never ending struggle to summarize its meaning and its function within human behavior and human belief systems. The first known attempts to define „religion“ could be traced back to ancient Greece and later, numerous great thinkers, philosophers, theologists, scientists, etc., who were trying to find „the proper definition“ of religion. It is worth mentioning that all those many attempts were (and are) mostly based on trying to find the very essence of religion in one particular thing. So called „magic bullet“ definitions are spread from many branches of science and therefore they largely show the points of view of the scientists and thinkers rather than actually trigger an understanding of religion as a whole. Sociologists tend to see religion as the product of society, and while defining it, they actually ignore thinking about its psychological aspects. Psychologists do the same in an opposite way, by forgetting the cultural dependency on behalf of the troubles of a single mind. And most common theological and phenomenological explanation of the „magic bullet“ called holiness is beyond the grasp of modern sciences itself. So much for examples from the „scientific community“. Therefore, the theories claiming that religion is an aggregate phenomenon, and the approach in studies of religion that merge the knowledge of many scientific disciplines, both natural and social, are the right ways to study „religion“ in its internal basis.
The theory of religion as an aggregate phenomenon was suggested by the cognitive branches of science. It refers to the thought that religion isn't one particular phenomenon, but more the product of a variety of the brain's mechanisms in a complex way (Boyer, 2001). Hence, cognitive studies of religion try to explain religious thoughts, beliefs and behavior as a set of different products of the mind's capacity as well as attempting to distinguish the different environmental conditions of these mechanisms. The efforts of cognitive science to merge a variety of scientific disciplines in order to understand the core of religious beliefs and behavior, allows scientists to approach „the religion“ as a not existing phenomenon in sui generis category - it could be better seen, analyzed and examined as that set of mechanisms mentioned above. Religion is therefore a highly complex system based on a developed processing sttructure of the human mind, one which allows people to believe and to be religious.
This short analysis of an attempt by cognitive science to understand religion as an aggregate phenomenon actually brings us to the next question where I'll try to describe how this contribution is made.
2) What can the cognitive and evolutionary sciences contribute to our understanding of religious thought and behaviour?
Cognitive science of religion has shown a new way to look for the essence of religion by suggesting the insight to religion's base as an aggregate phenomenon, as mentioned above. The cognitive mechanisms of human mind are primarily the results of evolutionary selection and adaptation, as cognitive science explains it. There were many attempts through the late 19th and whole 20th century, that consider evolution as the starting point to seek the essence of religious behavior and tendencies, but every one failed because of the insufficient level of understanding the evolutionary processes. However, evolutionary science plays a main part in cognitive studies of religion nowadays together with extended research in wide range of the other scientific disciplines, f.e. neurology, psychology, biology, anthropology, sociology, linguistics, history, philosophy and many more. Everything is also largely based on experimental research, that actually allows to bring science about religion to more solid position amongst the natural sciences in general.
By starting to highlight the natural basis of religion in human's mind, cognitive science reversed the approach of religion's studies from asking „how“ (f.e. attempts to explain and interpretate religious systems and beliefs) to further questionning „why“ (Lawson, 2012). That is enabled by extended possibility to develop hypotheses followed by finding explanations based on experimental research.
It might seem that the biggest effort of the cognitive science of religion is to search for inward capacities of human's mind to develop religious thinking, belief systems and religious behavior in natural sciences alone, but cognitive scientists also take culture under consideration. Thus cognitive science presumes, that religious beliefs and behavior are the product of the mind influenced by enviroment (Boyer, 2001), which means that religion isn't independent of culture and society of course. Hence, cognitive science offers the multidisciplinary approach to studies of religion, covering both natural and social sciences under the auspices of co-operation on the way to explain cognition and human capacities for religious thinking.