From Brain Imaging Religious Experience to Explaining Religion
A Critique
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 13823976 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Nina P Azari (University of Hawaii System, corresponding author), Marc Slors (0000-0002-4459-2859, Department of Philosophy, University of Nijmegen, The Netherlands) |
| Year | 2007 |
| Volume | 29 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Pages | 67-86 |
| Publication date | 2007-01-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Archive for the Psychology of Religion (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0084-6724 • E-ISSN: 1573-6121 |
| Publisher | SAGE Publishing (PUBLISHER • US) |
| DOI | 10.1163/008467207x188630 |
| OpenAlex | W2040660896 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 5 |
| References cited | 59 |
Recent functional neuroimaging data, acquired in studies of religious experience, have been used to explain and justify religion and its origins. In this paper, we critique the move from describing brain activity associated with self-reported religious states, to explaining why there is religion at all. Toward that end, first we review recent neuroimaging findings on religious experience, and show how those results do not necessarily support a popular notion that religion has a primitive evolutionary origin. Importantly, we call into question an assumption—key to that account of religion—concerning a conceptual relation between ‘religion’ and ‘religious experience’. Then, we examine the conditions that must be met in order to explain religion on the basis of brain imaging findings. Moreover, we list principled reasons to be sceptical of explanations of religion in terms of the neural underpinnings of experiences. We conclude that the data from neuroimaging studies are not suited for an explanation of religion
Cognition · Epistemology · Neural correlates of consciousness · Neuroimaging · Psychology of religion · Relation (database · Religiosity · Religious experience · Religious philosophy · Skepticism · Sociology · Evolutionary Game Theory and Cooperation · Neuroscience · Philosophy · Psychology · Psychology of Moral and Emotional Judgment · Religion, Spirituality, and Psychology · Social Psychology
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The meaning of ‘meaning’
The Neural Basis of Economic Decision-Making in the Ultimatum Game
The measurement of regional cerebral blood flow during the complex cognitive task of meditation
Sources of Mathematical Thinking
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The myth of religious experience
Development and validation of brief measures of positive and negative affect
Religion-as-Schema, With Implications for the Relation Between Religion and Coping
The Content of Religious Experience
Research
The Structure of Religious Mystical Experience in Relation to Pre- and Postexperience Lifestyles
Individualism and the Mental
The psychology of religion
An Empirical Investigation of the Discriminability of Reported Mystical Experiences among Religious Contemplatives, Psychotic Inpatients, and Normal Adults
A General Attribution Theory for the Psychology of Religion
| Unique citing works | 5 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 0,28 |
| Citation span | 2008 - 2022 (15) |
| Citation velocity | historical |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 5 |