Explaining Religious Ideas: Elements of a Cognitive Approach

Numen ◽  
1992 ◽  
Vol 39 (1) ◽  
pp. 27-57 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pascal Boyer
Keyword(s):  
Mental Representations ◽  
Belief Systems ◽  
Cognitive Systems ◽  
Social Categories ◽  
Cognitive Approach ◽  
Ethnographic Data ◽  
Anthropological Approach ◽  
Religious Systems ◽  
Argument Proceeds ◽  
Cognitive Salience

AbstractThis paper outlines an anthropological approach to religious representations that is grounded in recent findings and hypotheses in cognitive psychology. The argument proceeds in four points. First, the main goal of this framework is to account for the recurrence of certain types of mental representations in religious systems. Recurrent features are not necessarily universal. They are the outcome of cognitive systems that make certain representations easier to acquire than others. Second, a cognitive approach must take into account the diversity of religious representations. It is argued here that religious systems bring together ontological assumptions, causal claims, episode types and social categories. These four "repertoires" may have different functional properties, and may therefore be acquired and represented in different ways. Third, universal features of tacit, intuitive systems may impose strong constraints on the variability of religious ideas. This is illustrated on the basis of ethnographic data. Finally, the type of representations one finds in religious belief-systems consists in conjectures, the cognitive salience of which is variable and should be evaluated in precise terms.

scholarly journals Intentionality: A philosophical-cognitive approach to mental representations

2014 ◽  
Vol 26 (39) ◽  
pp. 819
Author(s):  
Cleverson Leite Bastos ◽  
Tomas Rodolfo Drunkenmolle
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Psychology ◽  
Mental Representation ◽  
Philosophy Of Mind ◽  
Mental Representations ◽  
Hard Core ◽  
Explanatory Models ◽  
Cognitive Approach ◽  
Clear Cut ◽  
Points Of View ◽  
Definition Of

This article critically analyses the notion of intentionality from several philosophical cognitive points of view. The authors argue that the notion of mental representation in the wider sense and intentionality in the narrower sense remains elusive despite accommodated paradoxes, improved semantic precision and more sophisticated strategies in dealing with intentionality. We will argue that different approaches to intentionality appear to be coherent in their inferences. However, most of them become contradictory and mutually exclusive when juxtaposed and applied to borderline questions. While the explanatory value of both philosophy of mind as well as cognitive psychology should not be underestimated, we must note that not even hard-core neuroscience has been able to pin point what is going on in our minds, let alone come up with a clear cut explanation how it works or a definition of what thought really is. To date, however, intentionality is the best of all explanatory models regarding mental representations.

Intelligence

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert J. Sternberg
Keyword(s):  
20Th Century ◽  
Systems Approach ◽  
Mental Representations ◽  
Contextual Approach ◽  
Cognitive Approach ◽  
Flynn Effect ◽  
Surrounding Environment ◽  
Theory Of Multiple Intelligences ◽  
Successful Intelligence

Intelligence is commonly viewed as the ability to learn from experience as well as to adapt to the surrounding environment. There are several approaches to understanding intelligence, including the psychometric, cognitive, biological, cultural/contextual, and systems approaches. Each approach places an emphasis on different psychological aspects of intelligence as well as on different ways of investigating it. The psychometric approach is largely based on statistical methods, especially factor analysis. The cognitive approach studies mental representations and processes. The biological approach is largely brain based. The cultural/contextual approach emphasizes the role of culture in defining what constitutes intelligence in a given cultural setting. And the systems approach looks at intelligence in terms of complex systemic interactions. Two systems theories are Howard Gardner’s theory of multiple intelligences and Robert Sternberg’s theory of successful intelligence. Gardner’s theory argues that there are eight distinctive intelligences, whereas Sternberg’s theory argues that intelligence comprises creative, analytical, practical, and even wisdom-based skills. Intelligence appears to be at least somewhat malleable. A number of programs have had modest to moderate success in helping people to improve their intelligence. These programs work best if they are sustained. They work less well if used only for short periods of time. Schooling is one way of increasing intelligence. The Flynn effect shows modifiability of intelligence across secular time. During the 20th century, IQs rose roughly 30 points worldwide, or 10 points per decade. These results suggest that environment can have a powerful effect, at least on IQ and over a generational time span. However, the increases experienced in the 20th century are not being experienced worldwide in the 21st century.

Japanese Suicide

2014 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul S. Atkins
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Capital Punishment ◽  
Belief Systems ◽  
First Century ◽  
Ancient Rome ◽  
Forthcoming Article ◽  
Early Twenty ◽  
Double Suicide ◽  
Religious Systems ◽  
Forms Of Violence

This is an advance summary of a forthcoming article in the Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Religion. Please check back later for the full article. Suicide in Japan has a relationship with various belief systems, including secular belief systems, such as Bushidō (‘the way of the warrior’) and emperor worship, as well as religious systems, such as Shintō, Buddhism, Confucianism, and Christianity, from the earliest times to the early twenty-first century. Cultural and religious environments in Japan have tended to take a neutral or even positive attitude toward suicide to some extent, similar to that seen elsewhere, for example, in ancient Rome, but in contrast to the stigma attached to suicide by the Abrahamic religions. Iconized Japanese practices of suicide, including seppuku/harakiri (ritualized self-disembowelment), junshi (suicide for the purposes of following one’s lord in death), shinjū (double suicide or murder–suicide by lovers), and the kamikaze of World War II (lit. “divine winds,” usually referred to as tokkōtai “special attack units” in Japanese) show the links between suicide in Japan and the construction of Japanese identity and are further expanded upon in literary and dramatic texts, in addition to religious and philosophical treatises and historical records. Suicide in Japan also intersects and overlaps with other forms of violence, such as warfare, capital punishment, and murder. In addition to causes and motives, of interest are preferred or unusual methods of suicide in Japan, their distinctive aspects in comparison with other cultures, and the symbolic and ritual elements of Japanese suicide.

scholarly journals Challenging the classical notion of time in cognition: a quantum perspective

2014 ◽  
Vol 281 (1781) ◽  
pp. 20133056 ◽  
Author(s):  
James M. Yearsley ◽  
Emmanuel M. Pothos
Keyword(s):  
Quantum Theory ◽  
Time Dependence ◽  
Mental Representations ◽  
Cognitive Models ◽  
Cognitive Systems ◽  
Cognitive Modelling ◽  
Time Points ◽  
Perfect Knowledge ◽  
Interesting Conclusion ◽  
Cognitive Realism

All mental representations change with time. A baseline intuition is that mental representations have specific values at different time points, which may be more or less accessible, depending on noise, forgetting processes, etc. We present a radical alternative, motivated by recent research using the mathematics from quantum theory for cognitive modelling. Such cognitive models raise the possibility that certain possibilities or events may be incompatible, so that perfect knowledge of one necessitates uncertainty for the others. In the context of time-dependence, in physics, this issue is explored with the so-called temporal Bell (TB) or Leggett–Garg inequalities. We consider in detail the theoretical and empirical challenges involved in exploring the TB inequalities in the context of cognitive systems. One interesting conclusion is that we believe the study of the TB inequalities to be empirically more constrained in psychology than in physics. Specifically, we show how the TB inequalities, as applied to cognitive systems, can be derived from two simple assumptions: cognitive realism and cognitive completeness. We discuss possible implications of putative violations of the TB inequalities for cognitive models and our understanding of time in cognition in general. Overall, this paper provides a surprising, novel direction in relation to how time should be conceptualized in cognition.

scholarly journals Keeping religion in mind

1999 ◽  
Vol 17 (1) ◽  
pp. 139-150
Author(s):  
E. Lawson
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Science ◽  
Human Mind ◽  
Implicit Knowledge ◽  
Cultural Factors ◽  
Cognitive Approach ◽  
Religious Ritual ◽  
Religious System ◽  
Random Array ◽  
Religious Systems ◽  
The Mind

The study of religion should continue to focus on the mind rather than being relegated to the emotions. As you study the mind, do not forget to study religion. Do not be so overwhelmed by socio-cultural factors that you forget about the key role that the mind plays in the formation of religious ideas and the practices they inform. And when you study the formation of religious ideas do not become too easily sidetracked into considering only emotive processes.  A cognitive approach to the study of religious ritual demonstrates that when you examine religious ideas and the practices they inform you are looking at a religious system in operation. The relationships among such ideas are systematic and orderly. If they were not we would be looking at a random array of ideas and practices. In such a situation anything would go. But in religious systems anything does not go. The judgments that religious ritual participants make about their own systems are informed by underlying principles that are part of their implicit knowledge. Perhaps, most significantly, such implicit knowledge does not seem to be acquired by instruction. So rather than looking primarily at social and cultural facts in order to explain their acquisition we also need to start looking more closely at how the human mind works; we need to be developing a new psychology of religion as a subdiscipline of cognitive science.

scholarly journals Scientific approaches to the study of psychological accompaniment in child with Down’s syndrome

2018 ◽  
Vol 28 (4) ◽  
pp. 128-132
Author(s):  
A. Sokolova
Keyword(s):  
Theoretical Analysis ◽  
Down's Syndrome ◽  
Down’S Syndrome ◽  
Research Problem ◽  
Internal Variables ◽  
Cognitive Systems ◽  
Cognitive Approach ◽  
Cognitive Reactions ◽  
The Subject ◽  
External Stimuli

In the period of scale changes in area of the special education the necessity of creation of optimal terms of educating and education of children increases with the special educational requirements in a stable and emotional, favorable social environment. Research actuality is s determined by the need to develop a theoretical and methodological substantiation the problem of psychological accompaniment a child with the Down's syndrome (DS). The aim of the article is there is realization of theoretical analysis of problem of psychological accompaniment in child with the Down's syndrome from position of subject-activity, cognitive, systems-oriented and structural-functional approaches. On results the study of research problem, drawn conclusion, that concordantly subject-activity approach in research of model of psychological accompaniment of children with the Down's syndrome the subject of kids with a syndrome Down's reflects the features his personality and repertoire specific of activity. The cognitive approach allows to form a look to the psyche, that is examined as a system of the cognitive reactions, related not only to the external stimuli but also with internal variables, for example, with consciousness. The aim of the article is there is realization of theoretical analysis of problem of psychological accompaniment in children with the Down's syndrome from position of subject-activity, cognitive, systems-oriented and structural-functional approaches.

scholarly journals Religi Ruwat Dalam Kidung Sudamala

2018 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 57-63
Author(s):  
RIA KASANOVA
Keyword(s):  
Data Analysis ◽  
Belief Systems ◽  
Analytical Description ◽  
Religious People ◽  
Religious Systems ◽  
The Universe ◽  
Birth Death

Abstract: Java community has a form of customs that have systems such as values, norms, views and rules of life in society that embodies in the form of traditional ceremonies, to maintain harmony and harmony of the universe. In various forms of traditional ceremonies are still maintained to date, such as the salvation of birth, death, descend, and others. One of the traditional rituals of Javanese society is still done is ruwatan ceremony. Sudamala is a famous ruwat story in the final days of the majapahit kingdom. The method of this research is analytical description method. This study aims to find what is contained in the song Sudamala through data analysis activities followed by then drawn conclusions. Next is to make the tangible text description. Based on the above discussion can be found forms of religious systems that are written in it, namely; religious emotions, belief systems, and religious people.   Keywords: religion, ruwat.

scholarly journals Mapping varied mental representations: The case of representing illegalized immigrants

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joel Eduardo Martinez ◽  
Alexander Todorov
Keyword(s):  
Mental Representations ◽  
Local Population ◽  
Data Driven ◽  
Social Categories ◽  
Shared Beliefs ◽  
Border States ◽  
Facial Phenotype ◽  
Collective Beliefs ◽  
Data Driven Approach ◽  
Influence Perceptions

How do people represent social categories? To answer this question, aggregate mental representations would typically be estimated at the sample level or within theory-derived individual differences (e.g., conservatives vs. liberals). However, these approaches can fail to capture the heterogeneous contours of collective beliefs. We introduce a novel data-driven approach that first clusters mental representations by similarity and then identifies which measures best differentiate between clusters. We apply this approach to understand mental representations of illegalized immigrants. Representations were estimated using face-based reverse correlation from border states, Texas and California (N = 1002), along with various measures thought to influence perceptions of immigrants: attitudes, demographics, ideologies, social geographic characteristics, and a manipulation of labels (i.e.., “undocumented” vs “illegal” immigrant). Comparative analyses revealed how the aggregate approach hid representational clusters that differed on visualized facial phenotype and affective expressions. Furthermore, the clusters were differentiated by characteristics not typically measured in social psychology: age and local population size perceptions. Data-driven approaches therefore offer a useful tool for identifying unexpected sources of shared beliefs by centering representational variation in investigations of mental representations.

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