Religion and Cognitive
Science: Cognitive Constraints
and Top-down Causation
James A. Van Slyke
Fuller Theological Seminary
Cognitive Science of Religion
 1990s – Decade of the Brain
– Success of Cognitive Sciences
– New Discoveries in Neuroscience
 Evolutionary Theory
– Strong research program
– Insights from evolution applied to human
behavior
Cognitive Science of Religion
Evolutionary Psychology
 Brain consists of cognitive modules
– Solve adaptive problems of our ancient ancestors
– Swiss army knife
– Each module is a ‘tool’
 Agency Detection Device
 Theory of Mind
– “Stone Age Mind”
Evolutionary Psychology
 Evolutionary ancestors
– Pleistocene Era – 1.8 to 11,000 years before
recorded history
– Adaptive problems faced
 Sexual selection
– Facial symmetry
– Waist to hip Ratio
 Kin Selection – Altruism
 Predator Detection
Minimally Counterintuive
Hypothesis (MCI)
 Boyer (2001) – Religion Explained
– Process information according to “intuitive
ontology” contained in templates
 PERSON
 NATURAL OBJECT
 TOOL
 ANIMAL
 PLANT
Minimally Counterintuitive
Hypothesis (MCI)
 Religious concepts retain intuitive ontological
categories while violating certain expectations
– Omniscient God = [PERSON] + special cognitive
powers
– Visiting ghosts = [PERSON] + no material body
– Reincarnation = [PERSON] + no death + extra body
available
– Listening statue = [TOOL] + cognitive functions
– Guardian River = [NATURAL OBJECT] + incest
abhorrence
Minimally Counterintuitive
Hypothesis (MCI)
 Religious concepts share a similar
conceptual structure across cultures
 They are minimally counterintuitive (MCI)
– Natural kinds with a limited number of unusual
properties (i.e. expectation-violations)
 Being MCI makes them attention-grabbing,
easy to remember, and thus “fit” for cultural
transmission.
Theological Incorrectness
 But concepts with many unusual properties
(expectation violations) are hard to recall.
 This is the case with theological concepts,
which are “maximally counterintuitive”
(MXCI) :
– “God is an omnipresent, omnipotent, omnisicent
essence with multiple forms derived from the
same substance that has no creation or
cessation point.”
Theological Incorrectness
Hypothesis
 Definition
– Barrett (1999)
 Religious cognition which requires quick recall relies
on intuitive knowledge
Intuitive
Knowledge
Theology
Doctrine
Basic
Concepts
Theological
Concepts
Concrete/Simple
Decreasing Cognitive Demands
Abstract/Complex
Theological Incorrectness
Hypothesis
 Example narrative:
– A boy was swimming alone in a swift and rocky river.
The boy got his left leg caught between two large, gray
rocks and couldn’t get out. Branches of trees kept
bumping into him as they hurried past. He thought he
was going to drown and so he began to struggle and
pray. Though God was answering another prayer in
another part of the world when the boy started praying,
before long God responded by pushing one of the rocks
so the boy could get his leg out. The boy struggled to
the river bank and fell over exhausted.
Cognitive Science of Religion
 Explicit religious beliefs do not reflect actual
beliefs
– Implicit cognitive systems
– by-product of unconscious, implicit cognitive
systems
Problems of Reduction
 Bottom-up account of religious cognition
Explicit
Processing
Theology/Doctrine
Theological Concepts
Basic Concepts
Implicit
Processing
Intuitive Knowledge
Bottom-up Causation
Cognitive Modules
Intuitive Ontology
Emergent Cognitive Systems
 Rather than a Swiss Army knife, cognitive
systems are flexible means of
representation
 Representational systems dependent on
environmental feedback
 Formation of patterns of neuronal activation
Stone Age Mind or
Symbolic Mind?
 Terrence Deacon (“Symbolic Species” – 1997)
– Human cognitive processing has become “front heavy”
– Brain structure evolved connections from the prefrontal
cortex throughout the brain
– Enabled the symbolic nature of human processing,
abstract concepts, and intelligence
Co-evolutionary Processes
 Language Development involved changes in
cultural transmission and the brain
– Languages became “user-friendly” – easy to
learn by children
– The brain has adapted in order to make it easy
to learn language – “front heavy”
Parallel
Distributed
Processing
 Word meaning and Inputs
language structure
are internalized
patterns in PDP
networks
Neurons in the brain
connect with one
another to form networks
Outputs
The brain learns by modifying
certain connections in
response to feedback
 Religious cognition is not based on intuitive
ontology, but association networks
– Networks built up over time
Top-down Causation
 Top-down Processing
– information processing guided by higher-level
mental processes
– as when we construct perceptions drawing on
our experience and expectations
 Top-down Causation
– Using higher level mental processes (i.e.
memories, concepts, etc.) to direct behavior
Top-down Processes
 Ambiguous Figure
– Old or Young Woman?
Top-down Processes
 Dr. Emily Grossman
– Form from motion
Mind Externalized
 “Being There” – Andy Clark (1997)
– Cognition is not just “in the head” but relies on
“external scaffolding”
 Social institutions, religious traditions, texts act as a
form of external memory that we rely on for religious
cognition
 Partial Programs
– Cognitive Programs are the product of initial parameters set
by genetics and normal brain development
– But, also develop according to environmental feedback,
which helps to “write” the program
A Different Model
Cognitive Scaffolding
Theology/Doctrine
Symbolic Processing
Religious Traditions
Top-down Causation
Theological Concepts
Emergence
Basic Concepts
Partial Programs
Bottom-up Causation
Implications
 Implicit cognitive systems are only part of
the story of human cognition
 Higher level semantic systems (concepts,
beliefs, etc.) also have a role to play in
behavior and cognition
 Cognitive Science of Religion only provides
a partial picture