Mind and Religion

Harvey Whitehouse is Professor of Anthropology and Director of the Institute of Cognition and Culture at Queen's University Belfast. Robert N. McCauley is Professor of Philosophy at Emory University in Atlanta. He is the author, with E. Thomas Lawson, of Rethinking Religion: Connecting Cognition and Culture (1990) and Bringing Ritual to Mind: Psychological Foundations of Cultural Forms (2002).

This book provides an excellent set of commentaries, and for those interested in cognitive approaches to religion more generally, it offers a good overview.

• 1 IntroductionPart 2 The Theoretical Context3 A Reductionistic Model of Distinct Modes of Religious Transmission4 Modes Theory: Some Theoretical Considerations5 Ritual Form and Ritual Frequency6 Divergent Religion: A Dual-Process Model of Religious Thought, Behavior, and Structure7 Rethinking Naturalness: Modes of Religiosity and Religion in the RoundPart 8 Testing the Modes Theory9 In the Empirical Mode: Evidence Needed for the Modes of Religiosity10 Memory and Analogical Thinking in High-Arousal RitualsPart 11 Wider Applications12 The Modes Theory Helps Explain Conversion Phenomena13 Charisma, Tradition and Ritual: A Cognitive Approach to Magical Agency14 Why Religions Develop Free Will Problems15 The Cognitive Foundations of Religiosity