RELIGION and COGNITION

An Introduction by István Czachesz

What is religion?

In different cultures, religion may be connected to different domains of human life:

  • In the Roman world, religion was basically a matter of cults and festivals. The great issues of life were discussed by philosophers, and stories about gods by the poets.
  • In ancient Judaism, cult, morality, ideas about the origin of the world, history, and poetry were all strongly interconnected and understood as parts of Jewish religion.
  • In Western modernity, religion is mainly restricted to cult and morality.

Comparing apples with oranges can be avoided by setting up proper categories of investigation. Cognitive science focusses on cross-cultural behavioural patterns. Cultural and individual differences are understood in the framework of universal building blocks.
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