Religion and the brain: Jordan Grafman's contributions to religion and brain research and the special case of religious language.

Brain Mystical experiences Pragmatics Psychedelics Psychology of religion Religious language Sacred texts Speech acts

Journal

Cortex; a journal devoted to the study of the nervous system and behavior
ISSN: 1973-8102
Titre abrégé: Cortex
Pays: Italy
ID NLM: 0100725

Informations de publication

Date de publication:
Dec 2023
Historique:
received: 26 04 2023
revised: 12 09 2023
accepted: 26 10 2023
pubmed: 24 11 2023
medline: 24 11 2023
entrez: 23 11 2023
Statut: ppublish

Résumé

Grafman and colleagues' papers in religion and brain research have documented the extent to which religious beliefs and behaviors are mediated by standard social cognitive networks in brain. Grafman's work however also points beyond treatments of religious cognition as merely a species of more general social cognitive processes. Data emerging from experiments targeting mystical states as well as reports of encounters with supernatural agents during controlled experiments with psychedelics, suggest that brain mediation of mystical encounters with supernatural agents involves both disruption/downregulation of social cognitive networks and activation of an additional as yet only partially identified neural process suggesting that a full neuroscience account of religious beliefs, behaviors and experiences must extend beyond treatment of religion as an ordinary social process.

Identifiants

pubmed: 37995522
pii: S0010-9452(23)00272-1
doi: 10.1016/j.cortex.2023.10.015
pii:
doi:

Types de publication

Journal Article

Langues

eng

Sous-ensembles de citation

IM

Pagination

374-379

Informations de copyright

Copyright © 2023 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Auteurs

Patrick McNamara (P)

Department of Psychology, National University, USA; Boston University School of Medicine, USA; Boston University School of Theology, USA; Co-PI Cognitive Neuroscience of Religious Cognition (CNRC) Project, USA; Center for Mind and Culture, Boston, MA, USA. Electronic address: pmcnamar3@gmail.com.

Classifications MeSH