CRC

CENTRE for RELIGION & COGNITION

In recent years, a new interdisciplinary approach to religion has been emerging, using methods and insights from cognitive science, neuroscience, and evolutionary theory. The increased interest in the cognitive aspects of religion coincided with the arrival of new brain imaging technologies. The Cognitive Science of Religion has opened up new ways of exploring the evolutionary origins, psychological underpinning, cognitive mechanisms, social significance, and other aspects of religion.

At the University of Groningen, the presence of the Cognitive Science of Religion offers an unprecedented opportunity for the joint exploration of historical, philosophical, and psychological aspects of religiosity. The success of early Christianity, the transmission of biblical traditions, the mechanisms underlying fundamentalism, the structure of rituals, and the connection of religion to other domains of human culture and civilisation are promising research areas of the new discipline.

The Centre contributes to the development of the Cognitive Science of Religion in a number of ways:

• It serves the international cooperation of scholars by organising meetings, workshops, and conferences.
• It maintains the The Archive for Religion & Cognition, which contains articles and texts related to the Cognitive Science of Religion.
• It fosters cooperation among scholars working at different faculties of the University of Groningen, as well as at different universities of the Netherlands, around the cognitive study of religion.
• It plans to publish the online Bulletin for Religion & Cognition.