San Antonio College Library

"Uniting Thomas Lawson's essays on the cognitive science of religion, this volume explores theoretical issues in the study of cultural phenomena such as religion, the role of imagination, and the experiments that emerge from these theories. The book begins with Lawson's influential essay 'Towards a Cognitive Science of Religion,' which was the first to employ the phrase, and has since become widely adopted in many different disciplines. It signals...

The author presents an investigation into the origins of morality, which turns out to be the basis for religion and politics.

Dr. Walsh offers an exciting look at the variety of shamanic practices and its basis in sound psychological principles from a thoroughly Western perspective. The timeless wealth of spiritual insights available through shamanic techniques are shown to the modern, non-tribal student. "A wonderfully lucid, engrossing guide to shamans' practices and beliefs."--Publishers Weekly

In a concise, lively, accessible, and witty style, the authors combine zoom-lens vignettes of religious practices with discussions of the latest research on religion's neurological effects on the brain. Among other topics, they consider religion's role in providing positive socialization, its seeming obsession with regulating sex, how religion's rules of behavior influence the law, the common biological scaffolding between nonhuman primates and humans...

"It may at first seem to be a strange combination, yet Niebuhr's analysis of the human condition inevitably led him into a dialogue with psychology. Often writing with blazing insight and analytical genius, Niebuhr was an avid student of human nature. He frequently displayed a keen awareness of the complexities and contradictions in his own psyche. Put simply, one does not write with this level of insight and depth without a sophisticated self-understanding."...

The Varieties of Religious Experience: A Study in Human Nature is a book by Harvard University psychologist and philosopher William James. It comprises his edited Gifford Lectures on natural theology, which were delivered at the University of Edinburgh, Scotland between 1901 and 1902.

"This was true mystical vision. This I could never have anticipated. But I knew that we were both on the same galactic journey into the great void that contains us all. I was standing before a boundlessness that could swallow the stars in a heartbeat."--Breakfast at the Victory.

Argues that efforts by the anti-religious to explain and undermine religion through cognitive science are misguided and that these approaches can actually be used to support the belief in and practice of religion.