Neurology and Religion

Examines what can be learnt about the brain mechanisms underlying religious practice from studying people with neurological disorders.

Alasdair Coles (Edited by), Joanna Collicutt (Edited by)

9781107082601, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 7 November 2019

316 pages, 14 b/w illus.
24 x 16 x 1.9 cm, 0.66 kg

'It is difficult to overstate the timeliness and importance of this book …' Emeritus Malcolm Jeeves, Science & Christian Belief

This innovative book examines what can be learnt about the brain mechanisms underlying religious belief and practice from studying people with neurological disorders, such as stroke, epilepsy and Parkinson's disease. Using a clinical case study approach, the book analyses the interaction of social influences, religious upbringing and neurological disorders on lived religious experience in a number of different religions. The interdisciplinary contributors to the book ensure a variety of perspectives to help understand how the religious life is affected when different cognitive functions are impaired; how faith modifies the effects of neurological disorders; and how awareness of faith practices may assist in the treatment of these conditions.

Editor's introduction
Part I. Basic Issues in the Neurological Study of Religion: 1. The discipline of neurology Alasdair Coles
2. The scientific study of religion Joanna Collicutt
3. Methodological hazards in the neuroscientific study of religion Stuart Judge
4. Embodied cognition and the neurology of religion Warren Brown
5. Phenomenology, neurology, psychiatry, and religious commitment Ian Kidd
6. Philosophical hazards in the neuroscientific study of religion Daniel de Haan
7. The glass onion and the mereological fallacy Sophie Grace Chappell
8. Toward an Islamic neuropsychiatry: a classification of the diseases of the head in Abul-Hasan 'Alibn Sahl At-Tabari's paradise of women Neil Agarawak
Part II. Neurology and Religion: 9. Temporal lobe epilepsy, Dostoyevsky and irrational significance Alasdair Coles
10. Parkinson's disease, religious belief and spirituality Clare Refern and Roger Baker
11. Beyond reasonable doubt: cognitive and neuropsychological implications for religious disbelief Gordon Pennycook, Daniel Tranel, Kelsey Warner and Erik W. Asp
12. Ramadam fasting and neurological disorders Ashraf El-Mitwalli
13. Autism and the panoply of religious belief, disbelief and experience Kelly Clark and Ingela Visuri
14. Personhood and religion in people with dementia Julian Hughes
15. Religion and frontotemporal dementia Nicolas Block and Bruce Miller
16. Religion and spirituality in neuro-rehabilitation: a case study Joanna Collicutt
17. Eastern spirituality, mind-body practices and neuro-rehabilitation Giles Yeates
18. Examining the continuum of life to determine death: a Jewish perspective Aron Buchman
19. Near death and out of body experience: a case for dialogue between scientist and theologian? Michael Marsh.

Subject Areas: Neurosciences [PSAN], Neurology & clinical neurophysiology [MJN], Philosophy of religion [HRAB]