Detailed Information on Publication Record
2020
Evolutionary, Cognitive, and Contextual Approaches to the Study of Religious Systems : A Proposition of Synthesis
LANG, Martin and Radek KUNDTBasic information
Original name
Evolutionary, Cognitive, and Contextual Approaches to the Study of Religious Systems : A Proposition of Synthesis
Authors
LANG, Martin (203 Czech Republic, guarantor, belonging to the institution) and Radek KUNDT (203 Czech Republic, belonging to the institution)
Edition
Method and Theory in the Study of Religion. Journal of the North American Association for the Study of Religion, Leiden-Boston-Koeln, Brill, 2020, 0943-3058
Other information
Language
English
Type of outcome
Článek v odborném periodiku
Field of Study
60304 Religious studies
Country of publisher
Netherlands
Confidentiality degree
není předmětem státního či obchodního tajemství
References:
RIV identification code
RIV/00216224:14210/20:00113989
Organization unit
Faculty of Arts
UT WoS
000528214900001
Keywords in English
cognition; complex adaptive systems; evolution; mechanism; the humanities and the sciences; religion; ritual
Tags
Tags
International impact, Reviewed
Změněno: 20/2/2022 19:45, Mgr. Ivona Vrzalová
Abstract
V originále
The explanatory gap between the life sciences and the humanities that is present in the study of human phenomena impedes productive interdisciplinary examination that such a complex subject requires. Manifested as epistemological tensions over reductionism vs. holism, nature vs. nurture, and the study of micro vs. macro context, the divergent research approaches in the humanities and the sciences produce separate bodies of knowledge that are difficult to reconcile. To remedy this incommensurability, the article proposes to employ the complex adaptive systems approach, which allows to study specific cultural systems in their ecologies and to account for the myriads of factors that constitute such systems, including nonlinear interactions between these factors and their evolution. On a specific example of religious systems, we show that by studying cultural systems in their contextual variability, mechanistic composition, and evolutionary history, the humanities and the sciences should be able to fruitfully collaborate while avoiding previous pitfalls of excessive reductionism, genetic determinism, and sweeping overgeneralizations, on the one hand, and pitfalls of excessive holism, cultural determinism, and aversion to any generalizations, on the other hand.
Links
| GA18-18316S, research and development project |
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