Believing Brains? Cognitive Approaches to Faith and Reason

From its infancy in phrenological false promises, the idea that faith and reason should leave physical marks on the human brain has attracted both empirical and popular interest. The simple localization of faith or reason to a clearly defined brain area is, however, unlikely at this point, and the practice of using appeals to brain imaging to justify the existence of psychological constructs—neurorealism—is increasingly under critical fire. While we do not yet have a clear picture of the intricate networks that provide for the human experiences of faith and reason, some basic principles derived from a blending of psychology and neuroscience suggest the types of cognition that we would expect to underpin both faith and reason.