Friday, May 20, 2011

Andrew Gelman draws attention to a terrific paper by Mark Chaves on the religious congruence fallacy.

Religious congruence refers to consistency among an individual's religious beliefs and attitudes, consistency between religious ideas and behavior, and religious ideas, identities, or schemas that are chronically salient and accessible to individuals across contexts and situations. Decades of anthropological, sociological, and psychological research establish that religious congruence is rare, but much thinking about religion presumes that it is common. The religious congruence fallacy [emphasis added] occurs when interpretations or explanations unjustifiably presume religious congruence.

3 comments:

JMLA said...

Thanks for the recommendation. I just read a Sam Harris book review in the Nation that I think coincides nicely: http://www.thenation.com/article/160236/same-old-new-atheism-sam-harris

Celebrtiy and Health said...

Nice recommendation, but where I can find more review ?

Languagehat said...

Wow, that is a terrific paper. I hope the author writes a boiled-down op-ed or something that I can pass on to people who won't take the time to read a long academic paper with references.