Biases and Heuristics in Decision Making and Their Impact on Autonomy

Cognitive scientists have identified a wide range of biases and heuristics in human decision making over the past few decades. Only recently have bioethicists begun to think seriously about the implications of these findings for topics such as agency, autonomy, and consent. This article aims to provide an overview of biases and heuristics that have been identified and a framework in which to think comprehensively about the impact of them on the exercise of autonomous decision making. I analyze the impact that these biases and heuristics have on the following dimensions of autonomy: understanding, intentionality, absence of alienating or controlling influence, and match between formally autonomous preferences or decisions and actual choices or actions.     

There are Non‐Causal Explanations of Particular Events

A defence of non‐causal explanations of events is presented in cases where explanation is understood as modal explanation. In such cases the source of modal information is crucial. All explanations implicitly use contrast classes, and relative to a particular contrast we can privilege some difference makers over others. Thinking about changes in these privileged “actual” difference makers is then the source of modal information for any given explanandum. If an actual difference maker is non‐causal, then we have a principled definition of a non‐causal explanation of an event regardless of how much causal information is also contained in the explanans. A demarcation of explanation into causal and non‐causal in this way recovers ordinary language about explanation as well as reflecting genuine differences in practice, such as the in‐principle evidential base for any modal claim.     

How Politicians’ Reelection Efforts Can Reduce Public Trust,Electoral Support,and Policy Approval

Politicians’ desire for reelection motivates them to be responsive to voters’ policy preferences. In the traditional view, voters choose between candidates based on their delivery of favorable outcomes such as ideologically appealing policies or a prospering economy. However, research in psychology shows that, in addition to outcomes, people care about procedural fairness and, particularly, impartial decision‐makers who make decisions without personal motives and interests. This, I argue, confronts politicians with a delicate task: politicians must present voters with favorable policy outcomes but without appearing as if they pursue these policies based on a personal, vote‐maximizing motive for reelection. In four survey experiments, I find support for this argument. Participants were significantly less inclined to trust and vote for politicians and support their policies when political decisions were described as motivated by reelection considerations than when no such motive was present. The findings advance our understanding of how citizens view political representation and have important implications for research on public opinion, legislative behavior, and democratic theory.     

SCIENCE AND CONFUCIANISM IN RETROSPECT AND PROSPECT

In contrast to Western science and religion, a topic which has been studied very much since the twentieth century, less research has been done on science and Confucianism. By way of a comparative viewpoint within the history of science, this article will deal with some aspects of science and Confucianism in retrospect, for instance, the Confucian origin of the idea of tian yuan di fang 天圓地方, the natural philosophy of qi, and the wu xing li tian zhi qi 五行沴天之氣 bringing abnormal astrological phenomena and reflecting a negative Confucian relation between politics, ethics, and nature. In the late Ming, Xiong Mingyu found that abnormal astrological phenomena, as atmospheric events, happened in the sublunar region rather than in the stars, and in the present time we can reinterpret the crisis of air pollution or global climate change as reflecting a negative Confucian relation between politics, ethics, and nature and as a warning of collective misbehavior in our use of modern scientific technologies.     

SOME WAYS EMERGING ADULTS ARE SHAPING THE FUTURE OF RELIGION AND SCIENCE

This article addresses how the field of religion and science will change in the coming decades by analyzing the attitudes of emerging adults (ages 18–30). I first present an overview of emerging adulthood to set the context for my analysis, especially highlighting the way in which emerging adults find themselves “in between” and in an “age of possibilities," free to explore a variety of options and thus often become “spiritual bricoleurs." Next, I expand on how a broadening pluralism in emerging adult culture changes both the conversation of “religion and science,” on one hand, and the locus for their interaction on the other. In the third section, I address the question of whether there exists a consensus view of how to relate religion and science. Paradoxically, though 18–30‐year‐olds perceive that there is conflict between science and religion, they personally endorse collaboration or independence. Finally, I draw conclusions for practitioners and theorists.     

MAPPING ONE WORLD: RELIGION AND SCIENCE FROM AN EAST ASIAN PERSPECTIVE

This article aims to delineate a model of religion‐science relationship from an East Asian perspective. The East Asian way of thinking is depicted as nondualistic, relational, and inclusive. From this point of view, most current Western discourses on the religion‐science relationship, including the interconnected models of Pannenberg and Haught, are hierarchical, intellectually centered, and have dualistic tendencies. Taking religion and science as mapping activities, “a multi‐map model” presents nonhierarchical, historical, social, multidimensional, communal, and intimate dimensions of the religion‐science relationship.     

SECULARIZING DEMONS: FUNDAMENTALIST NAVIGATIONS IN RELIGION AND SECULARITY

Since the turn of the millennium, theologians and secular scholars of religion have increasingly begun exploring the relationship between transhumanism and religion. However, analyses of anti‐transhumanist apocalypticisms are still rare, and those that exist are situated mainly among broader explorations of religious and secular bioconservatism. This article addresses this lack of specificity by drawing analyses of transhumanism and religion into dialogue with explorations of contemporary demonology through a close study of the beliefs of the evangelical conspiracist Thomas Horn and the anti‐transhumanist milieu around him. Exploring the milieu's multifaceted demonology of the secular world in light of genealogies of religion and secularity, the article situates Horn's demonology as one attempt to negotiate these genealogies, using what Sean McCloud terms a “‘supernatural’ hermeneutics of suspicion” that sees spiritual forces as the structural base of reality. It argues that, while fringe, milieus like Horn's illuminate broader cultural tensions and genealogical relations surrounding the place of religion in a secular(izing) world.     

PETER HARRISON,LUDWIG WITTGENSTEIN,AND THE PROBLEM OF PRE‐MODERN RELIGION

Peter Harrison's Gifford Lectures demonstrate that the modern concepts of “religion” and “science” do not correspond to any fixed sphere of life in the pre‐modern world. Because these terms are incommensurate and ideological, they misconstrue the past. I examine the influence and affinities of Ludwig Wittgenstein's philosophy on Harrison's study in order to argue that Harrison's project approaches Wittgenstein's. Harrison's book is a therapeutic history, untying a knot in scholarly language. I encourage Harrison, however, to clarify how future scholars can progress in their study of phenomena once termed “scientific” or “religious” without succumbing to these same mistakes.     

TWO TYPES OF “EXPLAINING AWAY” ARGUMENTS IN THE COGNITIVE SCIENCE OF RELIGION

This article discusses “explaining away” arguments in the cognitive science of religion (CSR). I distinguish two rather different ways of explaining away religion, one where religion is shown to be incompatible with scientific findings (EA1) and one where supernatural entities are rendered superfluous by scientific explanations (EA2). After discussing possible objections to both varieties, I argue that the latter way offers better prospects for successfully explaining away religion but that some caveats must be made. In a second step, I spell out how CSR can be used to spell out an argument of the second kind. One argument (“Bias Explaining Away”) renders religion superfluous by claiming that it results from a cognitive bias and one (“Adaptationist Explaining Away”) does the same by claiming religion was (is) a useful evolutionary adaptation. I discuss some strengths and weaknesses of both arguments.     

THE HYBRIDITY OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE: A RESPONSE TO LEONARDO AMBASCIANO

This article responds to Leonardo Ambasciano's review of The Scientification of Religion: An Historical Study of Discursive Change, 1800–2000 by Kocku von Stuckrad. It criticizes a narrative that presents naturalism and science as the ultimate system of knowledge. Contesting this rhetoric, the article underscores the plurality and hybridity of knowledge systems, which is the main topic of the book under review.