A Few More Notes on Science and Religion/Head and Heart

Some take recourse in this common cliché: science and religion depict the contrast of “head” and “heart,” respectively. That idea is somewhat distorting since, at least minimally, we know that emotions and rationality are intertwined and take place in various functions of our wonderfully complex and often chaotic brains. 

For the past decade or two, affective neuroscientists like Antonio Damasio and Luiz Pessoa have noted the close connection between emotion and decision-making. They encapsulated the trend lines of recent research on emotion and cognitive science when they wrote, 

“There are no truly separate systems for emotion and cognition because complex cognitive-emotional behavior emerges from the rich, dynamic interactions between brain networks.” Damasio & Pessoa

And yet the head/heart dichotomy begins to bring us to the right position in understanding our heritage in the United States. Historically, we want either to be warmed in our feelings about the world around us—to see meaning and order and beauty—or to have our thinking kindled—to analyze the particulars of how things fit all reach; something which is the ultimate ideal, and the hopeless quest.

In addition, I learned from Robert McCauley in Why Religion is Natural and Science is Not that religion, with its stories and community and rituals--but not theology, with its complicated rationalized discourse--has a higher cognitive "naturalness" than science and its patient and careful process (which is closer to theology).

This means that when science has truly affected our culture, it’s not the experiments but the larger story of ourselves and our world—what we might call its religious aspects. Albert Einstein’s special relativity theory is amazing science, but when we hear that time dilates, that’s an astounding story. Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution through natural selection is ground-breaking science, but what influences culture is that we are more similar to chimpanzees, and less special, than we thought. I note then not only science for science’s sake, but science for culture’s sake. 

And when science has affected culture is indeed, that is when science has interacted most notably with religious life in America.

Emotions: Helpful or Not? And Does Science Have Anything to Say about it? (Another Soul Dialogue)

Nick, my imaginary friend: Greg, did you say the topic today would be Scripture and positive psychology?

GSC: That I did! And we will get to it. But not today. Because first, I think we need to take on a common misconception about life and happiness.

Nick: Ok, what are you thinking?

GSC: It’s something I heard the other day in a sermon—“Christian faith isn’t all in your head.” On the one hand, Amen to that! On other hand, faith isn’t all in your feelings either!

Nick: Not to be too philosophical--or scientific--but no, duh.

GSC: You’d be surprised by how many people fall for the feelings trap. Can I show you an amazing drawing? It shows how facts must lead the train of our lives, which is followed by our faith in those facts, and then by our feelings. 

Nick: Hey, that’s not your picture! You stole it from Cru! And the train’s sleeker than in the ‘80s. It’s been updated from your college years.

GSC: You’re right on several fronts, and I admit that the language and image is a bit silly. But still the point is clear—don’t follow your feelings because they change. Put your faith in what you know to be true and the feelings will follow.

Nick: Ok, let me take on the role of an antagonist… What have you got against emotion? Don’t you realize that everything you care about is based on emotion? And what does science have to say?

GSC: Good question! I love emotion, and like Jonathan Edwards’s famous 18^thcentury defense of “religious affections,” emotions or “affections” are central to most believers’ understanding of Christian faith and most people’s experience of life. 

Nick: Is there a difference for Edwards between emotions and affections?

GSC: Yes. “Affections” for Edwards represented something a bit more substantial than ephemeral emotions. Still the point stands—it’s not all cold rationality. 

Nick: I think that’s right. As you often hear in Plato's dialogues, “Socrates, you are the wisest man alive.”

GSC: Thanks. Hard to know what to say…

Nick: Here’s something. Aren’t these affections or emotions a gift to give us motivation?

GSC: God definitely gives us emotions or feelings. At the same time, it’s not feelings that define us. It’s actually walking in God’s way. As C. S. Lewis wrote in a letter to one of his many correspondents in 1950, 

“Obedience is the key to all doors: feelings come (or don’t come) and go as God pleases. We can’t produce them at will and mustn’t try.” C. S. Lewis

Nick: We haven't talked much about science, and I'm always interested in what scientists can contribute. Neuroscientist Antonio Damasio has found that, without emotions, we can’t make moral decisions.

GSC: There you go, always putting theology and science into the conversation!

Nick: Ok, I’ll do one more, Jonathan Haidt notes that often we, with our rational deliberation, are simply the rider on the back of the elephant of emotions. 

GSC: Tru dat! But the point is that, through taming our emotions, learning how to engage our rationality, and living in a good community, we learn to direct the elephant. 

Nick: So do you agree with Haidt or not?

GSC:  I think Haidt is good, but he overstates his case. In brief I'd say that we all default to Haidt, but shouldn't end there. And that I'm convinced the American church is too often led around by the vagaries of our emotions. It's not good...

Nick: Fair enough. So both emotions and reason need to work together, but it’s how we actually live that defines our happiness?

GSC: Ah yes, young padawan, you summarize well! I think you’ve learned much for today. Let’s keep walking. Next time, maybe we’ll pick up the topics of positive psychology and Scripture…