“The Cognitive Science of Religion”

Paul Bloom
Department of Psychology
Yale University

Paul Bloom, Professor of Psychology and Linguistics at Yale University, is the author of Descartes’ Baby: How the science of child development explains what makes us human (Basic Books, 2004) and How children learn the meanings of words (MIT, 2000), as well as scores of papers on such topics as the evolution of language, the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, the naming of artifacts and natural kinds, and the psychology of moral reasoning. He is also co-editor of Behavioral and Brain Sciences.

Professor Bloom’s lectures will each be self-contained; they will not presuppose one another.

Visiting commentators
Lecture I:   Ned Block (New York University)
                 Deborah Kelemen (Boston University)
Lecture II:   Steve Stich (Rutgers University)
                 Leda Cosmides (University of California,Santa Barbara)
Lecture III:  Scott Atran (Institut Jean Nicod)
                 Peter van Inwagen (University of Notre Dame)
Lecture IV: Susan Gelman (University of Michigan)
                Jerry Levinson (University of Maryland)