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Although the title about the “link” between brain injury and religious fundamentalism is misleading, the findings seemingly fail to capture the apparent prevalence of a major component of what underlies not just religious fundamentalism, but also conservative fundamentalism. 1/ https://twitter.com/BrvHrt09/status/1211872347159969793
The study focused on damage to two specific areas of the brain in the prefrontal cortex that are believed to have a role in “openness” and “cognitive flexibility”. 2/
"Cognitive flexibility" refers to a person’s ability to update their beliefs based on new information/evidence. Clearly, this has not only been an issue with religion over the years, but it's also been a problem with conservative politics (e.g. climate change). 3/
While the brain damage “link” may be tenuous, in my view the study properly focuses on the relationship between religious fundamentalism (and conservative fundamentalism) and personality traits/type….or as I’ve previously referred to it: "binary orientation". 4/
In previous threads, I’ve written about the role that the binary orientation of individuals, coupled with the “binary institutional conditioning” of society plays in religious and political tribalism. 5/ https://twitter.com/Nick_Carmody/status/1161047325734608896
