Hi On Mon, 18 Feb 2002, James Guinee wrote: > Arguably Christian psychologists, as well as religious psychologists in > general, see sin as a more prevalent aspect of culture, as well as useful > in explaining the state of that culture. > > But should secular psychologists? > > Do you view sin as a useful concept, as a part of the vocabulary of > psychology? Or should it be restricted to religious circles?
A. As noted below in the Webster definition, sin does not necessarily entail religion (e.g., "an offense against religious or moral law" "an action that is reprehensible"), so it would be quite possible to operationalize sin in such a way as to separate the construct from religion. Main Entry: 1sin [audio.gif] Pronunciation: 'sin Function: noun Etymology: Middle English sinne, from Old English synn; akin to Old High German sunta sin and probably to Latin sont-, sons guilty, est is -- more at IS Date: before 12th century 1 a : an offense against religious or moral law b : an action that is or is felt to be highly reprehensible <it's a sin to waste food> c : an often serious shortcoming : FAULT 2 a : transgression of the law of God b : a vitiated state of human nature in which the self is estranged from God synonym see OFFENSE B. Even accepting the religious sense of sin, it would be important to distinguish between "sin" as a phenomenon to be studied by psychologists (e.g., how do people feel and why when they have "sinned," however operationally defined), and "sin" as an explanatory construct (e.g., mental illness being a consequence of sinning against god, implying a vengeful god as some kind of causal agent). The first (i.e., sin as phenomenon) would be acceptable to any psychologist (atheist or religionist) interested in the role of religion in human behaviour and experience. One would be able to apply the standard explanatory constructs (e.g., cognitive dissonance, attitude-behaviour principles, rationalization) to develop a psychological model to account for the phenomenon. The causal use of "sin," however, is extremely problematic for any psychologist wanting to maintain more than a veneer of being scientific because it implicates the supernatural as a causal agent. As with any non-natural explanation, psychologists choosing this road will need very compelling evidence that naturalism is inadequate to explain the phenomena. That is, we would need, for example, strong evidence that cases of mental illness can ONLY be explained by positing a deity or religious plane as the causal agent. The strong idea of a Christian psychology is almost an oxymoron to me, as would be extreme notions of Black Psychology, Eurocentric Psychology, or somewhat further afield, fields like Creationist Science, Aryan Science under Hitler, and many other cases where non-scientific beliefs unduly influenced the discipline and made it non-scientific. That is, there was undue and unwarranted emphasis on the modifier. Of course, psychology (unfortunately) is not synonymous with Scientific Psychology, which opens the door to all kinds of "Adjectivized" Psychologies where there is no possible inconsistency with the religious, political, or ethnic beliefs. I wonder whether many religious psychologists/researchers either (a) make a simplistic and unnecessary leap from religious phenomena (e.g., religious people live longer) to religious mechanism, and/or (b) are willing to simply use pro-religious findings pragmatically as an argument (albeit a specious one) for encouraging more people to practice or maintain their religion? Best wishes Jim ============================================================================ James M. Clark (204) 786-9757 Department of Psychology (204) 774-4134 Fax University of Winnipeg 4L05D Winnipeg, Manitoba R3B 2E9 [EMAIL PROTECTED] CANADA http://www.uwinnipeg.ca/~clark ============================================================================ --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To unsubscribe send a blank email to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
