Can Science Explain Religion?: The Cognitive Science DebateThe New Atheist movement of recent years has put the science versus religion controversy back on the popular cultural agenda. Anti religious polemicists are convinced that the application of the new sciences of the mind to religious belief gives them the final weapons in their battle against irrationality and superstition. What used to be a trickle of research papers scattered in specialized scientific journals has now become a torrent of books,