In the summer of 2020, CMAC brought on our first full-time demographer, Rachel Bacon. Rachel is working on the Modeling Religious Change project, adapting traditional demography methods to cooperate with cutting edge methods in computational simulation. Following the release of…
Ryan Cragun, Kevin McCaffree, Ivan Puga-Gonzalez, Wesley Wildman, F. LeRon Shults Secularism and Nonreligion Abstract: Statistical models attempting to predict who will disaffiliate from religions have typically accounted for less than 15% of the variation in religious affiliations, suggesting that…
Last year, Rachel Bacon started at CMAC as a Postdoctoral Fellow working full-time on the Modeling Religious Change project. She has a wide variety of academic experience in sociology and demographics of religion. We’re excited to introduce you to Rachel!…
One of the first questions that comes up when talking about new spiritual services like deep brain stimulation or hallucinogenic experiences is: are they the real deal? Are these experiences authentic? Isn’t there some important difference between a nun who…
From hallucinogenic drugs to deep brain stimulation, we are constantly finding new ways to foster or deepen spiritual experiences. The sheer range of technology available today that aims to create, guide, and optimize spiritual experiences is dizzying. You may be…
Wesley J. Wildman, Saikou Y. Diallo, George Hodulik, Andrew Page, Andreas Tolk, and Neha Gondal Complexity January 2021 Overview: Operating universities under pandemic conditions is a complex undertaking. The Artificial University (TAU) responds to this need. TAU is a configurable,…
Saikou Diallo, F. LeRon Shults, Wesley J. Wildman AI & Society August 2020 Abstract: Public policies are designed to have an impact on particular societies, yet policy-oriented computer models and simulations often focus more on articulating the policies to be applied than…
Earlier this year, we welcomed George Hodulik to the CMAC team as a Creative Solutions Designer. George comes to CMAC with years of technical experience in software engineering and an eagerness to do more good with data. Find out a…
Across the globe and throughout history, religiosity has been the norm. But occasionally, you find times or places where supernatural worldviews fade among a large portion of the population. Right now, for example, most of Northern Europe, Scandinavia, and many…
Kate J. Stockly and Wesley J. Wildman About the book: From psychedelic tourism to techno-geek psychonauts, spiritual seeking has finally merged with high-tech entrepreneurism. Most people are still not aware of these technologies of spirituality, let alone how they are…
CMAC Research Associate F. LeRon Shults recently published Practicing Safe Sects: Religious Reproduction in Scientific and Philosophical Perspective. The book is now open access and anyone can download it for free! Shults’ book addresses how conceptions of supernatural agents arise…
This is the 4th in our series, “Can We Trust Psychology?” Part 1: What is the replication crisis and why did it happen?Part 2: The Beauty of a Theoretical MessPart 3: The Social Side of Psychology When we’re thinking about why the replication…
In April 2011, the first issue of Religion, Brain & Behavior was published by Taylor & Francis, adorned then as today with William Blake’s “Web of Religion”. The journal provides “a vehicle for the advancement of current biological approaches to understanding religion…
The Artificial University (TAU) is an epidemiological model with a special feature: it takes seriously human factors in the spread of the SARS CoV-2 virus, including compliance (or non-compliance with public health recommendations and the effects of social networks. Under…
Wesley J. Wildman, F. LeRon Shults, Saikou Diallo, Ross Gore, Justin E. Lane Secularism and Nonreligion August 2020 Abstract: The abandonment of supernatural religious beliefs and rituals seems to occur quite easily in some contexts, but post-supernaturalist cultures require a…
Dave Rohr has been in the CMAC network since 2013 as a doctoral fellow. He’s now stepping into a new role as a postdoctoral fellow and joining the admin staff as an Executive Assistant. Learn more about Dave’s background and…
Central Databases on Maternal-Child Health Studies Using Central Databases on Maternal-Child Health
Rich Byrne, Gail H. Cassell, Matthew E. Downs, Florida International University, John Halamka, Shayri M. Kansagra, Leavitt Partners, Rakhee Palekar, Neelima Ramaraju, Kunal J. Rambhia, Kippy Rudy, Jay Schnitzer, Taylor Wilkerson August 2020 Introduction: The complex decision-making regarding reopening of…
A Cross-Cultural Examination of Ritual as a Signaling and Solidarity-Building Strategy Kate J. Stockly, Stephanie Arel, Megan K. DeFranza, Damian Ruck, Luke Matthews Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture, Vol. 14, No. 1 August 2020 Abstract: Prior research…
Keynote Address to the International Association for the Cognitive Science of Religion, August 12, 2018 Dr. Wesley J. Wildman CMAC Executive Director Dr. Wesley J. Wildman gave the following keynote lecture at the 2018 International Association for the Cognitive Science…