Cognitive Bubbles: Towards a Logic of Fundamentalism

Abstract

This paper examines fundamentalist cognition from a formal perspective with the aim of showing that such a perspective has explanatory power. Formal traits in fundamentalist thought are shown to turn up consistently in different fundamentalist groups and regarding different issues, and to be related to fundamentalist groups’ dynamics, theology, and political organization. Analysis of fundamentalist cognition also suggests that the epistemological stance of strong relativism in the public sphere may be conducive to fundamentalism.