ABSTRACT
Work in the cognitive science of religion (CSR) has been used to challenge the rationality of religious beliefs. According to these challenges, CSR shows us that religious beliefs are formed
or influenced in a way that is rationally doubtful. In past work, the author has defended the Religious Reasons Reply to this challenge: individual and collective religious belief is not adequately explained by CSR; believers believe, at least in part, for various reasons that may well—for all that CSR tells us—in fact be good reasons. This reply faces an objection: we have evidence that religious believers rationalize their beliefs with these reasons. Believers don’t originally believe for these reasons but, if they later come to believe in part for these reasons, the process of rationality does not reliably lead them to good reasons. The author develops this rationalization-based objection in detail and shows that there are some good reasons to think that religious believers rationalize in an epistemically defective way. However, religious believers will also typically possess some reasons that partially deflect the charge of rationalization. The Religious Reasons Reply stands, although believers should reduce their confidence at least somewhat due to the evidence of rationalization.
