{"id":11261,"date":"2015-09-08T10:52:11","date_gmt":"2015-09-08T15:52:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/college.unc.edu\/?p=11261"},"modified":"2024-07-02T16:07:58","modified_gmt":"2024-07-02T16:07:58","slug":"experienceproject2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/collegearchive.unc.edu\/?p=11261","title":{"rendered":"The Experience Project awards $1.7 million to 22 research projects"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"The<\/a>
The Experience Project looks to answer questions about how religious experiences affect a person\u2019s concept of God; how transformative experiences can affect a person\u2019s identity, values, belief system and behaviors; and how religious and other types of transformative experiences differ.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

A research collaboration that aims to build new understanding about how religious and transformative experiences occur and shape people\u2019s lives is awarding its first round of funding with more than $1.7 million going to 22 projects.<\/p>\n

The Experience Project, a $5.1 million project<\/a> supported by a grant from the John Templeton Foundation<\/a>, looks to answer questions about how religious experiences affect a person\u2019s concept of God; how transformative experiences can affect a person\u2019s identity, values, belief system and behaviors; and how religious and other types of transformative experiences differ.<\/p>\n

The project is co-directed by Michael Rea<\/a>, a professor of philosophy, and Samuel Newlands<\/a>, the William J. and Dorothy K. O’Neill Collegiate Associate Professor in Philosophy \u2014 both of the University of Notre Dame<\/a>\u2019s College of Arts and Letters<\/a> \u2014 and L.A. Paul<\/a>, a professor of philosophy in the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill<\/a>\u2019s College of Arts and Sciences.<\/p>\n

One component of the project, Rea said, focuses on the nature and significance of religious experiences.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re trying to figure out what we can and should conclude about God and God\u2019s love for us through the patterns and varieties of religious experiences throughout the world,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Another component focuses on ordinary but momentous events people face every day, Paul said.<\/p>\n

\"L.A.<\/a>
L.A. Paul, a professor of philosophy at UNC<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cThe project takes a bold new approach to understanding some of life\u2019s deepest existential questions by exploiting the resources of analytic philosophy and empirical social science to try to get a better sense of the importance and meaning of lived experience, self-realization and our understanding of our place in the world,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

The project offers non-residential funding and residential fellowships at Notre Dame’s Center for Philosophy of Religion and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and also funds a series of collaborative workshops.<\/p>\n

Project funding falls into one of three research categories \u2014 social science, philosophy and philosophy of religion.<\/p>\n

Among the projects receiving non-residential funding are:<\/p>\n

    \n
  • \u201cReceptivity of God through Ritual,\u201d by Terence Cuneo, a University of Vermont professor of philosophy. Cuneo will investigate the connection between religious experience and religious activity, especially liturgical activity in the Christian tradition. Through four essays, Cuneo will explore the ways in which people come to appreciate rituals and the crucial role they play in developing an ability to experience God in the ordinary.<\/li>\n
  • \u201cTransformative Understanding,\u201d by Tania Lombrozo, a University of California, Berkeley, associate professor of psychology. Lombrozo will develop the claim that gaining understanding \u2014 as opposed to simply gaining knowledge \u2014 is a transformative experience that can change beliefs, values and attitudes. Through a series of studies, she will investigate the nature of transformation people undergo when coming to understand something new and how that understanding can change worldviews.<\/li>\n
  • \u201cShifting Bodies, Shifting Feelings: Birth Transforms Positive Emotions from Self-Relevant to the Selfless,\u201d by June Gruber and Sona Dimidjian, psychology faculty members at the University of Colorado Boulder. The pair will test folk theory assumptions that birth radically transforms one\u2019s experience of emotions in ways that cannot be understood without having had the experience. They will examine how birth enhances emotional diversity, specifically selfless emotions.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

    Additional projects receiving funding in the first round:<\/p>\n

      \n
    • \u201cDivine Forgiveness as Religious Experience,\u201d Brandon Warmke, Wake Forest University.<\/li>\n
    • \u201cIs It Possible to Have a Veridical Experience of God\u2019s Absence?,\u201d Max Baker-Hytch, University of Oxford.<\/li>\n
    • \u201cEmbodied Religion: Social Structures and Religious Experience,\u201d Christina Van Dyke and Robin Dembroff, Calvin College and Princeton University, respectively.<\/li>\n
    • \u201cResponding to Skepticism: Radical, Moral, and Religious,\u201d Michael Bergmann, Purdue University.<\/li>\n
    • \u201cReligious Experience and the Transformation of Human Cognition: Approaches to Spiritual Perception,\u201d Paul Gavrilyuk and Mark Spencer, University of St. Thomas.<\/li>\n
    • \u201cMystical Experience in Psychology,\u201d Martin Echavarria and Enrique Garcia, Abat Oliba University.<\/li>\n
    • \u201cPersonal Possibility,\u201d Martin Glazier, New York University.<\/li>\n
    • \u201cThe Self-Conditioning Strategy as an Important Ingredient in Transformative Decision-Making,\u201d Enoch Lambert, Harvard University.<\/li>\n
    • \u201cEvaluating Transformative Experiences,\u201d Mark Johnston, Princeton University.<\/li>\n
    • \u201cReasonable Commitments and Transformative Experiences of Value,\u201d Kyla Ebels-Duggan, Northwestern University.<\/li>\n
    • \u201cThe Mother of all Transformative Experiences: Thinking About and Caring About Profoundly Different Individuals,\u201d Paul Bloom, Yale University.<\/li>\n
    • \u201cThe Warm Glow of Burning Man: Investigating the Impact of Transformative Experiences on Prosocial Behavior,\u201d Molly Crockett and Aleksandr Chakroff; University of Oxford and Harvard University, respectively.<\/li>\n
    • \u201c\u2018I Was Never the Same\u2019: Development and Validation of a Text-Based Approach to Studying Transformative Experience,\u201d Jesse Graham, University of Southern California.<\/li>\n
    • \u201cComputational Models of the Intuitive Theory of Transformative Experiences,\u201d Joshua Tenenbaum, Massachusetts Institute of Technology.<\/li>\n
    • \u201cDating and Sex After Divorce at Midlife,\u201d Elizabeth Armstrong and Spencer Garrison, University of Michigan.<\/li>\n
    • \u201cTravel as Transformative Experience: Touristic Quests for Radical Self-Discovery,\u201d Thomas DeGloma and Erin Johnston, Hunter College (CUNY) and Princeton University, respectively.<\/li>\n
    • \u201cThe Social Organization and Cultivation of Transformative Experience,\u201d Justin Farrell, Yale University.<\/li>\n
    • \u201cSouls Without Borders: Conservative Protestant Missionary Work as Transformative Experience,\u201d Daniel Winchester, Purdue University.<\/li>\n
    • \u201cMarywood University Bridges Experience:\u00a0An Interdisciplinary Exploration of Religious and Spiritual Experience,\u201d John DePoe and Melinda Krokus, Marywood University.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

      In an upcoming funding cycle, the Experience Project will award additional grants for work in philosophy, theology and religious studies.<\/p>\n

      By Brian Wallheimer, University of Notre Dame College of Arts and Letters<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

      A research collaboration that aims to build new understanding about how religious and transformative experiences occur and shape people\u2019s lives is awarding its first round of funding with more than $1.7 million going to 22 projects. The project is directed by L.A. Paul, a professor of philosophy at UNC.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":11262,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center 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