| Scott Atran | |
|---|---|
| Born | 1952 New York City |
| Residence | France, United States |
| Nationality | American, French |
| Fields | Anthropology, psychology, cognitive science |
| Institutions | École pratique des hautes études, Cambridge University, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, University of Michigan, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, École Normale Supérieure |
| Doctoral advisor | Margaret Mead |
Scott Atran (born 1952) is an American and French anthropologist.
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Atran was born in New York City in 1952 and he received his PhD in anthropology from Columbia University. While a student at Columbia, he became assistant to anthropologist Margaret Mead at the American Museum of Natural History. In 1974, he organized a debate at the Abbaye de Royaumont in France on the nature of universals in human thought and society, with the participation of linguist Noam Chomsky, psychologist Jean Piaget, anthropologists Claude Lévi-Strauss and Gregory Bateson, and biologists François Jacob and Jacques Monod, which many consider a milestone in the development of cognitive science.
Atran has taught at Cambridge University, Hebrew University in Jerusalem, and the École des Hautes Études in Paris. He is currently a research director in anthropology at the French National Centre for Scientific Research and member of the Jean Nicod Institute at the École Normale Supérieure. He is also visiting professor of psychology and public policy at the University of Michigan, and presidential scholar in sociology at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York City.
He has experimented extensively on the ways scientists and ordinary people categorize and reason about nature,[1][2] on the cognitive and evolutionary psychology of religion,[3][4] and on the limits of rational choice in political and cultural conflict.[5][6] His work has been widely published internationally in the popular press, and in scientific journals in a variety of disciplines. He has briefed members of the U.S. Congress and the National Security Council staff at the White House on the The Devoted Actor versus the Rational Actor in Managing World Conflict,[7] on the Comparative Anatomy and Evolution of Global Network Terrorism,[8] and on Pathways to and from Violent Extremism.[9] He was an early critic of U.S. intervention in Iraq[10] and of deepening involvement in Afghanistan,[11] and he has been engaged in conflict negotiations in the Middle East.[12][13][14]
In addition to his recent work on the ideology and social evolution of transnational terrorism, which has included fieldwork with mujahedin and supporters in Europe, the Middle East, Central and Southeast Asia, and North Africa, Atran conducts ongoing research in Guatemala, Mexico, and the U.S. on universal and culture-specific aspects of biological categorization and environmental reasoning and decision making among Maya and other Native Americans.
Atran's debates with Sam Harris, Dan Dennett, Richard Dawkins and others during the Beyond Belief symposium on the limits of reason and the role of religion in modern society have sparked considerable controversy.[15][16][17] He is a frequent contributor to the op-ed page of The New York Times and to The Huffington Post, as well as to professional journals such as Science and Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America.
Atran's publications include Cognitive Foundations of Natural History: Towards an Anthropology of Science, In Gods We Trust: The Evolutionary Landscape of Religion, Plants of the Peten Itza' Maya (co-authored with Ximena Lois and Edilberto Ucan Ek), The Native Mind and the Cultural Construction of Nature (co-authored with Douglas Medin), and Talking to the Enemy: Faith, Brotherhood, and the (Un)Making of Terrorists.