Thread by @Helenreflects

Claire White, in this excellent review of cognitive science of religion, looks among others at people's intuitive explanations for health and illness. Several fascinating observations, many of which relevant. 1/
routledge.com/An-Introductio…

First, many people have a "coexistence view" of why illness happens. This is the idea that supernatural and natural explanations of illness are not seen as exclusionary. She reviews work by Cristine Legare on the AIDS pandemic in S Africa, where Legare found 2/

that many people in S Africa blamed both supernatural factors (e.g., witchcraft) while also being aware of how AIDS is transmitted (naturalistic explanation). White speculates that we want to keep on having supernatural or additional (moral) explanations of ill health 3/

Just saying "Oh they happened to catch [covid]" or "they're unlucky and got cancer" doesn't seem like it's enough for people, as they keep on asking "Why me?", "why him", so moral or supernatural explanations come in to fill that gap 4/

Hence, the idea of witchcraft, or divine punishment, or in more secularized places, the idea that one somehow did something to deserve the illness (this ties into a naive "just world" view people have). 5/

Indeed, White cites work showing that laypeople blame personal actions and supernatural stuff more than just bad luck (least favorite explanation) for ill health. This explanatory gap might also account for our persistent tendency to moralize ill health 6/

Or to put so much faith in dieting, exercise and other things one might do to address health issues. Just accepting that ill health is not usually to blame to personal or supernatural agency might be a good start. /end