Is There ‘Spiritual Intelligence’? An Evaluation of Strong and Weak Proposals

The debate about whether, and in what sense, there is ‘spiritual intelligence’ remains unresolved. We suggest it will be helpful to make a distinction between strong weak versions of the claim. version proposes that separate distinct spiritual intelligence meets criteria set out by Howard Gardner his ‘multiple intelligences’ framework. This involves evidence from neuroscience, evolutionary psychology, cognitive developmental individual differences, experimental tasks, psychometrics. review relevant conclude no support for proposal. claim assumes apparent contexts same as found elsewhere, but nevertheless deployed distinctive way. supports claim, we six key marks intelligence: ineffability, embodiment, open-minded attention, pattern-seeking meaning-making, participation, relationality. Our approach makes use architecture, Interacting Cognitive Subsystems (ICS), which has been proved useful modelling practices. It future bring this into dialogue with other scientific approaches psychometrics research.