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Study Finds Link Between Brain Damage and Religious Fundamentalism
The Big Think ^
| 05/09/2017
| Paul Ratner
Posted on 05/09/2017 7:01:54 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
Eyerusalem Solomon of Tacoma Park, Maryland, prays for Pope John Paul II in the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception March 31, 2005 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Joe Raedle/Getty Images)
Scientists found that damage in a certain part of the brain is linked to an increase in religious fundamentalism. In particular, lesions in the ventromedial prefrontal cortex reduced cognitive flexibility - the ability to challenge our beliefs based on new evidence.
The researchers, led by Jordan Grafman of Northwestern University, utilized data gathered from Vietnam War veterans as part of the Vietnam Head Injury Study. They compared levels of religious fundamentalism between 119 vets who had lesions and 30 veterans who didn’t.
The study further confirms that the prefrontal cortex is associated with religious beliefs and is the latest in a number of recent studies that look to find the neurological basis for religion.
“The variation in the nature of religious beliefs are governed by specific brain areas in the anterior parts of the human brain and those brain areas are among the most recently evolved areas of the human brain,” said Grafman.
How free these areas are from disease, in particular the part known as the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, may determine a person’s mental openness - necessary to appreciate the “diversity of religious thought.” The prefrontal cortex was previously linked to having a cognitive function in spiritual experiences.
CREDIT: NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF MENTAL HEALTH
(Excerpt) Read more at bigthink.com ...
TOPICS: Science; Society
KEYWORDS: braindamage; fundamentalism; religion
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To: SeekAndFind
So, is this step one in diagnosing that an actual lobotomy can ‘fix’ them.
Make nice new liberals out of them?
21
posted on
05/09/2017 7:11:13 AM PDT
by
Mr. K
(***THERE IS NO CONSEQUENCE OF REPEALING OBAMACARE THAT IS WORSE THAN OBAMACARE ITSELF***)
To: All
Shown below is a brain scan of the social justice warrior who concocted this fake news:
22
posted on
05/09/2017 7:11:47 AM PDT
by
Grampa Dave
(100+ days without Hilliarly/Huma as POTUS! Thanks, President Trump for this great reality!)
To: Steve_Seattle
Sounds like it to me. Also strikes me that libs and ragheads have exponentially more brain damage than ANYbody else.
23
posted on
05/09/2017 7:12:12 AM PDT
by
Tucker39
(Known as the Father of modern agriculture)
To: SeekAndFind
So, they’re trying to say that religion is a mental disease?
24
posted on
05/09/2017 7:12:29 AM PDT
by
FrankR
(FULL REPEAL, OR NO DEAL)
To: Steve_Seattle
In general more suffering tends to nudge people away from a drab earthly existence and towards God. That’s nothing new. Even the bible says so.
25
posted on
05/09/2017 7:12:31 AM PDT
by
HiTech RedNeck
(Embrace the Lion of Judah and He will roar for you and teach you to roar too. See my page.)
To: SeekAndFind
Next they will try to mandate frontal lobotomies for those of us who have examined the evidence, come to a conclusion and remain faithful to it.
You know - like those “closed minded individuals” who are convinced that other fundamental concepts are true, such as Water is Wet and Gravity Works, no matter how much the learned elites work to convince us that Wet Water and Gravity are only racist constructs of the Privileged Class.
26
posted on
05/09/2017 7:12:40 AM PDT
by
BwanaNdege
("The church ... is not the master or the servant of the state, but the conscience" - Luther)
To: SeekAndFind
Quite the opposite, of course, is true. A belief that there is no right or wrong, only the priority of feelings, is a clear indication of mental disease.
A firm moral conviction is central to mental health. I do not doubt that certain forms of brain damage may generate healing to overcome that damage.
Certainly, the ability to compensate for brain damage by making a serious attempt to hold firmly to fundamental truths is a sign of extraordinary mental health.
Once again the atheists have tried to demonstrate that the cart is pushing the horse.
27
posted on
05/09/2017 7:13:16 AM PDT
by
Louis Foxwell
( brought us to the brink of e)
To: HiTech RedNeck
One can understand a lot of viewpoints and still choose one over the others.Excellent!
28
posted on
05/09/2017 7:14:31 AM PDT
by
BwanaNdege
("The church ... is not the master or the servant of the state, but the conscience" - Luther)
To: SeekAndFind
Many years ago my mother fell on ice and slammed her forehead into the cement sidewalk. She was never the same after that injury. She became a religious fanatic in a short while, seeing angels and hearing what she thought was god’s voice. Later diagnosed as seriously mentally ill.
29
posted on
05/09/2017 7:14:56 AM PDT
by
Rapscallion
(The Constitution is the Supreme Law of the Land, not Sharia, not Congress not President.)
To: SeekAndFind
"The researchers define fundamentalism as a cognitive approach that embodies adherence to a set of firm religious beliefs advocating unassailable truths about human existence.
If you omit the word "religious," they could be talking about any narrow-minded person, not just those thought of as "fundamentalists." The word "fundamentalist" seems to be a very slippery and loaded word, very unscientific. This seems like bigotry masking as science.
To: Mr. K
Environmentalism... Exposed... Cooked data. No change in belief.
Moving on.
31
posted on
05/09/2017 7:16:03 AM PDT
by
sayfer bullets
(I didnt leave the [---] party, the [---] party left me. - Ronald Reagan)
To: SeekAndFind
If you had a more or less random group of 150 Vietnam veterans without head injuries, how many of them would have fundamentalist religious beliefs?
32
posted on
05/09/2017 7:16:11 AM PDT
by
smokingfrog
( sleep with one eye open (<o> ---)
To: Honorary Serb
Diversity = BALKANIZATION = VIOLENCE = etc etc
Homogeneity = relative peacefulness (comparatively)
33
posted on
05/09/2017 7:17:21 AM PDT
by
litehaus
(A memory toooo long.............)
To: Rapscallion
A lot of spiritual voices are out there, not all of them good.
34
posted on
05/09/2017 7:17:40 AM PDT
by
HiTech RedNeck
(Embrace the Lion of Judah and He will roar for you and teach you to roar too. See my page.)
To: SeekAndFind
how about a correlation between gender identification and delusions...
35
posted on
05/09/2017 7:18:33 AM PDT
by
teeman8r
(Armageddon won't be pretty, but it's not like it's the end of the world.)
To: SeekAndFind
Pretty small sample size - just saying
36
posted on
05/09/2017 7:21:21 AM PDT
by
KosmicKitty
(Waiting for inspirations)
To: Rapscallion
"Many years ago my mother fell on ice and slammed her forehead into the cement sidewalk. She was never the same after that injury. She became a religious fanatic in a short while, seeing angels and hearing what she thought was gods voice. Later diagnosed as seriously mentally ill."
People with schizophrenia or brain damage can have illusions about all sorts of things. In some cases, these illusions take a religious form, especially in a culture in which a person might have had religious training as a child. Those memories are stored in your brain and can be "unleashed" by various sorts of trauma.
The mother of a friend of mine recently had hallucinations of angels and of ordinary people (little girls); the hallucinations were caused by a severe urinary infection. But I am very hesitant to use the abnormal as an explanation for the normal.
To: SeekAndFind
I notice that they didn’t say “fanaticism”, as that would implicate both Muslims and communist idealists.
Though it might be good to examine communism as a “fundamentalist ideology”.
38
posted on
05/09/2017 7:22:56 AM PDT
by
yefragetuwrabrumuy
(Leftists aren't fascists. They are "democratic fascists", a completely different thing.)
To: SeekAndFind
You mean like muslims and climate change activists?
To: FrankR
You nailed it. In a roundabout way, they are saying that if you aren’t an atheist, raving homosexual liberal lunatic, then you must have brain damage. And I’m saying, should we have another civil war next, or a Crusade.
40
posted on
05/09/2017 7:26:31 AM PDT
by
Quickgun
(I got here kicking,screaming and covered in someone else's blood. I can go out that way if I have to)
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