Religion versus science might be all in the mind

The Sydney Morning Herald ^ | April 29 2003 | Chris McGillion

[WaveThatFlag]

For years now, one small branch of science has been chipping away at the foundations of religious belief by proposing that "otherworldly" experiences are nothing more than the inner workings of the human brain. Many neuroscientists claim they can locate and explain brain functions that produce everything from religious visions to sensations of bliss, timelessness or union with a higher power.

These claims have been strengthened by the work of the Canadian neuropsychologist Dr Michael Persinger. By stimulating the cerebral region presumed to control notions of self, Persinger has been able to induce in hundreds of subjects a "sensed presence" only the subjects themselves are aware of. This presence, Persinger suggests, may be described as Jesus, the Virgin Mary, Muhammad or the Sky Spirit - depending on the name the subject's culture has trained him or her to use.

"Neurotheology", as this line of inquiry has been dubbed, has its critics. Some say it fails to distinguish between experiences that contain a moral or spiritual dimension (such as visions of God) from those that don't (such as ghostly perceptions). Others point out that none of this research can ever establish whether our brains have been designed to apprehend religious experiences or whether these are simply the by-product of bad wiring.

But all agree that the approach is far too simplistic. "Where reductionist brain science fails," wrote John Cornwell, director of the Science and Human Dimension Project at Jesus College, Cambridge, earlier this month in The Tablet, the British Catholic weekly, "is in its failure even to mention, let alone give an account of, human imagination.

"This is not to claim that imagination is some kind of Cartesian spooky stuff, or to deny the theory of evolution, or to suggest that imagination is somehow outside the realms of biology, but simply to reflect on the consequences that flow from our ability creatively to compare things in one domain with those in another."

This is the objection addressed in a paper, Hallucinating God: The Cognitive Neuropsychiatry of Religious Belief and Experience, to be presented at a conference on evolutionary psychology in the United States in August. The paper has been written by Ryan McKay, a researcher at Macquarie University's Centre for Cognitive Science.

McKay says delusional beliefs may arise from so-called religious experiences when two factors are in play: first, a brain deficit that gives rise to an aberrant perception of some kind and second, a belief pathology that interprets (or imagines) this perception in ways inconsistent with what is scientifically plausible or otherwise generally regarded as acceptable.

The second factor represents a breakdown - or dysfunction - in the way the human belief evaluation system normally operates. Put simply, we tend to evaluate whether a belief is credible in light of everything else we know.

By contrast, when someone experiences an unusual sensory perception and also suspends well-known and widely accepted logical, physical or biological principles in their explanation of the perception, a belief pathology is involved, says McKay. Significantly, one can occur without the other. Persinger, for instance, claims to have had a mystical experience of "encountering a God-like presence" - the result of stimulating his temporal lobes electromagnetically - without developing a religious belief in God.

He thus represents what McKay calls a "mystical atheist" - someone who experiences paranormal sensations but is able to override the evidence of their senses when forming beliefs about them and accepting instead a rational explanation. Clearly, many adherents of religious doctrines develop and maintain their beliefs in the absence of direct religious experiences. An obvious reason is quite simply the effects of socialisation.

But McKay's argument goes to the origin of how such beliefs are generated in the first place. "Individuals with the 'second factor'," he says, "would tend to be misled by untrustworthy sources of information, and/or tend to be prone to having their belief formation systems derailed and overridden by their motives [wish fulfilment being chief among them]. Motives thus help to explain what maintains delusory beliefs once they have been generated by first-factor sources."

The jury is still out on whether such religious experiences are mere delusions and whether God might be nothing more than a hallucination. But the argument for both has just become a lot more interesting.

[MineralMan]

"I'll look for it and get back to you. It was in a book I have. "

You do that. Please be sure to supply the author and title, and an ISBN number for the book, as well. That way, I'll be able to find it.

However, something being in a book does not make it true, you know. In order to verify such a situation, one would have to actually find the person this "happened" to and check the veracity of the claim.

Lots of things are written in books that are pure lies, and that includes books that are about Christianity.

[Dog Gone]

I used to think that the nagging voice I heard was my conscience speaking to me.

Later, I determined that it was actually my nagging wife.

[Semper Paratus]

Since humans came to be there have been shrines and temples made wherever and whenever there were human inhabitants.

I don't know if one case of a temple or shrine created by an animal.

[mdmathis6]

The whole article begs the question....the scientists who can create these sensations are acting..Exogenously(from the OUTSIDE) on the brain. Another words these sensations don't normally occur unless an outer source or stimulus is made to act on the brain. It doesn't dis-prove religious experience at all, though it may want to make one pause to reflect on the source of his/her experiences. Many things besides God can go "bump" in the night you know!

[gcruse]

I don't know if one case of a temple or shrine created by an animal.

Is that because animals aren't superstitious by nature, or because
few of them have opposable thumbs?

[Rytwyng]

"There is a God shaped vacuum in the heart of every man, and only God can fill it" -- Pascal

Looks like they finally found it.

[MineralMan]

"I don't know if one case of a temple or shrine created by an animal."

Hmm...depends on your definition of temple or shrine. You should see what a secretary bird does in making it's nest to attract other birds. Or check out the pack rat's nest. Pretty gaudy with stuff that has nothing to do with survival.

So..define temple or shrine.

[gcruse]

Amazingly, there are over a hundred instances on Google of the co-appearance of "ceiling fan" and "near death experience." It goes to show how patterns can be found in anything. Alas, none of the hits has to do with finding serial numbers on a blade.

[MEGoody]

"Okay. Then religious experience is a certain kind of brain chemistry. Turn off the lights, and Mona Lisa is no different from Dogs Playing Poker."

If there's nothing more to the mind than just 'chemistry,' then man can't know or choose anything. He is merely at the mercy of the chemicals reacting in his body.

Certainly chemistry is part of it, but we do not know which comes first, the 'stimulus' (e.g. God's presence) or the chemicals. These experiments do not answer that question. And I cannot foresee one that ever could.

[MineralMan]

"Amazingly, there are over a hundred instances on Google of the co-appearance of "ceiling fan" and "near death experience." It goes to show how patterns can be found in anything. Alas, none of the hits has to do with finding serial numbers on a blade."

Yeah, I did that search too. But the person who mentioned this said he found it "in a book he has," so I suppose we'll find out which book contains this claim.

Of course, that it exists in a book does not mean that it actually happened. I'd think that if this was a true story, it would be on every fundamentalist Christian web site, with all the corroborating evidence. It is not, or the Google search would have turned it up.

So, I conclude that it's a nice little story made up by the author of some book trying to convince folks of something or another.

Never mind.

[MineralMan]

"Certainly chemistry is part of it, but we do not know which comes first, the 'stimulus' (e.g. God's presence) or the chemicals. These experiments do not answer that question. And I cannot foresee one that ever could."

Well, there's a problem with this logic, I'm afraid. Since the concept of a deity or deities exists in all cultures we know of, there are two possibilities: 1. All those deities exist. 2. Mankind can conceive of deities, even if they don't exist.

Which one is more correct?

[Semper Paratus]

So..define temple or shrine.

It means that the human species is the only one that seeks trascendence.Shrines and temples being manifestations of that.

[Taliesan]

I'll bet you could stimulate a certain region of the cortex and induce a sensation of heat coming from the fingers.

Which proves, of course, that fire is mythical.

[kms61]

Do you have a citation to back that up?

[MineralMan]

"It means that the human species is the only one that seeks trascendence"

And you know this how? Is the building of temples, etc., the only sign of a search for transcendence? I don't think that's accurate, even with humans.

Bottom line, here, is that you do not know that only humans seek transcendence. You believe that to be true, but belief is not knowledge.

I will tell you a story: I visited a local beach, which has a cliff alonside it. I hiked up to the cliff to watch the sunset one afternoon, since I find sunsets to be a transcendental sort of thing. Imagine my surprise as I sat there, contemplating the earth spinning in space, when I saw about two dozen common ground squirrels emerge from their burrows and sit on the edge of the cliff, doing the same thing I was doing.

They sat there, unmoving, until the sun disappeared below the horizon, then all turned and re-entered their burrows.

Go figure.

[gcruse]

Which proves, of course, that fire is mythical.

Well, no.  It proves that we don't react to reality.
We react to our perception of reality.

[Rytwyng]

You should see what a secretary bird does in making it's nest to attract other birds. Or check out the pack rat's nest. Pretty gaudy with stuff that has nothing to do with survival.

Actually those are sexual displays. Lots of energy that apparently is "wasted" on sexual displays - whether in plumage or antlers or other bodily adornment, or in actions such as extravagant nest building, etc -- is actually functional in that it tells potential mates, "Mate with me! I'm so adaptable that I've got resources to burn!". (Parallels with human sexual behavior are too obvious to require elaboration.) So these apparently wasteful displays, do indeed have survival, or rather, reproductive, value.

Temples, shrines, and altars, by contrast, serve no apparent adaptive function. Nor does a celibate priesthood -- explain THAT by natural selection!

[sr4402]

The jury is still out on whether such religious experiences are mere delusions and whether God might be nothing more than a hallucination. But the argument for both has just become a lot more interesting.

A jury on personal experiences, how interesting, of course that explains all religious things. Like why our dating system is based on the Lord's Death. Like why Josephus meantions Christ's death. Hmmm... like the the Apostle Pauls treaty on Justification by Faith. Hmmm... just a few facts to get in the way that everything is relative to one's own experiece.

Who said, there is no more a shallower mind than one turned in on itself.

[ArcLight]

I find all this sort of thing fascinating, and I'm all for research into religious experiences and the brain. But anybody who thinks religious faith can be explained this easily is kidding himself.

Here's an obvious objection: Most religious people rarely experience this deep sense of transcendance that the article speaks of. It happens now and then, perhaps, but not all that frequently. If this feeling is the reason for religious faith, why does faith persist after the feeling's gone?

This certainly doesn't invalidate the line of inquiry, but it suggests to me that there must be a lot more going on inside the skull of the typical Babdist, such as myself.

[Celtjew Libertarian]

Why would a part of the brain evolve to be able to experience an otherworldly "sensed presence," unless there is some sort of otherworldly presence that can be sensed in the first place?

After all, hallucinatory sounds and implanted memories don't deny the fact that there are real sounds and memories that actually exist. Neither does the ability to induce such spiritual experiences prove that there are no such real, spiritual experiences.