Neurological states associated with religious experiences strongly suggest that there are specific regions of the brain that produce them
A New Mind Journal Original
Jaime F. Adriazola
American Graduate University, Washington DC
It has been 145 years since Charles Darwin wrote his famous book "The Descent of Man" (1871), where he argued that humans do not have an innate instinct to believe in God. "Belief in God has often been not only the Great, but the most complete of all the distinctions between man and inferior animals. However, it is impossible. . . to hold that this belief is innate or instinctive in men."
This conclusion is based on the general observation that many human cultures do not include in their beliefs a deity that can be interpreted as being, in any way conceptually similar to the Judeo-Christian monotheistic God. However, Darwin went on to point out that ... "The belief in omnipresent spiritual entities seems to be universal; and it seems to have come from a considerable advance of man's reason, and from a greater advance in his faculties of imagination, curiosity, and questioning."
In other words, there seems to be no innate tendency to believe in the monotheistic God of the Judeo-Christian religion or to believe in some supernatural force or entity. Why could this be? Why is atheism not the universal result of the advancement of natural science?
The answer is inescapable. Our minds are adapted to think religiously, rather than rationally, and this is the result of our evolutionary history. The capacity for religious experience is found in all human societies. However, within each society there is considerable variation among individuals to the extent that they have such religious beliefs, and that such beliefs seem to modify their behavior.
Likewise, this ability, as well as human language capacity, has been empirically associated with specific neurological structures of the human nervous system. The capacity for human language and participation in war may be causally linked to specific ecological circumstances. The capacity for religious experience has consequences for those who have it: people who have the ability to believe in the supernatural (and especially to act in those beliefs) under certain circumstances, having high rates of survival and reproduction.
The most likely context for the capacity for religious experience to evolve is the same chronic, though episodic, small-scale warfare observed between our primate cousins and our evolved ancestors. Moreover, not only has the capacity for religious experience been the result of war, but making war itself is more likely.
The capacities for religious experience and war are mutually reinforcing. They are a sort of evolutionary arms race which can be succinctly as a "law": religion facilitates the war, which in turn facilitates religion.
As Darwin said, the ubiquity of religious belief in our species is strong evidence that the capacity for such a belief is a specific evolutionary adaptation of the species. And, like all traits evolved, there is considerable variation within the human groups for this trait. In fact, precisely this variation is the prerequisite for evolution through natural selection.
In addition, the observation that most people, even in our technological culture, believe in the supernatural, essentially without empirical evidence, is strong evidence for the idea that the capacity for such a belief is "wired in our brains." And, like all evolutionary psychological mechanisms, one can ask the question, "What is the use?" Or, "What is the biological function of the capacity for religious belief?" As we shall see, it certainly seems that the evidence points to the conclusion that: "The ability of religious belief increases our ability to participate in war, which in turn improves our fitness."
Michael Persinger, a professor of psychology at Laurentian University in Canada, published “Neuropsychological Bases of Belief in God". In it, Persinger argued that a specific neurological condition known as 'temporal lobe epilepsy' produces psychological states that are similar to the religious experiences of people like Joan of Arc and St. Paul in 'The Road to Damascus'. 'Temporal lobe epilepsy' is different from other forms of temporal lobe epilepsy in which epileptic seizures do not involve seizures, immobility or loss of consciousness. In contrast, a person who has a 'temporal lobe epilepsy' attack observes a change in sensory perception, often involving changes in odors, sounds, tastes, and phantom sensations in the skin. Some people also experience cognitive changes such as 'Déjà Vu' or 'Jamais Vu' during a seizure in ‘temporal lobe epilepsy’, and a significant fraction of these people also experience a greater sense of 'religiosity', including the feeling of a presence Invisible and supernatural.
Researcher Persinger developed a machine, often called the "The God Helmet" (read the full article on 'NewmindJournal.com'), which generates a weak magnetic field in and around the right temporal lobe of a person's brain. Approximately 80 percent of people, in a test of the "Helmet of God", felt the presence of an invisible figure nearby, which is usually interpreted as a supernatural entity, as a figure of God or the spirit of a person absent or dead.
Other researchers, such as Vilayanur S. Ramachandran, have also linked temporal lobe epilepsy and other neurological effects to religious experiences. Ramachandran based his work on the prior research of Norman Geschwind, a clinical psychiatrist. Geschwind described a clinical syndrome, called Geschwind syndrome, which is characterized by hypergraphia (the tendency to write lengthy detailed arguments and descriptions, often on religious subjects), hyper-religiosity, fainting, mutism (the inability to speak at certain events Social), and pedantism (the tendency to extensive discourse, on obscure topics, especially word definitions and the fine points of grammar).
Geschwind hypothesized that this syndrome is a manifestation of a form of mild temporal lobe epilepsy and suggested that it might explain the behavior of some historical hyper-religious figures.
Ramachandran tested the Geschwind hypothesis using a lie detector type device that measures the electrical conductivity of the skin as an indirect indication of emotional arousal. Ramachandran found that people with mild temporal lobe epilepsy reacted differently to religious words than people who did not have temporal lobe epilepsy.
Jeffrey Saver and John Rabin also studied the relationship between temporal lobe epilepsy and extended their recommendations to neurological states generated by the limbic system of the brain and neurochemical states generated by the ingestion of hallucinogenic drugs. They noted that a large amount of Americans have reported having religious experiences, characterized by feelings that included the belief that a specific event "should happen”, were aware of "the presence of God," that "God had responded to their Prayers”, which were being protected (or at least looked at) by an invisible presence (often characterized as the spirit of an absent or dead person), who felt the presence of a" sacred spirit in nature "or" presence Evil "or a deep sense of" oneness with the cosmos."
In particular, many people who had such experiences described a sense of depersonalization (they felt "outside themselves") and a sense of being united or part of their environment. They also noted descriptions of such feelings, often interpreted as religious experiences, by epileptics, such as the Russian writer Fyodor Dostoevsky.
They emphasized that such interpretations were just that: the interpretations were not the causes of such experiences, but rather the cognitive means by which people who had experienced such attacks explained their sensations to themselves. In other words, sensations came first, and subsequently, religious explanations.
Eugene d'Aquili and Andrew Newberg have recently presented an integrative model of the neurobiological underpinnings of religious experience. In his books, 'The Mind Mysticism: Probing the Biology of Religious Experience' and Why God will not go away: 'Brain Science and the Biology of Belief', the books report how their research in the states of Neurological factors associated with religious experiences strongly suggest that there are specific regions of the brain and states that produce such experiences.
This model is based on his research on neurological correlations between brain functions and regions, as well as the religious experiences of devoutly religious mystics and people. They studied these correlations using brain scans and other measures of brain activity using subjects trained in Eastern and Western meditative traditions i.e. (monks, nuns, and priests). They found that these subjects had consistent patterns of brain activity that were different from those not religiously trained, and that these patterns of brain activity were correlated with specific meditation and religious practices.
Researchers D'Aquili and Newberg have pointed out that the center of the greatest religious experience is a sense of wonder, combined with "sensations slightly pleasing to feelings of ecstasy”. They have shown that such sensations can be induced by rhythmic chanting and body movements, combined with loud music and colorful visual displays. Consequently, the factors that induce these sensations produce a condition of sensory overload and excitation of the sympathetic nervous system, together with simultaneous parasympathetic activation, due to the conscious "damping" of the excitation.
Such sensations are common in two contexts: military training and religious training. It is no coincidence that human beings preparing for war use exactly the same types of sensory stimuli described by d'Aquili and Newberg. They have tied such exhibitions to religious activities and demonstrated the deep similarities between religious and secular rituals: "Patriotic rituals ... emphasize the "holiness" of a nation, or a cause, or even a flag… meaningful idea in a visceral experience."
Researcher Dean Hamer found a correlation between a single human gene and a measure of human behavior that correlates strongly with the capacity for religious experiences. Using a combination of molecular genetic techniques, demographic analysis, and epidemiology, Hamer and his colleagues at the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Maryland, showed a strong correlation between a specific gene (called VMAT2), and "self-transcendence" which is correlated with religious experience.
………………….End of part 1
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