A neuroscientist's case for the existence of ... the soul!

[Guest guest]

>

> Then came 1993.

>

> The Christmas Day of 1993, just weeks after Kash had met the Holy

> Spirit of the Almighty Creator, turned out to be the most special

> ever. He was told to request Shri Adhiparasakthi Devi if it was

> possible to visit Shri Jesus and wish Him a Merry Christmas.

>

> Kash meditated and the Power of the Holy Spirit (Mother Kundalini)

> coiled in his sacrum bone snaked up the Tree of Life into the

> Kingdom of God (Sahasrara Chakra). The Everlasting Light shone ever

> so dazzlingly from above the Golden Throne of the Great Holy Spirit

> as Shri Mataji Nirmala Devi sat in Bliss and Joy.

>

> After the customary greetings he asked if She could fulfill his

> wish of visiting Shri Jesus.

>

> The Holy Spirit replied that of course She would and got down from

> Her Throne. She then stretched Her Hands, with palms facing

> upwards, towards him and requested him put his palms, turned

> downwards, over them.

>

> He followed Her instructions. Immediately he found himself being

> lifted a few inches above the carpet of clouds on which he had been

> standing earlier. Both then started traveling at super-warp speed

> into the Universe.

>

> Upon reaching Shri Jesus' place they stopped at a short distance

> away. The whole area was glowing softly, as if charged by a Divine

> presence.

>

> Shri Jesus, who knew that visitors had arrived, started walking on

> the soft clouds towards them to greet them.

>

> He was wearing a long, whitish-gray robe that reached His ankles.

> Another piece of cloth was draped across His right shoulder and

> diagonally down the left waist. He was tall, big boned and

> muscular. He had a beard, with wavy hair cascading into curly

> locks. The eyes were either dark brown or black. Kash noticed that

> His skin was light brown, and was of ethereal form. Jesus Christ

> looked very fresh and youthful, as if He had just stepped out of a

> shower and groomed Himself.

>

> They then walked back to His place and sat down to meditate.

> Kash clearly noticed the immense size and strength of Shri Jesus as

> in that squatting position His biceps and thighs really stretched

> the fabric taut. There was no doubt that Shri Jesus was physically

> a very strong person, a towering hunk of massive masculinity.

>

> All raised their Kundalinis and went into meditation.

>

> When finished Kash bowed with folded hands to the Universal Savior

> in obeisance, again wishing Him a 'Merry Christmas,' and left with

> the Spirit of the Living God to Her abode.

>

> He then requested to return and was given permission. As he closed

> the eyes of his spiritual body he left the Templum Spiritus Sanctus

> within and returned to this world of insatiable greed and wanton

> consumption.

>

> Note: According to Kash all the Universal Beings always look very

> fresh, clean and neat, as if they had just taken a bath and groomed

> themselves. Immaculate cleanliness is one of the many

> distinguishing characteristics of the Heavenly Hosts. The sight,

> neatness and radiance of Shri Jesus especially impressed Kash. On

> his first encounter this radiating cleanliness was overwhelmingly

> evident.

>

> http://adishakti.org/meeting_his_messengers/shri_jesus.htm

>

 

Dear devotees of the Divine,

 

Namaskaar – I bow to the Holy Spirit who exists within you,

 

After many years i wish to say something that i had always believed

to be true. That is the reason i questioned Arwinder, Lalita and Kash

for the first time ever regarding this belief.

 

At 12.40 pm today September 9, 2007 i asked Arwinder what form was he

when he used to meet Shri Mataji since 1995. i explained to him i

want to know if he met Her in his physical body, soul or something

else. He replied, " As my spirit " . i then asked him if spirit is the

same as soul. He replied that it is the same thing.

 

Arwinder was told to remember this fact for the rest of his life.

 

i then called Lalita and asked her the same question, but first

informing her about Arwinder's answer that he met Shri Mataji as

spirit or soul. Lalita answered rhetorically, " What's the

difference? " , implying that there is no difference between " spirit "

or " soul " and that it is one and the same thing. Lalita replied that

her answer is the same too, and that it was her soul who used to meet

the Adi Shakti.

 

i also told Lalita to remember that fact for the rest of her life.

 

When asked where is her soul, she replied " Within me. "

 

Nearly an hour later Kash was questioned the same but he had no

knowledge that his siblings were questioned earlier. i asked him what

he was when he used to meet Shri Mataji in his Sahasrara.

 

He replied " Myself " .

I asked him to clarify what he meant.

He replied, " As spirit " .

I asked, " What you mean? "

Kash replied spontaneously, " As soul " .

 

There is another reason for my questioning them. A few days ago on

August 31st, 2007 i purchased " THE SPIRITUAL BRAIN: A Neuroscientist's

Case For The Existence Of The Soul " . Kash (26 years-old), Arwinder

(17 years-old) and Lalita (13 years-old) have experienced their own

souls thousands of times over the years. They have given immense,

unprecedented, and irrefutable evidence of Jesus' Kingdom of God

within themselves into which their souls entered daily.

 

As i have said before, " Time is on Her side .... and ours too! "

 

warmest regards,

 

jagbir

 

 

---------

 

Just released - a neuroscientist's case for the existence of ... the

soul!

TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 04, 2007

 

 

The belief that the mind does not exist apart from the brain

dominated the twentieth century. But can we really dismiss our

thoughts and feelings, or furthermore, our religious and spiritual

experiences, as simply outcomes of the firing synapses of our brain?

In THE SPIRITUAL BRAIN, authors Dr. Mario Beauregard and Denyse

O'Leary present the groundbreaking evidence that the mind cannot be

simply reduced to physiological reactions in the brain.

 

Most neuroscientists are committed to the view that mystical

experiences are simply the result of random neurons firing,

or " delusions created by the brain. " THE SPIRITUAL BRAIN takes

another approach, powerfully arguing for what many in science are

unwilling to consider—that people actually contact a reality outside

themselves during intense spiritual experiences. Beauregard uses the

most sophisticated technology to peer inside the brains of Carmelite

nuns during a profound spiritual state. His results and a variety of

other lines of evidence lead him to the surprising conclusion that

spiritual experiences are not a figment of the mind or a delusion

produced by a dysfunctional brain.

 

ABOUT THE AUTHORS – Mario Beauregard's work at the University of

Montreal on the effects of consciousness and volition on the

emotional brain, and the neurobiology of the mystical experience has

received international media coverage. Dr. Beauregard was selected by

the World Media Net to be one of the " One Hundred Pioneers of the

Twenty-First Century. " Denyse O'Leary is a Toronto-based journalist

who specializes in faith and science issues and who has written for

the Toronto Star and the Globe & Mail.

 

 

The Spiritual Brain

A Neuroscientist's Case for the Existence of the Soul

By Mario Beauregard & Denyse O'Leary

Published by HarperOne

Hardcover / ISBN 978-0-06-085883-4 / $25.95 / 400 pages / September

2007

 

Here are some of the comments on The Spiritual Brain

 

" If you have a mind, you will find The Spiritual Brain a refreshing

antidote to the strange arguments offered by some scientists who

insist that their minds, and yours, are meaningless illusions. " -

Dean Radin, PhD, Senior Scientist, Institute of Noetic Sciences and

author of The Conscious Universe and Entangled Minds

 

The Spiritual Brain is a wonderful and important book that provides

new insights into our experience of religion and God. It offers a

unique perspective to the ongoing dialogue between science and

religion. This book is a necessary read for both the scientist and

the religious person.

 

-Andrew Newberg, M.D. Associate Professor of Radiology and Director

of the Center for Spirituality and the Mind at the University of

Pennsylvania. Co-author of Why We Believe What We Believe.

 

" The Spiritual Brain is a very important book. It clearly explains

non-materialist neuroscience in simple terms appropriate for the lay

reader, while building on and extending work that Sharon Begley and I

began in The Mind and The Brain, and work that Mario and I

collaborated on in academic publications. " - neuropsychiatrist

Jeffrey Schwartz, author of The Mind and the Brain

 

" I truly was bowled over by the book, ... In The Spiritual Brain

neuroscientist Mario Beauregard and science writer Denyse O'Leary

push back hard. First they debunk the most widely touted urban

legends of impoverished materialism "

- Michael Behe, author of Edge of Evolution

 

I've just finished reading The Spiritual Brain (I was sent an advance

copy). It's superb, and is a milestone in what I think is going to be

a 'long twilight struggle' against materialist neuroscience.

- neurosurgeon Mike Egnor

 

http://mindfulhack.blogspot.com/2007/09/just-released-neuroscientists-

case-for.html

 

 

--

 

Drawing on cutting edge research in brain imaging done on Carmelite

nuns, neuroscientist Mario Beauregard examines how our brain

processes religious, mystical and spiritual experiences. The evidence

he presents flies in the face of conventional thinking and provides

scientific documentation for the validity of mystical experiences,

giving us a peek into our very souls.

 

Do religious experiences come from God, or are they merely the random

firing of neurons in the brain? Drawing on his own research with

Carmelite nuns, neuroscientist Mario Beauregard shows that genuine,

life-changing spiritual events can be documented. He offers

compelling evidence that religious experiences have a nonmaterial

origin, making a convincing case for what many in scientific fields

are loath to consider--that it is God who creates our spiritual

experiences, not the brain.

 

Beauregard and O'Leary explore recent attempts to locate a " God gene "

in some of us and claims that our brains are " hardwired " for religion—

even the strange case of one neuroscientist who allegedly invented an

electromagnetic " God helmet " that could produce a mystical experience

in anyone who wore it. The authors argue that these attempts are

misguided and narrow-minded, because they reduce spiritual

experiences to material phenomena.

 

THE SPIRITUAL BRAIN: A Neuroscientist's Case For The Existence Of The

Soul

Mario Beauregard, Ph.D. & Denyse O'Leary

Hardcover: 384 pages

Publisher: HarperOne; 1 edition (September 4, 2007)

ISBN-13: 978-0060858834

 

 

--------------------------------

 

Do religious experiences come from God -- or are they just illusions

created by the brain?

 

The Spiritual Brain: How Neuroscience is Revealing the Existence of

God by Mario Beauregard, Denyse O'Leary

 

Most scientists today would answer the latter. To them, physical

reality is the only reality. Absolutely everything else -- including

thought, feeling, mind, and will -- can be explained in terms of

matter and physical phenomena, leaving no room for the possibility

that religious and spiritual experiences are anything but illusions.

But neuroscientist Mario Beauregard does not approach his work with

such materialist presumptions. So when he first began studying the

spiritual experiences of Carmelite nuns at the University of

Montreal, he didn't doubt in principle that a contemplative might

contact a reality outside herself during a mystical experience. Now,

in The Spiritual Brain: How Neuroscience is Revealing the Existence

of God, Beauregard (with co-author Denyse O'Leary) offers compelling

evidence from his research that religious experiences have a

nonmaterial origin -- and that may indeed be God who creates our

spiritual experiences, not the brain.

The Spiritual Brain reveals:

 

- Why religious experiences can't be dismissed as illusions just

because they are associated with brain activity -- and more than

thoughts and feelings can be;

 

- How the areas of brain activation associated with contemplative

prayer are quite distinct from those associated with hallucinations,

autosuggestion, or states of intense emotional arousal -- resembling

instead how the brain processes real experiences;

 

- Scientific evidence that individuals who have religious experiences

contact an objectively real " force " that exists outside themselves;

 

- Extraordinary evidence that such experiences can occur even when

clinical criteria of death have been reached and the brain is no

longer functioning -- and why this suggests that such experiences are

not illusory;

 

- Are religious experiences pathological? How studies show that

people reporting religious experiences score lower oon

psychopathology measures and higher on psychological well-being

scales than people who don't report them;

 

- Why the high incidence of religious experiences in the American

adult population also indicates that such experiences should be

considered normal, not pathological;

 

- How the transformation that often follows religious experiences can

involve changes in thoughts, emotions, attitudes, core beliefs, and

behaviors;

 

- How there is absolutely no scientific evidence showing that

delusions or hallucinations produce by a dysfunctional brain can

induce the kind of long-term positive changes that often follow

spiritual experiences;

 

- How evolutionary psychology errs in attempting to ground spiritual

experience in the qualities that animal nature requires in order to

survive -- providing no explanation for the most significant evidence

regarding spirituality;

 

- How materialist presuppositions restrict the areas scientists are

permitted to research to narrow, unproductive paths -- shutting the

door to truth;

 

- Why materialist neuroscientists have not succeeded in providing a

satisfactory explanation of how religious experiences arise from the

interaction between various brain regions, neural circuits and

neurotransmitters -- and why their effort to so is doomed to failure;

 

Beauregard and O'Leary also take on recent theories about a " God

gene " and that brains are " hardwired " for religion. Such misguided

and narrow-minded attempts to reduce spiritual experiences to

material phenomena, they argue, amount to knee-jerk scientific

materialism that cannot account for the many irrefutable accounts of

mind over matter, of intuition, willpower, and leaps of faith, of

the " placebo effect " in medicine, of near-death experiences on the

operating table, and of psychic premonitions of a loved one in

crisis, to say nothing of the occasional sense of oneness with nature

and mystical experiences in meditation or prayer. Traditional science

explains away these and other occurrences as delusions or

misunderstandings, but by exploring the latest neurological research

on phenomena such as these, The Spiritual Brain gets to their real

source.

 

" A lively introduction to a field where neuroscience, philosophy, and

secular/spiritual cultural wars are unavoidably intermingled. " --

Publishers Weekly

 

www.hebookservice.com/products/BookPage.asp?prod_cd=c7123