Religion and the Brain

[Gauracandra]

LUCKY SEVERSON: As people around the world pray to their God and practice meditation, an increasing number of scientists, like Professor Michael Persinger at Laurentian University in Sudbury, [Ontario,] Canada, are probing for a connection between spiritual experiences and the brain.

 

DR. MICHAEL PERSINGER: I think one of the most exciting challenges in science is to find the basis, the empirical basis, of why people experience the "God phenomenon." Not belief in God -- that is a different process. But the experience of the "God phenomenon." That of course is tied to the brain itself.

 

SEVERSON: Dr. Persinger is a neuroscientist who has been conducting experiments with a helmet that pulses tiny bursts of electrical activity into the brain. Persinger says the pulses can simulate mystical or spiritual experiences.

 

And at the University of Pennsylvania, Dr. Andrew Newberg can show, through a brain scan, the parts of the brain that are activated during meditation, and also during prayer.

 

(to Dr. Newberg): Doctor, what's the significance of all this? What does it mean?

 

DR. ANDREW NEWBERG: Well, what it means is that when people actually do these kinds of spiritual practices, when people do prayer or meditation, that there are real changes that are going on in their brain.

 

SEVERSON: The concern of some religious believers is that this new research might imply that God is a concept created in our brains rather than a transcendent being who exists quite independent of us.

 

MS. GRACIA THOMPSON: I feel it would be against God to try to alter or change anyone's belief of Him.

 

MR. RAMIRO GARCIA: I cannot conceive of living without the presence of someone greater than ourselves to lean on.

 

SEVERSON: Dr. Persinger says his experiments can actually induce the sense among his subjects that there is a presence in the room with them.

 

DR. PERSINGER: The types of experiences in our laboratory when magnetic fields are applied to the brain are considered spiritual because the person feels at one with the universe. Very often it is very personal. There may be a sensation of quiescence, a kind of eternal peace, but they know that somehow their sense of self has been changed forever.

 

PROFESSOR JOHN HAUGHT: This is something that is not entirely new. A lot of people have testified, for example, that under the influence of LSD or cocaine or other stimuli to the chemistry of the brain, that certain ideas happen that didn't happen before.

 

 

SEVERSON: John Haught is a professor, not of science but of religion, at Georgetown University. He argues that religion encompasses much more than biology -- that it means charity and faith and doing good works.

 

PROF. HAUGHT: I would say that in this recent flurry of news about the brain and religion, what is often left out is that religion means much more than a state of mind or [an] ecstatic or mystical mood. It's a commitment over a lifetime to what a person considers to be good.

 

SEVERSON: Among the scientists in the field, Dr. Persinger is controversial because he has stated in the past his view that God is a creation of the brain.

 

DR. PERSINGER: There are Christians and individuals of other faiths who have come to me, very often hostile at first, pointing out that I am threatening their belief, accusing me of being an atheist and often worse terms. I am not trying to remove God as a phenomenon. I am trying to understand the areas of the brain and the magnetic patterns -- the electromagnetic patterns -- within the brain that produce the experience.

 

SEVERSON: Dr. Newberg argues his experiments with meditators and those who pray doesn't disprove God.

 

DR. NEWBERG: When I take a brain image of a nun who has the experience of being in the presence of God, what I can tell you is that this is what is going on in their brain when they have that experience. What I can't tell you, just based on imaging studies alone, is whether or not they've actually been able to do that, they've actually been in the presence of God. But I think it raises some very interesting issues and questions for us, as scientists and also as philosophers, to be able to explore where the true reality lies.

 

SEVERSON: Dr. Michael Baimes is one of Newberg's subjects -- an expert on meditation and stress management.

 

DR. MICHAEL BAIMES: It's pretty darn interesting to see that when people do this ancient meditation practice, a predictable change in brain function happens.

 

SEVERSON: Here's how it works. After the subject has meditated, Dr. Newberg injects them with radioactive dye and he takes pictures of their brain. As they get deeper into their meditative state, the colors depicting brain activity change.

 

DR. NEWBERG: But when the person went into the meditation, what we see is a dramatic decrease over here in this particular orientation area, and this is that particular part that helps us differentiate the self from objects in the world.

 

SEVERSON: When we meditate and pray, for instance, the part of the brain that helps us orient ourselves and create a sense of self shows less activity, less red -- the brain quiets down.

 

DR. NEWBERG: What they are perceiving is a sense of being at one with something else, in this case, the idea of being within the presence of God, or finding some way of becoming joined or in union with a sense of God.

 

SEVERSON: Newberg believes the brain is engineered to allow spiritual experiences. And Professor Persinger in Canada believes that the brain over generations has evolved to what it is today to allow spiritual experiences.

 

DR. PERSINGER: People are afraid to die. The sense of diminishing, that tremendous terror of losing a sense of self is incapacitating. So I think somewhere in the development of the brain there was a kind of cognitive process that allows people to have minimal anxiety if they just felt that the self, part of brain activity, was tied to a concept that was infinite and lasted forever. If something is infinite and lasts forever, there is no anxiety. And I think that spirituality that comes out of that process has allowed the human being as a group -- as a species -- to survive.

 

SEVERSON: So is it possible that one day science will be able to prove or disprove God with a certainty? A goal of science perhaps, but for many of the faithful, a waste of time.

 

PROF. HAUGHT: The conflict is not between science and religion or science and theology, but it's between two belief systems: the belief system that matter is all there is and the belief system that there is something in addition to matter.

 

DR. NEWBERG: If there is a God, it certainly makes sense that the brain is set up this way, because it would be silly for us to have some fundamental disconnect with the God that created the brain.

 

SEVERSON: Like other neuroscientists delving into religion, Professor Persinger has taken some heat for his work. He may be more careful now about what he says, but what he says is that science is not threatening religion.

 

DR. PERSINGER: The fact that we can now understand the brain basis to faith simply tells us that we can understand it more effectively. It doesn't make it go away any more than when you look at the brain and you are seeing a sunset, and it is beautiful. It doesn't take the beauty away, it just allows you to understand more of it.

 

SEVERSON: So the science continues, and the debate. And the question: "Will the science challenge the faith of the believers or will it simply add to it?”

[gHari]

Isn't this scientology? Alpha waves and all that stuff?

 

Clearly a possible explanation is that perhaps the brain normally, out of tension or fear, generates high levels of activity to be able to respond quickly to threatening situations or even cope with the death thing, the survival thing, and all those other things that we feel so dependent upon. Such fears are alleviated by remembering Krsna. The calmness is therefore a by-product of the 'religious experience', not the cause of it.

[Gauracandra]

I don't find anything wrong with the idea that spiritual experiences can lead to physiological responses. Many saints have had physical responses or ecstatic symptoms arise when they experience the divine. I believe in the past there have been postings on one St. Theresa of Avila and her physical symptoms of pain in separtion from God. In recent times Srila Gour Govinda Swami was known to experience such symptoms as well. The fact that the brain would react to me is simply confirmation and not negation of this phenomenon.

 

Gauracandra

[Gauracandra]

One more quick note. I completely disagree that such experiences are an evolutionary development to help us die in peace. A long time back I challenged this notion on these forums. I had seen a television program that said that the common experience of the white tunnel of light was due to humans evolving a coping mechanism for death. But this completely did not make sense given the rules of evolutionary selection. Evolution "occurs", so they say, because certain traits are selected out. Now, the problem is, when a person dies, and experiences this "white light" phenomenon, there is no person to work at selecting this genetic pattern out. How would a primitive man recognize those with the genetic capacity to experience this white light, from those who don't experience it. And suppose they could determine which person did or did not experience it, what can you do when that person dies. There is no opportunity to mate, thereby transferring the genetic coding for this experience. The person is dead. And since the only time a person will experience this is right before death, there will never be a chance to transfer those genetic traits, distinct from those who don't have the traits to see this white tunnel of light. So this idea that the tunnel of white light, which is experienced by people throughout the world, in many completely different cultures, was somehow due to natural selection is complete nonsense.

 

Gauracandra

 

[This message has been edited by Gauracandra (edited 11-14-2001).]

[Dharma]

Your post is interesting as the Dr appears to be speaking of part of an ancient pattern of enlightenment of which an early part of the journey is Profound Divine Mystical Experience (personal and undeniable encounter with God), followed by Insight leading to permanent genetic restructuring of the brain resulting in various states of mukti.

 

Here is an excerpt from an interview with Acharya Sri Samadarshini, direct disciple of Sri Kalki Bhagavan, best know for his ability to give enlightenment to others, speaking of the brain and the mystical or God experience:

 

"Now we know that there are 2 hemispheres in the brain, left & the right. Not all people are mystical. If some body has to be a mystic, then a different kind of electricity has to flow in his brain cells in a particular pattern. Only such of these people have mystical experiences and not others. Now Bhagavan says when he performs a psychic surgery to you and do some thing to you psychically, electrical impulses are sent into a certain small part in your left hemisphere of the brain and when these electric currents go to that part of the brain then naturally the way you experience reality would be different. That is how it has happened to all the previous sages and saints and mystics of the past, though some people were unaware of it. Now Bhagavan is making it happen to any body that is serious and seeking for it. And before this they are taken through a process and finally when their consciousness gets connected to Bhagavan’s consciousness then this is what happens to people. This is how all people land into this state. "

 

She later goes on to say that this experience depends mainly on the left cerebral cortex.

 

The rest of the interview is at www.skyboom.com/ddasa/index38.html

 

 

[karthik_v]

Originally posted by Dharma:

Here is an excerpt from an interview with Acharya Sri Samadarshini, direct disciple of Sri Kalki Bhagavan, best know for his ability to give enlightenment to others

Isn't this Kalki Bhagavan you are mentioning the same one a.k.a. Vijay Kumar who used to work for an insurance company before he became God? Isn't he the same one who went into hiding after being threatened with the possibility of an arrest?

 

I am sorry if we are talking of 2 different people. Nevertheless, Kalki avatar is yet to manifest. It will manifest only at the end of Kali yuga. This yuga is just 5000 years old and has a long way to go before Kalki avatar incarnates. So, anyone claiming as Kalki avatar is bogus.

[Dharma]

People call that guru Sri Mukteswara Bhagavan, Lord of Enlightenment or Sri Kalki Bhagavan because he has given them the personal experience of God (profound divine mystical experience), Union, or in many instances total Mukti. This is not so mysterious I suppose as enlightenment was traditionally passed down through diksha since ancient times, and mystical experience is a benediction yet there is a very tried and true process leading up to its occurance. I know first hand some of what he is capable of so I do not care so much who or what he is-only that he has helped me and I have had experiences that would have taken many years of sadhana to attain on my own.

 

He has only asked two questions of me-Are you suffering and do you wish to be free of suffering?

 

Nor do I know if he ever sold insurance or not. He once told me not to call him Kalki as there are about 800 Kalki's in India- 500 of them are in jail. I suppose if one of them is truly the Sampoorna Avatar it is lucky he was merely imprisoned and not killed, as man for the most part has almost zero tolerance for living Gods. People called Christ and Buddha "bogus"as well.

 

That is the nature of belief (ignorance).It must battle often to the death to perpetuate itself. Experience is the arch enemy of belief. For all the so called scientific temperment the question as to whether God exists or does not exist is a fundamental ignorance that few bother to find out first hand. It is much safer to stay in the realm of concepts, beliefs and ideas. Thus there is little difference in the one who believes and the one who does not belief as neither one really knows. It's kind of sad if you think about it. All the Holy Wars and bloodshed- offending with and defending ignorance.

 

As a gambling woman, I would wager quite a sum that if I were to tell you that on my first encounter with a monk of Sri Kalki Bhagavan I saw God, actually in a tangible form that I could embrace, and experienced tremendous transformation as a result, and then if I went on to say that that Being continued to appear to me over a course of a year, you would be angered, indignant, or think me insane. In another time and place I would have been be burned alive for such experience.

 

But a few-maybe one in ten thousand would have the courage seek out the one who can give this experience to actually discover and experience for himself. To annihialte belief.

 

You know why? Because if you were to actually have some experience, ignorance which is making great use you would die. The security you have built around your concepts and beliefs would shatter and there would be tremendous pain as there always is when a security shatters. Men have made a mastery out of running from and managing suffering. Why face it now? Ignorance is bliss so they say.

 

As for the timing of Kaliyuga, that is debatable and the will of God is very strange. It is conceivable that an Omnipotent One could be unaffected by a calendar or a human concept of time.

 

I suppose however if you wished to remain in a degenerate state of ignorance and suffering for a few more milleniums no one would try to stop you. Kali Yuga is a state of consciousness as well as an astrological occurence. A Yuga marks the spiritual progression of man not necessarily time as we measure it.

 

 

 

[This message has been edited by Dharma (edited 11-17-2001).]

[mel9]

god is the cause of our remembrance, intelligence and forgetfulness. people with alzheimers, dementia, progressive atropy of the brain, amnesia and senility are just a few of the many diseases that affect the brain of man but it can recover if we only concentrate ourselves within the heart the beauty of god, every second, minute, hour of the day. if you think its easy it is not because the mind`s attention span is very short considering that it has to serve its master, the self on how the latter should settle his bills, how to run a big family, corporation, community,

governmens and even the world! that`s the cause why brains deteriorate rapidly having concentrated on the things that are not fraternal. spirit comes spirit not materiality from spirituality. if you think materially not eternally then you lose sight of what is fraternal and beautiful which are responsible for us to be able to remember the past and renew ties severed long ago. if you can acquire this art of always remembering what is good within your heart then consider yourself on the road to recovery against forgetfulness. the forgetfulness of not wanting to recall the memories of our youth which is too painful to remember during our twilight years like a

once fresh flower that has withered by the ravages of time. do become god conscious and surely you will find your youthful memories again. it`s the only prescription that i know of.

 

[This message has been edited by mel9 (edited 11-17-2001).]

[Dharma]

More on enlightenment & the brain from Acharya Sri Samadarshini, a monk of Sri Kalki Bhagavan. Pictures of the new temple in Bangalore are at www.indofu.com if any one is near there and wants to visit. There is another temple for enlightenment being constructed in the Indus Mountains. A picture of that facility is at www.skyboom.com/ddasa/index49.html

 

""My first experience is that when I conducted my first mukthi yagna enlightenment happened to 30 people and the next yagna that I conducted it happened to 35 people. We made a dint in human Consciousness that every person that makes it, it would be easier and easier for man. I hope that the possibility does not arise, but if mankind does not make it, it’s going to be terrible.

 

We are not here prophesying the doomsday but what is in stored for man is evident. The way man’s thoughts & emotions are structured today; we must know man and nature are one organism and not two separate entities. The ruthlessness, selfishness & brutality we have within us, the amount of violence that is there in our every day life, all this is effected in the nature around us and very soon if man would go the way he is going, the tension he is building up because of the speed, competition and the struggle for survival, we seem to be moving towards inner death if we are not yet already. And if this is what is going to happen then we are going to have severe natural calamities. Mankind is going to have lot of diseases invaded because if the disease is inside that is going to manifest outside. Each one of us should only think, pause and look how am I living and we will know how we are going to be a few years from now, a few months from now. The speed at which the world is moving- what is going to happen to man? And lots of people are going to go INSANE. We can already see it happening. Many families we see, at least 2 people are insane or those who are managing to be sane. They are struggling to keep up their sanity. The world is moving towards disaster. If the pollution is going to increase because the kind of civilization we are in is the product of our mind and greed, then thousands are going to die out of lung diseases.

 

A large section of human population is going to be wiped out. That is what is in stored for man. It is not that the earth is going to become a dead planet and human race is going to be wiped out, no, but then lots and lots of people are going to die and those who are going to be left behind are going to be living is a huge graveyard and it is not a pleasant experience. Its time that one becomes serious about life, serious about ourselves, serious about our fellow human beings, serious about suffering around us. We got the gift of thinking, feeling, we can’t be dreaming and selfish any more. We have to buckle up. I hope & pray that we can come across 60,000 serious people. I now that they are definitely there. If this is not going to happen by the time it is 2010 then we are in for a crises. Mother earth is going to revolve. She is not going to take it on any more. The house is burning already we can’t wait any more. Today in India we can see, there is drought and to such places one of our enlightened dasas go, sit down and go into a deep state of love & compassion then it rains. Earth is aching and seeking for enlightened people. That’s what has to happen now."""""