Brain and Spiritual experience.

[tyder001]

Well, maybe this one will stay civil. I'm almost afraid to say "interesting article."
Researcher Says Distinct God Spot in the Brain Does Not Exist | Neuroscience News

 

[Angel of Ioren]

So does this prove that our belief in gods comes from the way we're wired? I buy that. It makes a lot of sense. Go back 1000 years and ask a Viking about god, and he'll ask which one. Today, talk to a christian about Thor and he'll say he can't wait for the Avengers either.

 

[mike]

So does this prove that our belief in gods comes from the way we're wired? I buy that. It makes a lot of sense. Go back 1000 years and ask a Viking about god, and he'll ask which one. Today, talk to a christian about Thor and he'll say he can't wait for the Avengers either.

back OT

The new work is based on a previously published study that indicated spiritual transcendence is associated with decreased right parietal lobe functioning,

He found that the participants with more significant injury to their right parietal lobe showed an increased feeling of closeness to a higher power.

'Neuropsychology researchers consistently have shown that impairment on the right side of the brain decreases one’s focus on the self,' said Johnstone.

'Since our research shows that people with this impairment are more spiritual, this suggests spiritual experiences are associated with a decreased focus on the self.

Aka mentally retarded,

Mental retardation (MR) is a generalized disorder appearing before adulthood, characterized by significantly impaired cognitive functioning

 

[trainedobserver]

It is all about brain function in the end but the conscious mind is just the tip of the ice burg. Myth and religion are expressions of complex and largely unconscious human psychophysiological processes that include the whole organism. There is a lot than can be learned from the study of myth and religion, certainly humanity has expended a great deal of energy in generating it. Rightly dividing the truth, as they say, is the thing.

 

[boomerang]

I have a very non-scientific feeling that self-awareness simply IS and exists as a property inherent in the universe. What we seem to be asking when we ponder life after death, is whether this property is elemental or emergent. That is--is it indelibly conserved, or does it emerge only when matter and energy are organized in certain ways? And then we should in turn ask if we are referring to a universal, or to an individuated consciousness.

It gets quite weird.

 

[Angel of Ioren]

Mike, I'm glad to have you back, but you can't go around calling anyone who's religious "retarded" - it's offensive to a lot of other members. I would appreciate it of you could discuss this topic without resorting to that.
You can use facts and humour all you want regarding the existence of god, but don't start attacking the intelligence of those that are religious. I know plenty of people that believe in a deity and are just as intelligent as those hat don't believe in one.

Thanks

PS The same goes for everyone else, theist, atheist, and agnostic. Support your arguments without personal attacks. That's a logical fallacy and a poor way of supporting your argument. I know that all of you are smarter than that and you can make your claims without logical fallacies.

 

[trainedobserver]

I have a very non-scientific feeling that self-awareness simply IS and exists as a property inherent in the universe. What we seem to be asking when we ponder life after death, is whether this property is elemental or emergent. That is--is it indelibly conserved, or does it emerge only when matter and energy are organized in certain ways? And then we should in turn ask if we are referring to a universal, or to an individuated consciousness.

It gets quite weird.

My understanding of it is that consciousness is an emergent quality of the proper arrangement of what we understand to be physical matter. Is it some field, extra-3rd dimensional substance, or wave? I don't think we have any way to detect it as it is now.

Something can be conscious and not self-aware and there are varying degrees and types of both consciousness and self-awareness. I believe it can be rightly said that across the population and across the time span of an individual's life, there are varying degrees of self-awareness. For example: How many people reading these words are aware of the fact that they are experiencing the substance of their own being taking the form of the screen displaying the characters? That is to say, how many are conscious of consciousness? If you are not aware that you are experiencing yourself (your consciousness) portraying yourself in the world, are you self-aware? We say animals are not self aware if they do not recognize themselves in a mirror, yet how many people are walking around thinking they are experiencing the world directly and not recognizing themselves in front of their very noses, so to speak?

 

[Kim323]

This is sort of a recaptulation of a post on another thread that delved into the nature of consciousness. I'd recommend three books I REALLY SAVORED reading on the subject: 1. Susan blackmore's conversations on consciousness, verbatim back and forth interviews she had with about 25 leading researchers who explore the actual NATURE of just what comprises consciousness. That is, that central question trained seemed to allude to: is consciousness a freestanding thing apart, or is it MERELY a byproduct of the firings of neurons/the physical processes of the physical brain? Or, of course, some combination of the two? 2. John r. Searle's Mind, very readable little volume by a prof of philosophy at uc Berkeley, exploring fascinating aspects of the self awareness trained talks about. This would be my FIRST choice of the three, and I know I can sound pedantic and lecturing like I'm before a class, BUT GET ON AMAZON AND ORDER THIS ONE!!!!!! Superb, and you'll find yourself CONSCIOUSLY focusing on your own consciousness as you read, like just WHAT IS the color red?!!! 3. Christof koch's Quest for Consciousness is a much harder slog. I think he's at ucla and he worked with Francis crick of the double helix fame. Kim

 

[Kim323]

Yes, I know that's spelled RECAPITULATION!!! As a teacher, I am acutely aware of spelling, etc. The three books I recommended in the post above are excellent, and did I mention that John searle's Mind will blow your mind??!!! SUPERB, and a quick little read and very scholary, too. Kim

 

[Polterwurst]

He found that the participants with more significant injury to their right parietal lobe showed an increased feeling of closeness to a higher power.

Well, I don't know the details of that finding, and maybe they have taken that into account, but to me it seems rather obvious that someone who survived severe head injury would think a lot about spiritual subjects, and wonder if there wasn't some higher power that helped him/her.

Although the means have become much more high-tech, I'm afraid neurologists today are still not much closer to explaining how things like spirituality, emotion or even memory work than in the beginnings of that field. Much less consciousness itself.What they are getting is more questions than answers. Last I've heard, memories don't seem to activate specific areas but areas throughout the whole brain. It might be that holographic model again. Twenty years ago, anyone who had theorized that would have been ignored at best.

Confident remarks like "we are about to find which area in the brain generates spirituality" always sound a little like someone is jumping to conclusions to me.

 

[Kim323]

I agree on more questions than answers, polterwurst. But those questions are sure mind blowing. One of the things that comes up in Susan Blackmore's book of interviews is the "zombie" hypothesis. The zombie "hunch"; that is, is consciousness separable from the physical processes of the brain? I've never liked that term zombie, smacks too much of the movie image. But could there be a MACHINE YOU, the exact you that even those who knew you would find indistinguishable from you, but all nighttime inside in terms of consciousness or self awareness? Sort of an academic exercise, but the root of consciousness is subjectivity. Some of the manta researchers she interviews are John searle, Roger pentode, whom we've all heard of, Francis crick, and max velmans,among many others. What comes up in every interview is the so-called "problem" of consciousness, which sure does raise as many questions as answers. I got the book down and just chose this at random:

Susan: what is it about consciousness that makes it so special..........that people talk about 'the problem of consciousness'? What is the problem?

Thomas Metzinger: The problem is that consciousness is opposed to all other states. A physical state, a biological state, a chemical state are only known from the outside, from a third person perspective. Consciousness is different in that we gain knowledge about it from the inside as well as the outside-and we really don't know what that statement actually means. Consciousness, we say, is also known from the first person perspective, by an experiencing self..........."

There are other scientists interviewed who take a different slant, agree, etc. The book is published by Oxford univ press, and is of relatively recent vintage, 2006. Certainly are a lot of questions! Susan blackmore, I think it was, sort of tongue in cheek described consciousness with the question: what does it feel like to be a bat? Kim

 

[Kim323]

That should be, in the above post, MANY researchers, and, of course Roger PENROSE. My son's iPad, when I write on it, has some sort of spell check thing that is sometimes very annoying. It overwrites me sometimes, suggesting stuff that is directly counter to what I correctly write, and then if i don't notice, does its own thing. Of course, sometimes, it's my own typos, but darn that thing is annoying. It's got a consciousness all its own! Can that thing be easily disabled? Kim

 

[trainedobserver]

I've wondered of late if animal life doesn't serve as the consciousness organs of the larger Earth organism to which we all belong, move within, and derive our being from, much like the brain/mind system is the consciousness organ of the individual human being.

I doubt it as there doesn't seem to be any evidence that consciousness is additive but you have to wonder if something doesn't emerge from the collective brain/mind systems of the various species on Earth that the individuals are ignorant of. Do the larger systems that we are a part of possess their own form of consciousness?

I don't think it would possible for us to detect due to the resource restriction problem, meaning we would be trying to comprehend something in the superset using only the subset of information that we can actually process. We are demonstrably blind to the majority of brain/mind activity that occurs within our own heads so it seems unlikely that we'd gain much insight into something as bizarre as a planetary organism's inner workings.

 

[mike]

Mike, I'm glad to have you back, but you can't go around calling anyone who's religious "retarded" - it's offensive to a lot of other members. I would appreciate it of you could discuss this topic without resorting to that.
You can use facts and humour all you want regarding the existence of god, but don't start attacking the intelligence of those that are religious. I know plenty of people that believe in a deity and are just as intelligent as those hat don't believe in one.

Thanks

PS The same goes for everyone else, theist, atheist, and agnostic. Support your arguments without personal attacks. That's a logical fallacy and a poor way of supporting your argument. I know that all of you are smarter than that and you can make your claims without logical fallacies.

Well since there is a question wether mental retardation is an insult or not

The terms used to describe this condition are subject to a process called the euphemism treadmill. This means that whatever term is chosen for this condition, it eventually becomes perceived as an insult. The terms mental retardation and mentally retarded were invented in the middle of the 20th century to replace the previous set of terms, which were deemed to have become offensive. By the end of the 20th century, these terms themselves have come to be widely seen as disparaging and politically incorrect and in need of replacement.[2] The term intellectual disability or intellectually challenged is now preferred by most advocates in most English-speaking countries. Clinically, however, mental retardation is a subtype of intellectual disability, which is a broader concept and includes intellectual deficits that are too mild to properly qualify as mental retardation, too specific (as in specific learning disability), or acquired later in life, through acquired brain injuries or neurodegenerative diseases like dementia. Intellectual disabilities may appear at any age. Developmental disability is any disability that is due to problems with growth and development. This term encompasses many congenital medical conditions that have no mental or intellectual components, although it, too, is sometimes used as a euphemism for MR.[3] Because of its specificity and lack of confusion with other conditions, mental retardation is still the term most widely used and recommended for use in professional medical settings, such as formal scientific research and health insurance paperwork.[4]

Retarded comes from the Latin retardare, "to make slow, delay, keep back, or hinder," so mental retardation means the same as mentally delayed.

The new work is based on a previously published study that indicated spiritual transcendence is associated with decreased right parietal lobe functioning,

Imo decreased = retarded, its all a matter of context
Im also of the mind retarded describes the effect of religions on society as a whole, it holds us back.
Children eventually outgrow a belief in the imaginary being santa claus, they give up a fantasy scenario for rational reality, yet when we look at the religious population its like looking at immature children, living in a fantasy world and believing in imaginary friends.......

But im happy to quote the OP articles terminology and use neurologically impaired.

But i doubt that will make them any happier

 

[trainedobserver]

Although the means have become much more high-tech, I'm afraid neurologists today are still not much closer to explaining how things like spirituality, emotion or even memory work than in the beginnings of that field. Much less consciousness itself.

I think you can just lump all that into human behavior. We have trouble explaining human behavior. As individual's we have trouble explaining our own behavior.

I really do think it is essentially out of our hands. The organism has evolved a brain/mind system that creates the illusion of individuality within an illusionary representation of the outside world it uses to navigate and exploit that outside world. Inside of that is the appearance of free will.

However, it can be demonstrated to be just that, just the appearance of choice that does not comprehend the complex array of events that dictate our behavior at any given moment. This is not an abdication of responsibility but rather a recognition of an unavoidable truth. Free will is an illusion to the tiny bit of us that constitutes the conscious mind.

The larger unconscious machinery under the hood reacts and is subject to the real world events that have led up to it going back to when the solar system formed and logically beyond that. Maybe there is some free will in there but I doubt it.

We rock on making choices (or so it appears to us) and suffering the consequences regardless. It's a paradox of sorts. but I think the key is in that largely invisible apparatus of our minds. At some point though you just have to say, "So what?" Contemplating the incomprehensible yields little and recognizing these things complicates rather than simplifies life.

 

[mike]

 

[mike]

 

[Kim323]

What is being discussed by some here, the nature of consciousness, and then free will, illusion, and put 'em together and you have the illusion of free will, is, of course, fascinating beyond words.

The whole thing is rooted in, sort of to be dualist, what you have on one side: it's called epiphenomenonism, determinism, mechanism, those tongue twisters denoting that WE are a product of that "wetter car engine", yes, trained, well put in your phrase "under the hood" that's sparking away and firing away producing this thing called consciousness that is essentially without meaning or value because that's all it is, a machine ultimately to be understood by that god called neuroscience, and we ain't got no free will because the only facts of existence are that everything was caused by something mechanical before it, and on and on and on.

Now, I love science, and I've been touting a book of interviews by Susan Blackmore with 20 (twenty) of some of the leading researchers in the fields of neuroscience, brain function, and consciousness. It can be possessed by You for the bank breaking sum of less than twelve dollars of good ol' uncle Sam greenbacks from amazon in mint condition, and free shipping if you're on amazon prime. I own no amazon stock.

The other side of that problem begun above is that you do have free will of some form or the other, at both the NEUROBIOLOGICAL and the level of you sitting right there in all your masculine or feminine splendor reading this. You CAN make a decision right now, tomorrow in your favorite restaurant deciding over that long menu, and, by gosh, whether you're going to go out and rob that bank that your neuronal firings brain squirted into your consciousness yesterday as a thought exercise when you drove by. I will guarantee that you will make the right decision based on intelligent rumination of the problem, based on either the threat of a long period of incarceration, or of simple ethical considerations.

I just wish that people would read the stuff they talk so much about, and this is written tongue in cheek. Yes, you may and probably even won't find the answers, but, man alive, the journey is fun.

If you're going to lay the future of humanity at the feet of neuroscience, start by reading twenty interviews.

Any typos, misspellings, or misplaced apostrophes in the preceding can be attributed to my conscious and free-willed decision, albeit begun at the neuronal level, to not go back and edit. Kim

 

[trainedobserver]

I'm not trying to prove anything to you Kim and I certainly don't claim to be an expert in any of this. I'm only talking about how things seem to me at the moment. It doesn't hurt my feelings if you don't agree.

The matter of Free Will or Will in general is certainly a very complex thing to try to disassemble. That our actions are dictated by what has come before seems painfully obvious.

The matter of where a decision point is actually made is a matter of scale though and things can appear to have branched due to one event when if you look further down the line it was decided by something even more previous. Discounting that, the bigger problem is that the actual decision tree occurs at the pre-conscious stage in the process inside a human brain. It may appear that we are aware of all the factors contributing to our choice but we really aren't. I don't think you would argue with that would you?

 

[mike]