The God Spots in the Brain

The God Spot

We evolved with a "god spot," a desire and need to look toward something
beyond us, something that can provide meaning and direction for our lives,
our high and low experiences, and can help us understand and control what
goes on in the world around us. With what do we fill that spot? I propose in
this series of lectures to explore how our forebears achieved this tens of
thousands of years ago and how infants do so today. Such barely culturated
experiences and beliefs teach about what the god that adequately fills the
god spot must satisfy. The lectures continue by describing how Christianity
has, does, and might better fill this god spot in each of us.

http://www.ksharpe.com/word/EP36.htm

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Believers from every tradition and around the world have reported similar
sensations of religious experience — a feeling of completeness, absence of
self, or oneness with the universe, feelings of peace, freedom from fear,
ecstatic joy, visions of a Supreme Being.

With the aid of new technology that allows them to watch the brain in
action, a group of scientists — sometimes described as "neurotheologists" —
have tried to explain how such experiences occur and perhaps even why.

"There are certain [brain] patterns that can be generated experimentally
that will generate the sense, presence and the feeling of God-like
experiences," says professor of Neuroscience Michael Persinger of Ontario's
Laurentia University. "The patterns we use are complex but they imitate what
the brain does normally."

Persinger originally set out to explore the nature of creativity and sense
of self. But his research into patterns of brain activity led him to delve
into the nature of mystical experiences as well.

To do this Persinger puts his subjects in a quiet room, depriving them of
light and sound, so that the nerve cells typically involved in seeing and
hearing are not stimulated. Then he applies a magnetic field pattern over
the right hemisphere of the brain.

Persinger was asked if his work leads him to conclude that "God," or the
experience of God, is solely the creation of brain-wave activity.

"My point of view is, 'Let's measure it.' Let's keep an open mind and
realize maybe there is no God; maybe there might be," says Persinger. "We're
not going to answer it by arguments — we're going to answer it by
measurement and understanding the areas of the brain that generate the
experience and the patterns that experimentally produce it in the
laboratory."

Mind, Body and Belief

To others who have thought deeply about religion, that is a conclusion that
far outstrips the evidence — a scientific leap of faith, if you will.

"They have isolated one small aspect of religious experience and they are
identifying that with the whole of religion," says John Haught, professor of
theology at Georgetown University.

Religion "is not all meditative bliss. It also involves moments when you
feel abandoned by God," says Haught. "It involves commitments and suffering
and struggle.… Religion is visiting widows and orphans; it is symbolism and
myth and story and much richer things."

Persinger says he is less concerned with trying to prove or disprove the
existence of God than with understanding and documenting the experience.
However, in his view, "if we have to draw conclusions now, based upon the
data, the answer would be more on the fact that there is no deity."

He is clear about an underlying motivation of his work — a fear that
unscrupulous people might use techniques to provoke a spiritual experience
to control people.

But Persinger also acknowledges a more positive possibility: "If you look at
the spontaneous cases of people who have God experiences and conversions,
their health improves," he says. "So if we can understand the patterns of
activity that generate this experience, we may also be able to understand
how to have the brain — and hence the body — cure itself."

What Prayer Does

That search for the mind-body connection also motivates the work of other
researchers, such as Professor Andrew Newberg at the University of
Pennsylvania.

"Whether there is a God or not in some senses isn't as relevant to the kind
of research we're doing so much as understanding why those feelings and
experiences are important to us as human beings," he says.

Newberg observed the brains of Tibetan Buddhists and Franciscan nuns as they
engaged in deep prayer and mediation by injecting radioactive dye, or
"tracer" as the subject entered a deep meditative state, then photographing
the results with a high tech imaging camera. He found that "when people
meditate they have significantly increased activity in the frontal area —
the attention area of the brain — and decreased activity in that orientation
part of the brain."

Many of these changes occur whether people are praying (focusing on oneness
with a deity) or meditating (focusing on oneness with the universe). But
there are differences, in that prayer activates the "language center" in the
brain, while the "visual center" is engaged by meditation.

Either way, Newberg finds that the sense of "unity," or "oneness"
experienced by his subjects is a real, biological event. And he acknowledges
the limits of his own work: He currently lacks a means to measure the
neurological events associated with other religious practices — such as
caring for the poor or ecstatic worship.

"Our work really points to the fact that these are very complex kinds of
feelings and experiences that affect us on many different levels," says
Newberg. "There is no one simple way of looking at these kinds of
questions."

Science and the Afterlife

Across the country, at the University of Arizona, professor of Neurology and
Psychiatry Gary Schwartz would probably say: "Amen" to that.

Perhaps the most controversial of the group of researchers dedicated to
studying the "God spot" in the brain, Schwartz explores the question of
whether consciousness survives death with the help of mediums (people who
demonstrate unusual accuracy in describing intimate attributes of the dead
to those who knew them well).

His experiments compare the brain waves and heart rates of both the medium
and the person for whom he or she is trying to contact the dead.

"One of the fundamental questions is, 'How does a medium receive this kind
of information?'" he explains. "To what extent are they using specific
regions of the brain which are purportedly associated with other kinds of
mystical or religious experiences?"

Schwartz says his research "is actually a window or a doorway, if you will,
to a much larger spiritual reality which integrates ancient wisdom with
contemporary science."

He concludes that the human brain is wired to receive signals from what he
calls a "Grand Organizing Design," or G.O.D.

"Survival of conscience tells us that consciousness does not require a
brain, that our memories, our intentions, our intelligence, our dreams? all
of that can exist outside of the physical body," says Schwartz. "Now, by the
way, that's the same idea that we have about God — that something that is
"invisible," that is "bigger than all of us," which we cannot see, can have
intellect, creativity, intention, memory and can influence the universe."

The Quest for Larger Things

Like the other researchers interviewed for Nightline, Schwartz suggests that
his work has taken him on a personal spiritual journey, requiring him to ask
himself hard questions about science, faith, and reason. And Schwartz says
that rather than diminishing faith, inquiries like his should enlarge the
world's understanding of it.

On that point, he and theologian John Haught agree.

"Faith is the sense of being grasped by this higher dimension, or more
comprehensive, or deeper reality," says Haught. "If we could come up with
clear proof or an absolutely mathematically lucid proof or verification of
deity, then that would not be deity — it would be something smaller than
us.…"

http://tinyurl.com/wpob

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Scientists, philosophers and atheists have long argued that God and
spirituality are constructs of the human mind, although that opinion
generally hasn't been a popular one. After centuries of bloody holy wars and
fierce theological dispute, the controversy of the Creator's existence has
taken a strange new turn: humanity may finally have uncovered tangible
evidence that the phenomenon of religious faith is all in our heads.

Literally.

A group of neuroscientists at the University of California at San Diego has
identified a region of the human brain that appears to be linked to thoughts
of spiritual matters and prayer. Their findings tentatively suggest that we
as a species are genetically programmed to believe in God.

The researchers came upon these cerebral revelations in the course of
studying the brain patterns of certain people with epilepsy. Epileptics who
suffer a particular type of seizure are often intensely religious, and are
known to report an unusual number of spiritually-oriented visions and
obsessions. Measurements of electrical activity in the brains of test
subjects indicated a specific neural center in the temporal lobe that flared
up at times when the subjects thought about God. This same area was also a
common focal point overloaded with electrical discharges during their
epileptic seizures.

Could this heretofore unidentified part of the brain -- nicknamed the "God
module" -- actually be some sort of physiological seat of religious belief?
The scientists who discovered it believe it might be. They have performed a
further study comparing epileptic subjects with different groups of
non-epileptics -- a random group of average people, as well as individuals
who characterized themselves as extremely religious. The electrical brain
activity of the subjects was recorded while they were shown a series of
words, and the God module zones of the epileptics and the religious group
exhibited similar responses to words involving God and faith. No word yet on
whether the brains of atheists and agnostics might flatline the monitors,
but the parallel results among the strong believers are considered
impressive.

"There may be dedicated neural machinery in the temporal lobes concerned
with religion," the research team announced at a conference for the Society
for Neuroscience. "This may have evolved to impose order and stability on
society."

Anthropologists and Darwinian theorists have frequently speculated that
religion may have developed as a self-policing mechanism as cooperation with
others became useful. With their intelligence and skills at making weapons,
there was little to stop early humans from slaughtering each other like wild
maniacs, until they began to fear unseen beings even bigger and badder than
themselves. This sort of adaptation has always been considered a purely
psychological function, but now we have the first evidence that the
religious instinct may be physically hard-wired right into our noggins.

Which brings us to the most intriguing conundrum posed by the discovery of
the God Spot. It's a double-edged sword shoved right through the heart of
the science vs. religion debate, bearing either good news or bad news for
the faithful masses depending on how you answer the chicken-or-the-egg
question: does it mean that God created our brains, or that our brains
created God?

"These studies do not in any way negate the validity of religious experience
or God," the God module's discoverers took care to note, plainly
anticipating a reception of fire and brimstone from certain quarters. "They
merely provide an explanation in terms of brain regions that may be
involved."

No matter how inconclusive or sketchy they label their findings as being,
these scientists will inevitably be denounced as heathenistic blasphemers
doing the work of Satan. Yet at the very same time, other equally devout
worshipers will praise this discovery as a beautiful and wondrous epiphany
that spells out God's great plan.

So what'll it be? A sacred temple in the temporal lobes, or an incidental
conflagration of the synapses? The Kingdom of Heaven confined to the insides
of our skulls, or "I think of God, therefore He is"? Touched in the head by
an angel, or brainwashed into belief by biology?

Believe what you want, but either way, I think those who draw any serious
mechanistic or teleological conclusions from this research ought to have
their heads examined, as well.

http://tinyurl.com/r3ik

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An article in Nov 17th, 2001 edition of New Scientist magazine claimed that
the prophet Ezekiel probably suffered from temporal lobe epilepsy. It
maintains that many of the typical, tell-tale signs are there, such as
fainting spells, temporary bouts of speechlessness, aggression, delusions,
compulsive writing, and excessive religiousness.

There is nothing particularly original about the New Scientist’s claim. For
many years now, there has been a suspicion that people like St Paul, St.
Joan of Arc, St. Teresa of Avila and Mohammed may have suffered from what is
sometimes referred to as the ‘sacred disease.’ It is also quite possible
that, like them, Ezekiel was a victim of the same malady.

In recent times, many neuroscientists have carried out brain research which
has tended to confirm that epilepsy and religiosity are often
interconnected. For example, in 1998, Vilayanur Ramachandran, of San Diego
University, published a book entitled, Phantoms in the Brain. In it he
maintained that, following seizures, about 25 per cent of epileptics report
deeply moving spiritual experiences. They include a feeling of a divine
presence and a sense of direct communication with God. Everything around
them is imbued with cosmic significance. They may say, “I finally understand
what it is all about... Suddenly it all makes sense... I have insight into
the true nature of the universe.”

As a result of examining the epileptics who report such significant
religious experiences, Ramachandran and other researchers have suggested
that there appears to be a “God spot” in the left temporal lobe of the
brain. Briefly put, they suspect that epileptic seizures cause damage to
some of the pathways which connect the area of the brain that deals with
sensory information to the one that gives such information emotional
significance. As a result, these patients can perceive an unusual depth of
spiritual meaning in every object and event. Ramachandran goes on to ask a
provocative question: if a surgeon removed a portion of the temporal lobe,
would he be performing a “Godectomy”?

http://www.redemptoristpublications.com/reality/sept02/godspot.html

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Seizures and the Sight of God
Isabella Eguae-Obazee
Researchers interested in the connection of the brain and religion have
examined the experiences of people suffering from Temporal Lobe Epilepsy.
Apparently the increased electrical activity in the brain resulting from
seizure activity (abnormal electrical activity within localized portions of
the brain), makes sufferers more susceptible to having religious experiences
including visions of supernatural beings and near death experiences (NDEs)
(9). Temporal Lobe Epilepsy (TLE) sufferers also may become increasingly
obsessed with religion, the study and practice of it (1). Why is it that
this form of epilepsy results in religious experiences among the other
supernatural experiences possible? Can people who have never studied or
practiced religion be susceptible to these same religious experiences? Why
do some interested researchers claim that such notable figures as Paul on
the road to Damascus, Joan of Arc, Ellen White of the Seventh-Day Adventist
Church and other persons suffered from TLE because of their range of
reported experiences with God, angels, and demons (1,3)? In my first paper,
I highlighted the connection scientists have made between religious
experience and the brain. In this paper, I intend to focus on Temporal Lobe
Epilepsy, as one of those connections, specifically the symptom of
hyperreligiousity.
In 1997 Vilayanur Ramachandran and his colleagues from the University of
California at San Diego headed a research study. The team studied patients
of temporal lobe epilepsy measuring galvanic skin response on the left hands
of the patients (11). This measurement allowed the research team to monitor
arousal (specific autonomic nervous system response) and indirectly surmise
the communication between the inferior temporal lobe and the amygdala, both
important in response related to fear and arousal (9). In addition to two
control groups a religious control group and a non-religious control group,
each group was shown forty words, including violent words, sexual words, and
simple words (like "wheel"), and finally, religious-related words. The
results of the study showed a greater arousal in the temporal lobe epilepsy
sufferers to religious words in comparison to the non-religious, whom were
aroused by sexual words, and religious control groups, whom were aroused by
religious and sexual words (10).

Ramachandran and his team concluded that although the patients were not
experiencing seizures or experiencing supernatural occurrences at the time
of testing, they were highly sensitive to religious words. Thus, the
experiences of temporal lobe seizures strengthened the patients interest in
religion (11). Such a conclusion seems fairly reasonable considering that
these patients also reported religious experiences during their seizures. Is
it possible that the increased arousal to religious words is not a direct
result of their temporal lobe epilepsy, but rather a result of the
supernatural experiences induced by their epilepsy? Possibly these patients
began to research and study religion more to finds ways to explain the
experiences that they had during their seizures. Subsequent research on very
religious, non-epileptic subjects supports this idea. In a different
experiment, the of very religious, non-epileptics' temporal lobes where
noted to be more active (11). However, in epileptic patients, Ramachandran
concludes that the seizure's damage to temporal lobe pathways makes these
patients more sensitive to certain ideas that to others do not have great
meaning; specifically, pathways that connect the part of the brain that
gives recognizes to sensory information and the part that gives emotional
meaning to the sensory information (4). Ramachandran believes that because
of these specific damage, everything that these patients experience has
great meaning (10).

Some people, interested in proving God's inexistence, speculate that some of
the notable religious figures suffered from temporal lobe epilepsy. For
example, they claim that Paul, a notable figure in Christianity had a
temporal lobe seizure as he was walking toward Damascus (1). In the New
Testament of the Bible, Paul claims to see God and hear Jesus Christ
speaking to him. Other notable figures like Ellen Smith, of the Seventh-day
Adventist Church also claims to have had profound visions directly from God.
Contrary to these researchers belief, there are other components of temporal
epilepsy beyond hyperreligiousity that would negate these ideas. Associated
with temporal lobe epilepsy is also a change in personality. The person may
become irritable and obsessive-compulsive; they focus on extremely abstract
aspects of their daily life, and attach a great deal of importance to daily
situations. In addition they experience emotions with more intensity. With
respect to these religious figures, the only one noted have any possible
experience with epilepsy is Ellen White, an influential member of the
Seventh Day Adventist Church. She suffered from a head injury during her
childhood however the head injury was suffered near the nasal-area of her
face (3). I found very little evidence to support the claims that her among
other religious figures suffered from TLE.

>From the studies completed on Temporal Epilepsy patients, it appears that
hyperreligiousity may simply be a result of increased interest in the
details and experiences of everyday life. However, the visions and other
supernatural experiences reported by these patients gives cause for
researchers to examine the temporal area of the brain. This portion of the
brain may be what researchers are calling the "God Spot," a part of the
brain where religion arises from (11). It is not clear why this would be an
ideal place for the so-called "God Spot." It is possible that the known
functioning of the Temporal Lobe, recognizing sensory information and
attributing meaning to sensory information is akin to the philosophies of
religion. Maybe, the "God Spot" acquires its spot over time rather than
having its presence in the brain early on in a human's life. If this were
true, the next step would be to examine the Temporal Epilepsy cases of
younger children. Do they also experience religion as older patients do?

Furthermore, if possible researchers should examine the prior religious
experiences and lives of temporal lobe epilepsy patients. Did they have any
interest in religion prior to their experiences with epilepsy? This may
provide insight intensity and contents of the persons reported religious
experiences. Hyperreligiousity is an interesting symptom of Temporal Lobe
Epilepsy. The action of the temporal lobe after experiencing epileptic
seizures supports the idea that religion might begin in the mind (10). I
hope that within the coming years more scientists will research this aspect
of temporal lobe epilepsy. Thus, giving us more insight into whether the
soul is within the brain.

http://serendip.brynmawr.edu/bb/neuro/neuro01/web2/Eguae.html

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1)Epilepsy: Sacred Disease by Paul Newman
http://stormloader.com/users/abrax7/epilepsy.htm

2)Yours, Mine, and Ours: Whose God is it, anyway?
http://slate.msn.com/goodword/98-10-13/goodword.asp

3)Ellen G. White, by Don Hawley, Part 8
http://www.sabbath.com/white/egw8.htm

4)BrainPlace.Com, Temporal Lobe
http://www.brainplace.com/bp/brainsystem/temporal.asp

5)"The God Spot"
http://www.parascope.com/articles/slips/fs22_3.htm

6)Brainstorms, A book review by Robert Finn
http://nasw.org/finn/brnstrm.html

7)Personal Experience
http://www.objectivethought.com/atheism/personalexperience.html

8)WebMD: Temporal Lobe Seizure
http://my.webmd.com/content/asset/adam_disease_psychomotor_seizure

9)Touched by the Word of God
http://www.newscientist.com/ns/971108/nreligion.html

10)Beliefnet
http://tinyurl.com/wpnu

11)Genesis of Eden
http://dhushara.tripod.com/book/rebirth/comment/scirel.htm