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| korben |
 Posted: Sat Feb 13, 2010 11:45 am Post subject: Spirituality & Brain Damage |
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http://www.livescience.com/health/spirituality-brain-link-100211.html
"Scientists have identified areas of the brain that, when damaged, lead to greater spirituality. The findings hint at the roots of spiritual and religious attitudes, the researchers say. " - LiveScience Staff
What do you think about this? Any thoughts?
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| inow |
| Posted: Sat Feb 13, 2010 11:55 am Post subject: |
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My thoughts? We evolved to feel attached to our pack... to our family... and to our environment. These attachments are strong, and useful, and so were reinforced through selection. Selection for this was so robust that parts of the brain became specialized in the sense of attachment and group association. When those brain areas are damaged, people's sense of "oneness" with the nature around them... with the universe... is greatly magnified. Interestingly, people also experience this while on certain drugs and chemicals like MDMA, which results in different levels of activity in those same brain regions. That magnified sense of attachment is generally called "spirituality."
In short, a bunch of natural brain stuff used for very useful functions in survival can result in the by-product of spirituality, especially when those regions are damaged or under the influence of certain drugs.
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| korben |
| Posted: Sat Feb 13, 2010 12:06 pm Post subject: |
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Hmm, so spirituality is practically a form of trying to survive after death because of one knowing about death? Such as, humans have such a need for survival that they create religion in an attempt to survive the inevitable certainty of death. This seems to say that religion could be said as being an evolution in the mind for survival? Does this sound right?
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| inow |
| Posted: Sat Feb 13, 2010 1:10 pm Post subject: |
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Well, that is certainly possible, but it is not what I meant with my post. My point was that in our evolutionary past we relied on those around us to survive. We formed bonds with our parents, our siblings, other pack members... fellow hunters, fellow gatherers, fellow troop members...
These attachments to others helped us to survive. We had people to look over our backs, and to care for us when we were sick, and to care for our children should we die... thus leading to higher chance of survival for our children. The pack mentality was such a vital part to our own survival that certain regions of the brain soon began to specialize in these attachments with others.
We feel rewarded when we have good friendships. We feel pleasure when we mate with someone. We feel accepted when we are part of a community, and all of these things are strongly reinforced with neurochemicals... The attachments are so important that our brains have evolved to encourage them... to reward us with pleasure when those connections with those around us are strengthened.
There are parts of the brain that specialize in this attachment to others... that specialize in making us feel connected to nature and the environment around us. These areas that provide us with the sense of connection and attachment... when damaged or under the influence of certain drugs... are the same areas responsible for a feeling of "oneness with the universe" or what others call "spirituality."
As for the natural explanations of why religion has taken precedence, there are a few other discussions on that topic already. Check them out.
http://www.thescienceforum.com/viewtopic.php?t=22198
http://www.thescienceforum.com/viewtopic.php?t=21810
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| skeptic |
| Posted: Sat Feb 13, 2010 5:38 pm Post subject: |
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The adaptation that iNow talks of is a big part of things. Groups like to follow a similar 'cause', and this need to become one with the beliefs of the group is selected for in evolution. If you agree with the group, you are more likely to survive and reproduce. Thus, this quality evolves.
However, there is a second quality required for religiosity. I call it gullibility, though the religious call it faith. |
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| loftmarcell |
| Posted: Sun Feb 14, 2010 3:39 am Post subject: Re: Spirituality & Brain Damage |
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| korben wrote: |
http://www.livescience.com/health/spirituality-brain-link-100211.html
"Scientists have identified areas of the brain that, when damaged, lead to greater spirituality. The findings hint at the roots of spiritual and religious attitudes, the researchers say. " - LiveScience Staff
What do you think about this? Any thoughts? |
Actually the article is talking about persons surviving brain tumours taking on a greater "spiritual" aspect in their lives ... which tends to indicate that the article is more about hinting the roots of the spiritual and religious attitudes of the so-called researchers more than anything else .... |
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| korben |
| Posted: Sun Feb 14, 2010 11:12 am Post subject: |
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Yeah, lol. I kind of did go off-topic in my own thread. I don't know where the idea came from, but the way "inow" worded his first post made me start thinking of why religion/spirituality originated in the mind of humans and I was just trying to relate it to survival (which to me is the only real meaning to life).
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| inow |
| Posted: Sun Feb 14, 2010 11:38 am Post subject: |
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Well, in that case, there are two prevailing views:
One - Religion is a byproduct of adaptations we've made which help us to survive (adaptations like being able to mentally rehearse interactions with unseen others, like having a sense of attachment to our community and family, like assigning causation to things even when their might not be any such causative agent, etc.).
Two - Religious belief and practice itself helped communities to advance and survive since there was a common narrative tying the group/pack together more consistently... one story to unite them and move forward toward common goals.
Both explanations have their strengths, and I personally do not find them to be mutually exclusive.
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| ishmaelblues |
| Posted: Mon Feb 15, 2010 1:21 pm Post subject: |
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| actually the prevailing view is that religion has a very real and purposeful meaning and use, your above two views are held by a very small minority of the world's population. |
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| inow |
| Posted: Mon Feb 15, 2010 2:28 pm Post subject: |
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| ishmaelblues wrote: |
| actually the prevailing view is that religion has a very real and purposeful meaning and use |
Please elaborate. What might those be?
| ishmaelblues wrote: |
| your above two views are held by a very small minority of the world's population. |
Truth and accuracy are not based on popularity. Did you have any specific criticisms which negate the validity of the views I've shared above? If so, I'd welcome learning what those are.
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| Arcane_Mathematician |
| Posted: Mon Feb 15, 2010 3:19 pm Post subject: |
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Actually, most sects of Religion are seen by a mass majority of the population as obsolete or wrong. There is no majority winner, so, truth be told, the majority says that every religion is either obsolete (Roman Gods) or wrong (Christianity).
Proof: Islam is incompatible with the tenets of Christianity, due to a disagreement with the fundamental ideals behind the two (Jesus being the son of God, and Muhammad being the final profit of God). If all Muslims say Christians are wrong and vis versa, then we have a Minority Muslim and a Majority Christianity. Now, add in Hinduism, who disagree with both Abrahamic religions, and both disagree with Hinduism. With a total of approximately 4.4-5 billion people, there is a majority of those who disagree with the largest held religious staple, Christianity (2.1-2.2 billion adherents). Since we have a majority who disagree with the supposed majority, I think its safe to say the majority opinion is that religions are wrong.
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| skeptic |
| Posted: Mon Feb 15, 2010 4:17 pm Post subject: |
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Good point. I once read an estimate that there are 20,000 substantially different religions on planet Earth. This ignores minor differences in denomination. Now, each of those 20,000 religions claim to be sole possessors of The Truth. And everyone else is wrong.
Obviously, this cannot be correct. The maximum number of religions that can have it correct is one. My own view is that the number that are correct is zero.
Last edited by skeptic on Mon Feb 15, 2010 6:35 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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| Arcane_Mathematician |
| Posted: Mon Feb 15, 2010 5:13 pm Post subject: |
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Suffice to say, its less than or equal to 1. I don't care which, if any, is correct. It's the fact that all but 1 are wrong that I care about
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| Pong |
| Posted: Mon Feb 15, 2010 9:58 pm Post subject: |
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| inow wrote: |
| Selection for (group attachments) was so robust that parts of the brain became specialized in the sense of attachment and group association. When those brain areas are damaged, people's sense of "oneness" with the nature around them... with the universe... is greatly magnified. |
That's not exactly what happened here though. We damaged a specific area of the brain already known responsible for "Me" definition. The result was people with a blurred sense of self, who scored highly in their sense of "universal oneness".
So the idea now is that in some individuals excessively self-centered thoughts may be emanating from this area, which we could suppress.
This is gonna sound wild, but I think this study corroborates a pet-theory of mine, that prehistoric surgery through the skull (which by fossil record was typically successful and freakishly common especially among early civilizations) was deliberate psychosurgery to modify social behaviour. Most of their holes access the parietal lobes.
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| SkinWalker |
| Posted: Mon Feb 15, 2010 10:21 pm Post subject: |
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Trephination was conducted by many cultures throughout history and prehistory. Some of the earliest known examples are with Andean cultures where the trepanned areas were coincident with prior cranial damage due to injuries. If indeed the incidence of parietal region trephinations is higher than, say, frontal or occipital, then this could correlate to the incidence of being struck in the head during conflict by club or mace. In fact, a study that I cite in a monograph I wrote on the topic of artificial cranial modification closely correlates a particular mace to the wound sizes found in reformed bone present in trepanned regions of the skull.
While "psychosurgery" may have been a goal of some trephinations, it seems unlikely at least for many if not most. Still, there are indications that even early "surgeons" were aware that head ache and even behavior was correlated to the brain or at least in the head. But this isn't hard to intuit since there is a definite sense of "being" that comes from the region. Early archaeologists and scientists (Broca and others) thought that trephination was a method of "letting out demons" or some other supernatural response to human beliefs.
I studied this at length and found little or no evidence to support it. Though there's no reason it cannot be so that I've found either.
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