Religion Today by Aden Ross;

Author:Aden, Ross; [Aden, Ross]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
Published: 2012-02-26T16:00:00+00:00

Building Blocks for a Proposed Theory of Religious Experience

The plasticity of the brain

The emergent character of culture

The interaction of brain, mind, and culture to produce religious experience

The proposed theory is built on three major points from current research (listed in the textbox “Building Blocks for a Proposed Theory of Religious Experience”).

The Plasticity of the Brain

The first insight is the “plasticity” of the brain. The common idea is that brain capacity grows rapidly during childhood and then remains static until it decays in old age. Moreover, the human brain has stayed the same throughout the ages. But current brain science has confirmed that the brain remains pliable and can change throughout life in response to stimuli. Studies have confirmed that this finding also applies to religious experience. For example, one study compared Buddhists who practiced a form of concentrated awareness called insight meditation with a control group. The brain scans of the Buddhists showed increased thickness in the prefrontal cortex, especially in the right hemisphere.164 This area is associated with attention. Interestingly, the most dramatic increases were in older persons who usually have a thinning of the cortex.165

But meditation is not the only activity that changes the brain. Other research has shown that patterns, rhythms, and repetition of ritual also alter brain structure and processes.166 Of course, religions have already known about the effects of repeated behavior. They have relied on meditation, ritual, ascetic disciplines, and group processes to train and nurture believers in religious experiences. As we have seen in the theories of Patañjali, Huxley, and even William James, the training involves more than objective descriptions of the mystical state. They prescribe what believers are to experience.

Surveys and studies of ordinary people have shown that religious experience is not merely a capability of a few gifted individuals. The findings of neuroscience suggest that the systems of the brain make it capable of religious experience. It may be that the brain is predisposed to it. However, religious experience is not predetermined. Humans cultivate this trait in various ways and to various degrees.

The Emergent Character of Culture

Why do all people have this trait in the first place? We have described the views that religion is only a product of the malfunction of brain systems. If so, then religions are coaching people in mental disorders. But this chapter has shown that religious experience is so common and widespread that, in general, it cannot be viewed as abnormal. To counter the notion that religious experience is merely the result of faulty brain chemistry, some scholars propose that consciousness is an emergent characteristic. If so, as a form of awareness religious experience is a form of that emergent trait.

The theory of emergence holds that there are different levels to reality. For example, we can go downward through these levels from mind to brain, from brain to brain cells (neurons and glial cells), and from cells to atoms and from atoms to electrons, etc. As we go downward, each level represents a simpler system. As we go upward, each level represents a more complex system.

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