Is the impulse to evolve a clue—and a cue—for us to open our minds to radical new possibilities for human existence? Explore these and other questions about consciousness, evolution and human destiny with visionary futurist Peter Russell.
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Category: NEUROSCIENCE
We’re used to thinking about the self as an independent entity, something that we either have or are. In The Ego Tunnel, philosopher Thomas Metzinger claims otherwise: No such thing as a self exists. The conscious self is the content of a model created by our brain—an internal image, but one we cannot experience as an image. Everything we experience is “a virtual self in a virtual reality.”
But if the self is not “real,” why and how did it evolve? How does the brain construct it? Do we still have souls, free will, personal autonomy, or moral accountability? In a time when the science of cognition is becoming as controversial as evolution, The Ego Tunnel provides a stunningly original take on the mystery of the mind.
TEDxRheinMain – Prof. Dr. Thomas Metzinger – The Ego Tunnel
Brain, bodily awareness, and the emergence of a conscious self: these entities and their relations are explored by Germanphilosopher and cognitive scientist Metzinger. Extensively working with neuroscientists he has come to the conclusion that, in fact, there is no such thing as a “self” — that a “self” is simply the content of a model created by our brain – part of a virtual reality we create for ourselves.
But if the self is not “real,” he asks, why and how did it evolve? How does the brain construct the self? In a series of fascinating virtual reality experiments, Metzinger and his colleagues have attempted to create so-called “out-of-body experiences” in the lab, in order to explore these questions. As a philosopher, he offers a discussion of many of the latest results in robotics, neuroscience, dream and meditation research, and argues that the brain is much more powerful than we have ever imagined. He shows us, for example, that we now have the first machines that have developed an inner image of their own body — and actually use this model to create intelligent behavior.
In addition, studies exploring the connections between phantom limbs and the brain have shown us that even people born without arms or legs sometimes experience a sensation that they do in fact have limbs that are not there. Experiments like the “rubber-hand illusion” demonstrate how we can experience a fake hand as part of our self and even feel a sensation of touch on the phantom hand form the basis and testing ground for the idea that what we have called the “self” in the past is just the content of a transparent self-model in our brains.
Now, as new ways of manipulating the conscious mind-brain appear on the scene, it will soon become possible to alter our subjective reality in an unprecedented manner. The cultural consequences of this, Metzinger claims, may be immense: we will need a new approach to ethics, and we will be forced to think about ourselves in a fundamentally new way. At TEDxRheinMain 2011 he will share his thoughts on consciousness and the self and talk about the concept of the Ego-Tunnel.
Pro. Dr. Thomas Metzinger:
(*1958 in Frankfurt am Main, Germany) is currently Professor of Theoretical Philosophy at the Johannes Gutenberg‐Universität Mainz and an Adjunct Fellow at the Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Study.
In 2009 he returned from a prestigious one‐year Fellowship at the Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin (Berlin Institute for Advanced Study), is past president of the German Cognitive Science Society and currently president of the Association for the Scientific Study of Consciousness. His focus of research lies in analytical philosophy of mind, philosophy of science and philosophical aspects of the neuro- and cognitive sciences as well as connections between ethics, philosophy of mind and anthropology.
He has edited and published extensively in German and English, e.g. one major scientific monograph developing a comprehensive, interdisciplinary theory about consciousness, the phenomenal self, and the first‐person perspective (“Being No One — The Self‐Model Theory of Subjectivity”, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2003). In 2009, he published a popular book, which addresses a wider audience and also discusses the ethical, cultural and social consequences of consciousness research (“The Ego Tunnel — The Science of the Mind and the Myth of the Self”, New York: Basic Books)
Antinatalists Already Know what Modern Psychology Will Reveal
”Why bother to succeed as individuals or to progress as societies once we have identified ourselves as only a crisscrossing mesh of stuttering memories, sensations, and impulses?”
”I am like a puppet sitting here. It’s not just I; all of us are puppets. Nature is
pulling the strings, but we believe that we are acting. If you function that way [as puppets], then the problems are simple. But we have superimposed on that [the idea of] a “person” who is pulling those strings.”
Thomas Ligotti
It’s a Brain Puzzle:
When we look at prayer through the lens of neuroscience, we can make an interesting observation: Talking to God is not really different from talking to one’s friends and neighbors.
Praying is in many ways a fascinating phenomenon. To the believer it is a direct method for communicating with God, an ever-present source of comfort in school, at work, while walking, running, or driving. To some praying is a communication with the ultimate power, something that inspires awe, feelings of unconditional love, and, indeed, a sensed presence of God.
To scientists however, praying is fascinating for different reasons. Praying is a puzzling human phenomenon, especially from the perspective of brain science. The brain did not evolve to communicate with invisible supernatural beings. Rather, the brain evolved to cope with challenges in the natural environment, to survive predation and develop tools, and to understand social groups and to interact with other humans. Though complex and highly distributed, these skills seem to recruit specific systems in the brain that point to an evolved set of cognitive functions that enable us to do what we do.
So what happens when believers attempt to communicate with their God?
If the brain did not evolve a system for conversing with highly abstract invisible entities, what brain systems activate when it does?
In a recent study our team used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to investigate how the brain responded to praying in Christian believers. Surprisingly, considering God’s postulated invisibility, omnipresence, omnipotence, and omniscience, we found that conversing with God was not associated with regions that process abstract concepts. Rather, we found a marked pattern of activity in four regions that typically activate when humans relate to other humans. Neurologically, this finding suggests that strong believers process God as a concrete person – in spite of the theologically complex and highly abstract nature of the Christian God. Interestingly, we did not find this pattern in believers who did not use praying regularly. Perhaps the religious brain can learn to treat gods as real persons through regular practice and strong beliefs.
Importantly and somewhat contrary to the widespread assumption that communicating with God constitutes a unique experience reserved for believers, our findings suggest that praying to God is comparable to ‘normal’ interpersonal interaction, at least in terms of brain function. Praying, it seems, is subserved by the basic processing of our biologically evolved dispositions like other complex cultural phenomena, in this case the evolved human capacity for social cognition.
One might ask if these findings, then, are evidence that God is just an illusion, an imagined friend that always listens in times of distress? Or may they in fact be proof that God affects us even at the level of brain function? Atheists and believers alike take considerable interest in this kind of research. Fortunately, as a scientist my interest lies solely in the physical world and speculations about the spiritual dimension lie well beyond scientific scrutiny.
As Arhus University in Denmark, Uffe Schjødt researches the neurology of social and cultural phenomena. He is the author of several studies that examine the biological and evolutionary foundations of charisma and religion.
Who are your role models for aging? What are your expectations and attitudes about the progress of your mind as you get older? Do you expect your memory to be better or worse in ten or twenty years? How about your sex life? What are your fears, concerns, and worries about getting older? Are you hoping that someone will develop the mental equivalent of Viagra?
In the last thirty years, the scientific evidence supporting the notion that your mind can improve through the years has become overwhelming. Clearly, the question is no longer whether your mind can improve with age but, rather, how you can optimize your mental powers as you get older.
This book presents practical, evidence-based wisdom to help you answer this question. You’ll learn new skills to increase memory, intelligence, creativity, and concentration. And you’ll cultivate greater confidence and healthy optimism as you discover how to improve your mind as you age.
Michael Gelb
Is it really possible to improve your mind as you age? Doesn’t memory deteriorate as we grow older?
Yes, it’s possible to improve your mind as you age. Memory can, of course, deteriorate as we grow older, if we neglect it. The good news is that there are simple practices that the average person can do to prevent deterioration and actually improve with age. Brain Power is a guide to these simple practices.
You share that the paradigm has shifted in relation to age and the mind. Please explain.
Most of us were raised with faulty ideas about our mental capacity — such as the notion that IQ is fixed at age five, that brain cells degrade yearly after age thirty, and that memory and learning ability inevitably decline with age. These notions, based on the scientific understanding that was prevalent in the 1950s, are myths — dangerous myths that can stifle our ability to flourish in the second half of life.
Just as Copernicus overturned the myth that the earth was at the center of the universe, so contemporary neuroscience has revolutionized our understanding of the potential to improve mental functioning as we age. We now know that mental abilities, including memory, are designed to improve throughout life. Neuroscientists call this neuroplasticity.
The brain is not, as was once thought, a compartmentalized, hardwired, static machine whose parts eventually wear out. Instead, it is a highly adaptable and dynamic organ, capable of generating new neurons and improving as we get older. People of average intelligence can, with appropriate training, raise their IQ, enhance their memory, and sharpen their intelligence throughout life.
What role does optimism play in longevity? Do cultural and environmental stimuli influence brain function?
According to a long-term study by Dr. Becca Levy people with an optimistic attitude toward aging outlive those with a pessimistic attitude by an average of more than 7 years. It’s easier to be an optimist when you know that the brain is designed to improve with use!
Our brain function is influenced by cultural, environmental and, of course, genetic factors. And, we can, by cultivating a positive, intelligent attitude toward aging, make the most of our genetic, cultural and environmental circumstances.
What are the most powerful techniques to improve memory as we age?
Maintaining a positive attitude about your memory
is the first step. When people believe that their memory is fading, they don’t bother trying to concentrate on registering new information, thus fulfilling their negative expectation. All memory techniques (aka mnemonics) are based on strengthening associations, so focus on connecting new information to something you already know. I also strongly recommend “Mind Mapping” (developed by Tony Buzan, author of the foreword to Brain Power) a technique for strengthening memory and creativity simultaneously.
What are the worst mental habits to eliminate immediately?
The worst mental habits are those that create and reinforce patterns of anxiety, fear and stress. That’s why, in addition to the chapter on how to cultivate freedom from stress, this book comes with a free download of the remarkable Brain Sync audio program that effortlessly guides you to experience brain wave states associated with deep rest and relaxation.
What are the most detrimental phrases to eliminate from internal and external conversations?
The way you speak can reinforce or transform negative attitudes and stereotypes about aging. Be wary of conversations that focus on commiseration (literally “to be miserable together”). If you find yourself indulging in discussions that focus on how “things ain’t what they used to be,” shift to an emphasis on gratitude and appreciation.
Here are ten phrases to eliminate:
• I’m having a senior moment.
• I’m not what I used to be.
• I’m too old.
• I can’t remember anything anymore.
• My memory is going.
• Getting older stinks.
• Everything was easier when I was younger.
• I’m over the hill.
• My best days are behind me.
• Things keep getting worse as I get older.
There are so many brain boosting supplements on the market, if you were only to take a few, which ones are the most essential?
A high quality multivitamin/mineral supplement is the most important daily brain-booster along with fish oil and Acetyl-L-carnitine (ALC).
The Master and his Emissary: The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World ~ Ian McGilchrist
This book argues that the division of the brain into two hemispheres is essential to human existence, making possible incompatible versions of the world, with quite different priorities and values.
Most scientists long ago abandoned the attempt to understand why nature has so carefully segregated the hemispheres, or how to make coherent the large, and expanding, body of evidence about their differences. In fact to talk about the topic is to invite dismissal. Yet no one who knows anything about the area would dispute for an instant that there are significant differences: it’s just that no-one seems to know why. And we now know that every type of function – including reason, emotion, language and imagery – is subserved not by one hemisphere alone, but by both.
In this new RSAnimate, renowned psychiatrist and writer Iain McGilchrist explains how our ‘divided brain’ has profoundly altered human behaviour, culture and society. Taken from a lecture given by Iain McGilchrist as part of the RSA’s free public events programme.
This book argues that the differences lie not, as has been supposed, in the ‘what’ – which skills each hemisphere possesses – but in the ‘how’, the way in which each uses them, and to what end. But, like the brain itself, the relationship between the hemispheres is not symmetrical. The left hemisphere, though unaware of its dependence, could be thought of as an ‘emissary’ of the right hemisphere, valuable for taking on a role that the right hemisphere – the ‘Master’ – cannot itself afford to undertake. However it turns out that the emissary has his own will, and secretly believes himself to be superior to the Master. And he has the means to betray him. What he doesn’t realize is that in doing so he will also betray himself.
The book begins by looking at the structure and function of the brain, and at the differences between the hemispheres, not only in attention and flexibility, but in attitudes to the implicit, the unique, and the personal, as well as the body, time, depth, music, metaphor, empathy, morality, certainty and the self. It suggests that the drive to language was not principally to do with communication or thought, but manipulation, the main aim of the left hemisphere, which manipulates the right hand. It shows the hemispheres as no mere machines with functions, but underwriting whole, self-consistent, versions of the world.
Through an examination of Western philosophy, art and literature, it reveals the uneasy relationship of the hemispheres being played out in the history of ideas, from ancient times until the present. It ends by suggesting that we may be about to witness the final triumph of the left hemisphere – at the expense of us all.
Iain McGilchrist is a psychiatrist and writer who works privately in London, and otherwise lives on the Isle of Skye.
He is committed to the idea that the mind and brain can be understood only by seeing them in the broadest possible context, that of the whole of our physical and spiritual existence, and of the wider human culture in which they arise – the culture which helps to mould, and in turn is moulded by, our minds and brains.
He was a late entrant to medicine. After a scholarship to Winchester College, he was awarded a scholarship to New College, Oxford, where he read English. He won the Chancellor’s English Essay Prize and the Charles Oldham Shakespeare Prize in 1974 and graduated (with congratulated 1st Class Hons) in 1975 (MA 1979). He was awarded a Prize Fellowship of All Souls College, Oxford in 1975, teaching English literature and pursuing interests in philosophy and psychology between 1975 and 1982. He then went on to train in medicine, and during this period All Souls generously re-elected him to a further Fellowship (1984-1991), and again in 2002 (to 2004).
He was formerly a Consultant Psychiatrist of the Bethlem Royal and Maudsley NHS Trust in London, where he was Clinical Director of their southern sector Acute Mental Health Services. He is a Fellow of the Royal College of Psychiatrists and is specially approved by the Secretary of State under Section 12(2) of the Mental Health Act, 1983. He trained at the Maudsley Hospital in London, working on specialist units including the Neuropsychiatry and Epilepsy Unit, the Children’s Unit and the Forensic Unit, as well as, at Senior Registrar level, the National Psychosis Referral Unit and the National Eating Disorder Unit. During this period he also worked as a Research Fellow in neuroimaging at the Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, USA. His clinical experience has been broad-based, and he has run a busy Community Mental Health Team in an ethnically diverse and socially deprived area of south London. He is interested in a wide range of psychiatric conditions, including depression, psychosis, personality disorders (especially borderline personality disorder), anxiety disorders, chronic low self-esteem, phobias, alcohol and drug abuse, as well as neuropsychiatry.
He has a busy practice as a medico-legal expert.
He has published original articles in a wide range of papers and journals, including the Times Literary Supplement, The London Review of Books, The Listener, Essays in Criticism, Modern Language Review, The Sunday Times, The Sunday Telegraph, BMJ, English Historical Review, British Journal of Psychiatry, and American Journal of Psychiatry, on topics in literature, medicine and psychiatry, and has published original research on neuroimaging in schizophrenia, the phenomenology of schizophrenia, and other topics. He took part in a two-part Channel 4 documentary, Soul Searching, in 2003. His first book, Against Criticism, was published by Faber in 1982, and dates from before his medical training, but deals with issues of the wholeness, uniqueness and embodied nature of the work of art, which are continuous with his current concern, the relationship between the history of ideas and shifts in brain hemisphere function, a topic which he has been researching for 20 years, and which is the subject of a recent book published by Yale University Press, The Master and his Emissary: The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World.
His other interests include the relationship between creativity and mental illness, and he is currently working on a number of books: a critique of contemporary society and culture from the standpoint of neuropsychology; a study of the paintings of subjects with schizophrenia; a series of essays about culture and the brain with subjects from Andrew Marvell to Serge Gainsbourg; and a short book of reflections on spiritual experience.
The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World
Renowned psychiatrist and writer Iain McGilchrist explains how the ‘divided brain’ has profoundly altered human behaviour, culture and society.
Those in science who look for the one principle behind all physical manifestations seek the unified field. Those with a religious orientation who want to know more about the power behind everything seek God. Both are equally slippery pursuits, and both are equally honorable when approached with honesty and openness.
A crucible is a vessel used for refining a substance, usually with the addition of extreme heat, which is exactly what I see happening to religion these days. Science, particularly neurotheology, has been turning up the heat under a crucible in which all religious experiences and beliefs are being scrutinized.
When the Church was calling the shots, during the time of Galileo (1564–1642) for example, it avoided such objective scrutiny, and many religious people continue to resist it today. But truth is in everyone’s best interest. I don’t believe any of the founders of the major religions would have a problem with looking for the essential truth behind different religious experiences—or for that matter, with any study that resulted in challenging cherished illusions that followers of the various religions have held on to since the founders’ deaths.
We might think of the Buddha as the first neurotheologist. He was a Hindu who concluded after years of rigorous study that people didn’t need to worry about much of what Hindu religion taught. The Buddha wanted to alleviate suffering by limiting study to as few variables as possible. He taught people to focus their concern on the observable present, and he insisted that the key to our well-being would be found in our (scientific-like) detachment from all things, including God.
Similarly, although Jesus was a Jew, when he was a child, his parents took him to Egypt to study science and philosophy.1 When he was older, he spent seventeen years in India and Tibet to further his learning and his search for the underlying truth of life.2
Discovering underlying truth is the goal of both religion and science; the only difference between the two is perspective. Those in science who look for the one principle behind all physical manifestations seek the unified field. Those with a religious orientation who want to know more about the power behind everything seek God. Both are equally slippery pursuits, and both are equally honorable when approached with honesty and openness.
Three centuries after Jesus Christ’s death, the Roman emperor Constantine hijacked Christianity by making the honest search for truth sacrilegious. Muhammad picked up the slack, once again probing the nature of the one underlying truth behind all things (the one God he called Allah), but it’s been 1,400 years since his death in 632 BCE. Since then, religious authority has consolidated, peaked, and been in decline.
The Christian Reformation weakened the influence of the Catholic Church on people’s minds. With religious freedom more prevalent, people again began probing for the underlying truth of things. This freedom has led to a renewed interest in discovering the roots of the major religions, and perhaps more importantly, it’s opened the door to looking for truth from entirely new angles.
Neurotheology: A Bridge
The field of neurotheology began when it was first recognized that the workings of the brain affect religious experiences and belief. For instance, it was discovered that “some people who suffer from temporal-lobe epilepsy experience religious revelations or hallucinations during seizures, even if they are atheists. Work in the field roughly divides into two types: either stimulating spiritual experience with drugs or studying brain activity during such experiences using imaging techniques to see which regions of the brain change.”3
At first, these scientists were excited because they had discovered a quantifiable trigger to religious experience, seemingly invalidating the essential nature of those experiences. However, after more analysis, it was concluded that in “showing how these deep and life-changing experiences operate in the brain…they have not explained them away. In fact, they have helped to explain the causes behind these experiences and, to some degree, have even justified the validity of religion in a secular society.”4
In other words, the fact that a change in brain activity can be recorded when someone has a religious experience doesn’t negate that religious experience. In fact, it has neurotheologists working overtime to try to determine the underlying causation and the overlying order in life—just as Buddha, Jesus, and Muhammad once did.
Recently, researchers at the University of Missouri attempted to isolate the portion of the brain responsible for the measurable phenomena we know as spiritual experiences. They concluded: “Spirituality is a much more dynamic concept that uses many parts of the brain. Certain parts of the brain play more predominant roles, but they all work together to facilitate individuals’ spiritual experiences.”5 [See also Mario Beauregard’s excellent 2008 book, The Spiritual Brain: A Neuroscientist’s Case for the Existence of the Soul.]
Isolating the primary ingredient necessary for a spiritual experience has been more successful. Paul J. Zak, a mathematician who holds a doctorate in economics and has done post-doctoral work at Harvard, has identified oxytocin as the chemical that registers as love in our brains. He recommends hugging, dancing, petting animals, and meditation as ways to increase what he has coined the “moral molecule,” which he explores more deeply in his new book The Moral Molecule. To put his discoveries into practice, Zak founded the Center for Neuroeconomics Studies, which endeavors to bring oxytocin-building (feel-good) morality into economics.
Building on the idea that science can’t reduce religion to the result of brain functions, Andrew Newberg filled his book Why God Won’t go Away: Brain Science and the Biology of Belief with the reasons why this is so. In fact, he’s demonstrated that just as visions and belief can result from stimulated brain activity, the opposite is also true—a change in brain chemistry can be caused by a religious experience. Newberg, an MD who is also the director of research at the Myrna Brind Center of Integrative Medicine at Thomas Jefferson University and Hospital in Philadelphia, has also done research to determine whether there is any difference between the brains of religious and non-religious subjects. While the practice of religion can be viewed as a mixed blessing, Newberg discovered a surprising advantage to having a religious bent, at least among a certain group of people engaged in a particular practice.
Newberg measured “changes in cerebral blood flow among Franciscan nuns as they prayed in a meditative fashion, finding a significant increase in activity in the frontal lobe,” which governs the higher brain functions. He also found that this practice actually grew the frontal lobe.6 Increased activity in this area of the brain and especially the growth of this area translate into better emotional control and judgement. Improvements in the frontal lobe also result in enhanced motor skill in activities such as writing, problem-solving, memory storage, and social interaction, as well as in spontaneity.7
This intriguing search to discover useful nuggets in the foreign soil of religion has led Professor Michael Winkelman at Arizona State’s Department of Anthropology to argue that shamanism is actually the original naturally occurring form of neurotheology. Winkelman describes shamanism as “an ancient healing practice” that supports the brain as well as the neuro-network that affects the health of the entire body. He makes his case for the scientifically verifiable objectivity of shamanism by pointing out that “the shamans’ experiences and practices have fundamental similarities around the world because they reflect innate brain process and experiences.”8
Today, serious neurotheologists are as concerned about how beliefs affect the brain, the body, and the health of both as they are about how the brain effects beliefs. The classic example of this is the observation that Tibetan Buddhist monks aren’t as moody or sick as often as most regular people.
The Dalai Lama wondered if the practices the monks engage in could be shared for everyone’s benefit. His cooperation in a study resulted in the establishment of the Center for Mindfulness in Medicine, Health Care, and Society, which is part of the University of Massachusetts Medical School. Founded in 1995 by Jon Kabat-Zinn, PhD, the clinic teaches mindfulness techniques to patients with chronic diseases of all kinds to help them better handle their symptoms.9
The documented successes attributed to Buddhist-derived mindfulness techniques include reduction in stress, chronic pain and illness, anxiety and panic, GI distress, sleep disorders, fatigue, high blood pressure, and headaches.
Also, a study by Richard Davidson, PhD, of the Laboratory for Affective Neuroscience at the University of Wisconsin, found “significant increases in antibody titers to influenza vaccine among subjects in the meditation compared with those in the wait-list control group.” They concluded that their “findings demonstrate that a short program in mindfulness meditation produces demonstrable effects on brain and immune function. These findings suggest that meditation may change brain and immune function in positive ways.”10
Bringing the Spiritual Down to Earth
Religion was originally established for practical reasons. Buddha’s teachings were designed specifically for the needs of everyday people. Moses’s commandments gave his people much-needed order. Still, somehow, over the millennia, religions have lost much of their vitally practical orientation as they’ve settled into comfortable traditions. Neurotheology is helping these spiritual traditions rediscover their practical applications. Essentially, it puts religious practices in a crucible in an attempt to refine something useful for all humans, whether their orientation is secular or sacred.
I doubt that all mystical experiences will ever be verifiably traceable to either a cause or effect relationship in the human brain. However, the pursuit serves a vitally important role. It inspires religious people to reexamine the fundamentals of their faith, strengthening their belief in what can be verified and setting cultural considerations and faith in perspective. It also isolates and verifies what is universally practical in religious exercises for the secular public.
Neurotheology’s success in calling attention to the practicality of religion for the pragmatic world serves the purposes of all. Such work reinforces what we all have in common, lowering the barriers between science and religion. It demonstrates the practicality of the sacred to a secular population and introduces objective reality to those whose religious thinking has grown fuzzy with traditional beliefs over the millennia.
As exciting as these scientific discoveries are, the really significant aspect to it all is how the field of neurotheology is introducing a worldview in which both the spiritual and the secular are proving to be simply different perspectives on the one reality that affects us all. This reinforces our common needs and interconnectedness and is bound to increase understanding among people of all kinds, contributing to a goal that makes sense from any perspective: a more peaceful and sustainable world.
Notes
1. Paul Perry, Jesus in Egypt: Discovering the Secrets of Christ’s Childhood Years (New York: Ballantine Books, 2003).
2. Elizabeth Clare Prophet, The Lost Years of Jesus: Documentary Evidence of Jesus’ 17-Year Journey to the East, 2nd edition (Montana: Summit University Press, 1988).
3. Michael Quinion’s World Wide Words website, “Turns of Phrase: Neurotheology.“
4. Ibid.
5. Jessalyn Tenhouse, “No Single ‘God Spot’ in Human Brain,” Futurity, April 18, 2012.
6. Michael W. Taft,”Hardwired for the Mystical?” Science 2.0, February 8, 2012.
7. K. L. Harting, “Frontal Lobes of the Brain: What Functions Do They Control?” Yahoo! Voices, May 27, 2007.
8.”Professor Argues That Shamanism Is the Original Neurotheology,” Center for Cognitive Liberty & Ethics, June 5, 2001.
9. “Stress Reduction Program,” Center for Mindfulness in Medicine, Health Care, and Society website.
10. Richard J. Davidson, Jon Kabat-Zinn, PhD, Jessica Schumacher, et al., “Alterations in Brain and Immune Function Produced by Mindfulness Meditation,” Psychosomatic Medicine 65 (2003): 564–70.
Biography
Hunt Henion, PhD, writes nationally on practical spirituality for Examiner.com. He holds a doctorate in religious studies from Ashwood University, has authored four books, and is a reviewer of inspirational books. He can be reached at forum@shiftawareness.com.
In Consciousness Beyond Life, the internationally renowned cardiologist Dr. Pim van Lommel offers ground-breaking research into whether or not our consciousness survives the death of our body. If you enjoy books about near-death experiences, such as those by Raymond Moody, Jeffrey Long, and James Van Praagh; watch televisions shows like Ghosthunters, Touched by an Angel, and Ghost Whisperer; or are interested in works that explore the intersection of faith and science, such as Spiritual Brain, Signature in the Cell, and When Science Meets Religion; you’ll find much to ponder in Consciousness Beyond Life.
Book Description
As a cardiologist, Pim van Lommel was struck by the number of his patients who claimed to have near-death experiences as a result of their heart attacks. As a scientist, this was difficult for him to accept: Wouldn’t it be scientifically irresponsible of him to ignore the evidence of these stories? Faced with this dilemma, van Lommel decided to design a research study to investigate the phenomenon under the controlled environment of a cluster of hospitals with a medically trained staff.
For more than twenty years van Lommel systematically studied such near-death experiences in a wide variety of hospital patients who survived a cardiac arrest. In 2001, he and his fellow researchers published his study on near-death experiences in the renowned medical journal The Lancet.
The article caused an international sensation as it was the first scientifically rigorous study of this phenomenon. Now available for the first time in English, van Lommel offers an in-depth presentation of his results and theories in this book that has already sold over 125,000 copies in Europe.
Van Lommel provides scientific evidence that the near-death phenomenon is an authentic experience that cannot be attributed to imagination, psychosis, or oxygen deprivation. He further reveals that after such a profound experience, most patients’ personalities undergo a permanent change. In van Lommel’s opinion, the current views on the relationship between the brain and consciousness held by most physicians, philosophers, and psychologists are too narrow for a proper understanding of the phenomenon. In Consciousness Beyond Life, van Lommel shows that our consciousness does not always coincide with brain functions and that, remarkably and significantly, consciousness can even be experienced separate from the body.
Pim van Lommel, M.D., was born in 1943, graduated in 1971 from the University of Utrecht, and finished his specialization in cardiology in 1976. He worked from 1977–2003 as a cardiologist in Hospital Rijnstate, an 800-bed Teaching Hospital in Arnhem, the Netherlands, and is now doing full-time research on the mind-brain relation.
He published several articles on cardiology, but since he started his research on near-death experiences (NDE) in survivors of cardiac arrest in 1986, he is the author of more than 20 articles (most of them in Dutch), one book, and several chapters about NDE. He is married, has two children and five grandchildren.
In November 2007, his book Endless Consciousness (Eindeloos Bewustzijn) was published in The Netherlands, which was a bestseller with more than 100.000 copies sold within one year. It was nominated for the Book of the Year in 2008. This book has also been published in Germany by Patmos Verlag as Endloses Bewusstsein. Neue Medizinische Fakten zur Nahtoderfahrung, and in English by HarperCollins as Consciousness Beyond Life: The Science of the Near-Death Experience.
Present! – Pim van Lommel (part one) Consciousness Beyond Life
Mel Van Dusen interviews renowned cardiologist Pim van Lommel about his research into the near-death experience and it’s implications for a radically new paradigm for living in the 21st century.
Present! – Pim van Lommel (part two) Consciousness Beyond Life
Pt.3 of 4 – Dr. Pim Van Lommel – Consciousness Beyond Life
Pt.4 of 4 – Dr. Pim Van Lommel – Consciousness Beyond Life
Deepak Chopra and Rudy Tanzi are co-authors of their forthcoming book Superbrain: New Breakthroughs for Maximizing Health, Happiness and Spiritual Well-Being by Harmony Books.
Like a personal computer, science needs a Recycle Bin for ides that didn’t work out as planned. In this bin would go commuter trains riding on frictionless rails using superconductivity, along with interferon, the last AIDS vaccine, and most genetic therapies. These failed promises have two things in common: they looked like the wave of the future but then reality proved too complex to fit the simple model that was being offered.
The next thing to go into the Recycle Bin in might be the brain. We are living in a golden age of brain research, thanks largely to vast improvements in brain scans. Now that functional MRIs can give snapshots of the brain in real time, researchers can see specific areas of the brain light up, indicating increased activity. On the other hand, dark spots in the brain indicate minimal activity or none at all. Thus we arrive at those familiar maps that compare a normal brain with one that has deviated from the norm. This is obviously a great boon where disease is concerned. Doctors can see precisely where epilepsy or Parkinsonism or a brain tumor has created damage, and with this knowledge new drugs and more precise surgery can target the problem.
But then overreach crept in. We are shown brain scans of repeat felons with pointers to the defective areas of their brains. The same holds for Buddhist monks, only in their case, brain activity is heightened and improved, especially in the prefrontal lobes associated with compassion. By now there is no condition, good or bad, that hasn’t been linked to a brain pattern that either “proves” that there is a link between the brain and a certain behavior or exhibits the “cause” of a certain trait. The whole assumption, shared by 99% of neuroscientists, is that we are our brains.
In this scheme, the brain is in charge, having evolved to control certain fixed behaviors. Why do men see other men as rivals for a desirable woman? Why do people seek God? Why does snacking in front of the TV become a habit? We are flooded with articles and books reinforcing the same assumption: the brain is using you, not the other way around. Yet it’s clear that a faulty premise is leading to gross overreach.
The flaws in current reasoning can be summarized with devastating force:
1. Brain activity isn’t the same as thinking, feeling, or seeing.
2. No one has remotely shown how molecules acquire the qualities of the mind.
3. It is impossible to construct a theory of the mind based on material objects that somehow became conscious.
4. When the brain lights up, its activity is like a radio lighting up when music is played. It is an obvious fallacy to say that the radio composed the music. What is being viewed is only a physical correlation, not a cause.
It’s a massive struggle to get neuroscientists to see these flaws. They are king of the hill right now, and so long as new discoveries are being made every day, a sense of triumph pervades the field. “Of course” we will solve everything from depression to overeating, crime to religious fanaticism, by tinkering with neurons and the kinks thrown into normal, desirable brain activity. But that’s like hearing a really bad performance of Rhapsody in Blue and trying to turn it into a good performance by kicking the radio.
We’ve become excited by a flawless 2008 article published by Donald D. Hoffman, professor of cognitive sciences at the University of California Irvine. It’s called “Conscious Realism and the Mind-Body Problem” , and its aim is to show, using logic, philosophy, and neuroscience that we are not our brains. We are “conscious agents,” Hoffman’s term for minds that shape reality, including the reality of the brain. Hoffman is optimistic that the thorny problem of consciousness can be solved, and science can find a testable model for the mind. But future progress depends on researchers abandoning their current premise, that the brain is the mind. We urge you to read the article in its entirety, but for us, the good news is that Hoffman’s ideas show that the tide may be turning.
It is degrading to human potential when the brain uses us instead of vice versa. There is no doubt that we can become trapped by faulty wiring in the brain – this happens in depression, addictions, and phobias, for example. Neural circuits can seemingly take control, and there is much talk of “hard wiring” by which some activity is fixed and preset by nature, such as the fight-or-flight response. But what about people who break bad habits, kick their addictions, or overcome depression? It would be absurd to say that the brain, being stuck in faulty wiring, suddenly and spontaneously fixed the wiring. What actually happens, as anyone knows who has achieved success in these areas, is that the mind takes control. Mind shapes the brain, and when you make up your mind to do something, you return to the natural state of using your brain instead of the other way around.
It’s very good news that you are not your brain, because when mind finds its true power, the result is healing, inspiration, insight, self-awareness, discovery, curiosity, and quantum leaps in personal growth. The brain is totally incapable of such things. After all, if it is a hard-wired machine, there is no room for sudden leaps and renewed inspiration. The machine simply does what it does. A depressed brain can no more heal itself than a car can suddenly decide to fly. Right now the golden age of brain research is brilliantly decoding neural circuitry, and thanks to neuroplasticity, we know that the brain’s neural pathways can be changed. The marvels of brain activity grow more astonishing every day. Yet in our astonishment it would be a grave mistake, and a disservice to our humanity, to forget that the real glory of human existence is the mind, not the brain that serves it.
