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We have been endowed with a symbolic brain that helps us adapt to and survive in our natural and man-made worlds. However it is open to both true and false beliefs both of which have impacts on our well-being. Supernatural beliefs may lead to disastrous consequences but continue to exist because they actually serve human survival through their reliance on faith and reduction of stress. So our symbolic brain's readiness for supernatural beliefs is a mixed blessing-but a blessing nevertheless. BOOK REVIEW A cleareyed look at the psychological and biological foundation of supernatural beliefs. In this accessible text, Kagan (The Psychological Immune System, 2006) undertakes to explain the seemingly inextinguishable human predilection toward faith in the supernatural. He discusses his subject in clear language with plenty of examples, drawing from the research and publications of psychologists, evolutionary biologists and neurologists, as well as other thinkers. Facts and hypotheses from these disciplines weave together into a well-structured argument. By supernatural beliefs, Kagan means to refer to everything from religion to belief in magic or aliens. Such a large definition at first seems untenable, but Kagan ties everything together well enough to convince readers that it's all related and relevant. He covers plenty of ground, from making sense of global warming to how professionals determine when supernatural beliefs have crossed the line into pathology. Kagan also frequently refers to his theory of the psychological immune system, which he developed in his first work: "I envision our symbolic brain as an important tool used extensively by our psychological immune system (Psy-IS) in its quest to protect, preserve, and enhance the life, property, and identity of ourselves and those we love and are bonded to." The symbolic brain provides the psychological immune system with material to accomplish these aims. Comfort, aspirations, and the cessation of anxiety and pain can result from supernatural beliefs, he says, which fits well with the functions of the psychological immune system. His knowledge of psychology enables him to consider the general mechanisms that underlie particular beliefs, and his keen interest flows through the book's easy-to-follow structure. The extensive reference list for further reading will appeal to lay readers eager to follow the argument Kagan coherently assembles. An excellent introduction to the science behind our beliefs.
The book lays out the evolutionary, historical and scientific evidence that a psychological immune system exists and details how this system functions and the impact it has had on our personal, social and national life. It shows ways that it can be helpful in our attempt to identify and handle the threats and dangers that face us just as our biological immune system does. And, like our biological immune system, it has the potential to be both beneficial and lethal.
Synthesizing thirty years of research, psychologist and science historian, Michael Shermer upends the traditional thinking about how humans form beliefs about the world. Simply put, beliefs come first and explanations for beliefs follow. The brain, Shermer argues, is a belief engine. Using sensory data that flow in through the senses, the brain naturally looks for and finds patterns - and then infuses those patterns with meaning, forming beliefs. Once beliefs are formed, our brains subconsciously seek out confirmatory evidence in support of those beliefs, which accelerates the process of reinforcing them, and round and round the process goes in a positive-feedback loop. In The Believing Brain, Shermer provides countless real-world examples of how this process operates, from politics, economics, and religion to conspiracy theories, the supernatural, and the paranormal. Ultimately, he demonstrates why science is the best tool ever devised to determine whether or not our belief matches reality.
Shermer demonstrates how our brains selectively assess data in an attempt to confirm the conclusions (beliefs) we've already reached. Drawing on evolution, cognitive science, and neuroscience, he considers not only supernatural beliefs but political and economic ones as well.
WHY DO YOU BELIEVE THE THINGS YOU BELIEVE? Do you remember events differently from how they really happened? Where do your superstitions come from? How do morals evolve? Why are some people religious and others nonreligious? Everyone has thoughts and questions like these, and now Andrew Newberg and Mark Waldman expose, for the first time, how our complex views emerge from the neural activities of the brain. Bridging science, psychology, and religion, they demonstrate, in simple terminology, how the brain perceives reality and transforms it into an extraordinary range of personal, ethical, and creative premises that we use to build meaning, value, spirituality, and truth into our lives. When you come to understand this remarkable process, it will change forever the way you look at the world and yourself. Supported by groundbreaking research, including brain scans of people as they pray, meditate, and even speak in tongues, Newberg and Waldman propose a new model for how deep convictions emerge and influence our lives. You will even glimpse how the mind of an atheist works when contemplating God.Using personal stories, moral paradoxes, and optical illusions, the authors demonstrate how our brains construct our fondest assumptions about reality, offering recommendations for exercising your most important muscle in order to develop a more life-affirming, flexible range of attitudes. You'll discover how to: Recognize when your beliefs are altered by others Guard against mental traps and prejudicial thinking Distinguish between destructive and constructive beliefs Cultivate spiritual and ethical ideals Ultimately, we must always return to our beliefs. From the ordinary to the extraordinary, they give meaning to the mysteries of life, providing us with our individual uniqueness and the ability to fill our lives with joy. Most important, though, they give us inspiration and hope, beacons to guide us through the light and dark corners of the soul
Whether we like it or not, deception is something we have to deal with almost every day. We are bombarded with advertisements for great deals, but the catch is always in the fine print. Deception has become a norm but does that mean honesty has ceased to exist? A Grand Debate takes a look at honesty versus deception by delving deeper into research done by professionals in the scientific and medical fields. Written in a conversational style, two people go head to head in a discussion to prove which is more prevalent in society today. Who will win the final battle?
About 90% of people have faith in a supreme being, but our yearning for the divine, and whatever it promises, involves a large divergence in mental states and behaviors. Some adhere to doctrine, supplication, and fastidious religious practices; others have a strong sense they are part of something greater and more universal. However, all religious and spiritual paths are mediated by complex brain networks. When different areas of the brain are stimulated, a person can have a variety of experiences, but there is no specific ‘God spot’ where stimulation enhances religiosity or spirituality. Functional brain imaging shows that there are specific areas of the brain that ‘light up’ when subjects perform certain religious activities, but imaging only provides anatomic correlations, not functional explanations. The Believer's Brain takes a step beyond these singular methodologies, providing converging evidence from a variety study methods of how humans’ brain networks mediate different aspects of religious and spiritual beliefs, feelings, actions, and experiences. Although the book reveals how our brain is the home to the religious and spiritual mind, understanding this gift will not diminish our spirituality or our love or our belief in a supreme being, but will increase appreciation of the apparatus that mediates these mental states.
Religious life involves more than prosaically stated beliefs. It also encompasses attitudes, emotions, values, and practices whose meanings cannot be adequately captured in verbal assertions but require effective expression in forceful images, portrayals, and enactments of a nonliteral sort. Indeed, the world's religious traditions are each marked by rich and distinctive symbols. In More Than Discourse, Donald A. Crosby discusses the nature of symbols in religion and investigates symbols appropriate for religious naturalism or what he terms Religion of Nature. This is a religious outlook that holds the natural world to be the only world; it is sacred but without any supernatural domain or presence underlying it. Warning against a too-literalistic approach to any religion by either its adherents or its critics, Crosby discusses the nature and roles of religious symbols, how they work, and their particular kinds of truth or falsity. A set of criteria for evaluating the effectiveness and meaning of religious symbols is provided along with explorations of specific symbols Crosby finds to be highly significant for Religion of Nature.
Science of the Supernatural takes the findings of science and applies them to the doctrines of religion. It tells how the natural and the supernatural are just two different parts of the same real universe. It shows why the spiritual realm is unseen by us and yet is as real as the elements that make up the earth. It explains why we mortals canaEUR(tm)t see the spiritual realm, and yet, the spiritual realm can affect us.We can contact God and get answers and sometimes even get what are called miracles from him.It shows how creation came from what we call nothing and how the creation, as given in Genesis, is God organizing what is already there. It tells why the fall of Adam left us in such sad state and how it will be for our benefit in time. It explains how God works with this fallen world. And it explains how to not only search for God as so many do but how to actually find him.Marvelous and wonderful truths are found when the theories of science are applied to the doctrines and truths of religion. They fit together quite well.
The cognitive science of religion is a rapidly growing field whose practitioners apply insights from advances in cognitive science in order to provide a better understanding of religious impulses, beliefs, and behaviors. In this book Ilkka Pyysiäinen shows how this methodology can profitably be used in the comparative study of beliefs about superhuman agents. He begins by developing a theoretical outline of the basic, modular architecture of the human mind and especially the human capacity to understand agency. He then goes on to discuss examples of supernatural agency in detail, arguing that the human ability to attribute beliefs and desires to others forms the basis of conceptions of supernatural agents and of such social cognition in which supernatural agents are postulated as interested parties in social life. Beliefs about supernatural agency are natural, says Pyysiäinen, in the sense that such concepts are used in an intuitive and automatic fashion. Two dots and a straight line below them automatically trigger the idea of a face, for example. Given that the mind consists of a host of such modular mechanisms, certain kinds of beliefs will always have a selective advantage over others. Abstract theological concepts are usually elaborate versions of such simpler and more contagious folk conceptions. Pyysiäinen uses ethnographical and survey materials as well as doctrinal treatises to show that there are certain recurrent patterns in beliefs about supernatural agents both at the level of folk-religion and of formal theology.