Religion Instinct?!

[Maeght]

So, there you go!  As I keep saying, some people have a natural ability to experience spiritual aspects of life. Some don't.  Maybe it can be learnt and depending on the person it may be relatively easy or very difficult.  It shows that there is a 'faculty' that enables spiritual experience.

Its not just, 'if you can see it, why can't I'?  Or...'If you can't show us the evidence, it cannot exist'! 

Also, the experiences cannot be brushed off as 'its all just brain wiring'.  Eye sight, hearing, taste etc. are all dependent on brain wiring, but that doesn't mean they don't connect us to real things.

I've always said exactly what is covered in that article, that how we interpret the world depends on how our brains are wired, and that study can rewire, reprogram, our brains. This is true of any study though. Where we differ Sriram is your interpretation that this study uncovers some extra, special faculty to see what is really there, whereas I just see this as a different way of interpreting the world which gives no greater understanding of what is real.

[Walter]

Go ahead and see what happens.

I want his agreement first .

[Sriram]

Hi everyone,

The point is that you people are not honestly agreeing to the following...

1. Certain experiences such as spiritual experiences, depend on brain wiring. If the wiring is not right, the person will not be able to experience such matters. This is fact as per the article above.

2. Since it depends on brain wiring, the experiences need not be purely imaginary or wishful thinking. It could be our connection to a reality that some people are unable to experience. Just as brain wiring enables eyesight, hearing etc. these internal wiring could connect us to a reality that is not otherwise obvious.  Since most spiritual people agree on the many beneficial effects of the experiences, they can be taken as real.

3. Evidence in objective terms cannot be provided.  Only anecdotal accounts can be provided.  So, stop asking for 'evidence...evidence'.  If you can't see it...you just can't. 

Cheers.

Sriram

[Gordon]

Hi everyone,

The point is that you people are not honestly agreeing to the following...

1. Certain experiences such as spiritual experiences, depend on brain wiring. If the wiring is not right, the person will not be able to experience such matters. This is fact as per the article above.

2. Since it depends on brain wiring, the experiences need not be purely imaginary or wishful thinking. It could be our connection to a reality that some people are unable to experience. Just as brain wiring enables eyesight, hearing etc. these internal wiring could connect us to a reality that is not otherwise obvious.  Since most spiritual people agree on the many beneficial effects of the experiences, they can be taken as real.

3. Evidence in objective terms cannot be provided.  Only anecdotal accounts can be provided.  So, stop asking for 'evidence...evidence'.  If you can't see it...you just can't. 

Cheers.

Sriram

Nope: you're begging the question here.

Mental experiences are unavoidably neurological experiences, and therefore vary across individuals, but that doesn't imply that what is experienced is some sort of external reality. For example, people with some forms of mental illness experience auditory hallucinations (they 'hear voices') but their internal mental experience doesn't then mean these voices are in any sense externally real.

[Sriram]

But how do you know that the people with these capabilities are most certainly not experiencing anything real? That is just your assumption.

[Gordon]

But how do you know that the people with these capabilities are most certainly not experiencing anything real? That is just your assumption.

Because a) many stop hearing voices as they respond to treatment, and b) these 'voices' are not external auditory events (in that they can't be heard by others who are in the same place at the same time).

[Maeght]

Hi everyone,

The point is that you people are not honestly agreeing to the following...

1. Certain experiences such as spiritual experiences, depend on brain wiring. If the wiring is not right, the person will not be able to experience such matters. This is fact as per the article above.

2. Since it depends on brain wiring, the experiences need not be purely imaginary or wishful thinking. It could be our connection to a reality that some people are unable to experience. Just as brain wiring enables eyesight, hearing etc. these internal wiring could connect us to a reality that is not otherwise obvious.  Since most spiritual people agree on the many beneficial effects of the experiences, they can be taken as real.

3. Evidence in objective terms cannot be provided.  Only anecdotal accounts can be provided.  So, stop asking for 'evidence...evidence'.  If you can't see it...you just can't. 

Cheers.

Sriram

This again reflects your view that there is a facility lacking in some people so that they cannot experience things which are real. That their wiring isn't 'right'. That's not what the article talks about, it talks about how religious study can mean that people interpret experiences as having a spiritual cause due to how the brain has been wired differently by that study. It talks about interpretation not about an extra ability. The interpretation could be correct but it could be incorrect, this study tells us nothing about that.

[Maeght]

The call for evidence is, in my view, often intended as a way of making the person who is making the religious or spiritual claim accept that this claim is a personal belief and is based on interpretation of experiences. Evidence isn't necessarily expected.

[Aruntraveller]

So because some of us haven't got the correct wiring we have no right to question your (dubious) assertions.

Are you sure you are not a politician?

[Udayana]

How can anyone know who has or doesn't have the "correct wiring" unless they have some other way to work out what is real or not?

The "hard wiring" idea is already wrong as the brain is constantly changing and reconfiguring itself (or at least we can agree that it seems to).

 

[Enki]

Sriram,

1. Certain experiences such as spiritual experiences, depend on brain wiring. If the wiring is not right, the person will not be able to experience such matters. This is fact as per the article above.

Actually the article suggests that anyone's brain wiring might be changed "if you contemplate God long enough". Why should this be so surprising?  The brains of people who have had strokes can change to allow some functionality to be regained by alterations in neurological pathways. There is some evidence that London cab drivers who have the 'knowledge'  show brain changes in the hippocampus. The brain is a malleable entity which is capable of development in all sorts of areas given the correct inputs.

2. Since it depends on brain wiring, the experiences need not be purely imaginary or wishful thinking. It could be our connection to a reality that some people are unable to experience. Just as brain wiring enables eyesight, hearing etc. these internal wiring could connect us to a reality that is not otherwise obvious.  Since most spiritual people agree on the many beneficial effects of the experiences, they can be taken as real.

There is no reason not to think that such experiences are intense personal experiences and they are very much distinct from eyesight or hearing.  With eyesight, for instance, we can ascertain whether we are seeing something objectively real by using other senses for verification. E'g. If we see a brick wall, we could try walking through it to see if it was real. other people would also see it.  On the other hand, if it was an hallucination, there would be nothing to stop us walking through it. Spiritual experiences are of a different class altogether. There is not the slightest evidence that they are connecting us to a different reality. We only have the assertion of someone who may be interpreting their own subjective experience in that way, be it as their particular god, or some sort of universal consciousness or whatever.
I have no problem with the idea of the benficial effects of such experiences because it seems they release opioid peptides and dopamine, which gives a sensation of satisfaction and supression of pain.

3. Evidence in objective terms cannot be provided.  Only anecdotal accounts can be provided.  So, stop asking for 'evidence...evidence'.  If you can't see it...you just can't.

Unfortunately the suggestion that we stop looking for evidence is a no no, because the only other alternative is to accept anecdotal accounts without due examination.
Perhaps, because you are asking us to suspend our disbelief, it just might be that your brain is wired in such a way that you give such little importance to evidence.
As you say, 'If you can't see it...you just can't.' However I live in hope that one day your brain may develop such important critical faculties.

[SteveH]

Sriram - you have not yet provided any evidence or argument to show that your spiritual experiences refer to anything outside your brain, nor, in the nature of things, can you: it is fundamentally undemonstrable.

[Sriram]

Sriram - you have not yet provided any evidence or argument to show that your spiritual experiences refer to anything outside your brain, nor, in the nature of things, can you: it is fundamentally undemonstrable.

Yes...it cannot be demonstrated.  That's what I have been saying.

[SteveH]

I give up.

[Sriram]

I give up.

Suits me!

[Bramble]

Sriram - you have not yet provided any evidence or argument to show that your spiritual experiences refer to anything outside your brain

To be fair to Sriram I don't think he has ever claimed on this site to have had a 'spiritual experience', nor has he so much as suggested that he has actually tried any of the 'objective methods' that he advocates, such as meditation and yoga. Indeed, his zealotry reminds me very much of the kind of brittle certainties one typically hears from the newly converted, blissfully free from the hard lessons of personal experience, who have discovered the one true way and can't wait to impose it on an unreceptive world, whose duty it is to validate it lest undermining doubts set in.

But, of course, Sriram is hardly new to this game: he has been hammering the same nail here since the site's inception, and before that for years on the BBC board, which makes me wonder why it remains so important to him that we, the unwashed, agree with him. He doesn't even seem to have changed his forceful (and sometimes quite insulting) proselytising approach, even though it must by now have occurred to him that keeping on doing the same thing whilst expecting a different result looks awfully like madness. But then I suppose it is our fault for not engaging in the techniques and methods he vaguely alludes to but never actually specifies or explains, such that one might follow up on them if one so chose. A potentially fatal flaw for him here, of course, is that plenty of folk do engage in many years (even decades) of meditation but fail to experience the 'truths' that he espouses. In fact, many come to very different realisations, which might explain why he doesn't seem to like Zen very much.

Previous posts of his suggest that it is a significant part of his belief system that all of humanity - and indeed the rest of the animal kingdom too! - will somehow converge on a single shared experience of the gospel according to Sriram. But since he has recently stated that he thinks some people simply aren't 'wired' for this revelation of divine Truth I'm not sure how he can expect us to join the merry crowd at the gates of moksha. Perhaps we'll need first to reincarnate as vessels more worthy of his scattered pearls.

[Sriram]

To be fair to Sriram I don't think he has ever claimed on this site to have had a 'spiritual experience', nor has he so much as suggested that he has actually tried any of the 'objective methods' that he advocates, such as meditation and yoga. Indeed, his zealotry reminds me very much of the kind of brittle certainties one typically hears from the newly converted, blissfully free from the hard lessons of personal experience, who have discovered the one true way and can't wait to impose it on it upon an unreceptive world, whose duty it is to validate it lest undermining doubt set in. But, of course, Sriram is hardly new to this game: he has been hammering the same nail here since the site's inception, and before that for years on the BBC board, which makes me wonder why it remains so important to him that we, the unwashed, agree with him. He doesn't even seem to have changed his forceful (and sometimes quite insulting) proselytising approach, even though it must by now have occurred to him that keeping on doing the same thing whilst expecting a different result looks awfully like madness. But then I suppose it is our fault for not engaging in the techniques and methods he vaguely alludes to but never actually specifies or explains, such that one might follow up on them if one so chose. A potentially fatal flaw for him here, of course, is that plenty of folk do engage in many years (even decades) of meditation but fail to experience the 'truths' that he espouses. In fact, many come to very different realisations, which might explain why he doesn't seem to like Zen very much. Previous posts of his suggest that it is a significant part of his belief system that all of humanity - and indeed the rest of the animal kingdom too! - will somehow converge on a single shared experience of the gospel according to Sriram. But since he has recently stated that he thinks some people simply aren't 'wired' for this revelation of divine Truth I'm not sure how he can expect us to join the merry crowd at the gates of moksha. Perhaps we'll need first to reincarnate as vessels more worthy of his scattered pearls.

Yes...indeed. I do think that many people would need to reincarnate into suitable vessels to be capable of further realization. You got it!

[Roses]

Yes...indeed. I do think that many people would need to reincarnate into suitable vessels to be capable of further realization. You got it!

And what would be a suitable vessel, an ocean liner?

[Walter]

To be fair to Sriram I don't think he has ever claimed on this site to have had a 'spiritual experience', nor has he so much as suggested that he has actually tried any of the 'objective methods' that he advocates, such as meditation and yoga. Indeed, his zealotry reminds me very much of the kind of brittle certainties one typically hears from the newly converted, blissfully free from the hard lessons of personal experience, who have discovered the one true way and can't wait to impose it on it upon an unreceptive world, whose duty it is to validate it lest undermining doubt set in. But, of course, Sriram is hardly new to this game: he has been hammering the same nail here since the site's inception, and before that for years on the BBC board, which makes me wonder why it remains so important to him that we, the unwashed, agree with him. He doesn't even seem to have changed his forceful (and sometimes quite insulting) proselytising approach, even though it must by now have occurred to him that keeping on doing the same thing whilst expecting a different result looks awfully like madness. But then I suppose it is our fault for not engaging in the techniques and methods he vaguely alludes to but never actually specifies or explains, such that one might follow up on them if one so chose. A potentially fatal flaw for him here, of course, is that plenty of folk do engage in many years (even decades) of meditation but fail to experience the 'truths' that he espouses. In fact, many come to very different realisations, which might explain why he doesn't seem to like Zen very much. Previous posts of his suggest that it is a significant part of his belief system that all of humanity - and indeed the rest of the animal kingdom too! - will somehow converge on a single shared experience of the gospel according to Sriram. But since he has recently stated that he thinks some people simply aren't 'wired' for this revelation of divine Truth I'm not sure how he can expect us to join the merry crowd at the gates of moksha. Perhaps we'll need first to reincarnate as vessels more worthy of his scattered pearls.

I must have read the same line four times , paragraphs?

However , a good post all the same .

[Bramble]

And what would be a suitable vessel, an ocean liner?

Or a chamber pot, perhaps?

[ekim]

Hi everyone,

The point is that you people are not honestly agreeing to the following...

1. Certain experiences such as spiritual experiences, depend on brain wiring. If the wiring is not right, the person will not be able to experience such matters. This is fact as per the article above.

2. Since it depends on brain wiring, the experiences need not be purely imaginary or wishful thinking. It could be our connection to a reality that some people are unable to experience. Just as brain wiring enables eyesight, hearing etc. these internal wiring could connect us to a reality that is not otherwise obvious.  Since most spiritual people agree on the many beneficial effects of the experiences, they can be taken as real.

3. Evidence in objective terms cannot be provided.  Only anecdotal accounts can be provided.  So, stop asking for 'evidence...evidence'.  If you can't see it...you just can't. 

Cheers.

Sriram

My impression is that Newberg is extending the experiments which Pavlov carried out on dogs to examine the psychology of behavioural conditioning, to examining the effect on the neurology of the human brain now that the technology is available.  Conditioning, apart from the motivation of desire (particularly for reward), usually requires repetition in some form or other.  The, so called, spiritual practices he mentioned of prayer, meditation and yoga have a strong element of repetition and it is this repetition which can create the appropriate 'wiring' which in turn creates the various subjective experiences.  Unfortunately, such conditioning processes can be used for good or ill, as we can see from the positive and negative elements associated with a variety of religions, politics and businesses.  However, within some 'spiritual' practices is the idea of what you mentioned, Mukti or Moksha, a means of liberating the subject consciousness from the subjective conditioning effects rather than identifying with them or adding to them, including metaphysical speculation.

[Walter]

Yes...indeed. I do think that many people would need to reincarnate into suitable vessels to be capable of further realization. You got it!

I believe that you will accept my woo if I call it quantum

quote from DEEPAK  CHOPRA

[Robbie]

I give up.

He has said more than once that there is no concrete evidence.

I agree with you that we make a choice when it comes to faith but certain things have to fall in place first to convince us it is the right choice. Most people don't have a religious experience.

[Sriram]

He has said more than once that there is no concrete evidence.

I agree with you that we make a choice when it comes to faith but certain things have to fall in place first to convince us it is the right choice. Most people don't have a religious experience.

Hi Robbie,

People don't understand that evidence of the kind they want, is not possible.  In this thread I have linked an article that clearly demonstrates that certain brain wiring is necessary for spiritual experiences.  It can happen both ways....the effort taken for the experience can create the necessary wiring and the existence of the wiring can create the experience.

It is clear that without the wiring (or the necessary effort) such experiences are not possible. 

The experience itself is a glimpse of another aspect of reality.....though some people who cannot have these experiences, would like to believe that the experiences are just random or hallucinatory internal experiences not connected to any objective reality. 

This battle will go on...! 

Cheers.

Sriram

[Sriram]

I believe that you will accept my woo if I call it quantum

quote from DEEPAK  CHOPRA

Yes...that is the 'Two boxes syndrome' that I have discussed here many times.