Religion
And The Brain
In
the new field of "neurotheology," scientists seek the biological basis
of spirituality. Is God all in our heads?
May 7 issue — One Sunday morning in March, 19 years ago, as Dr. James
Austin waited for a train in London, he glanced away from the tracks toward the
river Thames. The neurologist—who was spending a sabbatical year in
England—saw nothing out of the ordinary: the grimy Underground station, a few
dingy buildings, some pale gray sky. He was thinking, a bit absent-mindedly,
about the Zen Buddhist retreat he was headed toward. And then Austin suddenly
felt a sense of enlightenment unlike anything he had ever experienced. His sense
of individual existence, of separateness from the physical world around him,
evaporated like morning mist in a bright dawn. He saw things "as they
really are," he recalls. The sense of "I, me, mine" disappeared.
"Time was not present," he says. "I had a sense of eternity. My
old yearnings, loathings, fear of death and insinuations of selfhood vanished. I
had been graced by a comprehension of the ultimate nature of things."
CALL IT A MYSTICAL EXPERIENCE, a spiritual moment, even a religious
epiphany, if you like—but Austin will not. Rather than interpret his instant
of grace as proof of a reality beyond the comprehension of our senses, much less
as proof of a deity, Austin took it as "proof of the existence of the brain."
He isn't being smart-alecky. As a neurologist, he accepts that all we see, hear,
feel and think is mediated or created by the brain.
Austin's moment in the Underground therefore inspired him to explore the
neurological underpinnings of spiritual and mystical experience. In order to
feel that time, fear and self-consciousness have dissolved, he reasoned, certain
brain circuits must be
interrupted. Which ones? Activity in the amygdala, which monitors the
environment for threats and registers fear, must be damped. Parietal-lobe
circuits, which orient you in space and mark the sharp distinction between self
and world, must go quiet. Frontal- and temporal-lobe circuits, which mark time
and generate self-awareness, must disengage. When that happens, Austin concludes
in a recent paper, "what we think of as our 'higher' functions of selfhood
appear briefly to 'drop out,' 'dissolve,' or be 'deleted from
consciousness'." When he spun out his theories in 1998, in the 844-page
"Zen and the Brain," it
was published not by some flaky New Age outfit but by MIT
Since then, more and more
scientists have flocked to "neurotheology," the study of the
neurobiology of religion and
spirituality. Last year the American Psychological Association published
"Varieties of Anomalous Experience," covering enigmas from near-death
experiences to mystical ones. At Columbia University's new Center for the Study
of Science and Religion, one
program investigates how spiritual experiences reflect "peculiarly
recurrent events in human brains." In December, the scholarly Journal of
Consciousness Studies devoted its issue to religious moments ranging from
"Christic visions" to "shamanic states of consciousness." In
May the book "Religion in
Mind," tackling subjects such as how religious practices act back on the
brain's frontal lobes to inspire optimism and even creativity, reaches stores.
And in "Why God Won't Go Away," published in April, Dr. Andrew Newberg
of the University of Pennsylvania and his late collaborator, Eugene d'Aquili,
use brain-imaging data they
collected from Tibetan Buddhists lost in meditation and from Franciscan nuns
deep in prayer to ... well, what they do involves a lot of neuro-jargon about
lobes and fissures. In a nutshell, though, they use the data to identify what
seems to be the brain's spirituality circuit, and to explain how it is that
religious rituals have the power to move believers and nonbelievers alike.
What all the new research shares is a passion for
uncovering the neurological underpinnings of spiritual and mystical
experiences--for discovering, in short, what happens in our brains when we sense
that we "have encountered a reality different from--and, in some crucial
sense, higher than--the reality of everyday experience," as psychologist
David Wulff of Wheaton College in Massachusetts puts it.
OUTSIDE OF TIME AND SPACE
What all the new research shares is a passion for uncovering the neurological
underpinnings of spiritual and mystical experiences—for discovering, in short,
what happens in our brains when we sense that we "have encountered a
reality different from—and, in some crucial sense, higher than—the reality
of everyday experience," as psychologist David Wulff of Wheaton College in
Massachusetts puts it. In neurotheology, psychologists and neurologists try to
pinpoint which regions turn on, and which turn off, during experiences that seem
to exist outside time and space. In this way it differs from the rudimentary
research of the 1950s and 1960s that found, yeah, brain
waves change when you meditate. But that research was silent on why brain
waves change, or which specific regions in the brain
lie behind the change. Neuroimaging of a living, working brain
simply didn't exist back then. In contrast, today's studies try to identify the brain
circuits that surge with activity when we think we have encountered the divine,
and when we feel transported by intense prayer, an uplifting ritual or sacred
music. Although the field is brand new and the answers only tentative, one thing
is clear. Spiritual experiences are so consistent across cultures, across time
and across faiths, says Wulff, that it "suggest[s] a common core that is
likely a reflection of structures and processes in the human brain."
There was a feeling of
energy centered within me ... going out to infinite space and returning ...
There was a relaxing of the dualistic mind, and an intense feeling of love. I
felt a profound letting go of the boundaries around me, and a connection with
some kind of energy and state of being that had a quality of clarity,
transparency and joy. I felt a deep and profound sense of connection to
everything, recognizing that there never was a true separation at all.
That is how Dr. Michael J.
Baime, a colleague of Andrew Newberg's at Penn, describes what he feels at the
moment of peak transcendence when he practices Tibetan Buddhist meditation, as
he has since he was 14 in 1969. Baime offered his brain to Newberg, who, since childhood, had wondered about
the mystery of God's existence. At Penn, Newberg's specialty is radiology, so he
teamed with Eugene d'Aquili to use imaging techniques to detect which regions of
the brain are active during
spiritual experiences. The scientists recruited Baime and seven other Tibetan
Buddhists, all skilled meditators.
TESTING FOR THE TIMELESS AND INFINITE
In a typical run, Baime settled onto the floor of a small darkened room, lit
only by a few candles and filled with jasmine incense. A string of twine lay
beside him. Concentrating on a mental image, he focused and focused, quieting
his conscious mind (he told the scientists afterward) until something he
identifies as his true inner self emerged. It felt "timeless and
infinite," Baime said afterward, "a part of everyone and everything in
existence." When he reached the "peak" of spiritual intensity, he
tugged on the twine. Newberg, huddled outside the room and holding the other
end, felt the pull and quickly injected a radioactive tracer into an IV line
that ran into Baime's left arm. After a few moments, he whisked Baime off to a
SPECT (single photon emission computed tomography) machine. By detecting the
tracer, it tracks blood flow in the brain.
Blood flow correlates with neuronal activity.
The SPECT
images are as close as scientists have come to snapping a photo of a
transcendent experience. As expected, the prefrontal cortex, seat of attention,
lit up: Baime, after all, was focusing deeply. But it was a quieting of activity
that stood out. A bundle of neurons in the superior parietal lobe, toward the
top and back of the brain, had
gone dark. This region, nicknamed the "orientation association area,"
processes information about space and time, and the orientation of the body in
space. It determines where the body ends and the rest of the world begins.
Specifically, the left orientation area creates the sensation of a physically
delimited body; the right orientation area creates the sense of the physical
space in which the body exists. (An injury to this area can so cripple your
ability to maneuver in physical space that you cannot figure the distance and
angles needed to navigate the route to a chair across the room.)
SELF AND NOT-SELF
The orientation area requires sensory input to do its calculus. "If you
block sensory inputs to this region, as you do during the intense concentration
of meditation, you prevent the brain
from forming the distinction between self and not-self," says Newberg. With
no information from the senses arriving, the left orientation area cannot find
any boundary between the self and the world. As a result, the brain
seems to have no choice but "to perceive the self as endless and intimately
interwoven with everyone and everything,"
Newberg and d'Aquili write
in "Why God Won't Go Away." The right orientation area, equally bereft
of sensory data, defaults to a feeling of infinite space. The meditators feel
that they have touched infinity.
I felt communion, peace,
openness to experience ... [There was] an awareness and responsiveness to God's
presence around me, and a feeling of centering, quieting, nothingness, [as well
as] moments of fullness of the presence of God. [God was] permeating my being.
This is how her 45-minute
prayer made Sister Celeste, a Franciscan nun, feel, just before Newberg
SPECT-scanned her. During her most intensely religious moments, when she felt a
palpable sense of God's presence and an absorption of her self into his being,
her brain displayed changes like
those in the Tibetan Buddhist meditators: her orientation area went dark. What
Sister Celeste and the other nuns in the study felt, and what the meditators
experienced, Newberg emphasizes, "were neither mistakes nor wishful
thinking. They reflect real, biologically based events in the brain."
The fact that spiritual contemplation affects brain
activity gives the experience a reality that psychologists and neuroscientists
had long denied it, and explains why people experience ineffable, transcendent
events as equally real as seeing a wondrous sunset or stubbing their toes.
PINPOINTING SPIRITUAL
EXPERIENCE
That a religious experience is reflected in brain
activity is not too surprising, actually. Everything we experience—from the
sound of thunder to the sight of a poodle, the feeling of fear and the thought
of a polka-dot castle—leaves a trace on the brain.
Neurotheology is stalking bigger game than simply affirming that spiritual
feelings leave neural footprints, too. By pinpointing the brain
areas involved in spiritual experiences and tracing how such experiences arise,
the scientists hope to learn whether anyone can have such experiences, and why
spiritual experiences have the qualities they do.
I could hear the singing of
the planets, and wave after wave of light washed over me. But ... I was the
light as well ... I no longer existed as a separate 'I' ... I saw into the
structure of the universe. I had the impression of knowing beyond knowledge and
being given glimpses into ALL.
That was how author Sophy Burnham described her experience at Machu
Picchu, in her 1997 book "The Ecstatic Journey." Although there was no
scientist around to whisk her into a SPECT machine and confirm that her
orientation area was AWOL, it was almost certainly quiescent. That said, just
because an experience has a neural correlate does not mean that the
PRODUCING VISIONS
In fact, some of the same brain
regions involved in the pie experience create religious experiences, too. When
the image of a cross, or a Torah crowned in silver, triggers a sense of
religious awe, it is because the brain's visual-association area, which
interprets what the eyes see and connects images to emotions and memories, has
learned to link those images to that feeling. Visions that arise during prayer
or ritual are also generated in the association area: electrical stimulation of
the temporal lobes (which nestle along the sides of the head and house the
circuits responsible for language, conceptual thinking and associations)
produces visions.
Temporal-lobe
epilepsy—abnormal bursts of electrical activity in these regions—takes this
to extremes. Although some studies have cast doubt on the connection between
temporal-lobe epilepsy and religiosity, others find that the condition seems to
trigger vivid, Joan of Arc-type religious visions and voices. In his recent book
"Lying Awake," novelist Mark Salzman conjures up the story of a
cloistered nun who, after years of being unable to truly feel the presence of
God, begins having visions. The cause is temporal-lobe epilepsy. Sister John of
the Cross must wrestle with whether to have surgery, which would probably cure
her—but would also end her visions. Dostoevsky, Saint Paul, Saint Teresa of
Avila, Proust and others are thought to have had temporal-lobe epilepsy, leaving
them obsessed with matters of the spirit.
Although temporal-lobe
epilepsy is rare, researchers suspect that focused bursts of electrical activity
called "temporal-lobe transients" may yield mystical experiences. To
test this idea, Michael Persinger of Laurentian University in Canada fits a
helmet jury-rigged with electromagnets onto a volunteer's head. The helmet
creates a weak magnetic field, no stronger than that produced by a computer
monitor. The field triggers bursts of electrical activity in the temporal lobes,
Persinger finds, producing sensations that volunteers describe as supernatural
or spiritual: an out-of-body experience, a sense of the divine. He suspects that
religious experiences are evoked by mini electrical storms in the temporal
lobes, and that such storms can be triggered by anxiety, personal crisis, lack
of oxygen, low blood sugar and simple fatigue—suggesting a reason that some
people "find God" in such moments. Why the temporal lobes? Persinger
speculates that our left temporal lobe maintains our sense of self. When that
region is stimulated but the right stays quiescent, the left interprets this as
a sensed presence, as the self departing the body, or of God.
Those most open to mystical experience tend also to be
open to new experiences generally. They are usually creative and innovative,
with a breadth of interests and a tolerance for ambiguity (as determined by
questionnaire). They also tend toward fantasy, notes David Wulff ...
I was alone upon the seashore ... I felt that I ... return[ed] from the
solitude of individuation into the consciousness of unity with all that is ...
Earth, heaven, and sea resounded as in one vast world encircling harmony ... I
felt myself one with them.
Is an experience like this
one, described by the German philosopher Malwida von Meysenburg in 1900, within
the reach of anyone? "Not everyone who meditates encounters these sorts of
unitive experiences," says Robert K.C. Forman, a scholar of comparative religion
at Hunter College in New York City. "This suggests that some people may be
genetically or temperamentally predisposed to mystical ability." Those most
open to mystical experience tend also to be open to new experiences generally.
They are usually creative and innovative, with a breadth of interests and a
tolerance for ambiguity (as determined by questionnaire). They also tend toward
fantasy, notes David Wulff, "suggesting a capacity to suspend the judging
process that distinguishes imaginings and real events." Since "we all
have the brain circuits that
mediate spiritual experiences, probably most people have the capacity for having
such experiences," says Wulff. "But it's possible to foreclose that
possibility. If you are rational, controlled, not prone to fantasy, you will
probably resist the experience."
MEASURING SPIRITUAL FORCE
In survey after survey since the 1960s, between 30 and 40 percent or so of those
asked say they have, at least once or twice, felt "very close to a
powerful, spiritual force that seemed to lift you out of yourself." Gallup
polls in the 1990s found that 53 percent of American adults said they had had
"a moment of sudden religious awakening or insight." Reports of
mystical experience increase with education, income and age (people in their 40s
and 50s are most likely to have them).
Yet many people seem no more able to have such an experience than to fly
to Venus. One explanation came in 1999, when Australian researchers found that
people who report mystical and spiritual experiences tend to have unusually easy
access to subliminal consciousness. "In people whose unconscious thoughts
tend to break through into consciousness more readily, we find some correlation
with spiritual experiences," says psychologist Michael Thalbourne of the
University of Adelaide. Unfortunately, scientists are pretty clueless about what
allows subconscious thoughts to pop into the consciousness of some people and
not others. The single strongest predictor of such experiences, however, is
something called "dissociation." In this state, different regions of
the brain disengage from others.
"This theory, which explains hypnotizability so well, might explain
mystical states, too," says Michael Shermer, director of the Skeptics
Society, which debunks paranormal
phenomena. "Something really seems to be going on in the brain,
with some module dissociating from the rest of the cortex."
THE NEURAL BASIS FOR
RELIGIOUS EXPERIENCE
That dissociation may reflect unusual electrical crackling in one or more brain
regions. In 1997, neurologist Vilayanur Ramachandran told the annual meeting of
the Society for Neuroscience that there is "a neural basis for religious
experience." His preliminary results suggested that depth of religious
feeling, or religiosity, might depend on natural—not
helmet-induced—enhancements in the electrical activity of the temporal lobes.
Interestingly, this region of the brain also seems important for speech perception. One
experience common to many spiritual states is hearing the voice of God. It seems
to arise when you misattribute inner speech (the "little voice" in
your head that you know you generate yourself) to something outside yourself.
During such experiences, the brain's Broca's area (responsible for speech
production) switches on. Most of us can tell this is our inner voice speaking.
But when sensory information is restricted, as happens during meditation or
prayer, people are "more likely to misattribute internally generated
thoughts to an external source," suggests psychologist Richard Bentall of
the University of Manchester in England in the book "Varieties of Anomalous
Experience."
Stress and emotional arousal
can also interfere with the brain's ability to find the source of a voice,
Bentall adds. In a 1998 study, researchers found that one particular brain
region, called the right anterior cingulate, turned on when people heard
something in the environment—a voice or a sound—and also when they
hallucinated hearing something. But it stayed quiet when they imagined hearing
something and thus were sure it came from their own brain.
This region, says Bentall, "may contain the neural circuits responsible for
tagging events as originating from the external world." When it is
inappropriately switched on, we are fooled into thinking the voice we hear comes
from outside us.
Even people who describe
themselves as nonspiritual can be moved by religious ceremonies and liturgy.
Hence the power of ritual. Drumming, dancing, incantations—all rivet attention
on a single, intense source of sensory stimulation, including the body's own
movements. They also evoke powerful emotional responses. That
combination—focused attention that excludes other sensory stimuli, plus
heightened emotion—is key. Together, they seem to send the brain's arousal
system into hyperdrive, much as intense fear does. When this happens, explains
Newberg, one of the brain
structures responsible for maintaining equilibrium—the hippocampus—puts on
the brakes. It inhibits the flow of signals between neurons, like a traffic cop
preventing any more cars from entering the on-ramp to a tied-up highway.
'SOFTENING OF THE
BOUNDARIES OF THE SELF'
The result is that certain regions of the brain
are deprived of neuronal input. One such deprived region seems to be the
orientation area, the same spot that goes quiet during meditation and prayer. As
in those states, without sensory input the orientation area cannot do its job of
maintaining a sense of where the self leaves off and the world begins. That's
why ritual and liturgy can bring on what Newberg calls a "softening of the
boundaries of the self"—and the sense of oneness and spiritual unity.
Slow chanting, elegiac liturgical melodies and whispered ritualistic prayer all
seem to work their magic in much the same way: they turn on the hippocampus
directly and block neuronal traffic to some brain
regions. The result again is "blurring the edges of the brain's sense of
self, opening the door to the unitary states that are the primary goal of
religious ritual," says Newberg.
Researchers' newfound
interest in neurotheology reflects more than the availability of cool new toys
to peer inside the working brain.
Psychology and neuroscience have long neglected religion. Despite its centrality to the mental lives of so
many people, religion has been
met by what David Wulff calls "indifference or even apathy" on the
part of science. When one psychologist, a practicing Christian, tried to discuss
in his introductory psych book the role of faith in people's lives, his
publisher edited out most of it—for fear of offending readers. The rise of
neurotheology represents a radical shift in that attitude. And whatever light
science is shedding on spirituality, spirituality is returning the favor:
mystical experiences, says Forman, may tell us something about consciousness,
arguably the greatest mystery in neuroscience. "In mystical experiences,
the content of the mind fades, sensory awareness drops out, so you are left only
with pure consciousness," says Forman. "This tells you that
consciousness does not need an object, and is not a mere byproduct of sensory
action."
For all the tentative
successes that scientists are scoring in their search for the biological bases
of religious, spiritual and mystical experience, one mystery will surely lie
forever beyond their grasp. They may trace a sense of transcendence to this
bulge in our gray matter. And they may trace a feeling of the divine to that
one. But it is likely that they will never resolve the greatest question of
all—namely, whether our brain
wiring creates God, or whether God created our brain
wiring. Which you believe is, in the end, a matter of faith.
With Anne Underwood