Back to Cosmic Relief Miracles & Wonders Page
Back to Cosmic Relief Links Page
Real news from C
SMIC RELIEF
The
only official web site by Cosmic Connie
NEW:
Cosmic Connie's Blog: Whirled Musings
Home | Email Cosmic Connie
Researchers discover possible "God module" in circuitry of brain
Are humans hardwired to hear the voice of God? Scientists at the University of California, San Diego, recently found that parts of the brain's temporal lobe, dubbed the "God module," may be the seat of mystical experiences.
The scientists, possibly fearing retribution from militant believers, emphasized that their findings in no way suggest that religion is simply a matter of brain chemistry. "So please don't hurt us," they added.
NEW ORLEANS -- Researchers at the University of California, San Diego, have reported that the human brain may be hard-wired to hear the voice of heaven. This may be the first effort to directly address the neural basis of religious experience and expression.
While studying a group of patients suffering from an unusual form of epilepsy that effects the temporal lobe, researchers at the UC San Diego brain and perception laboratory determined that the parts of the brain's temporal lobe -- which the scientists immediately named the "God module" -- may affect how intensely a person responds to religious beliefs.
People suffering this rare type of epilepsy have long reported intense mystical and religious experiences during their seizures. However, they are also unusually preoccupied with mystical thoughts between seizures. That gave this team the idea to use these patients to investigate the relationship between the physical structure of the brain and spiritual experiences.
In their carefully designed experiment, researchers determined that one effect of the patients' seizures was to strengthen their brain's involuntary response to religious words, leading the scientists to suggest a portion of the brains was naturally attuned to ideas about a supreme being.
The team reported that it was not clear why such dedicated neural machinery for religion may have evolved, but they suggested that one possibility was to encourage tribe loyalty or reinforce kinship ties or the stability of a closely knit clan.
The scientists emphasized that their findings in no way suggest religion is nothing more than a matter of brain chemistry. "These studies do not in any way negate the validity of religious experience or God," they cautioned. "They merely provide an explanation in terms of brain regions that may be involved."
The researchers studied three patients, all of whom displayed the unusual mystical preoccupations and profound religious feelings of people whose epilepsy affects the temporal lobe. They tested the patients' involuntary responses to a series of test words about sex, violence and religion by measuring the electrical conductivity of their skin. This is a standard laboratory technique for assessing emotional responses. Comparing the patients' responses to those of a group of more normally religious people and a neutral control group, they found that the patients had an unusually strong reaction to religious terms like the word "god" compared to the other people tested.
Researchers said their study suggests there may be neural circuits in the temporal lobe that could be part of the machinery of the brain involved in the mystical experiences and God. Both during the seizures and in between the seizures, there is a heightened activity of these circuits.