The Mystical Mind: Probing the Biology of Religious Experience (Theology and the Sciences)

The Mystical Mind: Probing the biology of religious experience, by Eugene d'Aquili and Andrew B. Newberg, Theology and the Sciences Series, Fortress Press, Minneapolis, MN, 1999, 240 ff.The neurology of mystical experienceBy Howard JonesUntil his death in 1998, Eugene d'Aquili was Clinical Associate Professor of Psychiatry at the University of Pennsylvania Medical School and his co-author is Clinical Assistant Professor in the Department of Radiology at the same university. They have pioneered neurological research into the nature of mystical experiences for the past quarter-century.After an introductory chapter explaining the scope of the book, Chapter 2 outlines the anatomy and physiology of the brain relevant to mystical experiences. The next chapters deal with the mind and myth and how the processes of consciousness use cognitive operators that work in the brain in a similar manner to mathematical operators: `The cognitive operators represent the way that the mind functions on all input into the brain [including] sensory input, thoughts and emotions.' The authors suggest that the generation of myth and its expression through ritual `can be traced to the functioning of the cognitive operators.' The importance of this is that myths and rituals form the basis of religions. The authors maintain that: `Ritual and liturgy help bring mysticism and spirituality to the masses in a manner impossible by meditation.'In the following chapter the authors discuss the neurophysiology of a unitary continuum of mystical experience. This state may involve various human experiences such as the aesthetic joy derived from Nature or music, the intense feeling of romantic love, the numinous experience derived from a vision of a divine that may be provoked by a mandala or mantra, to the state of oneness experienced as the culmination of a transcendental meditation. The rhythm of the activities involved in ritual, such as chanting or dancing, contributes to these transcendental states. The authors discuss the neurophysiological processes involved here. These rituals contain universal elements applicable at all times of the religious calendar and others that are specific for particular occasions - Christmas or Easter, Rosh Hashana or Passover, and so on.From their physiological studies, the authors suggest models to explain the processes involved in various types of meditative states and there is a whole chapter on the near-death experience as a mystical phenomenon. They attempt a definition of religion in the context of a neuropsychological basis for the concept of deity, and explore the nature of consciousness in terms of reality and sacred visions.This is an erudite but therefore challenging book for any but those immersed in the psychology of religion at the highest level. I suspect that it will be barely accessible to the general reader.Dr Howard A. Jones is the author of The Thoughtful Guide to God (2006) and The Tao of Holism (2008), both published by O Books of Winchester, UK. The Biology of Belief: Unleashing the Power of Consciousness, Matter and Miracles How God Changes Your Brain: Breakthrough Findings from a Leading Neuroscientist

This book is part of a series intended to demonstrate the existence of common ground between science and religion. Its stated aim is to "explore a nontraditional approach to religion and theology that is based not so much on highly abstract concepts or ancient texts as on that part of human beings that allows us to study all of these concepts and to contemplate and, perhaps, experience, the higher being or state of being—the mystical mind."The book has three parts. The first purports to describe the functioning of the brain and central nervous system, or the "brain/mind", as the authors like to refer to it. I suspect that readers with no prior knowledge of the subject would find the account difficult to follow. What they may not realize is that even readers who are familiar with conventional neurophysiological terminology and concepts will be pretty much at sea, for the real purpose of this section does not seem to be to give an objective description of modern ideas about the brain but rather to introduce the unconventional ideas and vocabulary that the authors will use in the rest of the book.These require taking on board a considerable number of neologisms that do not form part of ordinary neurology. We encounter, for example, something called a cognitive operator which is "essentially similar to the operators used in mathematics". There are seven different types of cognitive operator: holistic operator, reductionist operator, quantitative operator, and so forth. Then there is the "empiric modification cycle", or EMC, which the authors regard as very important. It is described in rather vague and abstract terms, with only a token attempt to base it anatomically in brain areas such as the limbic system and autonomic nervous system.Part Two is titled "The Mystical Mind" and seeks to provide a neurological basis, complete with "models" and complex diagrams, for the production of myths, the existence of ritual, and mystical experience, including the near-death experience. Here the authors implicitly accept the existence of a value scale in mystical states, with "higher" and "lower" types of experience. At the apex, predictably, we find the experience of "Absolute Unitary Being", or AUB. At the psychological level this corresponds to "pure consciousness", the condition of being conscious but not conscious of anything outside oneself. This is equated with God, though the authors prefer to speak of "higher being".Here we are going well beyond the accepted boundaries of neurology and entering the realm of metaphysics. Part Three is in fact explicitly metaphysical, being concerned with "neurotheology". Once again we encounter the various kinds of "cognitive operator" that we were introduced to in Part One, but now united with phenomenology. Applying this mixture to theological concepts yields "metatheology" and finally "megatheology", which the authors hope will provide a near-universal theology that "could be adopted by most, if not all, of the world's great religions as a basic element without any serious violation of their essential doctrines."This is certainly an ambitious book, and I cannot avoid feeling that it contains elements of what I have called the Casaubon delusion—the overpowering conviction that one has found a universal key to explain all mythologies. Admittedly the authors do include suitable caveats for their more speculative ideas, but perhaps not as many as they should. They conclude modestly: "Whether this megatheology deriving from neurotheology will be helpful to anyone, only time will tell."I am not confident that it will be helpful; at least, it wasn't for me. Neurology is always difficult but this is difficult in the wrong way: too much jargon, too little firm basis in facts, too much unfounded speculation. Moreover, although it is supposed to be science, it offers explanations and models but makes few or no predictions, but science demands predictions. I was left with the impression that the authors started from a settled view—that mystical experience affords knowledge of ultimate reality—and then tried to construct a neurological basis for that position. But the validity of mystical knowledge has to be argued on its own terms; it depends on metaphysics, not neurology. And the authors seem to agree, for in their concluding pages they take a "rigorous phenomenological approach" and boldly pose the question: "What is the nature of reality?"This, of course, is the ultimate metaphysical question about the meaning of Life, the Universe, and Everything. For Douglas Adams in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Universe the answer, famously, was 42. These authors are rather more verbose. "Since it is in principle impossible to determine which starting point is more "fundamental", external reality or the awareness of the knower, one is forced to conclude that both conclusions about God (AUB) are in a profound and fundamental sense true - namely, that God is created by the world (the brain and the rest of the central nervous system) and that the world is created by God."Thirty years ago I might have agreed with this conclusion, but today I prefer 42. You pays your money and you takes your choice.

There is a very good and important book in here - somewhere. Unfortunately, what is enormously significant information about how our brains work, is written in the form of a scientific paper by two men who are clearly primarly scientists rather than scientific writers. The book spouts arcane scietific terminology throughout, focusing very much on detail rather than a bigger picture, and is very dense in the infomation it gives, with only rare flashes of lucidity. Scientific terms are rarely explained, meaning one needs to use an advanced dictionary to be able to understand what is being said. In reality, what was needed was this material being written by a scientific writer with the verve, clarity and energy of a Richard Dawkins or Edward O. Wilson, where the subject was made truely accessible and was illuminated with eloquence.. If you do manage to slog your way through this clogging book - ironically the antithesis of mystical - you will find fascinating information on how your brain works, and in particular how it works with regard to religion - basically, that our brains are so structured and composed to require us to create religion. So was it worth the slog? Ultimately it was, but it is a very frustrating read, and really needs to be rewritten by someone who can make a complex, but by no means impossible subject come alive, showing how the findings here can profoundly illuminate our lives.