(January 5, 2024 at 1:34 pm)neil Wrote: "The 'God' Part of the Brain" by Matthew Alper - I found any mention of this book only once on this forum, on a thread that's more than 10 years old.
Is anyone here familiar with this book? Although I haven't read it, I have heard the author interviewed about it, so I have an overview or superficial idea of what it's about.
In an interview with the author, they're discussing the gene or series of genes involved in producing a belief in deities, an afterlife, etc., and he's asked, "how did it get there - who put it there?" The way he responds to this is rather vague, and essentially, he simply doesn't know.
There is another book - one that I have read ("Rule by Secrecy" by Jim Marrs), that inspired me to come up with a possible explanation that would answer that question (of who put it there or how it got there); essentially, it's the portion of the book that discusses Hasan's method of recruiting people to make them assassins.
I'd never heard of this book before. Thank you for introducing me to it.
There's quite a bit of information on the Amazon page. As far as I can tell, Alper comes to the conclusion that what we perceive as spiritual experiences derive entirely from brain chemistry. That is, if we feel that we have temporarily become "One with the Universe," this is simply a feeling we have due to an unusual brain state, and has no further meaning concerning God or how an [alleged] soul relates to reality.
I suspect that most people on this forum will agree with his conclusions, even if they don't know of his specific arguments (e.g. which parts of the brain, or which chemicals).
The answer to the questions of "how did it get there?" would probably go along the lines of "it's a glitch in the system," or that certain reward systems in our mental feedback can be gamed, with chemicals or other stimulation, to go beyond what we normally experience.
The problem this runs up against is the ineffable nature of most spiritual experiences. It is a common characteristic of people claiming such an experience that they say it can't be described it words. Therefore we can't be completely sure that a drug-induced experience is really the same as the sort of mystical or spiritual state that Plotinus, among many others, say they've had.
I've never had any experience like this, so it's hard for me to be sure about them.
Does Marrs also conclude that spiritual experiences are brain tricks like this?
