Possible explanation of supernatural religious visitations

[BlackMason]

I just though that perhaps the claims that the religious figures in the bible and koran could have been telling the truth. Hold up, take a step back, this isn't what you think. I'm thinking along the lines of sleep paralysis.

Yeah! We've all had it before. You're sleeping and then you suddenly become conscious. Just one problem: Your brain doesn't disengage that part that stops you from acting out your dreams. So now you've got no control of your body. You can't move. You feel like there's an incredible pressure on your body. You try to scream but a petty little squeek comes out. In the corner of your eye you see an ominous figure.

Your brain thinks you're still sleeping but you're not. Some people see "shadow men" and others see alien greys. The list goes on and on. These things people see during sleep paralysis sometimes talk to them. I've heard someone say they usually threaten him. Now what are the chances that Mary or Joseph was having sleep paralysis when they saw these angels? I believe scripture paints a scene where these visions are experienced right before or after sleeping. It is believed that Mohammed got a visitation from the angel Gabriel. What if he too was having an episode of sleep paralysis. These angelic visitations are often experienced by an individual and not by a group. Hmm...strong case?

[Silver]

In the end, no matter how one prefers to color it up with semantic language, it is still delusion.

[KUSA]

It's plausible but I think most of them had schizophrenia.

[max-greece]

It's plausible but I think most of them had schizophrenia.

I think most of them never existed in the first place.

[Tonus]

Maybe they were using LSD-laced postage stamps?

[Anomalocaris]

I just though that perhaps the claims that the religious figures in the bible and koran could have been telling the truth. Hold up, take a step back, this isn't what you think. I'm thinking along the lines of sleep paralysis.

I think they are mostly just lying attention whores who took advantage of religiously promoted gullibility in society at large.

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It's plausible but I think most of them had schizophrenia.

Native Americans have extremely low rate of genetic predisposition towards schizophrenia compared to Euroasians. Can that be correlated to a significantly lower rate of putative supernatural religious visitations?

[Confused Ape]

I'm very interested in the neuroscience of religious belief. Here's an interesting idea -

Why revelations have occurred on mountains? Linking mystical experiences and cognitive neuroscience.

The fundamental revelations to the founders of the three monotheistic religions, among many other revelation experiences, had occurred on a mountain. These three revelation experiences share many phenomenological components like feeling and hearing a presence, seeing a figure, seeing lights, and feeling of fear. In addition, similar experiences have been reported by non-mystic contemporary mountaineers. The similarities between these revelations on mountains and their appearance in contemporary mountaineers suggest that exposure to altitude might affect functional and neural mechanisms, thus facilitating the experience of a revelation. Different functions relying on brain areas such as the temporo-parietal junction and the prefrontal cortex have been suggested to be altered in altitude. Moreover, acute and chronic hypoxia significantly affect the temporo-parietal junction and the prefrontal cortex and both areas have also been linked to altered own body perceptions and mystical experiences. Prolonged stay at high altitudes, especially in social deprivation, may also lead to prefrontal lobe dysfunctions such as low resistance to stress and loss of inhibition. Based on these phenomenological, functional, and neural findings we suggest that exposure to altitudes might contribute to the induction of revelation experiences and might further our understanding of the mountain metaphor in religion.

There's no real evidence that Moses, Jesus or, it seems, even Muhammed existed but that doesn't really matter in this context. People having odd experiences up mountains would have led to the idea that mountains were the place to go in order to have revelations from deities or supernatural messengers. Legends about religions' founders had mountains included for this reason.

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Native Americans have extremely low rate of genetic predisposition towards schizophrenia compared to Euroasians. Can that be correlated to a significantly lower rate of putative supernatural religious visitations?

Native Americans had, and still have, their own their own traditions for religious visions.

Vision Quest Traditions

[Anomalocaris]

I usually have issues with people trying to force innocent explanations for religious frauds when willful and cunning deceit seems more plausible and more consistent with human nature.

I think revelations tend to be said to have been received on mountains for more pragmatic reasons:

1. Mountains are high and therefore closer to any putative daddy in the sky. So clamountain seem to set a good dramatic stage for the fraud to come.

2. Mountains are sparsely populated, so there will be less chance of someone saying "No, you didn't, I saw you while you claim to have been taking to a burning bush"

3. Mountains often have long standing association with spirits and the supernatural, dating to long before the alledged reception of revelations. So mountains lends a pre-fabricated air of mysticism to the fraud.

[Minimalist]

On the other hand, they could simply have been delusional fuckwits.

[Anomalocaris]

Native Americans had, and still have, their own their own traditions for religious visions.

Vision Quest Traditions

Exactly. I think religious visions tend not to be attributable to simple innocent explanations like mental disease. They tend to be reflective either of outright fraud by the individual involved, or are the cummulative effect of social malaise.