this post was submitted on 26 Sep 2024
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Brain damage linked to increased likelihood of religious fundamentalism, new study finds (www.techspot.com)
submitted 1 month ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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The study, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, took an innovative approach by examining two groups of individuals with focal brain lesions resulting from injuries or disorders. One cohort consisted of 106 Vietnam veterans who suffered traumatic brain injuries in combat decades ago. The other included 84 patients from rural Iowa who experienced strokes, surgical complications, or other brain injuries.

Study: https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2322399121

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[–] [email protected] 22 points 1 month ago (3 children)

The impact brain chemistry has on all sorts of things is very poorly understood.

There's this device called a "God Helmet" which purports to induce religious experiences on demand through electromagnetic stimulation.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/God_helmet

There are other experiments with infrasound which appear to induce ghost like hallucinations:

https://higgs.ph.ed.ac.uk/outreach/higgshalloween-2021/haunted-frequency

Could all the sensations of "a presence" or ghosts or spirits just be by-products of electromagnetic or auditory pollution? Possibly. Nobody wants to look into it because "well, clearly, spirits and such aren't real!"

It's a decided lack of curiosity. :(

[–] [email protected] 19 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I'm an atheist and committed skeptic when it comes to anything supernatural, but I'd love to try all of those. I'd really love to try them on a high dose of mushrooms.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 month ago

On a high dose of mushrooms, blindfolded in a dark room, and with earphones on, you won’t even know you’re a person who’s taken a drug

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 month ago

They did for the god helmet. The wiki page references it as [17] https://doi.org/10.1558%2Fjcsr.v2i2.24573

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 month ago (1 children)

The impact brain chemistry has on all sorts of things is very poorly understood.

It's not just an impact. Everything we are IS brain chemistry. Emotions, thoughts, wants, desires, likes, dislikes, skills, talents... they're all just a combination of chemicals and firing synapses in the brain. We are biological meat bags. There's no such thing as a soul.