Re: The Spirituality of Chimps

"Mark Thomas" <m.thomas57@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in news:dtq8i8$16r1$1
@darwin.ediacara.org:

By the way, it is hard to follow the argument when you don't include at
least a part of the post you are following to.

The status centre hypothesis is eminently testable by brain scanning.
It should light up under social stress. I would further suggest that
clinical depression is in there too and occurs when an individual is
forced so far down, or even out of the hierarchy, that they feel unable
to control their lives any further. Clinical depression is part of the
mechanism that stops the game (as it is being lost) and so gives the
individual the chance of a new start somewhere else.

I would then stick my neck out, if it is a neck, and not a constriction
caused by a misplaced halo, and suggest that the part of the status
centre that lights up to the alpha will also light up for God i.e. when
a person believes they are in the presence of their God, or are engaged
in what they believe to be meaningful communication with their God.

Don't know about the "status centre", but there is an area in the temporal
lobe that has been identified as being associated with "feelings of
spiritual transcendence". This is noted on page 13 of Rita Carter's
"Mapping the Mind". She quotes Canadian neuroscientist Michael Persinger,
but I haven't followed up on this any further.


Yours,

Bill Morse

.

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