Wheaton professor featured in Newsweek cover story on God and the brain
May 1, 2001
Religious, mystical and spiritual experiences have long intrigued lay people. In contrast, science has largely ignored transcendental experience as without biological bases[~]up until recently
Professor of Psychology David Wulff is among the small but growing number of scientists engaged in examining the connections between brain activity and experience of the divine, a discipline becoming known as neurotheolgy[~]and featured on the May 7 cover of Newsweek magazine.
The Newsweek piece features Wulff as a commentator on the neurological underpinnings of encountering something outside everyday life.
Wulff told Newsweek that the consistency of spiritual experiences from culture to culture and throughout time, '''suggest(s) a common core that is likely a reflection of structures and processes in the human brain.''' In other words, Newsweek said, there's a spirituality circuit.
Wulff's academic and research interests focus on the psychology of religion (The 2nd edition of his scholarly work Psychology of Religion: Classic and Contemporary was re-released in 1997.). The crux of the debate is whether the brain creates this spiritual activity and maps it as it would any neurological activity, or whether the spirituality circuit developed in response to perceiving external stimuli[~]namely, God.
Whatever the case, some brains seem more attuned to registering the mystical. People who report religious experiences or visions tend to be creative, innovative and prone to fantasy, Newsweek reported, ''suggesting,''' Wulff told the magazine, '''a capacity to suspend the judging process that distinguishes imaginings and real events.'' He added that most people have the capacity for this kind of experience, but many likely resist it through rationality.
Wulff is book review editor for the International Journal for the Psychology of Religion and serves on the executive boards of the Society for the Scientific Study of Religion and Division 36, Psychology of Religion, of the American Psychological Association. Click here for more on Professor Wulff.
Last updated on 5/1/01.
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