The Struggle to Explain and Discover Reality

Authors Avatar

3/4/05

The Struggle to Explain and Discover Reality

Typically, spiritual experiences are marked by the word “transcendent” because the most significant feature regarding them is the fact that their quality is independent of and perhaps above the material universe. On the other hand, science may be a valuable method of collecting data from these experiences to determine certain physical properties that do exist, using a factual form of examination. Through this data, it can be made easier to understand certain aspects of these transcendental experiences without demeaning their true essence. However, where does the exact separation line belong? Through research, I have attempted to discover what science can do to make a positive impact on the understanding of spirituality without breaking through its boundaries of what it is capable of teaching. An article useful in my research was titled “Why God Won’t Go Away: Brain Science and the Biology of Belief,” written by Andrew Newberg. This article discusses scientific tactics of explaining brain behavior, first leading the reader through the background of meditation observation through science and then differentiating between fact and spiritual experience that cannot be fully understood when using fact as its basis of interpretation. “Cybergrace: The Search for God in the Digital World” by Jennifer J. Cobb is introduced with the description of the situation surrounding a scientifically advanced computer that was able to beat the world’s greatest chess player in a round of chess. This article describes the fate that it seems humans have come to reach – the battle between human uniqueness and technology’s ability to minimize it. This article attempts to teach us that instead of approaching technology’s seemingly extensive ability to beat us at our own strengths in the form of a battle, we should instead view it as a great opportunity to integrate our possibilities both scientifically and spiritually in order to come to a more full understanding of each. The third article used in this research is titled “Psychobiology of Altered States of Consciousness”, written with the common efforts of Dieter Vaitl et al. The attempt is made by these writers to describe what physical processes occur during several states of consciousness; including drowsiness, daydreaming, hypnagogic states, sleep and dreaming, and near-death experiences. This article, along with the preceding two, leads us closer to answering the main question behind the attempted integration of truth discovered by fact and truth discovered by means where fact is unnecessary. To what extent can science be useful in describing the nature of transcendent experience, and where should the union be broken?

Join now!

        The purpose of using science to explain the physical effects of meditation lies in its goal to find factual proof that the claims of meditators are somehow valid. Newberg states,

“For years, Gene and I have been studying the relationship between religious experience and brain function, and we hope that by monitoring Robert’s brain activity at the most intense and mystical moments of his meditation, we might shed some light on the mysterious connection between human consciousness and the persistent and peculiarly human longing to connect with something larger than ourselves” (162).

In this attempt, scientists are trying ...

This is a preview of the whole essay