In Reply to: Does prayer work? posted by Perry on August 16, 2004 at 16:03:18:
I read this article a few years ago when I was redefining my belief system, and found it quite interesting. The gentleman researches the brain's reaction to both prayer and meditation, using his as his subjects both Franciscan nuns and tibetian monks, who are from very strong religious orders and have dedicated their lives to their religion.
In both cases, their brains were measured to find the level of mental activity when they went into their prayers and meditations, and what happens at that point they come in contact with God/Supreme Being. And in both cases, greater activity was reported in the front of the brain:
"When people meditated, they activated this front attention-focussing area of the brain and turned off this orientation, parietal part of the brain - basically blocking the sensory input into that part of the brain, which would be associated with an altered sense of self-image. We also saw a very significant increase in activity in an area known as the thalamus which plays a key-role in allowing parts of the brain to etalk' to each other."
The article ends with this thought:
"Did God create the brain or does the brain create God?"