* This is the second installment in my “Why I Don’t Believe” series.
Satirist Jonathan Swift once remarked, “It is useless to attempt to reason a man out of a thing he was never reasoned into.” Now, obviously I have more faith in rational discourse than that; otherwise I would not be writing this blog. But Swift’s statement does underscore a difficulty I face in debating religion: Most believers anchor their testimonies in personal, spiritual experiences—not logic or hard evidence. This is especially true for Mormons.
This isn’t to say that Mormons are irrational. Rather, they just mistake their spiritual experiences for evidence. The purpose of this post, then, is to demonstrate that such experiences do not constitute reliable evidence for Mormonism.
Unlike some atheists, I know what it means to feel that so-called “burning in the bosom.” Moreover, I understand that those feelings aren’t reducible to, say, warm fuzzies or heartburn. Spiritual experiences are often powerful and formative in one’s life. They were in mine. Allow me to share a spiritual experience of mine when I was Mormon.
Back in high school, I sometimes slept in the guestroom of the basement because it afforded me greater privacy in prayer and scripture study. There, I would say long emotional prayers and fall asleep to devotional music.
One night, as I lie resting in bed, I felt arrested by a dark and menacing spirit. There was an amorphous blackness above me, and I could not move to escape it—I was paralyzed. And then the oddest sensation: I felt my “spirit” leaving my body, as though the demonic presence came to possess it. After a minute or so, this sensation would subside and (somehow) I’d go to sleep.
This same episode occurred on at least three different occasions. It was terrifying experience for me, but simultaneously sacred as well; I related it to Joseph Smith’s First Vision, and was admittedly flattered that the “powers of darkness” would likewise combine against me.
The spiritual witness I received was undeniable, and it steeled my testimony against whatever doubts I had. I’m sure that my Mormon readers believe they have a similarly unshakable faith. That’s why I’ll be discussing the invalidity of spiritual experiences. Because so long as people are convinced by their spiritual experiences, they may not seriously consider all the evidences against Mormonism.
Oddly enough, I came to question my spiritual experiences by investigating alien abductions—the geek in me has always been interested in the paranormal. I found startling parallels between my most seminal spiritual experience and people’s accounts of alien abductions.
A lot of alleged abductees report having been paralyzed during their abduction. They also perceive a threatening presence in their room. To the abductee’s brain, that presence registers as an extraterrestrial. Lastly, abductees report having an out-of-body experience or a levitation-like sensation such as being pulled up into a spacecraft by a beam of light.
Each of the above elements—paralysis, the feeling of an ominous presence, and a levitation sensation—was present in my spiritual experience. Interestingly, the same could arguably be said for Joseph Smith’s First Vision*—at least the official 1838 telling of it.**
After doing some research, I concluded that those phenomena are actually symptoms of sleep paralysis. Sleep paralysis happens when you’re about to enter or exit REM, the deepest part of sleep. At this juncture, your brain is awake, though in a dreamlike state, and your body remains asleep (thus the paralysis). Sleep paralysis affects a third of the population, teenagers in particular, and can be genetically inherited.
The cognitive sciences can explain the vast majority of spiritual experiences, in their various forms, as psychological phenomena that transcend any one religious tradition. Prayer and meditation, for example, lessen brain activity in the parietal lobe, which is the part of the brain that orients us in time and space. Consequently, prayer and meditation are associated with a “self-forgetting”—that is, a feeling of one with the universe and/or the divine.
Epilepsy also holds some insights about our brain and spiritual experiences. Epileptics often claim to hear the voice of God or witness angelic visitations during a seizure. Neurologists believe that this is due to epilepsy occurring in the temporal lobe, an area known as “the seat of spirituality.”
The story of Jeff Schimmel is a perfect illustration of how our temporal lobes affect spirituality. Schimmel, a 49-year-old secular Jew from Los Angeles, lived most of his life devoid of any spirituality. That all changed when he had a benign tumor removed from his left temporal lobe. Post-surgery, he began to suffer from seizures. He also, for the first time in his life, started to hear voices in his head and have religious experiences, like visions of the Virgin Mary.
By far the most exciting neurological research on this matter comes from Dr. Michael Persinger. He has created a device (“the God helmet”) that artificially induces spiritual experiences in those who wear it. Subjects wear the helmet, and it electromagnetically stimulates the aforementioned areas of the brain. Roughly 80% of those who undergo this experiment report spiritual experiences. These experiences vary among the subjects and are understood within the context of the subjects’ respective beliefs. A Christian, for example, might see Jesus. A Muslim might find herself before Allah. Even the nonreligious report things like out-of-body experiences.
Watch this short video about the God helmet:
I don’t mean to argue that because spiritual experiences likely stem from the brain, God cannot be involved. But at the point at which scientists like Dr. Persinger are able to manufacture these experiences, how can we be sure that any are from God? It strikes me as unfair that God would communicate with us via so fickle and fallible a thing as our brain. God is, after all, no author of confusion.
There may even be spiritual experiences for which there is no immediate or complete naturalistic explanation. One cannot, however, jump to a supernatural conclusion—that commits the “God of the gaps” fallacy. The ancient Greeks didn’t understand lightning, but that didn’t justify their belief that Zeus was up in the clouds hammering out lightning bolts. A more relatable example: When you see a magic show and are unable to explain a trick, you don’t assume that actual magic occurred. Instead, you rightly figure that there’s a perfectly normal explanation for the trick even if you don’t know it at the time.
The philosophical principle at play here is Occam’s Razor, which states that the best explanation is that which requires the fewest assumptions. And because supernatural explanations make unwarranted or superfluous assumptions (the existence of gods, magic, etc.), the more reasonable explanation is almost always the naturalistic one.
For more information about the science of spirituality, explore this article.
The apparent biological basis of spiritual experiences aside, there is yet another compelling reason to discount your spiritual experiences as evidence for Mormonism—namely, the fact that such experiences are not at all unique to Mormonism!
Spiritual experiences have been commonplace in every society, in every age. The only difference is the god to whom people credit those experiences. People routinely have spiritual experiences in and affirmations of Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, Sikhism, Catholicism, Norse/Roman/Greek paganism, etc. What’s more, these people are as sincere in their beliefs as you are yours. How is it that you’re able to dismiss their experiences/beliefs (those of the 6.5 billion non-Mormons), but never doubt your own?
The world is awash in competing—indeed, conflicting—spiritual experiences. They can’t all be right, but they can all be wrong.
The standard LDS answer is that most religions contain shards of the Truth, whereas they (Mormons) have the “fullness of the Gospel.” All people are endowed with the “light of Christ” by which they can know the truths in their religions. Therefore, Mormons don’t entirely dismiss other religions’ miracles and their members’ experiences, just those things that disagree with Mormonism (as if that were somehow ecumenical). But could it not just as conceivably be the case that Islam is true and a merciful Allah allows infidels to enjoy some spiritual experiences?
Another possibility, and one I don’t personally entertain, is that Mormons’ spiritual experiences are not from God, but Satan. As an atheist, I think this line of argumentation is bunk. But given that Mormons believe in Satan, perhaps they should consider the possibility.
The Bible portrays Satan as being adept at deception. Joseph Smith taught, “Some revelations are of God: some revelations are of man: and some revelations are of the devil.” So convincing were these counterfeit revelations that Smith felt the need to equip the Saints with tests by which Satanic messengers may be recognized. In Doctrine & Covenants 129, for instance, Smith said that if you shake hands with an angel and can’t feel its hand, then that messenger is of the devil. And yet we have no record that Smith ever gave the handshake test to the Angel Moroni or any other angelic visitors.
If you care to pursue this argument further, I’d recommend Richard Packham’s treatment of it.
Finally, Mormons have received spiritual witnesses for things we now know to be false. Paul H. Dunn was a General Authority of the LDS Church. He was a member of the First Quorum of Seventy for many years. In General Conference and elsewhere, he shared personal experiences of his life that were later proved untrue. Elder Dunn claimed, among other exaggerations, that his garments protected him in WWII as enemy machine-gun bullets ripped away his clothing, gear and helmet without ever touching his skin. He also claimed that he was once a professional baseball player. Dunn was forced to admit in 1991 that he had contrived these faith-promoting tall tales. The LDS Church demoted Dunn to emeritus status as a result. Despite their falsity, Dunn’s stories filled many members with the spirit.
So insofar as spiritual experiences are a universal human phenomenon and can testify to falsehoods and result in contradictions, they should not be accepted as evidence for Mormonism or any religion for that matter.
*Here, Dr. Robert Bushman argues that the First Vision was a standard out-of-body experience.
**To read about the conflicting First Vision accounts, check out this link.
Cecil Adams, the world’s foremost authority on just about everything, once covered
sleep paralysis in an amusing way:
http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/596/what-causes-sleep-paralysis
Rock on, Jon
Jon, another well-written and thought-out article. I think it is fair to say there are at least two possibilities: 1) god could be a delusion created by brain chemistry; or 2) god uses brain chemistry as a necessary conduit to reach people. Even if #2 is true, which for various reasons I doubt, it is a far cry from “proving” Mormonism. It is much easier to produce evidence or at least reasons to believe in some kind of god, any god, than to produce good evidence for Mormonism.
What really broke the spell for me was realizing that those good, happy, peaceful feelings I had occasionally at church did not prove anything about the Book of Mormon or Joe Smith, they were just feelings produced by my brain in response to emotionally charged stories and images. The same kinds that people of all faiths had that tied them to their particular brand of religion.
It is not that these feelings of the divine or numinous are unimportant or invalid, it is just that we should not interpret them to mean more than they do. Concluding that mormonism is true on the basis of such feelings is like concluding you are the greatest tennis player in the world on the basis of winning a single game against a friend. Winning the game might feel good, but the conclusion of world tennis domination does not follow.
The unreliability of spiritual experience was the key point in my deconversion as well. I wrote about this in how I became an atheist, which concludes my story of how I stopped believing in Mormonism.
Excellent!
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signature: nexium online
I am hoarse from making this point so many times:
a) The mere fact that the brain is involved in certain experience DOES NOT prove that ONLY the brain is involved. In fact, nothing would have surprised Aristotle and Aquinas less than contemporary neuroscience – of course we use the brain when we think. Aristotle knew that over 2000 years ago, without the benefit of fancy brain scanning machines. This is not news! The question is not whether the brain is necessary for thought (of course it is), the question is whether it is sufficient for thought. On the latter count, I say no (the biggest argument being the inability of materialism to account for intentional language).
b) Neuroscientists can manufacture all sorts of experiences by tinkering with the brain. There is brain activity when you see the tree outside the window, but that same brain activity can be produced by a neuroscientist poking at your brain. Does the fact that some experiences (spiritual AND empirical) are not reliable demonstrate that none are? Are you prepared to deny the existence of the external world?
I think Jon is probably confronting some of these issues in the Phil of Religion course he is taking.
I should say that I am not prepared to call every spiritual experience authentic (just as I am not prepared to call every empirical experience authentic). But this is a real problem for theists – how to vet the reliable from the unreliable (whose spiritual experience was real, if any of these – J Smith, Moses, Mohammed, etc). I think at least one course of action is to rely on reason – I tend to reject any spiritual experience whose content makes claims that are otherwise known to be false by reason (for instance, I think reason alone can tell us that God exists and that God is good, so I am dubious of anyone who says “God told them” to blow up pizzerias in Tel Aviv).
“The mere fact that the brain is involved in certain experience DOES NOT prove that ONLY the brain is involved.”
My argument was more sophisticated than that.
I wrote, “I don’t mean to argue that because spiritual experiences likely stem from the brain, God cannot be involved. But at the point at which scientists like Dr. Persinger are able to manufacture these experiences, how can we be sure that any are from God? It strikes me as unfair that God would communicate with us via so fickle and fallible a thing as our brain. God is, after all, no author of confusion.”
And second, I employed Occam’s razor to argue that the natural explanation for spiritual experiences (that is, the brain-centric one) is preferable over the supernatural one.
I don’t think you are taking seriously enough my second point:
Mustn’t we say the same thing about sensory experiences of an *allegedly* external world? So mustn’t you also say “”But at the point at which scientists like Dr. Persinger are able to manufacture these experiences, how can we be sure that any are from [an external world]?”" In both cases (spiritual experiences and empirical ones) we can easily reproduce the experience by tinkering with the brain (putting on “god helmets” or “experience helmets”). Might all of our sensory experiences of an outside world be “delusions produced by brain chemistry”? If you are going to live by Occam’s razor, you’ll have to die by it too.
My first point was that employing Occam’s razor here to reduce us to brain-centric (materialist) explanations is a wrong-headed reduction. Occam tells us that the simplest explanation that can explain all of the phenomena is preferable explanation – but I don’t think brain-centric or materialist explanations CAN explain the most basic human phenomenon, that of intentional language!
I might also add that I don’t know that Occam’s razor is due the sort of uncritical assent so many tend to give it. I actually prefer a principle of plenitude over the principle of reduction. Leibniz preferred the principle of plenitude, arguing that God created the most varied of all possible worlds. Kant thinks we should not “rashly diminish” the wide variety of entities. Occam’s razor has really come to represent the banner of reductionism for the sake of reductionism. I don’t march under that flag.
Dr. Kleiner,
Do you think that we can doubt the experiences of schizophrenics that see things that we don’t see? Why or why not (I’m not trying to be snarky here, I honestly want you thoughts on the subject)?
As I mentioned above, I think some sensory experiences of an external world have questionable reliability. Experiences of schizophrenics or people on LSD would be examples of such things. By the same token, people who have [alleged] spiritual experiences but who are really just having epileptic episodes throws some doubt on the reliability of those experiences. It is worth adding, though, that the mere fact that someone is schizophrenic does not necessarily entail that their perceptions are false (they sometimes are, and sometimes are not). By the same token, it seems possible for a person with epilepsy to have both “artificial” spiritual experiences but also real ones.
Jon says the world is “awash in competing—indeed, conflicting—spiritual experiences. They can’t all be right, but they can all be wrong.” But can’t we say the same thing of sensory experiences of an external world?
My point, then, is this:
Jon wants to dismiss spiritual experiences because they are (a) unreliable and often conflicting and (b) they can be artificially produced with “god helmets”. So we (by Ockham’s razor) have reason to reduce them to brain chemistry / delusions. Those facts are supposedly sufficient for denying the reliability of ANY spiritual experiences.
But I think we can say the same thing about sensory experiences. They are (a) unreliable and often conflicting and (b) they can be artificially produced by neuroscientists putting on “experience helmets”. So, by Jon’s own reductive reasoning, this should then be sufficient for denying the reliability of ANY sensory experiences of an external world.
I am not interested in defending the veracity of ALL supposedly sensory experiences of an external world, nor am I interested in defending the veracity of ALL supposedly spiritual experiences. I just think there is the possibility that SOME sensory experiences are reliable and that SOME spiritual experience are reliable. Jon’s claim is quite broad, he denies the veracity of ANY spiritual experiences simply because he can explain away SOME.
“I just think there is the possibility that SOME sensory experiences are reliable and that SOME spiritual experience are reliable. Jon’s claim is quite broad, he denies the veracity of ANY spiritual experiences simply because he can explain away SOME.”
This is where you’re wrong, professor. I don’t deny the veracity of all spiritual experiences. There’s a reason why I did not entitle this post “The Invalidity of Spiritual Experiences.” My argument is not so much that these experiences are always invalid, but rather that they’re almost always unreliable. How do we differentiate a real spiritual experience from an illusory one? I suppose your retort would be, “How do we differentiate a real external world from an illusory one?” Maybe we can’t. I’m still marshaling my thoughts on that front, and I’ll respond to that objection in full later.
Jon is right, I made his argument out to be stronger than it really is. Let me weaken my response, then, a bit. I will do so by appealing to Chesterton (I cited this passage recently regarding ghosts, this is all from his book Orthodoxy – a great little book):
“The open, obvious, and democratic thing is to accept the evidence of an old apple-woman when she bears testimony to a miracle, as we accept it when she bears testimony to a murder.”
Why should we be more immediately skeptical of the apple woman’s claims about a spiritual experience than we are about a sensory experience? “We believe an old apple-woman when she says she ate an apple; but when she says she saw a ghost [or had a spiritual experience] we say, ‘But she’s only an old apple-woman’.”
Chesteron is not here claiming that the apple-woman’s spiritual experience is necessarily reliable, rather he is pointing something out about our selective trust in others. We freely, willingly, and rationally believe her when she gives us an account of a murder she witnessed. Why should we view her as less credible when she speaks about a miracle (or a spiritual experience generally)? The point is that the skepticism about spiritual experiences does not derive from some high minded scientific attitude (for if it did, we would have the same sort of skepticism about the apple-woman’s “ordinary” sense experiences of an external world). Rather the skepticism derives from a plain old anti-religious bias, it is an ideological decision made in advance of the evidence (the anti-thesis of “free-thinking”).
I’d just like to say that these arguments are fascinating. I love all of the debates on the SHAFT website. Every week they give me new views to consider that I don’t normally encounter in my daily Utah life.
I don’t belong to any religion, nor do I consider myself an atheist. I’ve heard that you can’t stay in the middle ground long before you are either “saved” or become an atheist, but with the continuous back and forth of Jon, Kleiner, and others, I am content just sitting back and taking it all in.
We’re flattered to have your audience, David. Are you a USU student?
I am. I attended the first SHAFT meeting, but then things got pretty busy with school/work. I’m planning on being there this week though, and even trying to attend the Darwin lecture on Thursday.
“Experiences of schizophrenics or people on LSD would be examples of such things. By the same token, people who have [alleged] spiritual experiences but who are really just having epileptic episodes throws some doubt on the reliability of those experiences. It is worth adding, though, that the mere fact that someone is schizophrenic does not necessarily entail that their perceptions are false”
I think I agree with you. But how do we decide upon which of the schizophrenics’ and drug users’ experiences are reliable and which ones aren’t?
If a schizophrenic sees something, we have to rely on logic, probabilities, and past experiences to determine what we consider to be reliable. (i.e. It’s easier to believe that they saw an apple than that they saw a unicorn.)
People treat schizophrenics like engineers treat inaccurate sensors. As long as everything is going they way you expect you more or less believe the sensor/schizo. When something is out of the ordinary, you try to check it out, but then you’re basically left believing whatever you feel makes the most sense.
That will be difficult business. One possible answer (I am not proposing this, just giving voice to one famous answer):
Kierkegaard thinks that only the person who is having the experience (and indeed only him at the time he was having it, perhaps not later), could be in a position to know. This is, at least in part, what Kierkegaard means by “truth is subjectivity”. (See Kierkegaard’s “A Book on Adler”. about a fellow named Adolf Adler had claimed to have had a vision).
Lol. Godwin’s law in action.
I actually value my spiritual experiences, but at the same time view them very skeptically as I try to discern their meaningfulness to me. For Jon’s part I want to say that I am often saddened by the way unwarranted certainty about religious matters has caused so much heartache and violence over the years. The scientific revelations about spiritual experience are unexplored territory and fascinating to me, amusing too. But the other main argument, that people of various and often contradictory religions have equally convincing religious experiences has given me pause for a number of years. It is all too convenient for me to think that my experiences alone are valid, and that others are merely emotional or delusional or satanic. Even the slightly more cosmopolitan approach, ‘their experiences testify of their pieces of the truth’ is too convenient.
Furthermore, experiences are often interpreted too broadly. Maybe I can be moved by the notion of a scripture, and it not necessarily be a testament to the historicity of that scripture. Maybe I am moved by the symbolism behind a doctrine, and need not interpret it as a witness of the truth of that doctrine and the falsehood of anything to the contrary. Finally maybe my powerful experiences centered around the story of that moment in the grove, are not evidence that it is a historical moment. Maybe this isn’t evidence of that the Church has been overwhelmingly inspired in the over 150 years that followed. On the other hand, maybe it is evidence that all of the above is true. I’m not sure, and it took me a long time to become comfortable with that. I spent two years telling that story of the boy in the grove with great conviction. But I have to give reasonable doubts a chance to influence my judgment as well as the numerous experiences that inspired my convictions.
Kleiner said that we should be skeptical of those possible spiritual experiences that counter good judgment. So, I think it reasonable to consider my experiences in the context of what I know about others’ experiences, and Mormon history, and my own moral judgment – rooted in the golden rule and compassion, but heavily reinforced by my experiences with the spirit. Those “spiritual” notions that I find most reliable, and conveniently most important are those which promote humanity towards my fellow humans, and needless to say, which boldly denounce inhumanity.
What is less reliable, are people’s religious convictions on more particular doctrines — things like homosexuality, where there is so much room for personal prejudice to appear as a substitute for more genuine religious conviction. Often, people’s beliefs on the subject are not even based on any spiritual experience that specifically relates. Rather, “Joseph saw God and Jesus so I better follow the modern prophets and avoid apostasy.” Sorry if this example becomes a distraction from my point, but it seems to me the most current and obvious example of unwarranted religious certainty leading to man’s inhumanity to man. I should add, that I do not think “hate” is the primary motive behind members efforts. Rather I name “dogma” as the major culprit – sincere, but unenlightened opinion, however well thought out the arguments may seem.
On the matter of the reliability of spiritual experiences and sensory experiences, I think one major factor is being overlooked. It is true that both are often unreliable. But the physical phenomena that we rely on as “fact” can be verified by additional witnesses or subsequent experiments or by physical evidence of a phenomena gathered after the fact. Spiritual phenomena can seldom be verified in quite this way. So, I think it is a mistake to equate the reliability the two kinds of experiences. It is true that two people, or even a hundred people, or even a conference center full of people can genuinely feel they are witness to the same spiritual phenomena at the same moment. But while the feeling is quite common, the specific information supposedly communicated by these feelings remains quite vague and open to subjective interpretation. And a conference of believers of a different religion will also genuinely attest to being witness to an “experiential reality” (which can be very meaningful), but the information being conveyed is contradictory to the other conference, or the dozens of others besides. So, the true test of something that purports to be reality is verifiability. And an individual or a communities vague experiential verifiability is not the same as scientific verifiability of a specific empirical observation, where one can isolate virtually all the variables and interpret the result with incredible clarity and reliability. So, again, while my day to day sensory data can be confusing (smoke and mirrors, I thought I heard something, I thought I saw something, did you see that? No, I swear I just saw…). The stuff that I rely on and live by in the natural world is overwhelmingly verifiable, regardless of cultural and ideological background. I apologize if I am stating the obvious. And I realize that Kleiner may not have been “equating” the two kinds of experiences, so I apologize if I misrepresented your position. But I think it is fair to say that we disagree about the relative reliability of the two kinds of experiences. I think we both value spiritual evidence and are skeptic of it, but to varying degrees.
(I say this, though I have called my spriritual experiences undeniable, unmistakable, compelling like nothing else… at least as compelling as any physical witness I ever recieved, and certainly more life-altering. But then in other quiet moments, not desiring to doubt, not hoping for reason to doubt (you have only my word on this point), but wanting to avoid self-deception, I confronted less flattering thoughts and evidence. Both moments seem to be moments of clarity. Although the latter, more candid moments, are admittedly less comfortable, particularly at first, the recognition and acceptance of those thoughts produced a similar peace and sense of awe as the more “affirmative” experiences).
Ultimately, I think the notion that we are all doing our best to make sense and put into words our experience of the “sacred” or the mysterious (I want to remove the idea of divinity from the statement for the sake of atheists) is something that can bring people together, as long as we avoid letting our appreciation of that mysterium tremendom et fascinans turn to arrogance and intolerance.