[IMC-Editorial] A New Peek Into Neuro-Theology, Peak Experience and Love

[Dullmusic at aol.com]

Dear Reader:

The following article should stand on its own accord. Some background 
material, however, may be helpful. The writings listed here  will shed light 
on its topic. Thank you.
"Religion and the Brain" by Sharon Begley with Anne Underwood - cover story, 
Newsweek Magazine, May 7, 2001
"Faith's Place" by Amy Ellis Nutt - cover story, the Star Ledger, Newark, NJ, 
December 3, 2003
"Searching For the God Within" by Sharon Begley - Newsweek January 29, 2001, 
page 59
"Can Prayer Really Heal?" by Dianne Hales - cover story, Parade Magazine, 
March 23, 2003
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A New Peek Into Neuro-Theology, Peak Experience and Love
By John Dull    3/1/03

What is love? Are we close to understanding that on a scientific and logical 
level? And by understanding love in that way are we closer to fostering it as 
a species?

In the 60's, a group of  biological psychologists became interested in an 
area of the lower brain called the Reticular Formation. Stimulation of this 
brain area causes cortex brain wave scans to switch from slow moving alpha 
wave states to fast moving beta wave states. The reticular system's role is 
to activate the cortex, and this brain area  thus became known as the 
"Reticular Activating System."

The psycho-biological every-day function of that brain mechanism works like 
this:
Sensory information from the outside enters into our reticular system through 
our sensory pathways, the new sensory information activates this reticular 
system, which, in turn, activates our cortex. The activated, awake cortex 
can, then, better process the new sensory information.
The Reticular System wakens the cortex to receive new sensory information, 
making the cortex  ready to receive and process new information.

Behaviorally, there is a correlate to this brain activity:
If a person is sitting in a room at rest, a person's cortex is normally in 
alpha. If a noise appears in the room, the person will orient sense receptors 
to the noise stimulus in order to process the new information. 
Psycho-biologically speaking, the brain becomes activated by the new sensory 
information which passes through the reticular formation, the cortex goes 
from alpha to beta , the cortex processes the new sensory information as the 
person orients senses to the stimulus, and the brain returns usually to alpha 
after processing the information.
If the stimulus is a lion creeping up on the person, however, the brain stays 
uncomfortably agitated in beta, a different set of brain mechanisms are 
triggered, and the flight response is evoked.

An interesting behavioral by product of the evolutionary development of this 
process of cortical activation and de-activation, was noted by a group who 
further studied the behavior associated with the neural  mechanism. Monkeys, 
for instance, are noted to exert considerable energy, when locked in a 
non-stimulating room, just simply to open a blind several times, just to look 
outside, as if to partake in that simple physical activity for the sake of 
the activity itself. They are seeking stimulation.

 Psychologists realized while documenting this behavior that there is a drive 
that developed, in the evolutionary process, a drive to be stimulated for the 
sake of stimulation itself. This is a new drive resulting from the advanced 
development of the reticular-cortical response. The documentation of  this 
behavior led to coining this brain-need with the name,  "Stimulation 
Variation Drive."  In other words, evolutionary advanced cortical development 
created a  need to seek stimulation for pleasurable effect. There is a need 
to enter into beta and go back into alpha on a continual basis, and it gives 
us pleasure, as the brain's on-again, off-again activity stimulates pleasure 
areas of the brain. 

Thus we go to movies, jump out of airplanes, travel, read books, etc. to 
stimulate the reticular system, activate the cortex,  release the activation 
and go back into alpha, just to start the process again. We will search for 
the highest amount of stimulation that is comfortable as a result of the 
Stimulation Variation Drive of our brain.

It seems quite logical that as this brain mechanism evolved and resulted in 
curiosity, wonder, awe, the need for knowledge, etc, that it played a 
significant biological and behavioral role in the history and development of 
our species i.e., knowledge gained now can help us avoid future dangers. 
Curiosity has a place in the protection of the species, and has an 
evolutionary purpose.
It also makes sense that as this new drive developed along with the growth in 
the size and mechanisms of the cortex, that a new force would develop between 
members of our species as a by product of the mechanism. 

That is to say, that people not only are attracted to stimulation and seek 
it, but people also create new and varied stimulation in the environment, and 
therefore BECOME ATTRACTIVE as stimulators to other folks who are seeking 
stimulation. This give and take of stimulation that is pleasurable, allowing 
de-activation and re-activation of the cortex as stimulating information is 
processed, is the basis of a new force in the human sphere of behavior and 
brain development - this paper posits that this is the force that from time 
immemorial we have called "love." That is, the emotion  which we have called 
"love" over the ages has a certain psycho-biological basis that is unique 
especially to the human species and results from the StimulationVariation 
Drive which developed so mightily in our species. Just as other emotions can 
be charted to areas of the brain, we will find that love can be charted to an 
interplay between these reticular cortical pleasure areas of the brain, and 
this emotion reaches its most developed  level in the human species. Advanced 
love is particular to our species.

This new idea has been alluded to in the works of the famed humanistic 
psychologist, Abraham Maslow.
Maslow started out as a successful psychobiologist.  He noticed, however , 
that the psychology of his day was spending most of its time analyzing 
deviant behavior. Maslow was convinced that we should be spending some of our 
time studying healthy behavior and learning from it, i.e., we all fall 
somewhere on the spectrum between deviance and health. If we could define 
"extreme health," we would be able to approach and foster health in 
individuals and the species,  perhaps faster than by approaching health by 
defining  and studying neuroses, as the psychology of the day was wont to do. 
Maslow decided to spend his time at the opposite extreme end of the 
deviance-health spectrum by studying health.
 
He was criticized in the early years by colleagues who thought that health 
was too ethereal a  subject to define. After all, who can objectively define 
what health is? Maslow proceeded voraciously , however , because he knew that 
he was approaching an important understanding of the species. His work has 
been justified many times over. Time proved him to be one of the leading 
humanistic psychologists and theorists of the era, and his work has 
proliferated and found its way into the upper echelon of behavioral theory, 
has affected business, education, religion and politics.

Maslow spent a great deal of time trying to define this "health."  How did he 
do this? Through testing and analysis,  he attempted to find individuals who 
he could label as "very healthy" people. This again brought criticism because 
of its subjectivity. Nevertheless, he isolated his "very healthy" people, 
people who tested for positive traits and seemed extremely active, happy and 
fulfilled, and he tried to find the common elements in their personality, 
much like psychologists might do while studying  the other end of the 
spectrum when they analyze, let's say, schizophrenics. By isolating and 
analyzing the traits of schizophrenics over several sharers of the malady, we 
learn about schizophrenia. Maslow felt we could do the same with extreme 
mental health by isolating its traits in extremely healthy individuals.

He made some amazing headway.  Some of the found correlates of the "very 
healthy" person were happiness, fulfillment, the ability to love and be 
loved, charisma, attractiveness, proactive behavior in any given field, 
curiosity, awe, wonder, self confidence and what he termed as "peak 
experience." The peak experience aspect of this behavioral picture threw 
Maslow for a loop. Maslow found that these "very healthy" people almost all 
shared a deep understanding of life through "peak experience ," often 
fleeting, almost out of body, momentary deep emotional experiences, insights 
and understandings of life. Where is this leading?

Maslow  tried to define "love" through these "self actualizers" as he called 
them. He thought that no matter how subjective his studies were, his studies 
were leading to important breakthroughs in a new understanding of the human 
species and health.

Here's the kicker. What Maslow was saying about health, the biopsychologists 
were saying about the Reticular Activating System and the Stimulation 
Variation Drive. Both Maslow and the biopsychologists were talking about 
curiosity, wonder, awe, the need for knowledge, stimulation, attraction, etc. 
They were using much of the same terminology.

What the future will realize, is that it is the basis of "love"  that is 
being explained by the theorists, the behaviorists and the bio-psychologists 
when explaining these neural and behavioral mechanisms. What this paper is 
saying, is that love is a relatively new force of energy and human attraction 
in the evolution of brain mechanisms, and  that the force or emotion  of love 
has appeared and grown as a direct correlate to the Stimulation Variation 
Drive. We are attracted to our neighbors on a higher cortical plain because 
we are owners of  developed reticular activating systems and cortexes.

Here's a projection. The neuro-theologists now studying brain areas that are 
associated with religious experience will find that the reticular activating 
system is an essential part of this entire peak-experience brain mechanism, 
and the reason that love and peace have been associated with the religious 
experience is that there is an interplay between all these areas of neuro 
peak experience, cortical excitation, and that this is especially pronounced 
in the "extremely healthy" brain that experiences a spiritual 
neuro-theological peak experience with developed reticular cortical alpha 
beta response.

Love is being defined in our day in neurological and bio-psychological terms. 
A new understanding of our species is emerging.





John Dull 
JMH Dull Productions
PO Box 213 
Rutherford, NJ 07070 
e-mail: dullmusic at aol.com
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