S & R, part 3 - Neurology

Andrew Newberg, neuroscientist, researches the similar mystical sensations reported by people of different religious traditions by scanning the brains of monks meditating, Christians praying, and others. "These commonalities indicate that the visions stem from the same neural processes... [Brain scans suggest] that suppressed activity ... (prompted by an individual's willed activity) could heighten a sense of unity with the external world", a blurring of the line between self and other, and, thus, a feeling of religious experience. (p.54)