religious experience Flashcards

Question

What does PINT stand for

Answer 1

Passive: the experience is not in control Ineffable: the experience itself is not describable Noetic: the experience brings knowledge and understanding Transient: the experience is temporary

Answer 2

In theism - Passivity is a very noticeable feature of religious experience. The experient often feels that God is directing or controlling them and that they have very little say In monism - Passivity features differently, because the believer usually seeks out the experience through meditation and other techniques. However, during the experience, the experiment is passive, being receptive to universal truths without their ego and its wishes getting in the way.

Answer 3

In theism - Ineffability is a feature of religious experience that grows more pronounced over time. The experiment often feels overwhelmed by Gods presence. In monism- Ineffability is a very important feature. Enlightenment cannot be described in words; instead, you have to experience it for yourself. Its possible that Enlightenment is different for everyone

Answer 4

In theism - Noesis is a revelation of Gods nature. This usually involves God handing down commandments or predictions (propositional revelation) but it can involve other gifts or abilities as well. In monism- Noesis is very important because the divine reality is an ultimate truth about life. This isnt usually presented as a set of rules or instructions, but more as guidelines, principles or insights that have to be built upon afterwards (in other words, non-propositional revelation)

Answer 5

In theism -There is a gulf between humans and God: God is holy but humans are sinful. This means the encounter is always going to be short-lived and characterised by strain but the consequences are long- lasting. In monism - Transience is less noticeable because human beings are not seen as sinful or cut off from the divine reality. Instead, its a matter of cultivating the lifestyle and mentality to make religious experiences as enduring as possible

Answer 6

James declares that the spiritual value of religious experience is not undermined if it can also be explained in psychological terms. Religious experience is something that happens within the brain – in the psyche – just because we can explain psychology that doesn’t mean there isn’t a divine interaction He argued that religious experience expresses truth in pragmatic terms, they are true to the extent that they help us individually improve and make sense of our lives in the world.

Answer 7

Rudolf Otto was a German philosopher, famous for his exploration of religious experience in his book, ‘The Idea of the Holy’ (1917). Otto was a Christian theologian and had written about the rational side of religion, but in this book he writes about the irrational side of religion - religious experience, which he regards as the experience of the numinous (divine power)

Answer 8

The numinous is wholly different from anything we have ever experienced. It produces a reaction of silence. It provokes terror because it is overwhelming. The numinous also attracts us because it is glorious and compelling - but we still want to turn away from it.

Answer 9

1. Stupor: is unlike anything that we have encountered or ever will encounter; the experient feels a blank wonder, an astonishment that strikes us dumb, amazement absolute. 2. The shudder: The experient is held speechless, trembles inwardly to the farthest fibre of its being ... the mysterious is beginning to loom before the mind, to touch the feelings. 3. Creature-consciousness and the simultaneous experiencing of the self as nothing: We become awareness of ourselves as contingent creatures, creatures who barely exist at all. We feel ourselves to be utterly unlike the numen and utterly inferior; This sense of our own nothingness may turn into a perception of sinfulness in yourself, but it doesnt have to. This may link to James distinction between healthy-minded religion and morbid-minded religion. It also links to the idea of Gods necessary existence. 4. Sense of unworthiness and need for covering. There is a feeling of being unworthy to be in the presence of the numen - we need what Otto calls a covering so that we feel we are no longer unfit to relate to the numen. We may close our eyes, cover our heads, take off shoes, kneel or show other acts of respect.

Answer 10

The objectivist view is that religious experiences are of something real. There is some entity that exists independently of the religious experience An objectivist would argue that religious experience is proof of the existence of God .

Answer 11

It is not necessary to think of religious experiences as evidence for the existence of a personal God. The important thing is the experience itself and the effect that it has on the experiment. Religious experiences are personal experiences, not factual experiences. A subjectivist would argue that the religious experiences are personal and hold meaning and truth only for the experient.

Answer 12

Richard Swinburne is an Oxford Professor of Philosophy, famous for his Christian apologetics (defence of religion).

Answer 13

Swinburne defines religious experience as | AN EXPERIENCE OF GOD OR OF SOME OTHER SUPERNATURAL THING - RICHARD SWINBURNE

Answer 14

Public experiences - perceiving a perfectly normal thing such as the sunset and interpreting it religiously or perceiving an unusual event ie resurrection and inviting a supernatural interpretation Private experiences- an experience that can be described using everyday language (dreams) - an experience which can't be described using everyday language (mysticism) - a conviction that God has been experienced in some way though no material evidence (sense of forgiveness)

Answer 15

1. The principle of credulity - WE OUGHT TO BELIEVE THAT THINGS ARE AS THEY SEEM TO BE, UNTIL WE HAVE EVIDENCE THAT WE ARE MISTAKEN 2. The principle of Testimony - (IN THE ABSENCE OF SPECIAL CONSIDERATIONS) THE EXPERIENCES OF OTHERS ARE (PROBABLY) AS THEY REPORT THEM

Answer 16

John Hick is an English Professor of Theology. Hick was a fundamentalist Christian in his youth but became a liberal Christian after studying the ideas of Immanuel Kant.

Answer 17

Hick's Pluralistic Hypothesis claims that: 1. There is one divine reality, the Real, which is the ultimate source of all religious experience 2. No religious tradition has a direct perception of the Real 3. Each religious tradition represents the Real as they experience it 4. The Real transcends all descriptions

Answer 18

It is impossible to create convincing rational arguments for God. Natural theology is not a good source to find out about God Religious experience is what gives people the reason to believe. People are religious because they experience the divine – they have FAITH. Justifying religious belief on the basis of experience points Hick towards pluralism because it applies to all religions. All religions seem to be in the same position: • No religion is able to rationally prove its claims about God. • All religions involve experiences of the divine. If no religion can prove their claims and if experience is what provides the grounds for belief then all religions must be treated with respect and taken seriously. Hick explained that the differences in the ways that people experience God are accounted for by the fact that people exist in different cultures and this shapes their experience.

Answer 19

For Dawkins religious experiences can be explained in three ways - Naturalistic Interpretations - Models - Evolution

Answer 20

Dawkins compares religious experiences with psychosis and compares religious experience with mental illness. Dawkins believes all religious experiences have a naturalistic interpretations Dawkins rejects the VERIDICALITY of such experiences (the truth of what they present). He argues that the brain creates our perception of sights and sounds in the world outside our own heads but that sometimes it does its job too well and fools us

Answer 21

1.The human brain is very good at producing realistic models of reality (it does it every time you dream or remember something) 2.Some people are particularly impressionable and easily mistake imagination for reality 3.Religious upbringing encourages impressionable people to confuse imagination of certain sorts for reality

Answer 22

Evolution is a process where mutations that appear by accident get passed on if they are SURVIVAL TRAITS that help animals survive and breed. Dawkins doesn't think religious experiences are survival traits, but he points out that survival traits can backfire. Brains that can imagine other people having motives of their own might lead people to imagine non-human things like animals, plants or the weather have motives too and this leads to belief in gods; it might lead to mystical experiences too. Brains that can cope with danger by imagining it can be controlled might lead people to imagine there are spirits that can be bargained with or prayed to and this leads to worshiping gods Brains that can cope with the fear of death might lead to a comforting belief in an afterlife or a being so powerful that it can overcome death and this leads to numinous experiences Religious experiences are a byproduct of something genuinely useful.

Answer 23

Michael Persinger is an American scientist who specialises in cognitive neuroscience.

Answer 24

He is famous for a series of experiments in the 1980s which claim to show that religious experiences can be created artificially by stimulating parts of the brain with electromagnetism.

Answer 25

Michael Persinger claimed to induce a sensation of a ‘presence’ in normal participants using a device he calls ‘the Koren Helmet’ after its inventor. Newspapers quickly renamed Persinger's device the God Helmet.

Answer 26

Persinger suggests that the left and right temporal lobes create our sense of self. If these two parts of the brain stop communicating, the ‘self’ in the right hemisphere ‘intrudes’ into our consciousness (inter-hemispheric intrusion) This feels like there is another being present in your mind. Persinger calls this effect ;sensed presence. Really, it is the other half of our own brain that we are suddenly conscious of, but it feels like an external presence. Persinger argues that this sensation explains experiences of the closeness of God, visitations of angels, saints, ancestors, aliens, ghosts or past lives. The God Helmet is supposed to disrupt communication between the temporal lobes by using magnetic fields. This causes an inter-hemispheric intrusion. Persinger claims this might happen naturally because of the earths magnetic field, producing UFO sightings and apparitions seen by large crowds. Persinger is advancing a naturalistic interpretation of religious experience, involving the effect of electromagnetic fields on the brains temporal lobes.

Answer 27

Persinger reports over 900 people who took part in his experiments claimed to experience mystical experiences and altered states. Persinger reports that at least 80 percent of his participants experience a presence beside them in the room and about one percent report an experience of God and others report less evocative experiences of another consciousness or sentient being. As soon as the electromagnetic field is turned off then the experiences cease. When Persinger performed this experiment on Tibetan monks and the Franciscan nun, they reported that the experience was similar to what they experience in their own meditation or prayer.

Answer 28

In 2005, Pehr Granqvist used equipment borrowed from Persinger himself to test 46 Swedish volunteers, but could not reproduce the sensed presence effect. He argues that Persinger’s experiments weren’t properly double-blinded - the participants in Persingers studies knew what was supposed to happen, so they convinced themselves that it was happening. Granqvist didn't tell some of his participants to expect anything at all - and they experienced nothing.

Answer 29

Charles Foster, in Wired for God? (2010) draws completely different conclusions from research into temporal lobes. He argues that even though brain structures like the temporal lobes bring about religious experiences, science can’t prove that those experiences aren’t ‘real’. Religious experiences might be our brains ‘tuning in’ to the divine. In fact, God might have created us with temporal lobes in order that we might communicate with him in Fosters words, our brains might be wired for God

religious experience Flashcards

(53 cards)