Why We Believe What We Believe: Uncovering Our Biological Need for Meaning, Spirituality, and Truth (Hardcover)

~ Andrew Newberg (Author), Mark Robert Waldman (Author)
Key Phrases: better believer, holistic functions, baseline scan, Santa Claus, Lucky Numbers, The Atheist Who Prayed (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

When Newberg, a professor of radiology, psychiatry, and religious studies, ponders the nature of reality, it makes fascinating, mind-bending reading. What is reality, he asks, but a combination of the subjective vividness of an experience (strengthened by the continuity and duration of that experience) and the consensus of others that it is so? Expanding on a thread picked up before in Why God Won't Go Away (2001), he and Waldman examine the Liar's Paradox, assert the likes of "Truth cannot be entirely known, for no matter how much evidence you collect, your knowledge will always be incomplete," and maintain that individual reality is exclusively guided by a combination of sensory perceptions (which are prey to any number of distorting influences) and beliefs. Heady stuff, but with extensive research and credible scientific resources to support it, enough to make a person rethink concepts of truth, reality, and belief. So rich a book that it begs to be read in small bites over a long time. Donna Chavez
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Review

"You cannot escape the power and influence of your beliefs. Pay attention to them, because they can make the difference between life and death, health and illness. Why We Believe What We Believe brings great clarity to the emerging science of consciousness and explains how these findings about the brain mesh with certain spiritual traditions. Every thoughtful person will want to be aware of the crucial ideas discussed in this book."-- Larry Dossey, MD, author of The Extraordinary Healing Power of Ordinary Things --This text refers to the Kindle Edition edition.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 336 pages
• Publisher: Free Press (September 12, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0743274970
• ISBN-13: 978-0743274975
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.3 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #70,829 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

84 of 87 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An Astonishing Book, September 20, 2006

By	Neil Schuitevoerder (Los Angeles) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This fascinating book examines how human beings construct their beliefs about everything: how we map the realities of the world, build moral and political beliefs, and develop religious and spiritual beliefs about the universe. The authors base their premises on neurobiological research and then they integrate their findings with contemporary psychology and sociology without ever becoming overly technical, a difficult feat when it comes to explaining the neurological processes of the brain.

The introductory chapter introduces the basic premises of the book, using the case history of a man who riddled with cancer and is about to die in a research hospital at UCLA. Placebo injections are given, and within a week all tumors disappear, but when newspaper reports describe the ineffectiveness of the medicine the patient thought he was taking, the tumors returned. The doctor convinced the patient that a "new and improved" medication was available, and again the tumors disappeared. The FDA then pronounced the medical study a failure, and again, the tumors returned. The authors return to this story throughout the book to explain how our beliefs can deeply influence the neurobiological processes in the brain.

In Chapter 3, the authors use numerous optical illusions to How the brain incorporates perceptual errors into its maps of the world. In this way, they show how many supernatural beliefs are literally perceived as real within the brain. In the next chapter, they show how different cognitive functions contribute to the foundations of everyday beliefs about reality, and how a child's brain is prone towards seeing monsters, believing in Santa Claus, and relying on magic to explain unusual occurrences in the world. The authors also show what happens in the brain when adults attempt to perceive the unperceivable, i.e. God and other spiritual realms.

In Chapter 5, Parents, Peas, and "Putty Tats," Newberg opens his chapter on developmental neuropsychology with a story of how his mother got him to eat his plate of peas. He uses this cute tale to show how early childhood beliefs can shape the remainder of one's adult life. The authors show how easy it is to implant false memories in children and adults, why autobiographical memories are faulty, and why false memories remain imprinted in various circuits of the brain well into adulthood. They also offer a brilliant integration of neurological development with the psychological development of morality (unfortunately, our brains begin to deteriorate in our thirties, and the likelihood of us changing our beliefs, especially inaccurate ones, becomes less and less the older we get.

As the title of Chapter 6 implies (Ordinary Criminals Like You and Me) we are not as moral as we like to think we are. Using brain scan research, they show how we are easily manipulated by authorities to lie, hurt and even kill. Ultimately, the more complex the moral dilemma, the longer it takes our brain to react. Thus we are likely to stand by and watch when others commit immoral acts.

In Chapter 7, Newberg describes his brain scan research with a group of Franciscan nuns engaged in prayer, and the authors suggest how spiritual beliefs become neurologically real in the minds of practitioners.

Chapter 8 includes the first brain scan study of Pentecostal practitioners who speak in tongues, and the findings show that this uniquely creative form of prayer is very different from other forms of spiritual practice, and is probably very similar to shamanic trance states, hypnotherapy, and certain altered states of consciousness brought about by drugs. The authors are careful to point out that Pentecostal practices are inherently beneficial and do not represent pathological processes of illness.

In Chapter 9, the authors conduct the first brain scan on an atheist who attempts to pray to God. They found that when a person focuses on opposing beliefs, a neurological dissonance takes place that prejudices the individual to reject them. Atheists are physiologically healthy individuals, even though they are one of the most despised groups in America. This chapter sheds light on why political parties tend to despise one another and goes a long way in explaining why there is so much religious discord in the world.

Finally, in Chapter 10, the authors discuss ways to become "a better believer" by developing a more cautious, skeptical, yet openminded approach when evaluating information from the media and from science. An overview of 27 forms of cognitive biases are presented, along with a systematic critique of prayer/religion research. They also summarize contemporary research on the placebo effect.

Overall, an astonishing book that was equally fun to read--but then again, that's what I believe.

83 of 93 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Well-written and compelling, although with obvious biases, September 20, 2006

By	Richard L. Deem "Rich Deem" (Los Angeles, CA USA) - See all my reviews

Andrew Newberg, professor of Radiology and Psychiatry, has written (along with Mark Robert Waldman) a sequel to his book, Why God Won't Go Away. The new book has strengths and weaknesses, but, should be of some interest to those who have an interest in spiritual matters and human behavior. The book is primarily written to address the question of how the brain works so that we arrive at what we believe to be true. The authors write from a spiritual perspective, but take numerous jabs at Christians and Christianity throughout the book. In contrast, New Age and Far Eastern religions seem to receive little or no criticism (co-author, Mr. Waldman seems to be into New Age type spirituality), and are actually endorsed. Likewise, atheists may not be entirely comfortable with the content, since it clearly challenges their cherished belief that that have no beliefs.

Even with this viewpoint bias, the first two parts of the book ("How the brain makes our reality" and "Childhood development and morality") are nothing less than fascinating. The topics are broad, so a lot of details are not included (especially supporting studies), although doing so would have increased the length considerably. Even so, I would have preferred more details and citations and a little of the controversy, which must be present in such a complex field. One gets the distinct impression that the results are not quite as neat and tidy as presented, and one wonders if studies that do not support the authors' premises are omitted as a form of viewpoint bias or just to save space.

A particularly interesting chapter entitle, "Ordinary Criminals Like You and Me," presents numerous experiments (many of which would be considered unethical today) that demonstrate that the vast majority of individuals will do extremely immoral acts, given the right conditions. For example, if enough people (planted experimental confederates) go along with a lie, test subjects will do likewise. In another study, participants "electrocuted" a "student" who was a "poor learner." Studies simulating prison conditions showed that the "officers" (experimental subjects) routinely mistreated the "prisoners" (also experimental subjects). In other experiments, subjects would usually act in selfish ways, rather than take the moral high ground. Newberg suggests that barring interception by our frontal lobes of our brain, all our actions would be immoral and selfish.

The book's third section, spiritual beliefs and the brain, presents Newberg's latest (and earlier) functional brain scan results on religious people. Previously, Newberg had studied the brain activity of Buddhists practicing meditation and Franciscan nuns practicing "centering prayer," a Roman Catholic method of meditating deeply on a specific biblical passage or concept. These results had shown similar patterns of brain activity for those meditating on "becoming one with the universe" or "inner peace" (Buddhists) and those meditating on God or the Bible. Both groups showed increased activity in the frontal lobes (primarily the prefrontal cortex), which represents the "attention area" and decreased activity in the parietal lobes (the "orientation area"). Each group interpreted their experience on the basis of their beliefs (e.g., inner peace for the Buddhists or God's presence for the nuns). In this book, Newberg added a third group - Pentecostal Christians who "speak in tongues." When analyzed, the brain scans showed increased activity in the thalamus (as in Buddhists and nuns). Speaking in tongues also resulted in high activity in the temporal lobes (involved in making emotions) and in the midbrain (probably resulting from the activities of speech and dance). Like Buddhists and nuns, Pentecostals represent a small percentage of the American population (probably only about 1% of Americans claim to speak in tongues). Newberg presented one case (not exactly a scientific sampling) of a spiritual atheist. Like the Buddhists, he practiced meditation, and presented with a brain scan similar to the Buddhists and nuns (though the actual scans were not shown in the book).

Also noteworthy was the finding of asymmetric thalamic activity in the Buddhists, nuns, Pentecostals, and even the one "spiritual" atheist, which is not found in the vast majority of people. The question arises whether these people are born with this asymmetry, resulting in the ability to play these mind games or whether the continual practice of the games themselves lead to the asymmetry. None of Newberg's studies were able to address these questions. An even more fundamental question concerns the rest of us, who lack the asymmetry, but still have religious beliefs. Maybe none of these studies really tell us anything about the kind of religious belief that most of us exhibit, since all the groups chosen for study represent extremely small minorities.

In conclusion, the book is well-written and compelling, although the obvious biases of the writers will probably annoy most Christian readers. The topic is complex and experimental design is difficult at best. Future studies will likely shed more light on this subject.

12 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Free Yourself From Your Belief in Beliefs., November 10, 2007

By	Bwookie (The Good Earth) - See all my reviews

In his latest book, author Andrew Newberg, MD (Why God Won't Go Away) explores the biological basis for belief and the nature of reality and truth. The book explores the powers of placebo, false memories, immorality in "moral" people, group think, speaking in tongues and 27 forms of biases.