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Religion Is Good For Your Brain
Hugh Pickens DOT Com writes "Sheila M. Elred writes in Discovery Magazine that a recent study has found that people at risk of depression were much less vulnerable if they identified as religious. Brain MRIs revealed that religious participants had thicker brain cortices than those who weren't as religious. 'One of the worst killers of brain cells is stress,' says Dr. Majid Fotuhi. 'Stress causes high levels of cortisol, and cortisol is toxic to the hippocampus. One way to reduce stress is through prayer. When you're praying and in the zone you feel a peace of mind and tranquility.' The reports concluded that a thicker cortex associated with a high importance of religion or spirituality may confer resilience to the development of depressive illness in individuals at high familial risk for major depression. The social element of attending religious services has also been linked to healthy brains. 'There's something magical about socializing,' says Fotuhi. 'It releases endorphins in the brain. It's hard to know whether it's through religion or a gathering of friends, but it improves brain health in the long term.'" (Read more, below.)
"Listening to sermons and reading religious works like the Bible may also invoke a cognitive benefit. "You're exercising your higher cortical function, thinking about complex concepts that require some imagination," says Harold G. Koenig, director of the Center for Spirituality, Theology, and Health at Duke University and a professor of psychiatry. According to Koenig the benefits of devout religious practice, particularly involvement in a faith community and religious commitment, are that people cope better. "In general, they cope with stress better, they experience greater well-being because they have more hope, they're more optimistic, they experience less depression, less anxiety, and they commit suicide less often. They don't drink alcohol as much, they don't use drugs as much, they don't smoke cigarettes as much, and they have healthier lifestyles. They have stronger immune systems, lower blood pressure, probably better cardiovascular functioning, and probably a healthier hormonal environment physiologically—particularly with respect to cortisol and adrenaline And they live longer." So where does that leave non-believers? "Out of luck, I guess," Koenig jokes. "Actually, I would suspect that people doing the types of things like religious people do — socializing, doing similarly complex cognitive tasks, would have similar benefits. But it is interesting that religion provides that whole package of things that people can adopt and pursue over time." Dr Dan Blazer says the study is very interesting but is still exploratory and that spirituality may be a marker of something else, such as socioeconomic status. "It's hard to study these things," concludes Fotuhi . "It's why research has stayed away from them. But there does seem to be a strong link between spirituality and better brain health.""
You can go pray to your invisible sky daddy. I'll just continue believing in sanity and meditation.
A thinking person should investigate religion, but not necessarily buy into it.
The Discovery article makes it pretty clear towards the end that it is not religious belief, but religious activities, that are likely responsible for the cognitive benefits.
Its not so bad as long as you can keep the fear from your mind.
One way to reduce stress is through prayer.
And in 2014, we also call it meditation. We have also learned, you dont have to be religious to meditate.
Religion makes you stupid. In particular the ability to recognize your true situation is something the mental pathogen needs to degrade in order to retain its ability to infect and spread. Hence all perceived gains come at a heavy price: You become less human and both free will and rationality is partially suspended by the malicious meme. The claim that this "improves brain health" just shows the effect at work. It is a misdirection that stems from the defensive strategy of the pathogen.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
Religion is the opium of the people.
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
Jesus is my personal brain-care specialist.
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve your problem, you're not using enough of it. --AC
Well I envy my cat in the same way: he's happily living his life hunting mice in the garden, eating his food, sleeping and getting petted by yours truly, blissfully unaware of how the food gets in his bowl, how the mice come to exist in the garden, how he gets to sleep warm and cozy even in the dead of winter, what his purpose is and how his life will end.
Comfy, care-free and appealing though a domestic cat's life may be, it doesn't mean I want to be a cat though. I much prefer having a brain big enough to look at the world in a more profound way, even if it can be unsettling.
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
Lisa Miller have a spiritual agenda.
Here is her TEDx talk about love and stuff: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v...
Also this study is in contradiction with this study:
Being Religious or Spiritual Is Linked With Getting More Depressed
http://www.huffingtonpost.co.u...
From Lisa Miller:
http://archpsyc.jamanetwork.co...
"We previously reported a 90% decreased risk in major depression, assessed prospectively, in adult offspring of depressed probands who reported that religion or spirituality was highly important to them."
From Being Religious or Spiritual Is Linked With Getting More Depressed
"A key finding of the study, conducted in several different counties, is that a spiritual life view predisposed to major depression, especially significantly in the UK, where spiritual participants were nearly three times more likely to experience an episode of depression than the secular group."
Lisa Miller have first to explain this contradiction. Maybe some people get cortical thickness from religion, and some don't. I don't have access to Lisa's article.
http://www.mueller-public.de - My site http://www.anr-institute.com/ - Advanced Natural Research Institute
And somehow that makes religious claims true? Reading Game of Thrones is very enjoyable for me but I've never demanded anyone start a real war for Cersei's fictional c***.
Believing that movies are "real" make them enjoyable, but not true. All the crying, pain, emotion shown is just an actor in front of a lot of cameras and people, and probably a green screen behind, but still you feel like it is true, Do the same with religion, suppose that there exist a meaning, luck, justice, etc in life, even someone that you can ask for help and that you can see his hand through confirmation bias. But don't take it too seriously because you know its false. You don't do things that could put your life or of others at risk because you saw someone in an (obviously fiction) movie doing it, take the same attitude regarding religion. Neither you should follow people that claiming that that fiction movie/book was real do things that affect other people lives.
...when it is religion itself that is causing you stress?
"But remember, most lynch mobs aren't this nice." (H.Simpson)
-- Joe
It may be that it helps in the short term, but what about in the long run?
When the stressed individual need to be waned off the childhood delusions all over again?
One way to reduce stress is through prayer.
Sex and alcohol work pretty well too. And they are arguably a lot more fun.
Your cat is looking down at you wondering if you know your reason for existence, to provide housing, food and message in between his naps.
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Religion has found itself at the very root of many, many conflicts throughout our history, with religious wars raging on for hundreds of years. Countless lives have been lost due to this.
THAT is an activity we now want to call a anti-depressant?
And people have the gall to call atheists evil for lacking faith.
Religion has also been very good for quantum physics, cosmology, geology and biology. The saying, "God does not play dice" has been very important in elucidating just how strange quantum theory is. In cosmology, because the big bang theory is so compatible with Christian theology, scientist have given it extra scrutiny and tried to defend alternatives much more vigorously. In geology, rigor has been given a boost by odd ball dating schemes based on scripture that oppose an old earth. And, in biology, evolution has needed a more rigorous development owing to religious opposition. Perhaps more fundamentally, with its sorting of existential questions into high priority, "In the beginning" being a starting point, focus and curiosity on foundational questions have been maintained over ages.
Clearly, religion is the key to happiness:
http://static.guim.co.uk/sys-i...
http://graphics8.nytimes.com/i...
http://media.dumpert.nl/foto/4...
You are welcome on my lawn.
Wow. That's a load of bullshit.
That makes one of us.
You are welcome on my lawn.
Not to invoke an argument, but the TFA talks about listening to sermons and reading the bible.
No. Here is what it says.
"Harold G. Koenig, director of the Center for Spirituality, Theology, and Health at Duke University and a professor of psychiatry"... author of "The Healing Power of Faith", "Faith and Mental Health"... "Listening to sermons and reading religious works like the Bible may also invoke a cognitive benefit, Koenig said."
I.e. Faith guy says maybe faith good for brain.
Also, that Discovery article is crap.
That "One recent study, published in December of 2013 in JAMA Psychiatry" - no it wasn't.
And which study does this sentence refer to? The supposed December 2013 JAMA one (actually published in February 2014) or the 2011 one?
And while a 2011 study found a shrinking of the hippocampus among people of certain religions, Koenig, a co-author of the study, points out that no one has replicated that work yet.
Cause, it either says that Koenig is a co-author of the JAMA study (which he isn't, but which is no made clear anywhere in the article which doesn't even name the study it discusses) and he disagrees with the data from the 2011 study...
OR, he is a co-author of 2011 study (which he was) which says that certain religious people have a shrinking hippocampus.
With which he disagrees as well, pointing out "no one has replicated that work yet".
Koenig is essentially saying "Fuck my study which shows how religion may actually be bad for your brain. Don't look at it. Nothing to see there. Not replicated. Bad study. Bad!"
Also, everything Koenig and that other guy who had nothing to do with the study (he apparently has not even read it) but they asked him to comment on it anyway, Dr. Majid Fotuhi, said about the social effect... pure bullshit.
From the actual study:
Importance of religion or spirituality, but not frequency of attendance, was associated with thicker cortices in the left and right parietal and occipital regions, the mesial frontal lobe of the right hemisphere, and the cuneus and precuneus in the left hemisphere, independent of familial risk.
Going to church does not matter. How much you THINK that religion or spirituality matter to you matters.
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
I tried this whole 'religion' thing, several times. The last time I tried it? It was literally killing me from the stress that it was creating in my life. I had infections that wouldn't heal until I finally had enough of all the bullshit and got away from religion, religious people, and all the arbitrary nonsense and hipocracy it's completely full of, then my health started turning around. Come on, people, look around you: Religion is just another tool being used to control people's lives and to further political agendas.
Are YOU using the TOOL, or is the TOOL using YOU? Think about it!
I have been a devout religious person for over thirty years, and I have been depressed for most of those years. I write into this moshpit of hate for anyone here who might struggle with depression. The religious beliefs of the people around you can uplift you, but they can just as easily degrade your situation until you are depressed. My father beat me from the age of 4 until the age of 13. He didn't do it because of religion, he beat me because I annoyed him and he wanted to shut me up. The religion he chose to line up with merely gave him a convenient excuse. I have had PTSD for most of my life, with verified uncontrollable physical symptoms and many health issues, and have lived most of my life in fear of others. Most of the time it feels like I have never been happy, that there is no point in my life that I could travel back in time to (were it possible) where I would feel a healthy sense of well-being.
I tried many religious disciplines to get rid of my health issues. They all failed.
Eventually I did find a therapy that worked, it's not religious at all. I'm approaching normal function in life, I'd say I'm depressed 2/3rds of the time. If you find that your medication isn't working like it used to and you have to increase the dose, understand that your mental health problem isn't caused by a Prozac deficiency in your diet. The drugs work by shutting off the message your body is trying to send. Your body makes you depressed to solve a stress problem. It's using depression so that you won't lose your reason. Any means of regularly obtaining a "mental reset" will honor the body's request, all the skilled relaxation therapies are just ways to do that. The "prayer" mentioned in the article is one of those relaxation methods, it is not your typical oh-shiat prayer (which believe me I've tried). It's a mantra that you recite over and over again, until it doesn't mean anything anymore, and you relax and get a mental reset.
And of course, my religion didn't forbid any of these kinds of therapies that helped me get well, but the prelates of my religion did, calling them infidelic, probably because I'd do them on the day I'm supposed to attend religious services, and no money would wind up in the plate. There are people who don't care about their fellow man but go to (or hold) religious services for instant credibility and to hook up with like-minded members of the opposite sex, if I just shocked you, I'm sorry. Religious services are not automatically a gathering of saints.
None of this has anything to do with whether you believe an invisible man in the sky is your friend, because any depressed person will tell you that you can have friends and still be depressed. And as to the question, "if he's so good and powerful, why didn't he fix your little problem", the notion of every religion is that such help is not automatically and freely given without condition. As it happened, I tried to follow the tenets of my religious faith, and as it happened I met someone in that faith who showed me this therapy, and as it happened I got better. So I could dare to say, "see, it works", but what's the point of that? I'm not going to say it's going to work for you, because I can't know that, especially because most of you have already insisted that it can't work, and so it's sure to not work for you, because you will see to it that it won't, so that you can be right, and miserable. Let's skip all that, you have the right to remain miserable, I'm not calling that into question.
But if you're bitter because you've tried the failed religious remedies that I've tried, just skip ahead to the skilled relaxation therapy. Then you can ponder your spirituality when you've got a better handle on your situation. If you are religious and are afraid your soul is in danger if you try yoga, meditation, self-hypnosis, etc., then the skilled relaxation method you want is called progressive muscle relaxation. It is religion-free, and you can still take your medicine.
Religion is good for your brain as long as some evil fuck doesn't decide to cut your head off because his religion tells him to cut your head off because of your religion.
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
Because...
"Being Religious or Spiritual Is Linked With Getting More Depressed"
http://www.huffingtonpost.co.u...
So, as usual, pick your side and go with it.
I like to dance. Much of dance is derived from tribal rituals. I can still enjoy dancing without fear of affecting the weather.
Well, a drunk man is always happier
It is very depressing especially when you invoke religion.
I think it is better for people to be depressed that deluded.