Are we smart enough

Jack Dikian

February 2011

Last night I was invited to dinner at my close friends and neighbors – towards the end of the night we got onto a conversation topic that’s always near to my heart; the lofty subject concerning the universe. Its size, structure, complexity, age, origin and not least what seems like the insignificance of our lives in the vastness of even the known universe.

Not only is the universe vast, there are billions and billions of stars and planets with the almost infinite of mysteries that may lie within each star system waiting to be uncovered. Our knowledge, of course, is still in its primordial stages. In an infinite universe, there are infinite possibilities and the idea of god might not be so unlikely.

We may be seeing the universe as it is because otherwise we wouldn't be here to see it, we wouldn't exist. Some claim there are many universes and because their sub-atomic particles are slightly different than ours they do not support life.

Some theories propose that the universe is best explained in 11 dimensions, and there could be another entire universe less than a millimeter away from us….and us being oblivious to it. But it may be more than that, it’s entirely possible that we, living in the restricted dimensions of space and time are beyond understanding the workings of the universe.

In the same way fish may be barely be aware of the medium in which they live and swim, so the microstructure of empty space could be far too complex for our unaided human brains." It's as if a fish is swimming in one pond, completely unaware that thousands of other ponds exist mere meters away from it.

Understanding that those ponds even exist, let alone understanding their connection to the original pond, is understandably beyond the comprehension of a single fish.

We similarly, attempt to make meaning and develop constructs such a unifying theory to describe how the universe works, idea of multiple parallel universes, human consciousness and the very idea of reality – we as fish may well find that the universe be simply beyond our understanding.

Is our brain hard-wired to believe in God

Jack Dikian

August 2003

Are human beings hard-wired to believe in God. That is, it possible that brain-structure is designed such that the belief in God is to serve as an anxiety reducing function.

The connection between the temporal lobes of the brain and religious feeling has led a Canadian neuroscientist, Dr Michael Persinger, from Laurentian University to attempt and answer if there is a biological and brain basis to some of the concepts that are called the God belief and the God experience.

If the brain basis for the sense of self is tied to language and left hemispheric processes then the right hemispheric equivalent, Persinger believes is a second sense which when experienced is the sense presence or the prototype of the God experience.

One hypotheses is that as we developed an ability to forecast our own self disillusion, and our own death, which generates a great deal of anxiety, the efforts of our brain’s

right temporal lobe is to relieve the anxiety of death - what we sense when we think we are sensing God.