Have we located the human “soul”?

William Atkins
Tuesday, 25 December 2007 01:25

Science - Health

Chinese researchers measured activity within the pineal gland as subjects performed religious meditation. Heightened activity within the pineal gland was discovered.       

Iyh-Horng Chen, who is associated with the National Taiwan University in Taipei, China, led the experiment that studied twenty human subjects. Eleven men and nine women practiced the Chinese meditation technique called “Chinese original quiet sitting.”

As these adults recited traditional sayings as part of this religious technique the Chen team scanned the subject’s brains with the medical technique called fMRI (functional magnetic resonance imaging).

The pineal areas within the brain were found to contain heightened activity during these recitations. Chen and his collaborators concluded, “There is no definition of ‘soul’ in the scientific field. However, our results demonstrate a correlation between pineal activation and religious meditation which might have profound implications in the physiological understanding of mind, spirit and soul.” [based on New Scientist article “What is the soul, but a humble pineal gland,“ December 15-21, 2007]

The conclusion of the experiment by Chen and associates were written up in Nature Precedings, which is an online website operated by the journal Nature. The online science website is dedicated to articles that are “unpublished but intriguing studies.”

The Chen results are not without opposite viewpoints. According to the New Scientist article, Bruce O’Hara, University of Kentucky (Lexington), states “I am skeptical, given the complete lack of evidence for any function of the pineal gland other than melatonin secretion.” Medically, the pineal gland secretes melatonin, a hormone that regulates the biological processes within the human body.