HOW ATHEISTS HAVE DISTORTED FACTS TO DISPROVE THE EXISTENCE OF GOD

In every society, there will be a section of people who will hold different views over what may seem so obvious to others. Such people will go to any lengths to come up with a totally different view that will try to discredit the truth. The beauty of science is that it does not just discard such a view on face value, but it gives such a proponent the opportunity to prove their case, which would have to go through a rigorous process of test through experiments and observations before it can be accepted or discredited.
 This was witnessed before the discovery of the big bang theory by proponents of a theory known us steady state theory, led by the then physicist, Fred Hoyle. The theory was highly favored as it removed the need for a creator of the universe. It stated that the universe was static and infinite. 

In the study of our brains, we have seen advances in neuroscience that have brought us to a high level in the understanding of our being through our brain. This understanding of our brain has brought us closer to understanding what the bible means when it tells us that we are made with such similarities to our creator and has armed us with a scientific basis on the understanding of our nature of worship based on our belief of the existence of God.
 A group of neuroscientists have, however, been in high gear making apparatus that would show that our feelings of spiritual presence of God in our worship, were just acts of artifacts of temporal lobe function or rather a state of mind or hallucination, apparently caused by intrusion of one hemisphere to the other one.
 The efforts by this group saw the invention of a unique apparatus which was dubbed the “God Helmet,” by Stanley Koren. This apparatus was originally called the "Koren helmet" after the inventor whom, together with a neuroscientist counterpart Michael Persinger conceived to study creativity and the effects of subtle stimulation of the temporal lobes. People who were asked to participants in the experiment reported a "sensed presence" while wearing the God helmet. The device has been used in Persinger's research in the study of the neural correlates of religion and spirituality, a field of study known as neurotheology.
The helmet is however said to have been designed to test several of Persinger's hypotheses about brain function and not specifically designed to elicit visions of God. The first of these tests proposes that the human sense of self has two components, one on each side of the brain, that ordinarily work
together but in which the left hemisphere is usually dominant.


Persinger argues that the two hemispheres make different contributions to a single sense of self, but under certain conditions can appear as two separate 'selves'. Persinger and Koren designed the God Helmet in an attempt to create conditions in which contributions to the sense of self from both cerebral hemispheres is disrupted.
The second experimental hypothesis was that when communication between the left and right senses of self is disturbed, as they report it while wearing the God Helmet, the usually-subordinate 'self' in the right hemisphere intrudes into the awareness of the left-hemispheric dominant self causing the intrusion of the adjacent hemisphere.
The third hypothesis was that "visitor experiences" could be explained by such "interhemispheric intrusions" caused by a disruption in the cerebral hemispheres. Persinger theorises that many paranormal experiences encountered during the experiment, feelings of having lived past lives, felt presences of non-physical beings, ghosts, muses, and other "spiritual beings", are examples of interhemispheric intrusions.
The God Helmet experiments were also intended, though not specifically designed, to validate the idea that religious and mystic experiences are artifacts of temporal lobe function which means that Temporal lobe seizures mimic or perhaps even embody certain essentially religious experiences. Persinger reports that many subjects have reported clear and undeniable sensation of “mystical experiences and altered states" while wearing the God Helmet.
The foundations of Persinger’s theory have, however, been criticised in the scientific press. Equally, reports by journalists, academics and documentarists gave a mixed reaction; and effects reported by Persinger have not been independently replicated.
The only attempt at replication published in the scientific literature reported a failure to reproduce Persinger's effects. The authors, Swedish researchers, proposed that the suggestibility of participants, improper blinding or idiosyncratic methodology could explain Persinger's results. 

Persinger argues that the replication was technically flawed, but these researchers have stood by their replication. This is a clear indication that the aim of science is not to disproof the existence of God as many would have us belief. If this was the case, scientists would have fallen head over heels in supporting this obviously flawed experiment. It also shows that scientists are guided by clear ethics and systems to test theories and experiments before they are accepted, irrespective of who is conducting the experiment.
 As we can clearly see, lots of issues have arisen in the past that tended to cause confusion and contradiction in matters relating to our religious believes as well as our entity.
 One famous aphorism constantly quoted and referred to, which may question our entity as a whole being, made by Sherlock Holmes  “I am a brain, my dear Watson, and the rest of me is a mere appendage,” was referred to by professor V.S. Ramachandran when he quoted a molecular biologist Francis Crick’s comment, that he saw the notion that our conscious experience and sense of self as based entirely on the activity of a hundred billion bits of jelly as dangerous if true.
We however now understand that we have two systems of nerves which spread out to different parts of the body and then converge and link together making man a single entity. The first of these systems which is the organ of the objective conscious mind has its centre in the brain and spread throughout the body through the spinal cord. It is the channel through which we receive perceptions from the physical senses. It is also the vehicle that controls the movement of the body. The second system serves as the organ of the subjective subconscious mind and is responsible for the functions of vital organs of the body and has its centre at the back of the stomach.  A system of nerves called the vagus nerves forms a connecting link between the two systems to make man physically a single entity.
The understanding of these two systems and how they are linked together has helped put to rest concerns raised by the above axiom by Sherlock Holmes. It is now evident that the rest of our body is not a mere appendage, but that it is a crucial and vital part of the whole. 

This is an extract from a manuscript I've written showing how to find the existence of God in science- Joe Mwai