This brings us to an important question: does neuroscientific

This brings us to an important question: does neuroscientific
research disprove a subject’s perceived interaction with God
(or spiritual realities more broadly), or does it merely suggest
a correlation between religious experiences and brain activity?

Religious believers might feel that they are
experiencing God as real, but there is no scientific reason to
think that such experiences are caused by a supernatural
being.

Given the myriad studies linking religious experiences to specific
patterns of brain activity, the predictable correlation of
specific neural activation patterns with specific religious
practices and experiences disqualifies God as an explanation.

Religious experiences can actually be induced in laboratory
settings. For example, taking certain hallucinogenic drugs can
initiate experiences that are reported as being remarkably
spiritual and accompanied by long-term positive effects in
one’s life. Additional research has suggested that temporal
lobe stimulation (via electromagnetism) can create a felt sense
of spiritual presence.

Others, however, will argue that experimental research on the
neural correlates of religious experience proves nothing about
the reality of God. They point out that the causal connection
between the brain and religious belief has not been
established. They argue that if God exists and interacts with
human beings, then surely the brain would respond
accordingly. In other words, if God does indeed interact with
humans, it would be more surprising if the brain did not
exhibit altered activation patterns. From this perspective,
one would actually expect the brain to mirror and respond to God;
brain scans could never disprove God’s causal role in this situation.