Neurology, the next debate frontier in the controversy?

In the eyes of some people on both sides of the debate, Christianity has been in a long uneasy battle with Science. Others may deny that this is happening in the mainstream, or hold the personal belief that they are in harmony. However, this very forum is evidence of the debate between secular scientific viewpoints and Christianity wotj its claims about the world, humanity, and the existence of a supernatural Creator.There have been struggles about certain viewpoints once held in the past, ones that shook Christianity's claims about the world.A famous overcited example: The claims about Galileo about the earth not being the center of the solar system caused quite a struggle back in the day, but the issue has long been resolved in the favor of Galileo.The next famous example is in this forum's very name, with far deeper theological implications: evolution. Most of science has accepted it, along with secularists and a large number of religiously inclined people. Christians have both claimed that evolution can be harmonized with Christianity, or that it is ''just a theory''. I disagree with the latter, and frequently doubt the former. However, it's quite clear Evolution used to be/still is a major frontier in debate about Christianity's exact nature, and possibly, truth. However, evolution is not my topic's main subject.That neurology itself as a valid branch of science is undisputed. Neurology is often used to support evolution in debate. However, over recent decades radical progress has been made in our understanding of the brain, and it has reveals opportunities for new research. Among these discoveries, many facets of the brain don't seem to quite match up with the views Christianity have of humans. It has shed light on many things, such as the workings of sexual attraction, aggression, morality, and much more. The other implication of increasing knowledge is that is becomes harder to pinpoint the role of the soul, or even to prove if the soul is necessary. It was not a single theory that did the job, it was slow but steady progress over a few decades.Christianity claims humanity is sinful, and Jesus eventually died on the cross to atone for these sins. Humanity has a knack for being ''sinful'', I have never doubted that. However, take the new findings on neurology, and the picture changes. While the ''sinful'' traits are true, neurology is showing that these traits are intrinsically present in humanity. Doesn't Creationism teach God did design us to the smallest detail? Then why do we have natural neurological traits, that make use prone to unnecessary agression (especially males, which is another proof for it being a neurological trait), hard to control sexual desires, that makes us want sex far too often and early (From a conservative POV), and in general is focused on physical attraction. A related concern is our natural bias for Charismatic people. Humans naturally trust good looking people, with certain body language, or a rousing voice, even if there may be ugly, twitchy people, who may have better ideas in the end. This is quite hard to match up with ''being made in God's imagine'' at times. The soul being nowhere to be found is also problematic, for reasons that speak for themselves.And despite all the discoveries, neurology is still in a developing phase. If we know that much by this point, what about 30 years in the future? Conservative Christians will have a hard time providing answers. In my opinion, it's an even larger problem for Christianity than evolution. It hasn't come to large-scale debating yet, but even the current neurology is a huge problem for creationists. Even without bringing evolution up (although that is eventually needed to make any sense of the ''why is it so'' aspect of neurology, should creationism fail to do so). And it's not ''just a theory'', it's objective evidence, that is gradually being understood as it is studied more and more. Eventually, it could be possible it becomes mainstream education, and then, would the US get lawsuits again, trying to prevent it from being taught as truth? My own prediction is that, yes, eventually it will become the next frontier of the secularism vs Christianity debate, and that Christians will have a disadvantage.So, I'd like to invite Creationists/Christians to comment on my prediction, and perhaps give evidence why neurology is not a problem. So, I request this to be placed in a subforum with no restricted posting for creationists. And since my own knowledge is still currently lacking on the specifics, some supportive evidence and reasoning from those with better knowledge would be appreciated. Edited by Admin, : Fix typos and spelling and grammar errors.

1) I know about the fall problem, but I opted to not include it in the OP. Personally I explain it looking at the nature of the brain. Many ''altered'' traits do not really correspond to ''gaining knowledge of good and evil'' Far from it, in many cases.The second approach I often see is that the fruit/God's punishment corrupted us, and also, our brains design. The fact that that the rest of nature is so needlessly cruel compared to paradise supports this ''option''. I see 2 problems with this. If God personally corrupted us to make us sinful, this creates a logical paradox with his indignation and sorrow of the corruption of mankind, especially since he drowned most of creation during the flood, and sacrificed his own son to atone for humanity's sins, that, is you take the corruption option, he inflicted himself as punishment... It makes no sense at all. The other problem is that, while our brain is ''sinful'', many of the traits are rough and primitive, but have some pragmatic logic to them. What orgin has this pragmatic logic? Evolution accounts for it, but a creationist doesn't believe in that. They may bring up corruption, but that brings us back to my first issue, the paradox of corruption and subsequent indignation.(2) True, but the origin of thoughts and actions is getting better understood by neuroscience by the day. The other problem with dualism, is that when due to a defect in development, or a illness like cancer, can make certain parts of the brain malfunction. In fact , I've read that a lot of brain parts got their function revealed when a tumor make them malfunction. And the results can be loss of human morality, emotions no longer playing a part in decisions, failure to form new memories. The ''soul'' is powerless to do anything about this. And it's only a small leap of logic to assume, these functions may be normally governed by the brain as well. This also can be seen in the differences in morality, temper, etc. Science may be able to detect them in a relatively normal brain eventually. And yet the soul is believed to be the core of our being, what dictates our actions and our morality. It's hard to fully disprove dualism, but this seems to make it very shaky.3) This is what happens when somebody knows most of the facts made in 2). The same applies. You can't really 100% disprove the soul by definition, but it can be make extremely unlikely. The facts about the brain are rather harsh. The more evidence, the more higher purpose becomes ''wishful thinking''. I'm still in this group myself, partially, even though I can't justify it at all, and I don't really like it either. But if people are brought up with this, it's extremely hard throw it away, or lose the doubt there there has been make a mistake.

Yeah, I hear this sort of thing often, Usually combined with ''some things science can't explain''. I personally are not able to just ignore such evidence, but I can see how other would. Perhaps more research, and shifting opinion in the majority would be able to slowly change this, but only time will tell. I know that people are naturally like this, they won't concede on this easily, it's the ultimate question about humanity, one could say. It annoys me greatly, but I admit that you're right on this.

I can see what you mean. Last summer, on vacation I had a frenzied mental conflict trying to be a atheist in my mind but still not having a full answer to anything. After a few days I had utterly exhausted myself mentally and psychologically. I mentally argued about free will, and then suddenly free will was illogical to me. I already held that position for a while before this, but, this time, I was struck with depression, everything feeling meaningless, me not even having the will to stand up and get moving anymore. I still managed to keep myself going though, that there was still meaning to things, I still had a strong will to live.It's oblivious now that strong reaction was due to mental instability, but still, it wasn't a pleasant experience. I am a bit ambiguous about free will again, but the core neurological arguments against it have not been refuted. But people often have this kind of backlash, especially when they are fatigued or hungry. Some people who cease to believe in God have a small depression as well. But in most cases, we make sense out of the new situation eventually, have a will to keep going.It's important, that should people have trouble with things neurology has proven/may prove, that somebody takes care to help them get a hold of things.

If this truly is the case, you most likely have created a scientific stir. If you would be so kind to provide the names of those top scientists who examined you.. Or some news link perhaps?{Following message 20 was spam and was deleted - Adminnemooseus}Edited by Adminnemooseus, : Spam note.