Connecting God and your brain not as easy as it sounds

WHY is it that in virtually every time period and place where human societies have existed, religion has followed?
In this disappointing entry into the atheist vs. believer debate, anthropologist Lionel Tiger and psychiatrist Michael McGuire, both accomplished, well-published elder statesmen in their fields, start with the observation that, given its ubiquity, religion must be a natural phenomenon.
To really understand religion, they argue, one needs to look at the brains in the heads of those who experience it.
You will find that life's stresses -- thwarted plans, boredom, navigating competitive and hierarchical social relationships, coming to terms with the deaths of loved ones and the impending death of the self -- take a neurophysiological toll.
The stress influences rates of production and depletion of neurotransmitters like dopamine and serotonin, making us feel crummy.
And religion provides a remedy, or as they put it, it "brainsoothes."
Religious gatherings offer moments of calm, of solidarity with a familiar and welcoming group. Accepting a supernatural authority reduces anxieties over hierarchy.
Following dictates set out in authoritative texts eases the turmoil of messy moral decisions, with forgiveness offered for transgressions. And belief in an afterlife dampens the dread of the inevitable.
So how well do they make their case?
Much of what they write is uncontroversial to the point of banality. But there's a lingering artificiality in how they select for discussion people's experiences and feelings, not much in the way of empirical support, and a failure to address alternate interpretations.
In contrast to much-discussed books of recent years that were highly critical of religion (Harris, Dawkins, etc.), this one tries to turn down the heat by championing a more objective stance.
The authors profess admiration for the creative energy religion motivates. They also acknowledge that the religious mood has encouraged great fractiousness in human history, and has played (and still plays) a role in closing minds against ways of understanding life and universe supported by rich and comprehensive evidence.
But reading God's Brain is a lot like listening to an affable professor who's clearly enthused with his own speculative ideas, but prone to verbosity, repetition and wearing you down with mildly relevant anecdotes.
The book also turns out to be difficult to read, but not for the reasons you'd expect. Its discussion of technical topics like neurotransmitters and brain function is tame compared to what you'll find in many books and articles that cover similar territory.
We sometimes compliment a book by saying that "the sentences fly off the page." In this book, sentences frequently need to be pried off:
"It is necessary to be aware of the different gradations of colour in sacred costume and what their wearers mean to the ideas of religion's meaning."
A stray clunker that made it past an editor under time pressure? Try this then:
"The percentages of informal rules that are often large do not unambiguously and agreeably have their source in religion."
There are likely great insights to be gained by gazing at religion through a neurological lens, but more cogent books than this are needed to launch the notion further into the mainstream.
Winnipegger Neil Schipper has worked as an engineer and math and science teacher. He is vice-president of the Humanist Association of Manitoba.