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Question: Is the Latter-day Saint conception of testimony from the Holy Ghost threatened by neuroscience or psychology?: Difference between revisions
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===The Latter-day Saint Conception of the Soul===
===The Latter-day Saint Conception of the Soul===


Latter-day Saints [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monism#Latter-day_Saint_view_(Mormonism) believe] that the body and spirit are connected as one in a form of [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monism substance monism]. This union between body and spirit is denominated the ''soul'' ([https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/scriptures/dc-testament/dc/88.15?clang=eng&lang=eng D&C 88:15]). The body is a separate entity from the spirit, as the spirit can live independently of the body ([https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/scriptures/bofm/ether/3.16?lang=eng Ether 3:16]); yet when the spirit and body are connected, they are intimately and intricately intertwined and can act upon one another.<ref>This is exactly the view that biblical scholars recognize as being advocated in the Bible. Donald R. Potts, "Body" in ''Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible'' ed., David Noel Freedman (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2000),194; Henry L. Carrigan, Jr., "Soul" Ibid., 1245; Alice Ogden Bellisb, "Spirit" Ibid., 1248. This is also the same understanding advocated in the Book of Mormon. Dennis A. Wright, “Soul” in ''Book of Mormon Reference Companion'' ed., Dennis L. Largey (Salt Lake City, UT: Deseret Book Company, 2003), 734; Noel B. Reynolds, "The Language of the Spirit  
Latter-day Saints [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monism#Latter-day_Saint_view_(Mormonism) believe] that the body and spirit are connected as one in a form of [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monism substance monism]. This union between body and spirit is denominated the ''soul'' ([https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/scriptures/dc-testament/dc/88.15?clang=eng&lang=eng D&C 88:15]). The body is a separate entity from the spirit, as the spirit can live independently of the body ([https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/scriptures/bofm/ether/3.16?lang=eng Ether 3:16]); yet when the spirit and body are connected, they are intimately and intricately intertwined and can act upon one another.<ref>This is exactly the view that biblical scholars recognize as being advocated in the Bible. Donald R. Potts, "Body" in ''Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible'' ed., David Noel Freedman (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2000),194; Henry L. Carrigan, Jr., "Soul" Ibid., 1245; Alice Ogden Bellisb, "Spirit" Ibid., 1248. This is also the same understanding advocated in the Book of Mormon. Dennis A. Wright, “Soul” in ''Book of Mormon Reference Companion'' ed., Dennis L. Largey (Salt Lake City, UT: Deseret Book Company, 2003), 734; Noel B. Reynolds, "The Language of the Spirit in the Book of Mormon" ''Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship'' 33 (2019): 187-222 (193). {{link|url=https://journal.interpreterfoundation.org/the-language-of-the-spirit-in-the-book-of-mormon/}}. The [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doctrine_and_Covenants  Doctrine and Covenants] accords with this understanding. See Larry Evans Dahl, “Soul” in ''Doctrine and Covenants Reference Companion'' eds., Dennis L. Largey and Larry E. Dahl (Salt Lake City, UT: Deseret Book Company, 2012), 619. There is nothing in the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pearl_of_Great_Price_(Mormonism) Pearl of Great Price] that contradicts this understanding. See Andrew C. Skinner, "Spirit(s)" in ''Pearl of Great Price Reference Companion'' ed., Dennis L. Largey (Salt Lake City, UT: Deseret Book Company, 2017), 280-1; Dennis L. Largey, “Soul” Ibid., 279-8. This understanding makes it so that the noumenon/phenomenon distinction disappears in Latter-day Saint theology. See Blake T. Ostler, "Ep71-Knowledge is Being (Pt 1) - Vol 5" ''Exploring Mormon Thought''. January 17, 2019. <http://www.exploringmormonthought.com/2019/01/topics-discussed-a.html> Accessed October 16, 2019.</ref> Thus, whenever we do something with our bodies, it affects our spirits. Whenever something occurs in our spirit, it can affect our bodies. It may be said that, at times (perhaps when the Spirit moves upon us), they can react to each other.
in the Book of Mormon" ''Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship'' 33 (2019): 187-222 (193). {{link|url=https://journal.interpreterfoundation.org/the-language-of-the-spirit-in-the-book-of-mormon/}}. The [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doctrine_and_Covenants  Doctrine and Covenants] accords with this understanding. See Larry Evans Dahl, “Soul” in ''Doctrine and Covenants Reference Companion'' eds., Dennis L. Largey and Larry E. Dahl (Salt Lake City, UT: Deseret Book Company, 2012), 619. There is nothing in the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pearl_of_Great_Price_(Mormonism) Pearl of Great Price] that contradicts this understanding. See Andrew C. Skinner, "Spirit(s)" in ''Pearl of Great Price Reference Companion'' ed., Dennis L. Largey (Salt Lake City, UT: Deseret Book Company, 2017), 280-1; Dennis L. Largey, “Soul” Ibid., 279-8. This understanding makes it so that the noumenon/phenomenon distinction disappears in Latter-day Saint theology. See Blake T. Ostler, "Ep71-Knowledge is Being (Pt 1) - Vol 5" ''Exploring Mormon Thought''. January 17, 2019. <http://www.exploringmormonthought.com/2019/01/topics-discussed-a.html> Accessed October 16, 2019.</ref> Thus, whenever we do something with our bodies, it affects our spirits. Whenever something occurs in our spirit, it can affect our bodies. It may be said that, at times (perhaps when the Spirit moves upon us), they can react to each other.


===The Latter-day Saint Conception of the Holy Ghost, False Spirits, and Light===
===The Latter-day Saint Conception of the Holy Ghost, False Spirits, and Light===

Revision as of 20:46, 29 October 2019

Question: Is the Latter-day Saint conception of testimony from the Holy Ghost threatened by neuroscience or psychology?

A Review of the Criticism

As a part of their epistemology, members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints believe that commitment and/or belief may be established by spiritual experience. This experience is known as having an experience with the Holy Ghost or "Holy Spirit" (Moroni 10:3-5).

Secularist critics of the Church charge that these experiences may be the result of something else and raise a number of naturalistic phenomenological explanations, stemming from neurological and/or psychological study, that supposedly account for the experiences and eliminate the possibility of them being caused by outside influence. Among these are the Backfire Effect (Compare "Belief Perserverance")[1], Cognitive Dissonance[2], Confirmation Bias[3], the Elevation Emotion[4] , and the Illusory Truth Effect.[5] Comparisons are also drawn between the feelings associated with the Latter-day Saint understanding of the Spirit and the effects of the God Helmet.[6]

This article will review each of these proposed explanations for different situations in Latter-day Saint epistemology associated with the Holy Spirit and seek to reconcile such claims within that epistemic framework. To begin, the Latter-day Saint theological conception of spiritual experience will be introduced and then a discussion of these items of interest will follow.

The Latter-day Saint Conception of the Soul

Latter-day Saints believe that the body and spirit are connected as one in a form of substance monism. This union between body and spirit is denominated the soul (D&C 88:15). The body is a separate entity from the spirit, as the spirit can live independently of the body (Ether 3:16); yet when the spirit and body are connected, they are intimately and intricately intertwined and can act upon one another.[7] Thus, whenever we do something with our bodies, it affects our spirits. Whenever something occurs in our spirit, it can affect our bodies. It may be said that, at times (perhaps when the Spirit moves upon us), they can react to each other.

The Latter-day Saint Conception of the Holy Ghost, False Spirits, and Light

Latter-day Saint theology teaches that there is a spectrum of light (synonymous with "truth" in this context) that one can receive in this life that comes from God. This light is known in Latter-day Saint vernacular as “The Light of Christ” (Moroni 7:16[8]; D&C 84:46). When one receives more of God’s truth, one receives more light (D&C 50:24; D&C 84:45). When one rejects light, is persuaded towards rejecting the truth that one has already received, or one deliberately chooses to remain without the light that God has revealed, one stays away or moves away from light.[9] This is seen as sinful. The Holy Ghost is seen as the one that moves God’s children further and further into the light (D&C 84:47). The Holy Ghost works through the Light of Christ given to all people (Moroni 7:16; D&C 84:45-46). Since the Light of Christ is understood to give life and life to all things (D&C 88: 11-13), it follows that it can work on our spirit and/or our body in order to produce sensations. The Holy Ghost works in unity with God, whom Latter-day Saints believe to be of their same species—a corporeal human being with a glorified body (3 Nephi 28:10; D&C 130:22). Satan and many false spirits are seen as those beings that move God’s children further and further into the darkness (D&C 50:2-3). All of these spiritual beings are known to be material instead of immaterial (D&C 131:7). As one receives more light, one is more receptive to receiving additional light and is seen as more sensitive to the Holy Ghost and the truth that God has revealed through prophets. As one moves away from the light, they are less and less able to perceive light. The ability to perceive light can ultimately be diminished (1 Nephi 17:45). As Elder David A. Bednar, an apostle in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, has taught:

As we yield to that influence, to do good and become good, then the Light of Christ increases within us. As we disobey, light is decreased and can ultimately be diminished within us.[10]

Thus these spirits are acting on both our body and our spirit, connected together intimately (called the “soul” in Latter-day Saint theology), to persuade us to accept, reject, or stay indifferent to light and truth. Since God is assumed to be the same species as humans, it follows that he will know how to stimulate our beings in such a way as to produce a spiritual reaction. When these spirits act on us, they produce physically felt sensations. Latter-day Saints believe that all human beings have the ability to perceive that which is of God from that which is of the devil (Moroni 7:14; see also D&C 8:2) through the same power given by the Light of Christ. It is generally believed that what God has revealed to prophets is good and will inspire one to love God and serve him (Moroni 7:20-25; Joseph Smith – Matthew 1:37).

A Review of The Different Neurological Phenomena

With the Latter-day Saint conception of spiritual experience and its purpose laid as a groundwork, a more responsible and comprehensible discussion of the criticism is now possible. The different neurological/psychological phenomena can be viewed from within this framework. It is believed by the author that the study of these phenomena does not diminish the Latter-day Saint conception of the Spirit or testimony (conviction of truth) in anyway, but rather that it informs, enlightens, and evens strengthens it (D&C 88:77-79).

The general premise of this examination is to demonstrate that, since Latter-day Saints commit themselves to substance monism, materialism (D&C 131:7), and a corporeal (meaning "with body"), anthropomorphic God, that no scientific study will be able to demonstrate nor falsify the validity of the use of spiritual experiences in Latter-day Saint epistemology. It may be said that each of the supposed psychological/neurological phenomena may occur through a causal chain of events begun by spiritual impetus provided by God and/or the Holy Spirit or Satan and/or false spirits. This could be neither demonstrated nor falsified since Spirit matter, according to Latter-day Saint doctrine, can’t be seen unless one has refined spiritual sight (D&C 131:7-8). Alternatively, the body may undergo a particular condition which may be manifested in our spirits; or the spirit may experience something that is manifested in our bodies.[11]

What follows is an introduction to each of the claims of provenance and a very brief exploration of it through the lense of this framework provided by Latter-day Saint scripture.

The Backfire Effect (Compare "Belief Perseverance")

The Backfire Effect “describe[s] how some individuals when confronted with evidence that conflicts with their beliefs come to hold their original position even more strongly.”[12] This is used to explain why Latter-day Saints frequently report feeling a stronger conviction of the truth even after reviewing critical literature. It is also used to explain how a Latter-day Saint might feel uncomfortable in the presence of critics when they share information that is supposedly “damaging” to their faith. Thus when Latter-day Saints report that the Spirit does not want them to be in a particular situation, these critics assert that they are merely under the influence of this effect.

The Backfire Effect, like the Elevation Emotion, hasn’t had a stable understanding of its physiological profile established. Experiments have failed to replicate the same findings that the researchers who first introduced the idea of the backfire effect produced.[13]

The Backfire Effect is contrasted with "Belief Perserverance" which is merely the ability to maintain a belief (without that belief being strengthened necessarily) even in the face of solid disconfirming evidence. Belief Perseverance is a well-established psychological phenomenon and is manifested in all people no matter what the belief being contradicted.

When Latter-day Saints report a stronger conviction of the truth after reviewing critical literature, it is, more often than not, the result of enduring study and prayer which they have used to search for answers to the questions of critics. It is not simply the result of wishful thinking or willful ignorance. To suggest otherwise seems ironically ignorant. Surely this may be the case with some. But the vast majority of Latter-day Saints take their scripture and history seriously since (in contrast to creedal Christianity and other religions) their theology is tied to their history. Diligent efforts have been and are made by the Church to provide helpful resources to Latter-day Saints so they can learn their history including controversial topics within a framework suited to their learning, emotional, cultural, and practical needs. FairMormon and other Latter-day Saint academic organizations such as the Interpreter Foundation, Book of Mormon Central, Pearl of Great Price Central, The Neal A. Maxwell Institute for Religious Scholarship, the BYU Religious Studies Center, and BYU Studies exist as entities in part to push back rationally on those who might believe that solid disconfirming evidence is available for the beliefs of Latter-day Saints.

Cognitive Dissonance

Cognitive Dissonance is commonly understood as the discomfort that one feels when one encounters new information that contradicts a currently-held belief.

Critics aver that when Latter-day Saints witness another person doing something that goes against what they believe God has commanded, that what they may describe as the Spirit telling them that such thing is wrong may instead be simply cognitive dissonance.

Cognitive dissonance is certainly something that occurs within the brain, which is obviously part of our bodies. However, given the Latter-day Saint conception of the soul this doesn't negate the possibility of dissonance being caused by a spiritual source. Latter-day Saints will generally report additional discomfort that is manifested on a deep, spiritual level when they encounter situations such as this. Latter-day Saint doctrine holds that the Spirit can press thoughts on our minds (D&C 128:1), that it can recognize and correct sin (John 16:8), and that it can constrain someone to do something or restrain them from doing it (1 Nephi 7:15; 2 Nephi 28:1; 32:7; Alma 14:11; Mormon 3:16; Ether 12:2). The Holy Spirit may provide the idea that causes the dissonance and/or simply cause the dissonance partially or fully. Latter-day Saints will generally be able to say confidently when they feel like a deeper, spiritual impetus is causing discomfort and when it is simply their own thoughts. Alternatively, their may be no influence from the Holy Spirit and instead, Latter-day Saints may simply be experiencing deeply held stress manifested in both body and spirit. Or perhaps some other combination of the preceding. Latter-day Saints will simply have to experience such dissonance for themselves, pay very close attention to their experience, and then take proactive steps to resolve the dissonance in a way consistent with their beliefs by study and/or faith (D&C 88:118).

Confirmation Bias

Confirmation Bias is understood as the tendency that all people have to seek for, learn, and recall information in a way that confirms their already-held beliefs.

There are several ways that critics apply criticism based on this information.

  • The most common way that critics use this information is by arguing that when Latter-day Saints pray, they are only seeking to confirm their already held beliefs about how their prayers should be answered. Thus spiritual experience is argued to be deterministic i.e. if you pray hard enough about something hoping for one answer, you’ll get it.

This criticism has a few weaknesses:

  1. Spiritual experience often doesn’t confirm what we want. As many Latter-day Saints can testify, there are simply many times in our religious experience where we’re given a distinct “no” to the prayers that we wish to receive a “yes” for or where we’re simply given a contrary answer to a particular piece of inspiration we wish to receive from the Spirit.
  2. The criticism assumes that all knowledge for Latter-day Saints comes from their immediately sensed experience i.e. what we pray about is first observed with our natural senses such as our sight and sense of hearing and then brought to deity in prayer. While that is at the very least partially true (D&C 9:7-9), there are other times where Latter-day Saints claim to receive knowledge that they wouldn’t otherwise have. This often comes during priesthood blessings but can also come as warnings of immediate danger, sudden impressions to go help someone, etc.
  3. Spiritual experience has often seen to not be able to be produced at will. This is the reason that many Latter-day Saints have gone through faith crisis because, for whatever reason, they have felt like God stopped answering their prayers. Consider the experience of famous Latter-day Saint musician Michael McClean and how he resolved such a predicament.
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  • Some critics assert that Latter-day Saints are too quick to interpret new events in light of their current beliefs. For instance consider what one website (run for former Latter-day Saints by former Latter-day Saints) created as a meme in part to mock Latter-day Saint tendencies to interpret a situation as miraculous:


The implied argument is that it is circular reasoning under philosophically empirical standards to assert that God miraculously caused that the temple in Houston not be flooded. This same argument is applied to Latter-day Saints and other religious persons anytime they assert that God has had some miraculous influence in their lives at "x" point in time i.e. "Well, can you prove that it was God who did that? Then why should I believe it?"

It is true that it is circular reasoning to assert that a higher power is behind anything and/or everything that may be claimed and/or perceived to be a miracle. But Latter-day Saints and other religious people might apply the Argument from Fallacy and counter by saying, "Well, how can you prove that it wasn't God?" It might also be pointed out that every belief system has some inherit circularity in it (See Wikipedia, "Turtles All the Way Down"). Latter-day Saints are not surprised to find circularity in their beliefs and don't expect a pristine epistemological nexus to the divine. Agency, or the power of self-determination and choosing to follow God or not in this life, is central to Latter-day Saint theology (Moses 4:1-4; Abraham 3:21-25). If God were to prove himself as the one behind a proposed miracle, wouldn't this diminish the need for one to choose to have faith in God (2 Nephi 2:27-28)? This is not to assert that there cannot therefore be any rational basis for Latter-day Saint and other religious belief. Scholars and apologists have been making a well-reasoned case for the veracity of Latter-day Saint scripture for quite some time.[14] This is only to say that not everything must be empirically provable in Latter-day Saint epistemology. As observed elsewhere on this website, knowing in Latter-day Saint epistemology is found at some confluence of reason, revelation, and faith (with a stress on revelation). The author of Hebrews in the Holy Bible observed that "faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen." (Hebrews 11:1)

The Elevation Emotion

The Elevation Emotion is a sensation that researchers have been investigating since (it seems) the year 2000. Jonathan Haidt—American social psychologist, author, and Professor of Ethical Leadership at New York University's Stern School of Business— seems to be the first to work on this with his interest in human transcendence.[15] It is defined as the:

emotion elicited by witnessing virtuous acts of remarkable moral goodness[16]

The nature of the emotion is described as:

a distinct feeling of warmth and expansion that is accompanied by appreciation and affection for the individual whose exceptional conduct is being observed.[17]

Critics claim that since this is so close to the “burning in the bosom” that Latter-day Saints describe, that this is a plausible naturalistic explanation for what Latter-day Saints and other religious persons might be feeling, with their bodies producing this emotion whenever something good and virtuous is witnessed.

However elevation hasn’t had a stable physiological profile established for it. That said, video clips shown to test subjects during experimentation may suggest that situations that induce elevation decrease vagal parasympathetic impact on the heart.[18] Thus perhaps it may be said that the Spirit simply acts on these areas of the body to produce the sensation.

Alternatively, those that have felt elevation have reported that they sense a "warm tingling sensation in their chest". The sensation produced by elevation may simply be the Holy Spirit’s physical effect manifested on/in the chest.

Elevation is said to be made manifest upon someone’s witnessing of “acts of remarkable moral goodness". In the Book of Mormon we learn that when one is in the service of their fellowmen, that one is in the service of God (Mosiah 2:17). Could this sensation be considered as God confirming the truth of this and motivating an individual to continue to seek out opportunities for altruism?

The God Helmet

In 1990, researchers Michael Persinger and Stanley Koren produced a helmet to study creativity, effects of mild stimulation to temporal lobes, and religious experience.[19] This helmet, when worn, reportedly produced the sensation of a "presence" with experimental participants. This gained widespread public attention and was nicknamed "The God Helmet."

The experimental results from Persinger and Koren have failed to replicate in a reliable way.[20] Some scholars have used the same helmet and generated no feelings in participants.[21] Others have used the same helmet and not turned it on and yet achieved the same report of "presence".[22] Some scholars have used fake helmets instead of the original “God helmet" that have produced the same feelings in test subjects.[23]Today it is generally felt by researchers that personality differences in participants ultimately determined if one felt this "presence" or not. The experiments showed that religious people were generally those that reported a "presence" while atheists and skeptics generally did not report such a feeling. A few notes regarding spiritual experience in relation to this:

  1. Some may be tempted to claim that since the religious people were the ones that were most open to feeling something and perhaps wanted to experience a presence, that this may be evidence of a deterministic nature of spiritual experience i.e. if you want a spiritual experience, you can will it to pass. This is contradicted by the lived experience of Latter-day Saints as has already been pointed out. It may be that one is able determine whether they are willing or not to experience the Holy Spirit whether in a more passive way (such as feeling at peace while taking the Sacrament) or in a more dynamic, personally revelatory way (2 Nephi 33:1-2) but they won't be able to force the Holy Spirit to interact with them in that dynamic way. Conversely, they may be able to will false spirits to interact with them if invited.
  2. The Latter-day Saint understanding of the soul should yet again be remembered. It would not be surprising to see that some manipulation of the brain or body could produce experiences that could be described as religious. This particular experiment doesn’t seem to be a reliable way to claim that, but certainly something like this device that is more efficacious may be produced in the future. Latter-day Saints should not be afraid of such study because, again, the theology welcomes scientific disciplines to help them be better instructed in it (D&C 88:77-79).

Illusory Truth Effect

The Illusory Truth Effect is understood as the effect on people’s rationality as they are exposed to the same data set. It has been observed since 1977[24] that if a person is repeatedly exposed to the same information over and over, that they will begin to believe that information no matter how irrational. As one is exposed to the information repeatedly, they increase in something called processing fluency which is known as the relative ease with which one processes information. Criticism is applied to Latter-day Saints, based in this knowledge, in a couple of ways:

  • Some critics claim that Latter-day Saints only believe what they believe because they have grown up with it and the information they have learned has simply become “second nature” as it were.
  • Some critics point to certain statements from General Authorities from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and criticize them for the manner in which they suggest a testimony might be obtained.

For instance, the now late Elder Boyd K. Packer, another apostle of the Church, once wrote:

It is not unusual to have a missionary say, “How can I bear testimony until I get one? How can I testify that God lives, that Jesus is the Christ, and that the gospel is true? If I do not have such a testimony, would that not be dishonest?” Oh, if I could teach you this one principle. A testimony is to be found in the bearing of it! Somewhere in your quest for spiritual knowledge, there is that “leap of faith,” as the philosophers call it. It is the moment when you have gone to the edge of the light and stepped into the darkness to discover that the way is lighted ahead for just a footstep or two. “The spirit of man,” is as the scripture says, indeed “is the candle of the Lord.” (Prov. 20:27.)[25]

Another apostle, Elder Dallin H. Oaks, has expressed similar sentiments about the obtainment of a testimony before.[26] Elder Gary E. Stevenson, another apostle, has reiterated those sentiments in print.[27]

In the critics' point of view, these General Authorities are encouraging people to simply think and pray about the Church being true until they finally believe that it is.

  • Finally, Latter-day Saints are known to encourage those within their circle of influence including family and other loved ones to seek a testimony of the Gospel by the Spirit. Since the Spirit is so central to conversion in Latter-day Saint theology, it makes sense that faithful Latter-day Saints will try their best to explicate how one can obtain a testimony and invite people frequently and sincerely to try the same process out for themselves to gain that testimony. The problem is that many people have sought a testimony for many years through spiritual experience and have not received a witness. Thus, with every time that Latter-day Saints invite someone to convert, the criticism supposedly becomes more and more valid as duped individuals seek repeatedly from that invitation to accept and convert to the Church.

The criticism has a few weaknesses. The first is the double standard applied by critics. This criticism assumes that critics are not under the same effect and/or that the only direction that one should or can travel in their understanding after having been made aware of supposedly more truthful information is away from the Gospel.

The second weakness is that it doesn’t adequately account for the many Latter-day Saints who used sincere truth-seeking processes to arrive at their conversion. It neglects those that converted to the Gospel even when they were critics to it before. It neglects the many Latter-day Saints who remained as serious students of the Gospel for a long time before converting after they felt their converting experience from the Holy Ghost. It portrays ordinary Latter-day Saints as mindless automatons that simply followed peer-pressure or cultural moors to gain their testimony. It does not capture the lived experience of millions of members.

The third weakness of the argument is that it is often used in overly reductionist ways and doesn’t account for the deeply personal, spiritual, and intimate experiences that Latter-day Saints have as they build/have built their testimonies of the Gospel. It reduces the experiences' sacredness to mere biological processes when it is almost never described as such by Latter-day Saints and never can be under the Latter-day Saint understanding of the soul as described above. Indeed, Latter-day Saints are generally apt to say when something is the result of simply wishful thinking or a more special impression.

Latter-day Saints understand that some need to be invited to pray about the Gospel more than once and follow the instructions in Moroni 10:3-5 closely. Namely, to first ponder the mercies of God, pray with real intent (meaning that one intends on acting on the answer), with faith in Christ, believing that God can reveal the truth of the Book of Mormon to any and all of God’s children. But Latter-day Saints also know that a testimony of the Gospel sometimes needs to be built over time (Alma 32: 27-43). But sometimes, Latter-day Saints may need to be reminded that not all people will receive a testimony of the Gospel through the Holy Ghost. Some people can have the spiritual gift to believe on other people’s words who claim to have received the Spirit so that they can inherit eternal life (D&C 46:13-14). Others don’t have faith and will simply need to continue to seek learning by study and faith (D&C 88:118). It is even possible for Latter-day Saints to believe that some won’t need to covert to the faith in this life (See D&C 137:7-8; Luke 9:49-50; Matthew 7:14; 1 Nephi 8:20 (19-24); 3 Nephi 27:33; D&C 22:4 (1-4); 43:7). They may be converted to the faith in the next. Elder Orson F. Whitney, another apostle of the Church active at the beginning of the 20th century, stated the following:

Perhaps the Lord needs such men on the outside of His Church to help it along. They are among its auxiliaries, and can do more good for the cause where the Lord has placed them, than anywhere else. … Hence, some are drawn into the fold and receive a testimony of the truth; while others remain unconverted … the beauties and glories of the gospel being veiled temporarily from their view, for a wise purpose. The Lord will open their eyes in His own due time. God is using more than one people for the accomplishment of His great and marvelous work. The Latter-day Saints cannot do it all. It is too vast, too arduous for any one people. … We have no quarrel with the Gentiles. They are our partners in a certain sense.[28]

If anything, it may be said that this criticism is valid for teaching Latter-day Saints that they should indeed prove all things and hold fast to that which is good (1 Thess 5:21). However, this criticism doesn’t seem to have any sort of deep impact on Latter-day Saint conceptions of finding truth, testimony, or the Spirit.

Conclusion

We see that the Latter-day Saint conception of testimony and/or spiritual experience does not have to be affected by knowledge of these things. We have used official teachings from Church leaders and the official scriptures to dispel the misunderstandings of the use of spiritual experiences in Latter-day Saint epistemology and demonstrated that there are meaningful ways to view this information without discounting the sacred experiences that Latter-day Saints have rationally sought after and hold at the center of their noetic structure.

Some may have objections to the way that the author decided to view the interaction of the above-mentioned propositions from Latter-day Saint pneumatology in relation to these phenomenological matters. Readers are encouraged to study the issue out for themselves with the Latter-day Saint conceptions of the soul, Holy Spirit, Light of Christ, angels (both good and bad), false spirits, the Devil, and God in mind and develop their own thinking relative to this subject. The larger point to be made is that the claims made by critics of the Church do not affect Latter-day Saint epistemology in any negative way.


Notes

  1. ↑ Bill Reel, "Cognitive Dissidents: 004: The Backfire Effect." Mormon Discussions Podcasts - Full Lineup. November 23, 2017. <https://mormondiscussionpodcast.org/2017/09/premium-cognitive-dissidents-004-backfire-effect/>. Accessed July 21, 2019.
  2. ↑ Bob McCue, “Van Hale’s ‘Mormon Miscellaneous’ Radio Talk Show,” Version 3. September 20, 2004.
  3. ↑ Bill Reel, “Cognitive Dissidents: 002: Confirmation Bias.” Mormon Discussions Podcasts - Full Lineup. November 7, 2017. <https://mormondiscussionpodcast.org/2017/08/premium-cognitive-dissidents-002-confirmation-bias/> Accessed October 9, 2019.
  4. ↑ James K. Rogers, "How Can We Find Truth? Part 4" The Amateur Thinker. February 18, 2011. <http://www.theamateurthinker.com/2011/02/how-can-we-find-truth-part-4/>. Accessed July 21, 2019.
  5. ↑ "Illusory Truth Effect." Stuff You Missed in Sunday School. <https://www.missedinsunday.com/memes/other/illusory-truth-effect/> Accessed July 21, 2019.
  6. ↑ Samantha Shelley, "Let's Talk about ‘The Spirit’." Zelph on the Shelf. January 17, 2019. <https://zelphontheshelf.com/lets-talk-about-the-spirit/> Accessed July 21, 2019.
  7. ↑ This is exactly the view that biblical scholars recognize as being advocated in the Bible. Donald R. Potts, "Body" in Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible ed., David Noel Freedman (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2000),194; Henry L. Carrigan, Jr., "Soul" Ibid., 1245; Alice Ogden Bellisb, "Spirit" Ibid., 1248. This is also the same understanding advocated in the Book of Mormon. Dennis A. Wright, “Soul” in Book of Mormon Reference Companion ed., Dennis L. Largey (Salt Lake City, UT: Deseret Book Company, 2003), 734; Noel B. Reynolds, "The Language of the Spirit in the Book of Mormon" Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 33 (2019): 187-222 (193). off-site. The Doctrine and Covenants accords with this understanding. See Larry Evans Dahl, “Soul” in Doctrine and Covenants Reference Companion eds., Dennis L. Largey and Larry E. Dahl (Salt Lake City, UT: Deseret Book Company, 2012), 619. There is nothing in the Pearl of Great Price that contradicts this understanding. See Andrew C. Skinner, "Spirit(s)" in Pearl of Great Price Reference Companion ed., Dennis L. Largey (Salt Lake City, UT: Deseret Book Company, 2017), 280-1; Dennis L. Largey, “Soul” Ibid., 279-8. This understanding makes it so that the noumenon/phenomenon distinction disappears in Latter-day Saint theology. See Blake T. Ostler, "Ep71-Knowledge is Being (Pt 1) - Vol 5" Exploring Mormon Thought. January 17, 2019. <http://www.exploringmormonthought.com/2019/01/topics-discussed-a.html> Accessed October 16, 2019.
  8. ↑ Here the term used is “Spirit of Christ”. It is understood that this is synonymous with “Light of Christ”. See Alan L. Wilkins, “The Light of Christ” in Book of Mormon Reference Companion ed., Dennis L. Largey, 521.
  9. ↑ See “Darkness, Spiritual in the Scripture Index on churchofjesuschrist.org
  10. ↑ Elder David A. Bednar, “Patterns of Light: The Light of Christ” The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. <https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/inspiration/latter-day-saints-channel/watch/series/mormon-messages/patterns-of-light-the-light-of-christ-1?lang=eng> Accessed October 5, 2019.
  11. ↑ As a potential example of the latter, consider the work done by scientists at the University of Utah that showed that the reward centers of the brain lit up when Latter-day Saints reported feeling the Spirit: Michael A. Ferguson, Jared A. Nielsen, Jace B. King, Li Dai, Danielle M. Giangrasso, Rachel Holman, Julie R. Korenberg & Jeffrey S. Anderson (2018) "Reward, salience, and attentional networks are activated by religious experience in devout Mormons", Social Neuroscience, 13:1, 104-116, DOI: 10.1080/17470919.2016.1257437. Other research appears to have built upon these conclusions to provide more solid neural correlates for spiritual experiences. Lisa Miller, Iris M Balodis, Clayton H McClintock, Jiansong Xu, Cheryl M Lacadie, Rajita Sinha, Marc N Potenza. (2019) "Neural Correlates of Personalized Spiritual Experiences" Cerebral Cortex 29:6, pages 2331-2338; Brick Johnstone, Daniel Cohen. 2019. "Universal Neuropsychological Model of Spiritual Transcendence" Neuroscience, Selflessness, and Spiritual Experience, 131-143.
  12. ↑ Robert Todd Caroll, “Backfire Effect” Skeptic’s Dictionary. March 14, 2015. <http://www.skepdic.com/backfireeffect.html> Accessed October 7, 2019.
  13. ↑ Eileen Dombrowski, “Facts matter after all: rejecting the ‘backfire effect’” Oxford University Blog. March 12, 2018. <https://educationblog.oup.com/theory-of-knowledge/facts-matter-after-all-rejecting-the-backfire-effect> Accessed October 7, 2019.
  14. ↑ See Brant A. Gardner, “Traditions of the Fathers: The Book of Mormon as History” (Salt Lake City: Greg Kofford Books, 2015); Brant A. Gardner, “Second Witness: Analytical and Contextual Commentary on the Book of Mormon” 6 vols. (Salt Lake City: Greg Kofford Books, 2007); John L. Sorenson, “Mormon’s Codex” (Provo and Salt Lake: BYU Religious Studies Center and Deseret Book, 2013); John Welch et al., “Knowing Why: 137 Evidences that the Book of Mormon is True” (American Fork: Covenant Communications, 2017); Noel B. Reynolds (ed.), “Book of Mormon Authorship Revisited: The Evidence for Ancient Origins” (Provo: FARMS, 1997). For evidence of the Book of Abraham, see here. For evidence for the Book of Moses see Jeffrey M. Bradshaw, "In God's Image and Likeness" (Salt Lake City, UT: Eborn Books, 2009); Jeffrey Bradshaw and David Larsen, "In God's Image and Likeness Vol 2: Enoch, Noah, and the Tower of Babel" (Salt Lake City, UT: Eborn Publishing, 2014).
  15. ↑ Jonathan Haidt, (March 2000) "The Positive Emotion of Elevation" Prevention & Treatment 3-1
  16. ↑ Aquino, Karl; Brent McFerran; Marjorie Laven (April 2011) "Moral identity and the experience of moral elevation in response to acts of uncommon goodness" Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 100 (4): 703–718.
  17. ↑ Ibid.
  18. ↑ Jennifer Silvers; Jonathan Haidt (2008). "Moral Elevation Can Induce Nursing". Emotion. 8 (2): 291–295. doi:10.1037/1528-3542.8.2.291.
  19. ↑ Ruttan, L. A., Persinger, M. A. & Koren, S. (1990). "Enhancement of Temporal Lobe-Related Experiences During Brief Exposures to MilliGauss Intensity Extremely Low Frequency Magnetic Fields". Journal of Bioelectricity. 9 (1): 33–54.
  20. ↑ Roxanne Khamsi (December 9, 2004). "Electrical brainstorms busted as source of ghosts". Nature. doi:10.1038/news041206-10.
  21. ↑ C.C. French et al. (2009). "The 'Haunt' project: An attempt to build a 'haunted' room by manipulating complex electromagnetic fields and infrasound" Cortex. 45 (5): 619–629. doi:10.1016/j.cortex.2007.10.011. PMID 18635163.
  22. ↑ Van Elk, M. (2014), "An EEG study on the effects of induced spiritual experiences on somatosensory processing and sensory suppression.", Journal for the Cognitive Science of Religion, 2 (2): 121
  23. ↑ Christine Simmonds-Moore et al., “Exceptional Experiences Following Exposure to a Sham “God Helmet”: Evidence for Placebo, Individual Difference, and Time of Day Influences” Sage Journals Vol 39, Issue 1, 2019 https://doi.org/10.1177/0276236617749185.
  24. ↑ Hasher, Lynn; Goldstein, David; Toppino, Thomas (1977). "Frequency and the conference of referential validity" (PDF). Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior. 16 (1): 107–112. doi:10.1016/S0022-5371(77)80012-1.
  25. ↑ Elder Boyd K. Packer, "The Candle of the Lord" Ensign, January 1983.
  26. ↑ Elder Dallin H. Oaks, “Testimony” General Conference, April 2008. “We gain or strengthen a testimony by bearing it. Someone even suggested that some testimonies are better gained on the feet bearing them than on the knees praying for them.”
  27. ↑ Elder Gary E. Stevenson, "Testimony: Sharing in Word and Deed" New Era, March 2019.
  28. ↑ Elder Orson F. Whitney, Conference Report, April 1928, 59. This was cited in Elder Ezra Taft Benson, "Civic Standards for Faithful Saints" General Conference, April 1972. He offered Thomas L. Kane and Alexander Doniphan as examples of people who would pray about the Book of Mormon but not be converted in this life.
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