All Praise the Delicious Tenticles of the Flying Spaghetti Monster

[hvindenm]

Tonight, I'm scoreing free wine, cheese, pizza, and a movie.  Yes, I have learned my grad-student-foraging lessons well.   The wine and cheese is being sponsored by the grad student association, and it is accomanying an art show.  Wee!!  I think it will be fun. 
The free movie sounds entertaining.  I just hope it's not one of those religious

Comments

[jedimomma]

Huh. Actually, our university hosts one of the best centers in this area--the Center for the Study of Health, Spirituality and Religion. The focus is on what role, if any, spirituality and religion play in human health, both from a descriptive and prescriptive point of view. For myself, I find it astounding that the health sciences have consistently ignored the role of spirituality and/or religion in one's health, even from a purely psychological standpoint. It looks like the MU professor moderating this event is from the healthcare profession--there's every chance that he is doing this sort of work. Whether or not science should be intermingled with religion or not, it is certainly the case that it *is* intermingled in many people's daily lives, and almost certainly plays a role in people's physical and mental health. It would be wise for us to try and honestly figure out what that role is

[hvindenm]

I appreciate your response. =) Unfortunately, the sponsor of the movie series was unable to attend the meeting last night. I was eager to hear a scientist's / doctor's perspective on how spiritual healing / religious healing works and/or relates to health care. I did read the summary (I feel lazy for only doing this!) of his paper on brain injuries, selflessness, and religious experiences. I appreciate his approach, as being a good model for understanding the natural world. Take a working thing, break it, and then see what happens. Scientists do this in genetics all the time, and it is a useful approach. I would encourage using science to understand how religion impacts health

[jedimomma]

I suspect that we have both substantial agreements and substantial disagreements here, but I'm not sure that we'll be able to get through them (or even *to* them) via this thread. Perhaps we'll see more of our respective positions as time goes on? =)