Neuromythology
According to neurobiologists Eugene D’Aquili and Andrew Newberg in their pioneering work The Mystical Mind: Probing the Biology of Religious Experience, the human mind is structured in such a way as to generate myths:
“Human beings have no choice but to construct myths to explain their world… this constructive orientation is inherent in the obligatory functioning of the neural structures of operators we have described.”
According to D’Aquili and Newberg, a mythic story represents a “deeply felt existential problem” for the society that creates it. Our minds are predisposed by their own underlying structure to create mythic stories, reconciling the opposing forces we encounter in the world or at least dramatizing the conflict between them. The creation of such myths is not optional- it is automatic; part of the structure of the mind itself. That is why mythmaking is a universal, present in all eras and in all societies.
Even atheists have their myths as well, though masquerading as something else. Some re-imagine history as a heroic battleground between the forces of reason and those of superstition, in which the progress of reason and human progress march hand in hand. In this myth, reason and science are eternally opposed to religion and superstition, but good will triumph in the end and evil will fade, ushering in a new golden age defined by scientific progress. Without even realizing it, they’ve created a new Zoroastrianism.
I believe that this universal impulse to generate myths is not exclusively neurobiological, but is the mind’s reaction to or interpretation of something else- the very real magic at the heart of the world.
As this magic has always existed, the mythic impulse has as well, resulting in the classical myths of the ancient world, as well as the still-extant mythologies of the great religions. Myth in this context is a social phenomena,and each mythology represents the worldview of an entire culture. Much of the modern world, however, is secular and fragmented, expressed not by a single viewpoint but by a multiplicity.
The broken mirror of the modern world shows us dozens of faces when we try to look into it, and no easy way to reconcile them into a meaningful unity. For better or for worse, most of us cannot connect with any tribal identity, or lay claim in any organic way to the mythology of a people. Even those who have such a connection are too often alienated, unable to feel themselves as belonging to their own point of origin.
Myth still flourishes in this strange new world, but it manifests in the fertile chaos of personal gnosis and private visions. The mythology we are creating today is intensely personal, manifesting in a thousand forms, and constantly fluid. My personal mythology might have a Celtic theme and yours might draw on Greek or Norse or Egyptian stories- but don’t let that fool you. These are personal visions inspired by the past, not reconstructions of anything. The creation of new myth and personal gnosis- this is a new type of spirituality for a new mode of life. Even when it draws on the most primal sources it is completely distinct from them.
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