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Dan Ferrisi

Dan Ferrisi

[ Author Bio ]

Review of The Spiritual Doorway in the Brain (2011)

Professor of Neurology Kevin Nelson has long had a fascination with near-death experiences. In his new book, The Spiritual Doorway in the Brain, Nelson provides a deeply neurologically driven interpretation of these extraordinary and often spiritual episodes. In this review, Dan Ferrisi analyzes Nelson's principal arguments about how unusual brain activity might explain near-death experiences and finds them quite persuasive. The human brain, the most highly evolved organ of which we know, is capable of bizarreness far greater than we could ever imagine, and Ferrisi finds that Nelson's scientifically literate book has much to teach us about it.

Dan Ferrisi, a metaphysical naturalist and a published writer for well over a decade, explores the intersection of religion and science, focusing in particular on Darwinian evolution, cosmology and physics. He also probes the philosophical arguments for and against religious belief. His influences include Hume, Russell and Sartre.

Published on the Secular Web

[ Modern Library | Kiosk Article ]
Modern Library

Review of The Spiritual Doorway in the Brain

| January 1, 2011 | Modern Library
(2011) Dan Ferrisi Review: Kevin Nelson. 2010. The Spiritual Doorway in the Brain: A Neurologist’s Search for the God Experience. New York, NY: Dutton. 326 pp. Those who are spiritually inclined diverge sharply from those with a strictly rationalist perspective over an afterlife, “the immortal soul,” and near-death experiences. Nevertheless, it seems probable that all […]
Kiosk Article

To Pray… or to Sacrifice a Goat?

| August 9, 2010 | Kiosk Article
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"Let me be succinct and clear: prayer is a useless exercise, undertaken by those who, in a fit of childish delusion, believe they can effect change in the real world by falling to their knees and murmuring to themselves. These people, oftentimes adults who have been properly educated and who can function in day-to-day society quite serviceably, are under the distinctly infantile impression that muttering under their breath can affect the outcome of some circumstance in which they have a stake, emotional or otherwise."

The Argument from Mundanity

| August 31, 2007 | Editor's Choice, Kiosk Article
"Sam Harris and Christopher Hitchens are among the most intellectually formidable, witty and persuasive atheists currently writing. Although Harris tends to attack theism from a philosophical standpoint, and Hitchens prefers consulting history and using religions' own texts against them, both have elegantly articulated a sound, unanswerable argument against Christianity (and every other religion currently vying for adherents among people who ought to know better). I shall call it The Argument from Mundanity."

My Escape From Catholicism

| May 30, 2006 | Kiosk Article
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Although Dan Ferrisi was born into a 100% Roman Catholic family, he eventually came to deplore religion as a pernicious influence on the species. This is the story of his journey from Catholicism to atheism.
[ Modern Library | Kiosk Article ]
 
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