Examining the Psychology of Belief

BOOK REVIEWS addressing Curie with respect and Irene, her older daughter, took after her The virulent sexism she faced is pre- evenhandedness, but she cannot possi- parents and became a skilled scientist sented as an execrable and pointless bly get past the romanticism of Marie’s and researcher. After Pierre’s death, the hindrance to her pursuit of brilliance. personal narrative. Her life possesses the two became closer as a collegial relation- Goldsmith strikes a fine and careful kind of sweep and drama that is the stuff ship grew between them. They shared a balance between celebrating Curie’s of epic romantic films. It is remarkable remarkable bonding experience during tremendous intellect and accomplish- that her life story has been filmed only World War I. Marie invented a porta- ments and examining the pathologies once, a reasonably accurate if rather ble x-ray machine and the two women that created so many disturbances in narrowly focused effort, Madame Curie, hauled it around the battle fronts assist- her private life. by director Mervyn Leroy in 1943. To ing battlefield surgeons in locating bul- At first, Barbara Goldsmith would try to ignore her vivid and dramatic life lets and shrapnel in wounded soldiers. appear to be an unlikely choice to write a would be to lose much of the narrative Eve, the younger daughter, never took biography of a scientist and intellectual. grip of this book. Curie’s obsessive thirst to science and was raised primarily by Her previous biographies are profiles of for knowledge plays out against a his- her grandfather. She studied music and minor celebrities like Gloria Vanderbilt torical backdrop of flights from tsarist eventually wrote a biography of her and Victoria Woodhull. However, oppression, failed love affairs, tragic famous mother. Goldsmith delivers an insightful and deaths, an almost unrelieved battering Goldsmith’s biography allows Marie thoroughly researched portrait of a sin- at the hands of the sexist and nationalist Curie a full, if troubled and flawed, gular and extraordinary woman, who French scientific establishment, spells humanity, not just a two-dimensional despite extensive setbacks persevered to of clinical depression, and the eventual martyrdom in a dingy garret room. become one of the greatest scientists in triumphs of two Nobel Prizes. Goldsmith adeptly controls this drama, never allowing it to fully over- whelm a thorough discussion of Marie’s Examining the Psychology of tremendous scientific achievement. The passages that detail her research and Belief its revolutionary nature are marvel- DAVID LUDDEN ously clear and lucid explanations of a complex and often tedious process Pseudoscience and the Paranormal. Second ed. By Terence of discovery. These passages serve to Hines. Prometheus Books, Amherst, N.Y. 2003. enrich the drama of her life because she ISBN 1-57392-979-4. 500 pp. Softcover, $21. accomplished such amazing scientific insights despite astounding obstacles. Her drive and resourcefulness were s Terence Hines describes in of her vertebrae had collapsed. Two admirable, going to extraordinary his book Pseudoscience and the months later, Sullivan was dead of the lengths and some real personal risks A Paranormal, Helen Sullivan cancer that Kuhlman had “cured” her to secure a reliable supply of the pitch- could walk only with a back brace, due of. Although it is clear that Sullivan had blende ore she needed for her exper- to the cancer that had weakened the not been cured, what can account for iments, and to obtain the laboratory bones of her spinal cord. But when faith Sullivan’s behavior that night on stage? space she required. healer Kathryn Kuhlman told her that The answer, according to psychologist Such a drive to achieve can easily her cancer was cured, Sullivan threw off Terence Hines, lies in the physiological become an obsession, and in Marie’s her back brace and ran across the stage and psychological factors that predis- case such an obsession caused her to pay several times as the audience applauded pose all of us to supernatural beliefs. a very high price. Her home life with and Kuhlman praised the Lord. For Physiological conditions, such as epi- husband Pierre was, to say the least, the rest of the evening, Sullivan felt no lepsy and migraines, are often associated unconventional. They had two children pain, but by early morning, the pain had with paranormal and mystical experi- together but Marie was a cold and dis- returned, only more intense than before. ences. Epileptic seizures arise from aber- tant mother. Goldsmith is charitable to Without the support of her brace, one rant electrical activity in the brain, and Curie, but her daughters grew up seeing David Ludden is an assistant professor of seizures in the motor areas of the brain and knowing very little of their parents. psychology at Lindsey Wilson College in give rise to the convulsions typically asso- The laboratory was their real home, and Columbia, Kentucky. E-mail: luddend ciated with epilepsy. However, when epi- Marie seemed to be able to relate with @lindsey.edu. lepsy occurs in other areas of the brain, people only in the context of the lab. there may be no obvious outward changes SKEPTICAL INQUIRER January / February 2006 59 BOOK REVIEWS in behavior and it can be detected only Americans who report that they have The constructive nature of percep- by medical tests. Temporal lobe epilepsy had some sort of paranormal experience tion and memory is another theme is known to produce feelings of profound indicative of life after death.” that runs through Pseudoscience and the joy and religious ecstasy, and is strongly Other paranormal experiences can be Paranormal. People generally assume correlated with the tendency to report explained by the fact that people do not that sensory perception presents a verid- mystical and paranormal experiences. have as much conscious control over (or ical depiction of the environment, but Temporal lobe epileptic activity has also awareness of) their outward behavior as this is not the case. Rather, our percep- been recorded in trance mediums and they think they do. As Hines points out, tion is a reconstruction of the external people with high hypnotic susceptibility. “Even under normal conditions of mus- world based on rather limited evidence Furthermore, epileptic-like brain activity cle tension, the feedback from the mus- and a lot of guesswork. Especially in can be induced fairly easily in non-epi- cles that tells the brain about the degree conditions of poor visibility, such as leptic populations. According to Hines, of muscular movement is far from per- low illumination and fuzzy detail, visual “Similar physiological changes may be fect . [, and continued] tension placed perception is largely a product of expec- brought about by the rhythmic chanting, on the muscles . aggravates this situa- tation. It is under just such conditions singing, and dancing seen in the religious tion.” Thus, it is not supernatural forces that most UFO and supernatural sight- and conversion rituals of many cultures.” but small, unconscious muscle move- ings are made. “People who report Because approximately one percent of ments that guide the Ouija planchette seeing impressive flying saucers are not the population has been diagnosed with or tip the dowsing rod. Likewise, the lying,” Hines maintains. “They really epilepsy, the condition is more prevalent hand motions in the autism technique perceive them, even though they weren’t than most people might think, and it can Facilitated Com munication come not there. The objects were a construction account for a large number of supposed from the patient but from the facilitator. of their brains and seem just as real as if paranormal experiences. Migraines are However, because these movements are they actually had been there.” caused by abnormal changes in blood unconscious, it seems only natural to The layperson’s view of memory is flow to the visual area of the brain and attribute them to some external force. just as flawed. Although people admit sometimes give rise to hallucinations sim- Hines also shows how appar- that their memories have gaps due ilar to the religious visions that have ent instances of faith healing can be to forgetting, they generally assume been reported by mystics through the explained by the role that emotional that what memories they can recall ages. In addition, some people experience arousal plays in pain suppression. The are accurate. However, psychologists migraine hallucinations without feeling brain produces a class of chemicals such as Elizabeth Loftus have repeatedly any pain, so they may attribute these hal- called endorphins that are released to demonstrated that subsequent expe- lucinations to supernatural causes instead suppress pain during times of stress or riences, leading questions, and hyp- of physiological ones. emotional arousal. The release of endor- notic suggestion can drastically reshape Many ghost sightings and abduc- phins explains how injured athletes can memories and even create memories tion experiences are reported to occur complete competitions and wounded of events that never occurred. Thus, when going to bed or waking up. The soldiers can manage acts of heroism. Hines maintains that supposed alien state between wakefulness and sleep is Patients who seek miracle cures are abductees really do “believe that they called hypnagogia, and both auditory excited by the prospect of a cure, and had been abducted and . cruelly used and visual hallucinations are common the music, singing, and oratory that by the aliens.” Likewise, false memories during this time. Hypnogogic hallucina- precede faith-healing events heighten of childhood abuse were planted in tions are experienced as being far more this emotional arousal. Thus, during patients of recovery memory therapy realistic than dreams, and so it is easy for and shortly after the faith healing ses- by therapists through the technique of the person experiencing them to believe sion, the patients feel less pain due to guided imagery and the use of hypnosis.

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