A large group of like-minded individuals congregated last Friday to learn about God. They did not meet in a church, but in the medical sciences auditorium-a fitting location for a ceremony of scientism, or the belief that religion can be explained by scientific research.

“Belief, Science and the Human Brain: Is God All in Your Head?” was hosted by the Toronto Secular Alliance, a student-run organization that represents atheists, agnostics, humanists, and skeptics on campus.

Led by Justin Trottier, the group has made a name for itself in only nine months. They claim to have eliminated prayers from graduation ceremonies, and were the first student group to officially oppose the new multi-faith centre. They have a 2,000-book library up and running, and, in less than a month, plan to open a “Freethought Centre.”

On the talk’s agenda were two scientists presenting new research on the “God phenomenon.”

Dr. Robert Buckman, an oncologist at the Princess Margaret Hospital, argued that our ability to believe is a coping mechanism acquired through evolution. Its purpose is to help us survive the “scary and unpredictable world” we all inhabit.

Buckman went on to argue that there is no big difference between believing in God and aliens. Both are simply “intellectually ludicrous” beliefs which help us cope.

Dr. Michael Persinger, a professor at Laurentian University in Sudbury, spent over 45 minutes elaborating on the technique he used to elicit religious experiences.

The experiment begins by placing the participant in a completely darkened, double-walled metal acoustic chamber. He or she sits in a chair facing eastward, wearing a special helmet designed to send weak, pulsed electrical patterns to their temporal lobes, for 30 to 60 minutes. Participants are sometimes are asked to press a button when they felt another presence in the chamber.

A statistically significant number of participants reported “the God phenomenon,” or something like it-a vision of an alien or dead releative, maybe-during the experiment. Over the past 15 years, he has performed the technique on 500 people.

Persinger concludes that the God phenomenon is a property of the brain, and that religious experiences can be generated in a laboratory setting. Whether this actually constitutes a substantive criticism against believers is a completely different story. Either way, the Secular Alliance is set to keep stirring up debate on campus.