Have We Lost Our Minds, or our Souls?
A critical book review on an essential topic
Ok, this is more of an academic post where I review a book raising critical objections to the work of Curt Thompson and Jim Wilder—and by extension the work that Cyd and I do hear at Embodied Faith, and the work many of your readers do to integrate mental health and the life of faith.
The book is Have We Lost Our Minds? Neuroscience, Neurotheology, the Soul, and Human Flourishing, by Stan W. Wallace.
As you will see below, Wallace argues that Thompson and Wilder are physicalists who reduce spiritual life to mental processes.
If that were true, that would be a problem. But it’s not true.
And so I spend quite a bit of time clearing up misunderstandings and overcoming distortions.
I also interviewe Jim Wilder on this topic a little bit ago:
You can download a PDF of this review below:
Have We Lost Our Minds? Neuroscience, Neurotheology, the Soul, and Human Flourishing, by Stan W. Wallace. Eugene, Oregon; Wipf & Stock, 2024, 203 pp. $31.00.
Reviewed by: Geoffrey Holsclaw, visiting professor, Western Theological Seminary
Have We Lost Our Minds?: Neuroscience, Neurotheology, the Soul, and Human Flourishing, by Stan W. Wallace, raises important issues about how to integrate neuroscience and spiritual formation, and the dangers of reducing spiritual life to neural processes. As the field and cultural influence of neuroscience continue to grow, discerning pastors, spiritual directors, and theologians will need to evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of its contribution to spiritual formation.
Broadly speaking, Have We Lost Our Minds? continues the debate between holistic dualists and reductive materialists (which Wallace calls “physicalists”). Concerned that different views of human nature influence our understanding of spiritual formation, Wallace worries that too much talk about neuroscience has sidelined the role of the soul in spiritual formation.[1] His concern is that “if we are ultimately a body, and most importantly a brain, spiritual formation is actually neural formation.”[2] To counteract this trend, primarily using the research of John W. Cooper and J. P. Moreland, Wallace offers biblical, theological, and philosophical arguments for the necessity of the immaterial soul and its distinction from and priority over the body.[3]
Certainly, Wallace has reason for concern. Many scholars seeking to integrate neuroscience and spiritual formation do seem to lose a historically Christian understanding of the soul. While being agnostic about the existence of God, researcher Andrew Newberg (who calls himself a neurotheologian) seems to sideline the soul by focusing on brain scans and localizing spiritual experiences in the brain.[4] George Vaillant claims that spirituality arises from biology and is happy to substitute the “limbic system’” for the “soul”.[5] Stephen T. Asma argues that God and the soul are just socially useful fictions. For him, religion adaptively stimulates and regulates our emotional brain (limbic) even while being refuted by the rational brain (neocortex).[6] Closer to Christian theology and spiritual formation, Warren Brown and Brad Strawn explicitly argue that dynamic physical systems—like the body-brain complex—give rise to what in the past has been called the soul.[7] All of these accounts either dismiss the need for the soul or offer a non-reductive physicalist view of the emergence of the soul from our embodied existence.
The assumed or stated framework of all these authors is problematic for Wallace. And all of these perspectives would have been worthy of engagement in Have We Lost Our Minds?. The trouble is that Wallace does not engage these perspectives or authors. He focuses instead on Curt Thompson and Jim Wilder, and only focuses on one book each (without reference to their other writings).[8] Wallace attempts to show that Thompson and Wilder are reductive physicalists who replace spiritual formation with neural formation. It is on this more specific level that Have We Lost Our Minds? misses the mark. The thesis of the book is problematic because Thompson and Wilder never explicitly argue against traditional understandings of the soul, as authors like Brown and Strawn do. This lack of explicit statements by Thompson and Wilder forces Wallace to offer arguments by implication and guilt by association. Unfortunately, the bulk of Wallace’s argument (1) misunderstands or misrepresents the stated positions of Thompson and Wilder, (2) is unclear about the particular stream of neuroscience that Thompson and Wilder draw from, (3) misrepresents the theological and philosophical tradition that he uses to criticize Thompson and Wilder, and (4) does not follow the more nuanced use of “mind” in the New Testament that Thompson and Wilder seem to assume.
In what remains, I will briefly cover each of the above four points. After that I will comment on how Thompson and Wilder make similar mistakes in the opposite direction. I will end by referring to an integrative study as an example of how this conversation can productively move forward.
First, Wallace seems to misunderstand or misrepresent Thompson and Wilder. Wallace’s argument in Chapter One is a two-step process. The first is to show that Thompson and Wilder implicitly identify the mind with the brain. The second is to claim this implies Thompson and Wilder are physicalists. Wallace marshals many quotes by Thompson and Wilder that he sees as conflating the mind and the brain, where “they interpret the fact of correlation between the mental and the neural to mean that the mental ultimately is the neural.”[9] Because Wallace argues that personal identity, human individuation, and moral character all belong exclusively to the soul, he see any attempts to connect these to brain activity as implicitly reducing the mind to the brain, which for him implies physicalism.
But Wallace misunderstands Thompson and Wilder regarding this conflation between the soul and the brain. An example is when he notes Thompson saying that “The left hemisphere sets me apart as ‘me’.”[10] Wallace understands this as conflating the metaphysical “me”—which belongs, for Wallace, to the soul—with the brain. But Thompson is offering a contrast between the contextual and holistic focus of the right hemisphere and the distinguishing and separating focus of the left hemisphere. Thompson is not making a metaphysical claim. He is noting that the left hemisphere distinguishes the “me” that I am from the broader “we” of which I am a part. It is fair for Wallace to ask whether insights gained from the lateralization of the hemispheres accurately reflect the best scientific findings. But it is a misunderstanding to make Thompson claim what he is not trying to claim, and then use this as evidence of a commitment to physicalism. Similarly, Wallace faults Wilder for seeming to identify the soul with the part of the brain called the cingulate cortex.[11] But Wilder clearly states in a footnote on that very passage that “neither Dallas [Willard] nor I would accept that the cingulate is the soul. The cingulate is in the body. We would both believe that the body should harmonize with the soul.”[12] Examples of this kind of misunderstanding are found throughout the book.
An analogy can help us see the differences between the two sides. Wallace is more like an auto mechanic. Thompson and Wilder are more like driving instructors. A mechanic needs to know how the engine, transmission, brakes, and exhaust work in order to fix them. And all of this comes with a specialized language that mechanics know and use, but that not everyone else knows or uses. A driving instructor, however, needs a working knowledge of how to operate a car, coupled with the best principles for how to drive a car alongside others who are also driving. A mechanic might be a poor driving instructor. And a driving instructor could be a bad mechanic. Despite all their sophistication regarding neuroscience, Thompson and Wilder want to help people know how to love God and love others better. They want to enable people to flourish out on the roads of everyday life. As practitioners, Thompson and Wilder are more like driving instructors using the language of neuroscience for this purpose. Like an auto mechanic, Wallace is more of a philosopher using the language of medieval substance dualism. It is fine for Wallace to prioritize medieval philosophical and theological distinctions (placing all mental activity on the side of the soul beyond the brain). But this philosophical standard should not be used to judge practitioners of an implied commitment to physicalism. Unfortunately, after arguing by implication in the first chapter, Wallace begins to assert throughout the rest of the book that Thompson and Wilder are in fact physicalists.
Second, Wallace does not seem clear about the neuroscience Thompson and Wilder draw from, leading to many of the above misunderstandings. While many branches of neuroscience do offer reductionistic accounts, the field of interpersonal neurobiology that Thompson and Wilder pull from does not. In his seminal articulation of interpersonal neurobiology, The Developing Mind, Dan Siegel emphasizes the three irreducible aspects of brain, mind, and relationships. The brain is the embodied neural mechanism shaping the flow of energy and information within humans. Our embedded relationships are the sharing and shaping of this energy and information. And the mind synchronizes and supervises this flow of energy and information within brains and between relationships (Siegel labels this as “regulating”). While using the language of emergence and complexity, which, admittedly, are often connected to a kind of physicalism, Siegel is clear that the mind is not merely “in” the brain, and states that the mind influences or has a downward causal relationship on the brain.[13] Similarly, Louis Cozolino, another major theorist of interpersonal neurobiology, clearly argues that we use our minds to change our brains in his Why Therapy Works, which is subtitled “Using our minds to change our brains”.[14] For Wallace, the fact of downward causality of the soul on the body is one of his arguments for prioritizing the soul over the body.[15] This means that advocates of interpersonal neurobiology agree with Wallace about the necessity of downward causation, even if they use a different framework to express this. It seems reasonable that people like Thompson and Wilder have taken this opening made by interpersonal neurobiology’s understanding of the mind (of having a downward causal relationship to the brain) and slipped in the theological concept of “soul” in its place. That would be the charitable interpretation given the context of the interpersonal neurobiology they are working with, and because, unlike Warren Brown and Brad Strawn, Thompson and Wilder are not explicitly arguing for a non-reductive physicalism.
An example of this misunderstanding of interpersonal neurobiology is seen in how Wallace quotes from Thompson’s The Anatomy of the Soul. Wallace, assuming that mind and brain are synonymous within neuroscience, changes his quotes of Thompson by substituting “brain” when Thompson had actually written “mind”.[16] Even if Thompson did use mind and brain as synonyms, Wallace should not change quotes to bolster his argument. But in fact, Wallace is misunderstanding Thompson’s meaning because, within interpersonal neurobiology, the mind and brain are not reducible to or synonymous with each other.
Third, Wallace seems to misunderstand the theological and philosophical sources he uses to criticize Thompson and Wilder. Throughout the book, Wallace offers a commendable summary of holistic dualism as the best explanation of human nature and the soul. He offers the medieval philosophical and theological tradition (especially Thomas Aquinas mediated through J.P. Moreland) as a counterweight against the reductionism of neuroscience. His argument, unfortunately, positions the two sides antagonistically, as if faith (philosophy and theology) were a corrective to reason (neuroscience). The trouble is that these philosophical and theological traditions have always engaged in an appreciative critique of the best scientific and medical knowledge available at the time, such that we should never operate within an opposition between faith and science.[17] For examples, the apostle Paul moved between the thought worlds of the Old Testament and Greek Stoicism.[18] Augustine worked between the New Testament and within Latin Stoicism and Neoplatonism.[19] Aquinas combined Aristotle and the reigning medical thought of Galen.[20] These philosophical and theological traditions have always engaged in a generative struggle to link the best medical and scientific knowledge of how God made us as creatures with the best understanding of how God made us for communion with himself. This ongoing appreciative critique within the philosophical and theological tradition is much more expansive than Wallace seems to allow for, leading to distortions in how he engages Thompson and Wilder. Rather than using philosophy and theology as an antagonistic corrective to neuroscience when talking about spiritual formation, we should strive to recognize how this kind of conversation is already internal to the best of our philosophical and theological traditions, and therefore already internal to spiritual formation.
Lastly, Wallace does not seem to follow the New Testament use of “mind” as something other than just the body or the soul. Wallace works primarily with the kind of opposition between body and soul that Jesus speaks of in Matthew 10:28 (NIV), “Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul (psychē).” But even Jesus makes a distinction between soul and mind, adding “mind” to the command of Deuteronomy 6:4-5, saying, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul (psychē) and with all your mind (dianoia) and with all your strength” (Mark 12:30 NIV). Similarly, when describing, in Romans 6-8, the great battle of transformation of all those who live in Christ, the apostle Paul does not speak of a battle between body and soul. He speaks of a war between flesh and Spirit, a battle played out in our minds, our thoughts, and our mindsets. Paul reminds us that “the mind (phroneō) governed by the flesh is death, but the mind (phroneō) governed by the Spirit is life and peace” (Rom 8:6, NIV). In fact, we are to be “transformed by the renewing of your minds (nous)” (Rom. 12:2 NIV), because God has handed us over to a “depraved mind (nous)” (Rom. 1:28 NIV). Regardless of the specific exegesis of these and similar passages, our minds, thoughts, and mindsets seem to occupy a dynamic place of struggle between the things of God (Spirit) and the corruption of sin (flesh). This dynamic struggle is far more complicated and requires more than a simple affirmation of holistic dualism, of siding with the soul over the body. It is reasonable to conclude that Thompson and Wilder and their use of interpersonal neurobiology are working within this place of struggle between the body and soul. This does not mean that Wallace has failed to make a case for holistic dualism and the necessity of an immaterial soul. But it does mean he has not made the case that Thompson and Wilder are physicalists.
But, as mentioned above, Wallace has put his finger on an issue regarding the use of neuroscience within spiritual formation. In this sense, many of the misunderstandings mentioned above could fairly be said to have come from the side of those employing neuroscience for the purposes of spiritual formation. Because of this, it would be helpful for people like Thompson and Wilder, and those who draw from their work, to clarify three aspects of their work to avoid future confusion or distortion.
The first aspect would be to clarify how and why interpersonal neurobiology is being used as a preferred source for spiritual formation. Is it to capitalize on the cultural currency and authority of scientific findings (a strategy pastors and theologians have often taken)? If so, it would be helpful to explore possible limitations or problems that arise from adopting this scientific framework. Perhaps interpersonal neurobiology is especially resonant with the biblical story in ways that other psychological view are not? If so, it would be helpful to show how this approach bolsters what we already find in Scripture. More generally is the question of how interpersonal neurobiology functions alongside, above, or below the authority of Scripture. Especially important is an articulation how interpersonal neurobiology does and does not help us understand sin and redemption.
The second aspect would be to clarify how an integration of interpersonal neurobiology and spiritual formation connects with, deepens, aligns with, or challenges the philosophical and theological traditions that precede it. Those in the stream that Thompson and Wilder work in sometimes seem unaware of, or even dismissive of, historical conversations about holistic dualism, the nature of the soul, and the nuanced theological discussion of these topics. These deeper philosophical and theological issues are important, and they come from a rich history that should not be ignored or too quickly cast aside.
The last aspect concerns how people like Thompson and Wilder connect their understanding of interpersonal neurobiology to the themes and terms of Scripture. When interpersonal neurobiology speaks of embodied emotions, embedded relationships, and a host of other terms and ideas, how do these connect to having the mind of Christ (1 Cor. 2:16), cultivating a pure heart (Psa 73:1), the command not to be anxious (Phil. 4:6), or the difference between living in the flesh or in the Spirit (Rom. 8:5)? Just as Wallace seemed to assume that all talk of the mind is synonymous with talk about the soul, people like Thompson and Wilder can err in the opposite direction by assuming that all these biblical terms are mostly talking about experiences of the body and the brain, which opens them to the charge of reductive physicalism. More engagement with biblical sources and more explanation of how biblical usage does and does not overlap with the terminology of neuroscience would help everyone involved.
With all this in mind, I will finish by noting a commendable example that gathers these different aspects together. Matthew Lapine’s The Logic of the Body: Retrieving Theological Psychology (noted above) does a wonderful job of bringing together the best of the medieval and Reformed philosophical and theological traditions, offers a deep engagement with Scripture and the life of Jesus, and engages the most recent research on emotions, all in order to grapple with the difficult mental health questions of depression and anxiety. He explicitly argues for holistic dualism in a way that Wallace would appreciate. But he also offers a complex discussion of the dynamics of embodied existence and emotions that Thompson and Wilder would recognize. Whether it is on the popular or academic level, the kind of mutually enriching dialogue between neuroscience and spiritual formation that Lapine models should be the pattern to follow as we continue to seek our formation in Christ.
[1] Stan W. Wallace, Have We Lost Our Minds?: Neuroscience, Neurotheology, the Soul, and Human Flourishing (Eugene, Oregon; Wipf & Stock, 2024), 7.
[2] Wallace, Have We Lost Our Minds?, 4.
[3] John W. Cooper, Body, Soul, and Life Everlasting: Biblical Anthropology and the Monism-Dualism Debate (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2000); J. P. Moreland, “In Defense of Thomistic-Like Dualism.” in The Blackwell Companion to Substance Dualism, edited by Jonathan J. Loose et al., 102-22 (Hoboken, NJ: Wiley-Blackwell, 2018); J. P. Moreland, “Substance Dualism and the Unity of Consciousness.” in The Blackwell Companion to Substance Dualism, edited by Jonathan J. Loose et al., 102-22 (Hoboken, NJ: Wiley-Blackwell, 2018).
[4] See How God Changes Your Brain, with Mark Waldman (New York: Ballantine Books, 2009), and Neurotheology: How Science Can Enlighten Us About Spirituality (New York: Columbia University Press, 2018).
[5] George Vaillant, Spiritual Evolution: How We Are Wired for Faith, Hope, and Love (New York: Broadway Books, 2008), 187.
[6] Stephen T. Asma, Why We Need Religion (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018), 3-14.
[7] Warren Brown and Brad Strawn, The Physical Nature of Christian Life: Neuroscience, Psychology, and the Church (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012).
[8] Wallace focuses on Curt Thompson’s Anatomy of the Soul: Surprising connections between neuroscience and spiritual practices that can transform your life and relationships (Carol Stream, IL: Tyndale, 2010), and Jim Wilder, Renovated: God, Dallas Willard & the Church that Transforms (Colorado Springs, CO: NavPress, 2020).
[9] Wallace, Have We Lost Our Minds?, 17, emphasis in original.
[10] Wallace, Have We Lost Our Minds?, 18. The quote is from Curt Thompson’s Anatomy of the Soul, 244.
[11] Stan W. Wallace, Have We Lost Our Minds?, 19.
[12] Wilder, Renovated, 216 (n. 19).
[13] Daniel Siegel, The Developing Mind: How Relationships and the Brain Interact to Shape Who We Are 3rd ed. (New York: Guilford Press, 2020), 2-14.
[14] Louis Cozolino, Why Therapy Works: Using our minds to change our brains. (New York: Norton, 2016).
[15] Wallace, Have We Lost Our Minds?, 60 (n. 47).
[16] Wallace begins this on page 9 of Have We Lost Our Minds?, and explains why in note 22.
[17] Peter Harrison, The Territories of Science and Religion (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2015).
[18] Susan Eastman, Paul and the Person: Reframing Paul’s Anthropology (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2017).
[19] James Wetzel, Augustine and the Limits of Virtue (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992).
[20] Matthew Lapine, The Logic of the Body: Retrieving Theological Psychology (Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2020).
As a counselor deeply influenced by both IPNB and reformed theo-psychology, I really appreciate this review and your constructive proposals.
Geoff, thanks for your review of my book! I believe you made some helpful observations and have helped move the conversation forward. But I do have a few disagreements with your understanding of what I wrote. I've posted a response to help further this good conversation. I'd be very interested in your thoughts. Here's the link to my response: https://stanwallace.org/blog/2024/12/some-agreements-and-disagreements-with-greg-holsclaws-review-of-my-book/#_ftn1