This 90-minute documentary examines free will from scientific, philosophical, and theological viewpoints. Without providing definitive answers, it takes on the deep questions of morality, autonomy, and accountability.
We often link brain power to intelligence or some innate talent. Things like memory, creativity, mathematical ability certainly are amazing capacities of the human brain. But I think the most amazing thing the brain does is change. It’s the power of those synapses and neurons and axons to recreate the pathways necessary for change.
Can our senses be trusted? “Scientists are working to understand the nature of subjective experience and whether or not expectation or motivation might actually result in different representations of sensory information in our brains.”
What intrigues me is the apparent tension between a focused mind and a wandering one… Who teaches their employees or their congregations to daydream in hopes of inspiration?
How might we find God speaking to us in 2020? In my view, after we’ve made our “No Year’s resolution,” we wait with hope for God to bring a new vision. Put another way, it is a new year, 2020, and a time to say Yes.
Our faith can give us the power for change, but so does our God-given neurobiology. Scientists call it neuroplasticity. Our brains are malleable, and as our neurons and synapses rewire, we change. New neurons can even form. This happens throughout our lives, though at a slower rate as adults. Any repeated brain activity rewires us, and once rewired, our mental and physical experience of the world can be transformed.