I’m going to be launching a blog soon and possibly a podcast and I was wondering if anyone on the forum (or maybe a friend or relative) has had a brush with trauma or maybe something in mental health that caused you to take a closer look at science. A step further, did you or someone else take this path as a Christian or other walk of faith? If there are any answers they don’t have to be detailed or extremely personal. Just wanted to see if there was anyone else on here like me that took this path.
A run in with the death of a family member caused me severe PTSD and I’ve looked at science and philosophy a lot more than I ever had before. It was answer searching as much as it was therapy. I always cared more about the arts so it was a very interesting turn for me.
I’ve been interested in science since around age 10, so no change in that.
In high school, which was many years ago, a classmate had a serious head injury. And that dramatically changed his personality. This did cause me to start questioning the received wisdom about souls and such.
And then there the book “Why I Left; Why I Stayed” by Tony and Bart Campolo. In brief, Bart had a head injury while biking, and that seriously changed his outlook.
Thanks for responding! Can you share more about the questions that were triggered with the situation with your classmate? I always thought science was neat and I respected it but at that time I didn’t think I really needed a deeper look. There were areas I didn’t grant to science in my high school days that I’m much more open to now.
I take the received view to be that there is more to a person than just the physical. The profound personality changes after a brain injury raised questions about that.
I had an elementary school teacher who got us engaging with the idea of going out and actually testing ideas. And that’s what gave me an interest in science.
We see that echoed in many debates in PS, where the actual scientists are reminding us that it isn’t just sitting back and thinking – it’s getting your hands dirty with actually trying things out to see what works.
I appreciate your answer and that’s a big question. I’ve wondered about similar questions in my case. The experience had an effect on me I didn’t expect or was prepared for.
I just turned 35 and back when I was in science class they were at least introducing other schools of thought but couldn’t find the balance in my opinion. Evolution was mentioned with creationism and I want to say the creationism had ID undertones. I think the teachers I had did their best but I don’t know if they really had an effect on me or my classmates like what you described.
Sort of the other way around for me. A serious injury to a friend made me commit to trying to believe in God. It’s a bit hard to explain, but it was important to me at the time and remains important to me today, as an agnostic…
Thank you for sharing and I hear you. I think I was searching for God myself. I stepped away from how I understood everything and explored other schools of thought that didn’t require the heart so much.