Sacred architecture has historically served to communicate religious teachings and elicit spiritual experiences. Although theologians and architects have offered explanations for this phenomenon, empirical evidence supporting these claims remains scarce. Scientific research on religious responses has usually overlooked architecture's role in shaping them. This study utilizes mobile...
This paper takes initial steps towards developing a theoretical framework of contemplative neuroaesthetics through sensorimotor dynamics. We first argue that this new area has been largely omitted from the contemporary research agenda in neuroaesthetics and thus remains a domain of untapped potential. We seek to define this domain to foster a clear and focused investigation of the capacity of...
The very practice of Zen is about turning the human mind on itself in order to directly experience the ungraspable, non-intellectual, and present-centered nature of being. Dropping off preconceptions, preferences, hopes, knowledge, and the like produces a deep mental cleansing that rescues the self from the grip of conditioning and returns it to its natural beginner&s;s mind: what in Zen is...