The Transcendent Brain

Spirituality in the Age of Science

By: Alan Lightman

Narrated by: Christopher Grove

From the best-selling author of Einstein’s Dreams comes a rich, fascinating answer to the question, Can the scientifically inclined still hold space for spirituality?

Gazing at the stars, falling in love, or listening to music, we sometimes feel a transcendent connection with a cosmic unity and things larger than ourselves. But these experiences are not easily understood by science, which holds that all things can be explained in terms of atoms and molecules. Is there space in our scientific worldview for these spiritual experiences?

According to acclaimed physicist and novelist Alan Lightman, there may be. Drawing on intellectual history and conversations with contemporary scientists, philosophers, and psychologists, Lightman asks a series of thought-provoking questions that illuminate our strange place between the world of particles and forces and the world of complex human experience. Can strict materialism explain our appreciation of beauty? Or our feelings of connection to nature and to other people? Is there a physical basis for consciousness, the most slippery of all scientific problems?

Lightman weaves these investigations together to propose what he calls “spiritual materialism”—the belief that we can embrace spiritual experiences without letting go of our scientific worldview. In his view, the breadth of the human condition is not only rooted in material atoms and molecules but can also be explained in terms of Darwinian evolution.

What is revealed in this lyrical, enlightening book is that spirituality may not only be compatible with science, it also ought to remain at the core of what it means to be human.


* This audiobook includes a downloadable PDF that contains illustrations from the printed book.

Powerful Reflection on the Creative Transcendent

When I was a Senior in College I wrote a Paper describing what I called the Affective Insight: the Moment we see and hear in the Works of our Greatest Artists, Writers, and Composers. They were using a part of their Consciousness that transcended the Physical and Mechanical processes of their Brain and Sensorium to meet the Reality of the World around them on a Deeper Level.

I think that Lightman is addressing that same property when he talks about Transcendence in the Material Brain that allows us to experience Spirituality. He uses the works of Mendelsohn, Lucretius, and Christof Koch to trace the Cases for Non-Material and Material Beliefs for Spirituality and the Rise of Spirituality from Human Consciousness.

The Third Chapter makes a powerful case for the existence of the Transcendent Creative instinct in the activity of Neurons and The Fourth Chapter is a beautiful reflection on our need for understanding of our Oneness with Nature and our Fellow Creatures on the Planet. These two chapters alone merit the Four Star Rating of The Transcendent Brain. ****

Outstanding and Insightful!

Fascinating…I now know that I am also a Spiritual Materialist. Love every book I have read by Alan Lightman