# Do brain chemicals shape my personality?

*Is personality shaped by neurotransmitters? DNA, environment and the ruh*

- URL: https://muftiabulayth.org/r/jtyem-eee78/s/5/
- Date: 2020-09-22 · Kind: question · Transcript tier: machine · Recording: Monday Nights with Mufti #183 | Q&A Unscripted & Unrestricted! 😉 | Mufti Abu Layth (31:14–38:10)
- Status: general teaching
- Watch from the start of the segment: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jTYEM-eEe78&t=1874s
- Recording page: https://muftiabulayth.org/r/jtyem-eee78/

**Topics:** Soul, nafs and consciousness; Depression and anxiety

**Question as asked:** Do your brain's neurotransmitters heavily affect personality?

**Summary (not a quotation; machine-made, unchecked):** Mufti Abu Layth says personality comes from DNA, environment and, in his personal view, the soul too, and that people can improve their predisposition through diet and training.

**Checked position (checked by two independent reviews, not by the channel):** Mufti Abu Layth says that, as his personal take, he feels the ruh plays some role in personality alongside DNA and environment.

**Evidence, his words at 32:59:** “that i do feel that that's my you know my personal take in the that i feel the ruach plays some role in in how we” (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jTYEM-eEe78&t=1979s)

## Longer summary

Asked whether neurotransmitters heavily affect personality, Mufti Abu Layth says neurotransmitters are a result of activity in the brain, and reframes the question as nature or nurture. Mufti says DNA unquestionably plays a significant role, through an epigenetic process, and that as his personal take, impossible to prove, consciousness and the ruh also play some role, alongside environment. He illustrates with an arbitrary happiness scale: genes may set someone's serotonin higher or lower, grief can bring a person down, and diet and training to cope can raise them. He adds that such gains can be passed on to children, so some people are predisposed to a better or worse situation but can remedy it through their own interventions.

## Sources and names cited

- ruh (soul) as consciousness

## Transcript (machine tier, 31:14–38:10)

[30:34] was in this kind of paradise this eden this garden of eden jannat that does not mean it was out of this world it was in this world somewhere and that is the view by many ulama including and speaking of even i'll be sharing some interesting across some very fascinating things to share but we'll come back to that in just a moment does your brain neurotransmitters affect personality heavily does your does your as

[31:14] in my or the universal you do are you asking that is personality shaped by neurotransmitters no not by neurotransmitters in that sense obviously neurotransmitters are a result of the activity that is taking place in the brain now i

[31:44] it's a complex process there's many there's a um it's you see there's many things happening in real time okay that the brain is incredibly sophisticated but personality the question is that is personality for example uh is it inherited is it through our dna do we gain our personality

[32:19] is it nature or nurture now i would feel that to a great extent there is an epigenetic process so there is uh unquestionably our dna would play a significant role in our personality in how it begins i definitely feel that i also feel that that part i think you know that part is a scientific discussion neuroscientific psychological stuff like that biological i also believe in another factor which i

[32:59] suppose is more philosophical and not really biological in that sense i would believe that our consciousness the way it the interplay between the consciousness and our bio biology results also in some impact on our personality as in some impact now that's almost going to be impossible to prove and i get that um but that i do feel that that's my you know my personal take in the that i feel the ruach plays some role in in how we

[33:38] i'm not saying that any of these are the you know the the dominant players i'm saying that these things all play a role so there is the dna there is uh i feel that there is consciousness there is that plays some role there is unquestionably things like um the environmental factors so you could and this may make a difference so it could be that for example let's say through your you know biogenetics you have your body

[34:18] has um dna to the dna code is rich in producing a healthy amount of serotonin let's see now that means that you by default like let's say happiness if i can or happiness meaning like if we place it on one to ten and we're measuring it against being stressed and anxiety and being worrying about things and you know being very worrisome extremely worrisome and uh plagued with this kind of like depression and on the other sense you've got a calm

[34:57] tranquil sense of happiness if we're placing it like that now let's say five is in the middle now your biogenetics your kind of dna already codes for you to be placed at something like six or seven like let's say that that that's how your dna has already been structured now you've got a bit of an upper hand let's say most people are around five and a half six five that kind of marker now somebody's dna could be

[35:35] uh in a way poor that they don't have a healthy sense of uh they have an im an imbalance in the neurochemistry so the serotonin levels are not as high as normal people so this is where your dna is impacting your general happiness but but you see the person could train themselves to overcome like you could be let's say you were a normal five and a half or i'm just using these terms arbitrarily by the way just

[36:14] as an approximation this is not an official code in how happiness is measured an affectometer but i'm just explaining so let's say you were out of five and a half or at a six but you faced so much grief in life unfortunately that it really beat the hell out of you that it brought your levels down it could be so you actually despite having the dna capacity and the information your environment was so plagued with

[36:52] tragedies that you you know you you were depressed and are more on the anxiety side or it could be that imagine you were just a five but then through diets by taking in certain you know having a healthy diet because things like neurotransmitters and stuff like that us you know they are contingent upon an uptake of certain amino acids and stuff like this now if you are having a healthy diet and then you're training yourself like let's say you went through a certain amount of stress but

[37:30] trained yourself to cope so you've actually increased so and then what would happen is as you've increased when you would have children you would pass on that ability to to them so there is this epigenesis this kind of uh epigenetical factor that takes place as well so it's not doom and gloom but some people may be kind of more predisposed to a better or a worse handicapped situation but they can also remedy it through their own interventions in life so yeah

[38:09] i hope that helps right so what is going on hassan too much nonsense on chats like stupid school kids people any kind of nonsense um you know will be deleted so and you could be blocked probably doing it with the super chat much love much love could we appreciate the good without evil on earth and what's going to happen to this appreciation

## Cite

Mufti Abu Layth Archive, segment jTYEM-eEe78/s/5. https://muftiabulayth.org/r/jtyem-eee78/s/5/

Not a fatwa: these answers were given to specific people at specific times. Ask a qualified scholar about your own situation.