Namaskar Noel ji.
thank you again for your perception.
Babas and matas repeatedly say that heeaven and hell are within the self.
In fact, I perceive two heavens and one hell. Kranti is a Sanskrit word which means revolution and shanti means peace. Creativty is associated with gamma waves and peace/deep sleep is associated with delta wave. So you are in heaven of kranti when your brain generates gamma waves and you are in heaven of shanti/peace when you are in deep sleep.
Beta state is as good as hell unless balanced.
Purpose of meditation is not necessarily physical feats. These are incidental on the way of progress-to reverse and prevent pain, suffering and decay of the body, that is, to bring it under perfect conscious command for achieving furher goals.
Wish you best of progress in life.
rgards
From India, Delhi
174thank you again for your perception.
Babas and matas repeatedly say that heeaven and hell are within the self.
In fact, I perceive two heavens and one hell. Kranti is a Sanskrit word which means revolution and shanti means peace. Creativty is associated with gamma waves and peace/deep sleep is associated with delta wave. So you are in heaven of kranti when your brain generates gamma waves and you are in heaven of shanti/peace when you are in deep sleep.
Beta state is as good as hell unless balanced.
Purpose of meditation is not necessarily physical feats. These are incidental on the way of progress-to reverse and prevent pain, suffering and decay of the body, that is, to bring it under perfect conscious command for achieving furher goals.
Wish you best of progress in life.
rgards
From India, Delhi
ANSWER TO 544/700+ PROTESTERS.
Dear friends,
Namaskar.
By the time I was writing the post in this thread yester day, the news was already circulated in the news papers that Dalai Lama,Nobel Laureate is scheduled to address Society for Neuroscience next month on this subject and 544 protesters have petitioned against this. I read the news after I posted my yester day's message here.
To day in The Hindu I read the news again but it says are 700+ and the ground is also different. Here I am answering to both the grounds.
To 544 protesters.
Their ground is that the research content of speach which is based on the research of Dr. Davidson and his team needs replication. It is premature claim at this stage.
Looking into the list of publication of Dr. Davodson I find that qiuite a number of research papers are already published in professional journals.
Moreover, What is said gamma wave now was known as fast beta in 1960s and was discovered by Hirai and Kasamatsu,both Japanese neurologists, in Zen meditators. The results are reported in professional jouranals and texts. No objection has been raised so far. So what Dr. Davidson and his team are finding is more or less replication of the findings of Hirai and Kasamatsu. So the replication objection does not stand.
To 700+ protesters.
Their ground is that Dalai Lama being a religious leader should not address a scintific society.
In 1935 a french lady cardiologist travelled Himalayan region to study the effect of oriental practices. In certain sadhu she found that he could lower his heart beat to the extent that her portable cardiograph equipment could not detect it. Since then there are thousands of scintific researches on the effects of religious practices. Here is an article on the future of endocrinology:
The Psycho-Neuro-Endocrine System
(Seven Endocrine Glands - After Ray Stanford)
The endocrine system stands at the heart of human opportunity and human dis-ease. This is the case because the major glands are the transmitting agents for social, emotional, mental and spiritual forces which underlie the whole of our physical worlds.
This idea may seem a bit farfetched to the uninitiated, simply skeptical, or strictly scientific. Many such folks believe that human beings are just peculiar masses of protoplasm which are somewhat controlled by brain impulses and nervous system patterns.
But, there is growing evidence that we are really this and much more. Research is appearing which will eventually validate that, "The mind is not so much in the body, as the body is in the mind."
This saying has roots both in the Eastern Hindu tradition and among Western mystics, such as Meister Eckhardt. The aphorism suggests firstly that mind is more than brain (an obvious part of the body) and secondly that the body is a dense projection of a deeper energy field called the mind.
Dr. Candace Pert, researcher at the National Institutes for Mental Health, says, "... it is possible now to conceive of mind and consciousness as an emanation of emotional information processing, and as such, mind and consciousness would appear to be independent of brain and body."
Social forces, emotions, thoughts, and spiritual energies stand hidden beyond, above, and within what we know to be the outer physical body and material world. These powers work through the physical and do not emanate from them. The reverse is actually the true case as the physical mechanism is an endpoint and not a beginning for anything.
Our health and our dis-ease are not simply due to physical allergens and microbes, accidents and mishaps, but to a host of forces which lie beyond yet within our material midst. There is rhyme and reason to the course of universal momentum and so to in our own lives on planet Earth.
The midway or meeting point for these invisible forces and the outer physical human form is the endocrine system, and, more specifically, the psycho-neuro-endocrine system. The concept of this system is really quite simple while the practical working out of it may be in the opposite direction.
Direct support for this view is now coming from the new medical discipline called psycho-neuro-immunology. Psycho-neuro-immunology springs from the earlier arena of psycho-somatic medicine and will eventually form the foundation of psycho-neuro-endocrinology.
The immune system backed by the nervous apparatus and the brain is receiving increasing emphasis in evaluation and treatment of disease. The following suggestions arise to help in the correlation of the components of a new psycho-physiological system:
1) The immune system is centered in the thymus gland located in the center of the chest cavity.
2) The thymus gland is one of seven major human endocrine glands.
3) All of the glands, through their hormones which are secreted directly into the bloodstream, have profound effects upon the physical body.
4) The glands are interconnected and interrelated through feedback mechanisms, the 'master' gland, and the nervous system.
5) The nervous apparatus and the endocrine glands actually make up one whole neuro-endocrine system.
6) The brain is the most important, but not the only nerve center, which influences the endocrine glands and the immune system and total health.
7) The brain and other nerve centers and the endocrine glands are dependent upon emotions, the mind and the soul through the whole of the psycho-neuro-endocrine system.
Reversing field, the psycho-neuro-endocrine system, composed of the Soul (psyche comes from the Greek word which means soul) and its agents - the chakras (Sanskrit for invisible vortices of consciousness) - works through the mental, emotional, and subtle bodies to manifest effects in brain and nerve centers, endocrine glands, organs and organ systems, body regions and parts towards illness or health. The following list approximates the relationships within the tracts which compose the chakra system:
This system, with the centers of consciousness as focal points, will be demonstrated to be the integrating, synthesizing, and animating force in the human body. The chakras will eventually be recognized for their vital functions in the reproductive process, in the creative capacity, and in the recreative and regenerative power within every human being. These centers as agents of the Soul potentially provide us with every quality, energy, attribute, and force which is active or latent in the universe. The psycho-physical energy centers are constantly and progressively working to draw the deeper, subtler, and more expressive energies of creation into the human organism and into the human community.
The psycho-neuro-endocrine system is the symbol par excellence of the sevenfold nature of the universe. It makes possible the whole of the creative process within the human organism and within human society. And it is the living agency for the movement of energy and consciousness in our world.
"While, according to Western conceptions, the brain is the exclusive seat of consciousness, yogic experience shows that our brain-consciousness is only one among a number of possible forms of consciousness, and that these, according to their function and nature, can be localized or centered in various organs in the body." Lama Govinda, Foundations of Tibetan Mysticism
The unity of the nervous and endocrine systems has been hypothesized and demonstrated for many years in the West as well as in the East. "Hence in the largest sense the autonomic nervous system and the various endocrine glands (merged through the hypothalamus) represent a single neuroendocrine system that has evolved to integrate and coordinate the metabolic activities of the organism." (Williams 'Textbook of Endocrinology) Yet, these systems remain separated in medical practice and specialization. This will assuredly be modified in the future.
The relatively new discipline of psycho-neuro-immunology has already begun to explore the connections between mind-emotions and neuro-endocrine functions, especially focusing on the thymus gland and white blood cell parameters. Dr. Pert's work (not discussed in this article) takes a further step in generalizing emotional energy throughout the body and theorizing mind-consciousness as an underlying foundation for the whole body. The next step will require a leap in courage and faith to include the psyche - the soul - in the quest for scientific and medical knowledge of the human organism.
Practically speaking, understanding of the psycho-neuro-endocrine system can help explain most any ailment. Paul Solomon has said that, "all disease processes and syndromes, not only are psychosomatic in their form . . . but also are symbolic of that process clinging to that which is obsolete for the nature and for the self."
Consideration of the body area of any condition, the systems and centers involved, the quality of energies focused in the illness, the relationships to past dis-ease and problems, and the symbolic nature of the challenge to health can create an opportunity for growth and healing and not just a struggle for recovery or survival.
(Seven Centers of Consciousness - After Arthur Avalon)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Return to
In late 1950s when Dr. Kimura found success in biofeedback in altering brain wave levels, some one informed him that what he thinks as his first discovery is known to the orient from time immemorial. Then he checked up certain Zen meditators and exlaimed:
"WE are knocking at the back doors of the age old tradition of the orient."
So my projection is that the pleas of the protesters will fall in favour of scintific temper.
regards
From India, Delhi
Dear friends,
Namaskar.
By the time I was writing the post in this thread yester day, the news was already circulated in the news papers that Dalai Lama,Nobel Laureate is scheduled to address Society for Neuroscience next month on this subject and 544 protesters have petitioned against this. I read the news after I posted my yester day's message here.
To day in The Hindu I read the news again but it says are 700+ and the ground is also different. Here I am answering to both the grounds.
To 544 protesters.
Their ground is that the research content of speach which is based on the research of Dr. Davidson and his team needs replication. It is premature claim at this stage.
Looking into the list of publication of Dr. Davodson I find that qiuite a number of research papers are already published in professional journals.
Moreover, What is said gamma wave now was known as fast beta in 1960s and was discovered by Hirai and Kasamatsu,both Japanese neurologists, in Zen meditators. The results are reported in professional jouranals and texts. No objection has been raised so far. So what Dr. Davidson and his team are finding is more or less replication of the findings of Hirai and Kasamatsu. So the replication objection does not stand.
To 700+ protesters.
Their ground is that Dalai Lama being a religious leader should not address a scintific society.
In 1935 a french lady cardiologist travelled Himalayan region to study the effect of oriental practices. In certain sadhu she found that he could lower his heart beat to the extent that her portable cardiograph equipment could not detect it. Since then there are thousands of scintific researches on the effects of religious practices. Here is an article on the future of endocrinology:
The Psycho-Neuro-Endocrine System
(Seven Endocrine Glands - After Ray Stanford)
The endocrine system stands at the heart of human opportunity and human dis-ease. This is the case because the major glands are the transmitting agents for social, emotional, mental and spiritual forces which underlie the whole of our physical worlds.
This idea may seem a bit farfetched to the uninitiated, simply skeptical, or strictly scientific. Many such folks believe that human beings are just peculiar masses of protoplasm which are somewhat controlled by brain impulses and nervous system patterns.
But, there is growing evidence that we are really this and much more. Research is appearing which will eventually validate that, "The mind is not so much in the body, as the body is in the mind."
This saying has roots both in the Eastern Hindu tradition and among Western mystics, such as Meister Eckhardt. The aphorism suggests firstly that mind is more than brain (an obvious part of the body) and secondly that the body is a dense projection of a deeper energy field called the mind.
Dr. Candace Pert, researcher at the National Institutes for Mental Health, says, "... it is possible now to conceive of mind and consciousness as an emanation of emotional information processing, and as such, mind and consciousness would appear to be independent of brain and body."
Social forces, emotions, thoughts, and spiritual energies stand hidden beyond, above, and within what we know to be the outer physical body and material world. These powers work through the physical and do not emanate from them. The reverse is actually the true case as the physical mechanism is an endpoint and not a beginning for anything.
Our health and our dis-ease are not simply due to physical allergens and microbes, accidents and mishaps, but to a host of forces which lie beyond yet within our material midst. There is rhyme and reason to the course of universal momentum and so to in our own lives on planet Earth.
The midway or meeting point for these invisible forces and the outer physical human form is the endocrine system, and, more specifically, the psycho-neuro-endocrine system. The concept of this system is really quite simple while the practical working out of it may be in the opposite direction.
Direct support for this view is now coming from the new medical discipline called psycho-neuro-immunology. Psycho-neuro-immunology springs from the earlier arena of psycho-somatic medicine and will eventually form the foundation of psycho-neuro-endocrinology.
The immune system backed by the nervous apparatus and the brain is receiving increasing emphasis in evaluation and treatment of disease. The following suggestions arise to help in the correlation of the components of a new psycho-physiological system:
1) The immune system is centered in the thymus gland located in the center of the chest cavity.
2) The thymus gland is one of seven major human endocrine glands.
3) All of the glands, through their hormones which are secreted directly into the bloodstream, have profound effects upon the physical body.
4) The glands are interconnected and interrelated through feedback mechanisms, the 'master' gland, and the nervous system.
5) The nervous apparatus and the endocrine glands actually make up one whole neuro-endocrine system.
6) The brain is the most important, but not the only nerve center, which influences the endocrine glands and the immune system and total health.
7) The brain and other nerve centers and the endocrine glands are dependent upon emotions, the mind and the soul through the whole of the psycho-neuro-endocrine system.
Reversing field, the psycho-neuro-endocrine system, composed of the Soul (psyche comes from the Greek word which means soul) and its agents - the chakras (Sanskrit for invisible vortices of consciousness) - works through the mental, emotional, and subtle bodies to manifest effects in brain and nerve centers, endocrine glands, organs and organ systems, body regions and parts towards illness or health. The following list approximates the relationships within the tracts which compose the chakra system:
This system, with the centers of consciousness as focal points, will be demonstrated to be the integrating, synthesizing, and animating force in the human body. The chakras will eventually be recognized for their vital functions in the reproductive process, in the creative capacity, and in the recreative and regenerative power within every human being. These centers as agents of the Soul potentially provide us with every quality, energy, attribute, and force which is active or latent in the universe. The psycho-physical energy centers are constantly and progressively working to draw the deeper, subtler, and more expressive energies of creation into the human organism and into the human community.
The psycho-neuro-endocrine system is the symbol par excellence of the sevenfold nature of the universe. It makes possible the whole of the creative process within the human organism and within human society. And it is the living agency for the movement of energy and consciousness in our world.
"While, according to Western conceptions, the brain is the exclusive seat of consciousness, yogic experience shows that our brain-consciousness is only one among a number of possible forms of consciousness, and that these, according to their function and nature, can be localized or centered in various organs in the body." Lama Govinda, Foundations of Tibetan Mysticism
The unity of the nervous and endocrine systems has been hypothesized and demonstrated for many years in the West as well as in the East. "Hence in the largest sense the autonomic nervous system and the various endocrine glands (merged through the hypothalamus) represent a single neuroendocrine system that has evolved to integrate and coordinate the metabolic activities of the organism." (Williams 'Textbook of Endocrinology) Yet, these systems remain separated in medical practice and specialization. This will assuredly be modified in the future.
The relatively new discipline of psycho-neuro-immunology has already begun to explore the connections between mind-emotions and neuro-endocrine functions, especially focusing on the thymus gland and white blood cell parameters. Dr. Pert's work (not discussed in this article) takes a further step in generalizing emotional energy throughout the body and theorizing mind-consciousness as an underlying foundation for the whole body. The next step will require a leap in courage and faith to include the psyche - the soul - in the quest for scientific and medical knowledge of the human organism.
Practically speaking, understanding of the psycho-neuro-endocrine system can help explain most any ailment. Paul Solomon has said that, "all disease processes and syndromes, not only are psychosomatic in their form . . . but also are symbolic of that process clinging to that which is obsolete for the nature and for the self."
Consideration of the body area of any condition, the systems and centers involved, the quality of energies focused in the illness, the relationships to past dis-ease and problems, and the symbolic nature of the challenge to health can create an opportunity for growth and healing and not just a struggle for recovery or survival.
(Seven Centers of Consciousness - After Arthur Avalon)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Return to
In late 1950s when Dr. Kimura found success in biofeedback in altering brain wave levels, some one informed him that what he thinks as his first discovery is known to the orient from time immemorial. Then he checked up certain Zen meditators and exlaimed:
"WE are knocking at the back doors of the age old tradition of the orient."
So my projection is that the pleas of the protesters will fall in favour of scintific temper.
regards
From India, Delhi
Dear friends. Namaskar. I have detected a mistake in my above quote. In place of Dr. Kimura please read as Dr. J. Kamiya. regards
From India, Delhi
From India, Delhi
Dear friends! Namaskar.
A science of human neuroplasicity has already emerged to study how meditation changes the sructure of neurons leading to better harmony.
Daniel Goleman who coined and propagated the word "emotional intelligence" is now in the field of human neuroplasticity. So I suppose professor Udai Parrek's courses on emotional intelligence will include human neuroplasticity and fees may be more.
Protests against Dalai Lama's lecture at Society for Neuroscience has failed. Below is the NPR News dated November 11,2005.
"The Links Between The Dalai Lama An...
NPR News
The Links Between The Dalai Lama And Neuroscience
This weekend, the Dalai Lama will deliver a keynote address to the world's largest group of brain scientists at the annual Society for Neuroscience meeting in Washington, D.C. Some researchers are profoundly unhappy. But the Dalai Lama and brain scientists have more in common than you might expect. "
Oh friends! Will you be far behind?
regards
From India, Delhi
A science of human neuroplasicity has already emerged to study how meditation changes the sructure of neurons leading to better harmony.
Daniel Goleman who coined and propagated the word "emotional intelligence" is now in the field of human neuroplasticity. So I suppose professor Udai Parrek's courses on emotional intelligence will include human neuroplasticity and fees may be more.
Protests against Dalai Lama's lecture at Society for Neuroscience has failed. Below is the NPR News dated November 11,2005.
"The Links Between The Dalai Lama An...
NPR News
The Links Between The Dalai Lama And Neuroscience
This weekend, the Dalai Lama will deliver a keynote address to the world's largest group of brain scientists at the annual Society for Neuroscience meeting in Washington, D.C. Some researchers are profoundly unhappy. But the Dalai Lama and brain scientists have more in common than you might expect. "
Oh friends! Will you be far behind?
regards
From India, Delhi
Dear CiteFriends,
Read this article yesterday, and thought I should share it with all, especially those who are interested in the Dalai Lama talk as mentioned by DrJi.
Source: The Washington Post
http://washingtonpost.com <link updated to site home>
AR2005111201080_pf.html
Dalai Lama Gives Talk On Science
Monk's D.C. Lecture Links Mind, Matter
By Marc Kaufman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, November 13, 2005; C01
In an unusual marrying of science and spirituality, the Dalai Lama
addressed thousands of the world's top neuroscientists yesterday,
telling them that society is falling behind in its efforts to make
sense of their groundbreaking research.
Speaking sometimes in Tibetan and sometimes in halting English to a
receptive audience at the 35th annual meeting of the Society for
Neuroscience, the Tibetan spiritual and political leader said
scientists and moral leaders need each other.
"It is all too evident that our moral thinking simply has not been able
to keep pace with such rapid progress in our acquisition of knowledge
and power," he said in a prepared text.
The speech at the Washington Convention Center had been opposed by some
members of the society who objected to a religious leader addressing
neuroscientists, who research the brain, emotions and human behavior.
Nearly 800 people had signed an online petition demanding that the
Dalai Lama's invitation be withdrawn.
Many of the petition signers were Chinese Americans, leading to
countercharges that they opposed him on political grounds. Relations
between China and once-independent Tibet have been badly strained for a
half-century, and the Dalai Lama is at the center of the dispute.
But except for minor protests yesterday -- one woman held a sign that
read "Dalai Lama not qualified to speak here" -- that conflict was
barely visible at the conference. Some attendees stayed away from his
talk, and others left early in what a few described as a protest of
sorts.
For most of the 14,000 conference participants who watched in the
lecture hall or from overflow rooms, the Dalai Lama's enthusiastic
embrace of science and promotion of meditation were warmly received.
His 10-day visit to Washington, which included a meeting with President
Bush last week, will continue today at MCI Center, where he is
scheduled to give a public talk on "Global Peace Through Compassion."
The author of a new book on the convergence of Buddhism and science,
the Dalai Lama has met with prominent scientists around the world for
almost 20 years and has encouraged an increasingly fruitful
collaboration between brain researchers and Tibetan monks.
Because of the controversy over his speech to the neuroscientists in
Washington, his aides said he would keep to a prepared text, something
quite unusual for him. But he often diverged from the text, despite
saying with a smile that he was feeling unusual "stress."
His talk focused on how he developed his interest in science as a boy
in Tibet, within a closed and isolated society, and on his view that
morality and compassion are central to science. He pointed out in his
prepared text, for instance, that although the atom bomb was great
science, it created great moral problems.
"It is no longer adequate to adopt the view that our responsibility as
a society is to simply further scientific knowledge and enhance
technological power and that the choice of what to do with this
knowledge and power should be left in the hands of the individual," he
said.
"By invoking fundamental ethical principles, I am not advocating a
fusion of religious ethics and scientific inquiry. Rather, I am
speaking of what I call 'secular ethics' that embrace the key ethical
principles, such as compassion, tolerance, a sense of caring,
consideration of others, and the responsible use of knowledge and power
-- principles that transcend the barriers between religious believers
and nonbelievers, and followers of this religion or that religion," he
said.
He acknowledged that some might wonder why a Buddhist monk is taking
such an interest in science.
"What relation could there be between Buddhism, an ancient Indian
philosophical and spiritual tradition, and modern science?" he said.
His answer was that the scientific empirical approach and the Buddhist
exploration of the mind and world have many similarities.
In the Tibetan Buddhist tradition, however, the Dalai Lama is known as
the reincarnation of a major force for compassion, and his strongest
words yesterday were directed at religious people who might lack that
trait.
"People who call themselves religious without basic human values like
compassion, they are not really religious people," he told the
audience, offering no names. "They are hypocrites." The words were
unusually critical for a speaker who likes to emphasize the positive
and productive.
The single protester outside his follow-up news conference at the
convention center was Pei Wang, a neuroscience graduate student at the
State University of New York at Buffalo. "This is supposed to be a
scientific talk," she said. "If he is not presenting data, he should
not speak. This should be about research, not about some politician
giving a speech."
The Society for Neuroscience annual meeting, which will continue
through Thursday and has attracted 31,000 people, features scores of
papers on research into human behavior.
In keeping with the Dalai Lama's involvement with meditation and the
physical and mental implications of the contemplative life, one of the
higher-profile papers reports on how regular meditation appears to
produce structural changes in areas of the brain associated with
attention and sensory processing. An imaging study led by Massachusetts
General Hospital researchers showed that particular areas of the
cerebral cortex, the outer layer of the brain, were thicker in
participants who were experienced practitioners of a type of meditation
commonly practiced in the United States.
"Our results suggest that meditation can produce experience-based
structural alterations in the brain," said Sara Lazar of the hospital's
Psychiatric Neuroimaging Research Program and lead author of the study,
which will appear in the journal NeuroReport. "We also found evidence
that mediation may slow down the aging-related atrophy of certain areas
of the brain."
Smiles and Peace
From Malaysia, Johor Bahru
Read this article yesterday, and thought I should share it with all, especially those who are interested in the Dalai Lama talk as mentioned by DrJi.
Source: The Washington Post
http://washingtonpost.com <link updated to site home>
AR2005111201080_pf.html
Dalai Lama Gives Talk On Science
Monk's D.C. Lecture Links Mind, Matter
By Marc Kaufman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, November 13, 2005; C01
In an unusual marrying of science and spirituality, the Dalai Lama
addressed thousands of the world's top neuroscientists yesterday,
telling them that society is falling behind in its efforts to make
sense of their groundbreaking research.
Speaking sometimes in Tibetan and sometimes in halting English to a
receptive audience at the 35th annual meeting of the Society for
Neuroscience, the Tibetan spiritual and political leader said
scientists and moral leaders need each other.
"It is all too evident that our moral thinking simply has not been able
to keep pace with such rapid progress in our acquisition of knowledge
and power," he said in a prepared text.
The speech at the Washington Convention Center had been opposed by some
members of the society who objected to a religious leader addressing
neuroscientists, who research the brain, emotions and human behavior.
Nearly 800 people had signed an online petition demanding that the
Dalai Lama's invitation be withdrawn.
Many of the petition signers were Chinese Americans, leading to
countercharges that they opposed him on political grounds. Relations
between China and once-independent Tibet have been badly strained for a
half-century, and the Dalai Lama is at the center of the dispute.
But except for minor protests yesterday -- one woman held a sign that
read "Dalai Lama not qualified to speak here" -- that conflict was
barely visible at the conference. Some attendees stayed away from his
talk, and others left early in what a few described as a protest of
sorts.
For most of the 14,000 conference participants who watched in the
lecture hall or from overflow rooms, the Dalai Lama's enthusiastic
embrace of science and promotion of meditation were warmly received.
His 10-day visit to Washington, which included a meeting with President
Bush last week, will continue today at MCI Center, where he is
scheduled to give a public talk on "Global Peace Through Compassion."
The author of a new book on the convergence of Buddhism and science,
the Dalai Lama has met with prominent scientists around the world for
almost 20 years and has encouraged an increasingly fruitful
collaboration between brain researchers and Tibetan monks.
Because of the controversy over his speech to the neuroscientists in
Washington, his aides said he would keep to a prepared text, something
quite unusual for him. But he often diverged from the text, despite
saying with a smile that he was feeling unusual "stress."
His talk focused on how he developed his interest in science as a boy
in Tibet, within a closed and isolated society, and on his view that
morality and compassion are central to science. He pointed out in his
prepared text, for instance, that although the atom bomb was great
science, it created great moral problems.
"It is no longer adequate to adopt the view that our responsibility as
a society is to simply further scientific knowledge and enhance
technological power and that the choice of what to do with this
knowledge and power should be left in the hands of the individual," he
said.
"By invoking fundamental ethical principles, I am not advocating a
fusion of religious ethics and scientific inquiry. Rather, I am
speaking of what I call 'secular ethics' that embrace the key ethical
principles, such as compassion, tolerance, a sense of caring,
consideration of others, and the responsible use of knowledge and power
-- principles that transcend the barriers between religious believers
and nonbelievers, and followers of this religion or that religion," he
said.
He acknowledged that some might wonder why a Buddhist monk is taking
such an interest in science.
"What relation could there be between Buddhism, an ancient Indian
philosophical and spiritual tradition, and modern science?" he said.
His answer was that the scientific empirical approach and the Buddhist
exploration of the mind and world have many similarities.
In the Tibetan Buddhist tradition, however, the Dalai Lama is known as
the reincarnation of a major force for compassion, and his strongest
words yesterday were directed at religious people who might lack that
trait.
"People who call themselves religious without basic human values like
compassion, they are not really religious people," he told the
audience, offering no names. "They are hypocrites." The words were
unusually critical for a speaker who likes to emphasize the positive
and productive.
The single protester outside his follow-up news conference at the
convention center was Pei Wang, a neuroscience graduate student at the
State University of New York at Buffalo. "This is supposed to be a
scientific talk," she said. "If he is not presenting data, he should
not speak. This should be about research, not about some politician
giving a speech."
The Society for Neuroscience annual meeting, which will continue
through Thursday and has attracted 31,000 people, features scores of
papers on research into human behavior.
In keeping with the Dalai Lama's involvement with meditation and the
physical and mental implications of the contemplative life, one of the
higher-profile papers reports on how regular meditation appears to
produce structural changes in areas of the brain associated with
attention and sensory processing. An imaging study led by Massachusetts
General Hospital researchers showed that particular areas of the
cerebral cortex, the outer layer of the brain, were thicker in
participants who were experienced practitioners of a type of meditation
commonly practiced in the United States.
"Our results suggest that meditation can produce experience-based
structural alterations in the brain," said Sara Lazar of the hospital's
Psychiatric Neuroimaging Research Program and lead author of the study,
which will appear in the journal NeuroReport. "We also found evidence
that mediation may slow down the aging-related atrophy of certain areas
of the brain."
Smiles and Peace
From Malaysia, Johor Bahru
Namaskar Noel ji.
I am extremely glad to see your article on Dalai Lama's talk. Of course, entry of meditation into neuroscience is not new, it will now be persued more vigorously and a kranti is a must.
Next, I like to share the future of endocrinology too because so far we are unto EEG. Here is an article on the subject.
The Psycho-Neuro-Endocrine System
(Seven Endocrine Glands - After Ray Stanford)
The endocrine system stands at the heart of human opportunity and human dis-ease. This is the case because the major glands are the transmitting agents for social, emotional, mental and spiritual forces which underlie the whole of our physical worlds.
This idea may seem a bit farfetched to the uninitiated, simply skeptical, or strictly scientific. Many such folks believe that human beings are just peculiar masses of protoplasm which are somewhat controlled by brain impulses and nervous system patterns.
But, there is growing evidence that we are really this and much more. Research is appearing which will eventually validate that, "The mind is not so much in the body, as the body is in the mind."
This saying has roots both in the Eastern Hindu tradition and among Western mystics, such as Meister Eckhardt. The aphorism suggests firstly that mind is more than brain (an obvious part of the body) and secondly that the body is a dense projection of a deeper energy field called the mind.
Dr. Candace Pert, researcher at the National Institutes for Mental Health, says, "... it is possible now to conceive of mind and consciousness as an emanation of emotional information processing, and as such, mind and consciousness would appear to be independent of brain and body."
Social forces, emotions, thoughts, and spiritual energies stand hidden beyond, above, and within what we know to be the outer physical body and material world. These powers work through the physical and do not emanate from them. The reverse is actually the true case as the physical mechanism is an endpoint and not a beginning for anything.
Our health and our dis-ease are not simply due to physical allergens and microbes, accidents and mishaps, but to a host of forces which lie beyond yet within our material midst. There is rhyme and reason to the course of universal momentum and so to in our own lives on planet Earth.
The midway or meeting point for these invisible forces and the outer physical human form is the endocrine system, and, more specifically, the psycho-neuro-endocrine system. The concept of this system is really quite simple while the practical working out of it may be in the opposite direction.
Direct support for this view is now coming from the new medical discipline called psycho-neuro-immunology. Psycho-neuro-immunology springs from the earlier arena of psycho-somatic medicine and will eventually form the foundation of psycho-neuro-endocrinology.
The immune system backed by the nervous apparatus and the brain is receiving increasing emphasis in evaluation and treatment of disease. The following suggestions arise to help in the correlation of the components of a new psycho-physiological system:
1) The immune system is centered in the thymus gland located in the center of the chest cavity.
2) The thymus gland is one of seven major human endocrine glands.
3) All of the glands, through their hormones which are secreted directly into the bloodstream, have profound effects upon the physical body.
4) The glands are interconnected and interrelated through feedback mechanisms, the 'master' gland, and the nervous system.
5) The nervous apparatus and the endocrine glands actually make up one whole neuro-endocrine system.
6) The brain is the most important, but not the only nerve center, which influences the endocrine glands and the immune system and total health.
7) The brain and other nerve centers and the endocrine glands are dependent upon emotions, the mind and the soul through the whole of the psycho-neuro-endocrine system.
Reversing field, the psycho-neuro-endocrine system, composed of the Soul (psyche comes from the Greek word which means soul) and its agents - the chakras (Sanskrit for invisible vortices of consciousness) - works through the mental, emotional, and subtle bodies to manifest effects in brain and nerve centers, endocrine glands, organs and organ systems, body regions and parts towards illness or health. The following list approximates the relationships within the tracts which compose the chakra system:
This system, with the centers of consciousness as focal points, will be demonstrated to be the integrating, synthesizing, and animating force in the human body. The chakras will eventually be recognized for their vital functions in the reproductive process, in the creative capacity, and in the recreative and regenerative power within every human being. These centers as agents of the Soul potentially provide us with every quality, energy, attribute, and force which is active or latent in the universe. The psycho-physical energy centers are constantly and progressively working to draw the deeper, subtler, and more expressive energies of creation into the human organism and into the human community.
The psycho-neuro-endocrine system is the symbol par excellence of the sevenfold nature of the universe. It makes possible the whole of the creative process within the human organism and within human society. And it is the living agency for the movement of energy and consciousness in our world.
"While, according to Western conceptions, the brain is the exclusive seat of consciousness, yogic experience shows that our brain-consciousness is only one among a number of possible forms of consciousness, and that these, according to their function and nature, can be localized or centered in various organs in the body." Lama Govinda, Foundations of Tibetan Mysticism
The unity of the nervous and endocrine systems has been hypothesized and demonstrated for many years in the West as well as in the East. "Hence in the largest sense the autonomic nervous system and the various endocrine glands (merged through the hypothalamus) represent a single neuroendocrine system that has evolved to integrate and coordinate the metabolic activities of the organism." (Williams 'Textbook of Endocrinology) Yet, these systems remain separated in medical practice and specialization. This will assuredly be modified in the future.
The relatively new discipline of psycho-neuro-immunology has already begun to explore the connections between mind-emotions and neuro-endocrine functions, especially focusing on the thymus gland and white blood cell parameters. Dr. Pert's work (not discussed in this article) takes a further step in generalizing emotional energy throughout the body and theorizing mind-consciousness as an underlying foundation for the whole body. The next step will require a leap in courage and faith to include the psyche - the soul - in the quest for scientific and medical knowledge of the human organism.
Practically speaking, understanding of the psycho-neuro-endocrine system can help explain most any ailment. Paul Solomon has said that, "all disease processes and syndromes, not only are psychosomatic in their form . . . but also are symbolic of that process clinging to that which is obsolete for the nature and for the self."
Consideration of the body area of any condition, the systems and centers involved, the quality of energies focused in the illness, the relationships to past dis-ease and problems, and the symbolic nature of the challenge to health can create an opportunity for growth and healing and not just a struggle for recovery or survival.
(Seven Centers of Consciousness - After Arthur Avalon)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Return to Whole Works Page
So friends! you will not have to buy medicines from outside. Your body is the biggest apothecary.
regards
From India, Delhi
I am extremely glad to see your article on Dalai Lama's talk. Of course, entry of meditation into neuroscience is not new, it will now be persued more vigorously and a kranti is a must.
Next, I like to share the future of endocrinology too because so far we are unto EEG. Here is an article on the subject.
The Psycho-Neuro-Endocrine System
(Seven Endocrine Glands - After Ray Stanford)
The endocrine system stands at the heart of human opportunity and human dis-ease. This is the case because the major glands are the transmitting agents for social, emotional, mental and spiritual forces which underlie the whole of our physical worlds.
This idea may seem a bit farfetched to the uninitiated, simply skeptical, or strictly scientific. Many such folks believe that human beings are just peculiar masses of protoplasm which are somewhat controlled by brain impulses and nervous system patterns.
But, there is growing evidence that we are really this and much more. Research is appearing which will eventually validate that, "The mind is not so much in the body, as the body is in the mind."
This saying has roots both in the Eastern Hindu tradition and among Western mystics, such as Meister Eckhardt. The aphorism suggests firstly that mind is more than brain (an obvious part of the body) and secondly that the body is a dense projection of a deeper energy field called the mind.
Dr. Candace Pert, researcher at the National Institutes for Mental Health, says, "... it is possible now to conceive of mind and consciousness as an emanation of emotional information processing, and as such, mind and consciousness would appear to be independent of brain and body."
Social forces, emotions, thoughts, and spiritual energies stand hidden beyond, above, and within what we know to be the outer physical body and material world. These powers work through the physical and do not emanate from them. The reverse is actually the true case as the physical mechanism is an endpoint and not a beginning for anything.
Our health and our dis-ease are not simply due to physical allergens and microbes, accidents and mishaps, but to a host of forces which lie beyond yet within our material midst. There is rhyme and reason to the course of universal momentum and so to in our own lives on planet Earth.
The midway or meeting point for these invisible forces and the outer physical human form is the endocrine system, and, more specifically, the psycho-neuro-endocrine system. The concept of this system is really quite simple while the practical working out of it may be in the opposite direction.
Direct support for this view is now coming from the new medical discipline called psycho-neuro-immunology. Psycho-neuro-immunology springs from the earlier arena of psycho-somatic medicine and will eventually form the foundation of psycho-neuro-endocrinology.
The immune system backed by the nervous apparatus and the brain is receiving increasing emphasis in evaluation and treatment of disease. The following suggestions arise to help in the correlation of the components of a new psycho-physiological system:
1) The immune system is centered in the thymus gland located in the center of the chest cavity.
2) The thymus gland is one of seven major human endocrine glands.
3) All of the glands, through their hormones which are secreted directly into the bloodstream, have profound effects upon the physical body.
4) The glands are interconnected and interrelated through feedback mechanisms, the 'master' gland, and the nervous system.
5) The nervous apparatus and the endocrine glands actually make up one whole neuro-endocrine system.
6) The brain is the most important, but not the only nerve center, which influences the endocrine glands and the immune system and total health.
7) The brain and other nerve centers and the endocrine glands are dependent upon emotions, the mind and the soul through the whole of the psycho-neuro-endocrine system.
Reversing field, the psycho-neuro-endocrine system, composed of the Soul (psyche comes from the Greek word which means soul) and its agents - the chakras (Sanskrit for invisible vortices of consciousness) - works through the mental, emotional, and subtle bodies to manifest effects in brain and nerve centers, endocrine glands, organs and organ systems, body regions and parts towards illness or health. The following list approximates the relationships within the tracts which compose the chakra system:
This system, with the centers of consciousness as focal points, will be demonstrated to be the integrating, synthesizing, and animating force in the human body. The chakras will eventually be recognized for their vital functions in the reproductive process, in the creative capacity, and in the recreative and regenerative power within every human being. These centers as agents of the Soul potentially provide us with every quality, energy, attribute, and force which is active or latent in the universe. The psycho-physical energy centers are constantly and progressively working to draw the deeper, subtler, and more expressive energies of creation into the human organism and into the human community.
The psycho-neuro-endocrine system is the symbol par excellence of the sevenfold nature of the universe. It makes possible the whole of the creative process within the human organism and within human society. And it is the living agency for the movement of energy and consciousness in our world.
"While, according to Western conceptions, the brain is the exclusive seat of consciousness, yogic experience shows that our brain-consciousness is only one among a number of possible forms of consciousness, and that these, according to their function and nature, can be localized or centered in various organs in the body." Lama Govinda, Foundations of Tibetan Mysticism
The unity of the nervous and endocrine systems has been hypothesized and demonstrated for many years in the West as well as in the East. "Hence in the largest sense the autonomic nervous system and the various endocrine glands (merged through the hypothalamus) represent a single neuroendocrine system that has evolved to integrate and coordinate the metabolic activities of the organism." (Williams 'Textbook of Endocrinology) Yet, these systems remain separated in medical practice and specialization. This will assuredly be modified in the future.
The relatively new discipline of psycho-neuro-immunology has already begun to explore the connections between mind-emotions and neuro-endocrine functions, especially focusing on the thymus gland and white blood cell parameters. Dr. Pert's work (not discussed in this article) takes a further step in generalizing emotional energy throughout the body and theorizing mind-consciousness as an underlying foundation for the whole body. The next step will require a leap in courage and faith to include the psyche - the soul - in the quest for scientific and medical knowledge of the human organism.
Practically speaking, understanding of the psycho-neuro-endocrine system can help explain most any ailment. Paul Solomon has said that, "all disease processes and syndromes, not only are psychosomatic in their form . . . but also are symbolic of that process clinging to that which is obsolete for the nature and for the self."
Consideration of the body area of any condition, the systems and centers involved, the quality of energies focused in the illness, the relationships to past dis-ease and problems, and the symbolic nature of the challenge to health can create an opportunity for growth and healing and not just a struggle for recovery or survival.
(Seven Centers of Consciousness - After Arthur Avalon)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Return to Whole Works Page
So friends! you will not have to buy medicines from outside. Your body is the biggest apothecary.
regards
From India, Delhi
Namaskar DrJi.
I have been some thoughts with my close friends that we as an entity "may" have our eyes clouded from what is the actual truth concerning who we are and what we are. I remember during our history classes, we are always reminded that History is important because it tells us about our roots, our origins and who we are. I grew older, I begin to see another line of thought and that history is relevent up to a certain era and history beyond that is supposedly, legends, myths, paganism, is not history, just forklores and children tales. Now, having slightly more sense than when I was a teenager, I begin to see much more. Those supposedly legends, myths, forklores, stories are also our history, taking examples from the Akkadians, Egyptians, Sumerians, Incas lores. In fact, in some of these civilisations it tells us more about who we are than even today's science can tell. From meditation, to martial arts, to astrology, to architecture, our ancestors has achieved more and understood more than we today. Industrialisation as well as religion (in some ways) has somewhat blinded us to the truth, I feel (not a proper subject for this tread). I believe that we are going to see and discover many many interesting and important things as science and technology progresses. It is going to be an exciting new age, if the shintoist are right. Of course it was mentioned in Zacharia Stitchin's writing that we will be moving into a new age very soon.
In remember reading somewhere that in Shinto believe there the world of spirituality will give in to the world of materialism until an age where both will emerge. Could it be the same Age Zacharia is talking about? I think there maybe some truth in this. We are actually seeing science researching and finding or already explaining things concerning spiritual (eg. meditation) supernatural (eg. energy healing) and much, much more.
In your explaination of the endocrine system, you have given me another piece of the life puzzle. I have been doing energy healing for a few months now. My instructor examples that what we are actually doing is actually bring our hands to a higher resonance level and when we touch the person, we help them entrain and bring their own level up to match us. I am still trying to grasp at all this, but a scientist friend who attend the same workshop told me that Dr. Edward (the instructor) was talking about quantum physics. Interesting. And Drji, with your sharing on the endocrine system, it help me understand a little more about our body. Thank you. And indeed, our body is a full equiped apothecary.
This is a very interesting and information tread for me. Thank you again Drji.
Smiles and Peace
From Malaysia, Johor Bahru
I have been some thoughts with my close friends that we as an entity "may" have our eyes clouded from what is the actual truth concerning who we are and what we are. I remember during our history classes, we are always reminded that History is important because it tells us about our roots, our origins and who we are. I grew older, I begin to see another line of thought and that history is relevent up to a certain era and history beyond that is supposedly, legends, myths, paganism, is not history, just forklores and children tales. Now, having slightly more sense than when I was a teenager, I begin to see much more. Those supposedly legends, myths, forklores, stories are also our history, taking examples from the Akkadians, Egyptians, Sumerians, Incas lores. In fact, in some of these civilisations it tells us more about who we are than even today's science can tell. From meditation, to martial arts, to astrology, to architecture, our ancestors has achieved more and understood more than we today. Industrialisation as well as religion (in some ways) has somewhat blinded us to the truth, I feel (not a proper subject for this tread). I believe that we are going to see and discover many many interesting and important things as science and technology progresses. It is going to be an exciting new age, if the shintoist are right. Of course it was mentioned in Zacharia Stitchin's writing that we will be moving into a new age very soon.
In remember reading somewhere that in Shinto believe there the world of spirituality will give in to the world of materialism until an age where both will emerge. Could it be the same Age Zacharia is talking about? I think there maybe some truth in this. We are actually seeing science researching and finding or already explaining things concerning spiritual (eg. meditation) supernatural (eg. energy healing) and much, much more.
In your explaination of the endocrine system, you have given me another piece of the life puzzle. I have been doing energy healing for a few months now. My instructor examples that what we are actually doing is actually bring our hands to a higher resonance level and when we touch the person, we help them entrain and bring their own level up to match us. I am still trying to grasp at all this, but a scientist friend who attend the same workshop told me that Dr. Edward (the instructor) was talking about quantum physics. Interesting. And Drji, with your sharing on the endocrine system, it help me understand a little more about our body. Thank you. And indeed, our body is a full equiped apothecary.
This is a very interesting and information tread for me. Thank you again Drji.
Smiles and Peace
From Malaysia, Johor Bahru
Namaskar Noel ji.
Your evolution of thought and practice really enchants me. In every source of knowledge there are hoaxes . Yes, in science and medicine too.Every source of knowledge being re-examined afresh. Only those knowledges will be there which will stand the test of time and hoaxes will be screened out.
On the health front, a global health culture is emerging. May be that by 2050 there will be no hospitals and the items in the chemist shops will be completely replaced. We will have wellness education institutes in place of medical colleges. Fatty medical books will be replaced by petty books.
regards
From India, Delhi
Your evolution of thought and practice really enchants me. In every source of knowledge there are hoaxes . Yes, in science and medicine too.Every source of knowledge being re-examined afresh. Only those knowledges will be there which will stand the test of time and hoaxes will be screened out.
On the health front, a global health culture is emerging. May be that by 2050 there will be no hospitals and the items in the chemist shops will be completely replaced. We will have wellness education institutes in place of medical colleges. Fatty medical books will be replaced by petty books.
regards
From India, Delhi
Dear friends,
Namaskar.
You may like to go through the following article.
Meditation associated with increased grey matter in the brain
November 14, 2005
New Haven, Conn.-Meditation is known to alter resting brain patterns, suggesting long lasting brain changes, but a new study by researchers from Yale, Harvard, Massachusetts General Hospital, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology shows meditation also is associated with increased cortical thickness.
The structural changes were found in areas of the brain that are important for sensory, cognitive and emotional processing, the researchers report in the November issue of NeuroReport.
Although the study included only 20 participants, all with extensive training in Buddhist Insight meditation, the results are significant, said Jeremy Gray, assistant professor of psychology at Yale and co-author of the study led by Sara Lazar, assistant in psychology at Massachusetts General Hospital.
“What is most fascinating to me is the suggestion that meditation practice can change anyone’s grey matter,” Gray said. “The study participants were people with jobs and families. They just meditated on average 40 minutes each day, you don’t have to be a monk.”
Magnetic resonance imaging showed that regular practice of meditation is associated with increased thickness in a subset of cortical regions related to sensory, auditory, visual and internal perception, such as heart rate or breathing. The researchers also found that regular meditation practice may slow age-related thinning of the frontal cortex.
“Most of the regions identified in this study were found in the right hemisphere,” the researchers said. “The right hemisphere is essential for sustaining attention, which is a central practice of Insight meditation.”
They said other forms of yoga and meditation likely have a similar impact on cortical structure, although each tradition would be expected to have a slightly different pattern of cortical thickening based on the specific mental exercises involved.
Yale University
Print this page
E-mail this page to a friend
More articles about " meditation "
regards,
Jogeshwar
From India, Delhi
Namaskar.
You may like to go through the following article.
Meditation associated with increased grey matter in the brain
November 14, 2005
New Haven, Conn.-Meditation is known to alter resting brain patterns, suggesting long lasting brain changes, but a new study by researchers from Yale, Harvard, Massachusetts General Hospital, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology shows meditation also is associated with increased cortical thickness.
The structural changes were found in areas of the brain that are important for sensory, cognitive and emotional processing, the researchers report in the November issue of NeuroReport.
Although the study included only 20 participants, all with extensive training in Buddhist Insight meditation, the results are significant, said Jeremy Gray, assistant professor of psychology at Yale and co-author of the study led by Sara Lazar, assistant in psychology at Massachusetts General Hospital.
“What is most fascinating to me is the suggestion that meditation practice can change anyone’s grey matter,” Gray said. “The study participants were people with jobs and families. They just meditated on average 40 minutes each day, you don’t have to be a monk.”
Magnetic resonance imaging showed that regular practice of meditation is associated with increased thickness in a subset of cortical regions related to sensory, auditory, visual and internal perception, such as heart rate or breathing. The researchers also found that regular meditation practice may slow age-related thinning of the frontal cortex.
“Most of the regions identified in this study were found in the right hemisphere,” the researchers said. “The right hemisphere is essential for sustaining attention, which is a central practice of Insight meditation.”
They said other forms of yoga and meditation likely have a similar impact on cortical structure, although each tradition would be expected to have a slightly different pattern of cortical thickening based on the specific mental exercises involved.
Yale University
Print this page
E-mail this page to a friend
More articles about " meditation "
regards,
Jogeshwar
From India, Delhi
Community Support and Knowledge-base on business, career and organisational prospects and issues - Register and Log In to CiteHR and post your query, download formats and be part of a fostered community of professionals.
Heaven-hr_persp ective_199.doc
Mitch Albom - The Five People You Meet in Heaven[1].pdf