Three lies and a half-truth

October 1, 2009

When it comes to understanding meditation, Christianity and neuroscience are closer than you might imagine.
By Therese DesCamp, www.ucobserver.org

When I teach about cognition and prayer, I often start with an exercise designed for failure. I ask the class to cross their legs and arms, slump in their chairs and think of nothing for two minutes. During this period, I remind them regularly and harshly how much time is left and that their minds should be empty.

Afterward, participants invariably speak about their frustration and discomfort. For me, it’s the longest two minutes of the course. But I love this exercise. It illustrates the three biggest lies and one half-truth about meditation: that meditation means getting our minds totally quiet; that if we get distracted we’re doing it wrong; that there’s only one correct, Christian way to meditate; and finally, the half-truth at the root of much suffering, that our goal is inner peace.

Neurobiology presents a problem for the first assumption, that our minds should be totally quiet in meditation. The human brain is made to be anxious; it’s designed to scan for incoming danger. Three seconds is the longest we usually concentrate on any single thing unless we exert serious effort.

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Brain Energy Use Key To Understanding Consciousness, Yale Researchers Find

June 16, 2009

High levels of brain energy are required to maintain consciousness, a finding which suggests a new way to understand the properties of this still mysterious state of being, Yale University researchers report. At its simplest, consciousness can be defined as the ability to respond meaningfully to external stimuli.

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MS Society Commends Federal Government’s Research Investment In Neurological Diseases

June 15, 2009

The Multiple Sclerosis Society of Canada praised the government’s announcement of $15 million to study the impact of a wide variety of neurological conditions, including multiple sclerosis.

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Medtronic Receives FDA Approval For BRYAN(R) Cervical Disc System

June 14, 2009

Medtronic, Inc. (NYSE: MDT) announced that it received U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approval to market the BRYAN® Cervical Disc System for the treatment of single-level cervical disc disease (radiculopathy and/or myelopathy). In July 2007, Medtronic’s PRESTIGE® Cervical Disc was the first artificial cervical disc to be approved by the FDA.

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Study: Zen Meditation Really Does Clear the Mind

September 3, 2008

The seemingly nonsensical Zen practice of "thinking about not thinking" could help free the mind of distractions, new brain scans reveal.

This suggests Zen meditation could help treat attention deficit and hyperactivity disorder (so-called ADD or ADHD), obsessive-compulsive disorder, anxiety disorder, major depression and other disorders marked by distracting thoughts.

"What I find really interesting in this approach is that it stands to regulate the mind by regulating the body — posture, breathing," Pagnoni said. The neural circuits for controlling posture are quite distinct from those responsible for higher brain functions, "and perhaps shifting one’s attention to posture or breathing facilitates a temporary quelling of mental chatter."

Read the complete article by Charles Q. Choi, Special to LiveScience.com…

Keywords: behavioral therapy, mindfulness, neuroscience, Alzheimer, Giuseppe Pagnoni, Emory University Atlanta, National Institutes of Health

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Can the Mind Shape the Brain?

May 27, 2008

Conventional wisdom holds that the human mind is nothing more than the human brain. This belief derives from materialism. By “materialism” I don’t mean the mania to shop unceasingly at the mall. Rather, I mean the philosophy that material reality is all that there is. Immaterial or spiritual realities are, in this view, simply epiphenomena of the material world.

Read the full article by Dinesh D’Souza …

Books by Dinesh D’Souza include Whats So Great About Christianity and Whats So Great About America

Keywords: Francis Crick, Mario Beauregard, Dinesh D’Souza, Daniel Dennett, ephiphenomenon, neuroscientist, materialism, placebo, nocebo

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