[...] The battle began when David Albert — a well-known philosopher of science with an expertise in quantum mechanics — savaged Krauss' book [A Universe From Nothing] in the Times [...]
So there you go. Start with nothing, add quantum field theory, get something. End of story. (You can throw in the end of God and religion, too).
David Albert was having none of it. As he correctly points out: Where do the fields come from? Better yet: Where do the laws of quantum mechanics come from? These are clearly meaningful questions even if, perhaps, they fall outside the domains of physics. The bulk of Albert's review is spent articulating how deeply Krauss had missed this point.
Krauss, in response, attacked the entire endeavor of philosophy.
In a widely panned Atlantic interview, Krauss refers to his philosophical critics as "moronic" and implies all philosophy of science to be useless. [...]
Make no mistake, philosophy (and the philosophy of science) are not about doing science. Instead, these fields ask entirely different kinds of questions. They explore the relation between the possible and the actual, the correct links between an argument and it's conclusions or the tension between theoretical models and claims of evidence for those models.
Comment: Epic.... The discussion of "nothing" that got these physicists and philosophers at loggerheads is the crux of the matter (please excuse the pun) it is the same as the Big Bang 'nothing'.... I think I am on the side of David Albert, the philosopher, who wrote the 'savage' review (see link below)..... He states that the existence of fields are the arbiter of whether particles pop in and out of existence and of course that is a big 'something' associated with electromagnetism. The real philosophical discussion is: what 'decides' which fields exist? Well, Dr Oliver Reiser had some interesting ideas that he wrote about over 50 years ago that he links up with established and even ancient religious/metaphysical beliefs. In the latest version of my book, I mentioned a little of Reiser's explanation of something from nothing and then made a clear connection with the Theory of Multi-Dimensional reality as both agree there has to be a bridge between two completely different worlds.... Anyway, as far as I am concerned, much of quantum theory and related (spacetime, string theory etc) in modern physics is a heavily disguised mathematical version of ancient beliefs...
Physics Vs. Philosophy: Really?
NPR Blogs, 2nd May 2012
Actually, I was most interested in the image of a painting dated 1520.... I note the sameness of the wheels drawn in paintings attributed to Nostradamus and it reminds me of a very ancient and esoteric tradition of maintaining knowledge of The Wheels of Time. For the first time, I realise why the wheels are depicted outside this dimension too.... I suppose this is all supposed to be secret but why? A few Christians are having a field day because the recognise that ancient knowledge preserved in the Bible of what happens at the 'End of Time' is happening right now.... The only problem is they don't seem to know that the Return of Christ is an energy not a person, there is no logic in their beliefs because the full story has been hidden away but decipherable if you are prepared to cover a huge amount of information from many different esoteric, religious and indigenous traditions. Here's a BIG hint: In the Middle Ages, you could only study theology or philosophy at a university if you had studied astronomy first.... From the horses mouth That basically takes you back to how religions started in the first place... clue... clue... clue... etc In my search for truth over the last 30 years or so, what is happening now makes sense to me.... There are hints in the literature that require a mind that can integrate and that is the problem because so few people actually have the kind of mind that can sort this out, but of course, that is deliberate because some think there has to be some standards.... Whatever, the magnetosphere is breaking down and the philosophers and physicists are arguing about 'nothing'.....
New York Times Book Review by David Albert: On the Origin of Everything
‘A Universe From Nothing,’ by Lawrence M. Krauss
New York Times, 23rd March 2012 I think this is essential reading if you want to understand the relationship between physics and philosophy or the philosophy of science. I am quite pleased to find out that my own research has led me to the most important questions in philosophy, but I did not need to study philosophy at university to come to my own conclusions and find some great minds to help me on my quest.
Has Physics Made Philosophy and Religion Obsolete?
The Atlantic, 23rd April 2012
It is hard to know how our future descendants will regard the little sliver of history that we live in. It is hard to know what events will seem important to them, what the narrative of now will look like to the twenty-fifth century mind. We tend to think of our time as one uniquely shaped by the advance of technology, but more and more I suspect that this will be remembered as an age of cosmology---as the moment when the human mind first internalized the cosmos that gave rise to it. Over the past century, since the discovery that our universe is expanding, science has quietly begun to sketch the structure of the entire cosmos, extending its explanatory powers across a hundred billion galaxies, to the dawn of space and time itself. It is breathtaking to consider how quickly we have come to understand the basics of everything from star formation to galaxy formation to universe formation. And now, equipped with the predictive power of quantum physics, theoretical physicists are beginning to push even further, into new universes and new physics, into controversies once thought to be squarely within the domain of theology or philosophy.
Comment: No, even though the argument here is out of date pseudo-scientific and bordering on intellectual snobbery, I still think we need physics and science combined with philosophy (for those with an interest) so that people can defend themselves against the religious frauds and the vermin that haunt the Cultic Milieu... I do have lots of nasty thing to say about science and how it is conducted, but quite frankly, it is still a good enough antidote to the madness of the worse fanatical elements -- the religionistas and the cult fiends -- that the world can do without. Over the years, I have come across people who can only be described as %&ç*"/& ignorant and in their ignorance, they try to pretend they know what they are talking about about,[the quote is relevant here: "Better to remain silent and be thought a fool, than to open your mouth and remove all doubt." ] but when these type get involved with cults they become extremely dangerous.... I suppose they brainwash easy.... Now, we all know that bullshit is very much an art form in modern society and I have even found an intellectual treatise called On Bullshit written by one of the world's most influential moral philosophers, Princeton University, Professor Emeritus Harry G. Frankfurt. Ironically this book has become a cult classic, see archives for more details or download a chapter here. But sometimes, the truth really matters and that is the problem. So, whilst some real truth has been hidden in archives and metaphysical messages have been given to the metaphysical community for years, very few have the intellectual abilities to correctly interpret the information and actually DO SOMETHING useful. So, now that the Earth's magnetic shielding is breaking down very few outside the metaphysical community realise that evolution and devolution is on the cards and outside of certain technical fields few realise that our modern technological society is at risk. A scientific and analytical approach may just save some from being mercilessly defrauded by the worse elements in the Cultic Milieu.
Comment: Hmmmm.... From this story I get the impression that the researchers are trying to prove something they want to prove which is an issue from the get go..... This is an interesting read but as usual, the title and the first few paragraphs are a little misleading.... I consider myself to be intuitive but it does not stop me being analytical.... These days, the synaesthesia kicks in hard with people and I KNOW that something is not right and then the detective archetype comes right out and I start to keep records of what exactly is going on with some people. I don't have or want religion, and I am not interested in getting involved with anyone's culty little religion either... Therefore, I can't really take this research that seriously when there are so many other considerations concerning human development that have to be understood.
Scientists Prove You Can Think Your Way to Wellness
Natural Society, 10th February 2012
Sometimes it really is the thinking that makes it so. Spend your days focusing on your vibrant health and you will be vibrantly healthy. In contrast you could make it known that you lack a healthy lifestyle, and as a result you will continue to live an unhealthy lifestyle. While this belief is held by many, a recent study has come out with even mainstream scientists proclaiming the very real power of thought.
Comment: I note that there is no link to a research paper, even an abstract would have been better than nothing, but there is a link to the Daily Mail article You will live longer if you TELL people you're healthy, as positive thinking lengthens life and a researcher's name, David Fäh, from the University of Zurich. Well, it is a fact that if doctors tell someone that they are going to live rather than die - even if they are dying - that this changes what happens, as the medical literature on the Placebo Effect is very clear on this matter. However, I have been thinking for a long time about common misconceptions related to positive thinking because my own experiences have made me question my beliefs. Not that long ago if I saw a 'scientific' report related to 'positive thinking' I believed it, but now I would be interested to know who was funding the scientists and what their motivations are. Simply my anguish is based around the experience of writing, publishing and my pathetic attempts at marketing. I thought positively, I had no reason to be negative and then the troubles started. I have come up against jealousy, nastiness, greed, sheer ignorance and arrogance. I now have a long mental list of horrible behaviour collected over the last 6/7 years or so. I know I am not responsible for the skewed perspective of people and I refuse to get involved with such people... I have worked extremely hard to come to this level of understanding because I understand the seriousness of what is facing this world... I did not achieve this by positive thinking, I did this by work, how others view my efforts has nothing to do with me and I have to be vigilant against the moronic. As I have written before, the concept of being positive is very useful for manipulators who create false choices.... The concept of positive thinking has been oversold...
EdgeScience Magazine - March Issue 10
Society for Scientific Exploration, February 2012
For the past two and a half years the SSE has been offering copies of EdgeScience to the public free of charge. In order to continue doing so, we need your help. Obviously, we would like you to become a member of SSE, in which case you would receive the latest digital issue of EdgeScience as it is published. You would also receive the quarterly Journal of Scientific Exploration, as well as other member benefits.
Comment: No. 10 is free but they are asking for members and money. Download free here. As usual there are some interesting articles. Contributions include Rupert Shledrake's "The Experimenter Effect: Are Blind Methodologies Also Needed in the Physical and Biological Sciences?"; Dean Radin's "Consciousness Matters: Research at the Institute of Noetic Sciences"; Arnold L. Lieber's "The Lunar Effect in the Lab"; as well as Jack hunter's "Anthropology and the Supernatural: From Spirits to Consciousness"; and P. David Moncrief's "Vritra and Geomythology." (courtesy anomalist.com). I am shocked that Rupert Sheldrake points out in 'The Experimenter Effect', examples of people who could wreck experiments or make experiments work better by their presence. Jacques Benveniste reported there was a a fellow female researcher who would also screw up experiments too... You really have to wonder why these people are not sick if they have such bad incoherent energy fields. It also makes you wonder whether this incoherence is focused out into the world rather than internally and that is why they are not continuously sick. I even wonder whether they just manage to make others sick around them or if it is restricted to objects like machines because these people can also cause electronics to break down, all rather curious...
Bengston's Energy Healing - Too Good to be True?
Paranormalia, 15th February 2012
¨
William Bengston's The Energy Cure came out at the end of last year, but I only just got around to it. I have an excuse I suppose, as my own book was coming out at the same time. But it's so extraordinary, I can't understand how I could have missed it. [...]
Yet Bengston's story is soberly told, not remotely New Agey, and includes impressive scientific evidence to back it up. So I'm surprised that the book has not made a bigger splash. I found plenty of references to it, but they are rather low key, and certainly not on the scale I'd expect. In particular, there's seems to have been little scientific discussion, and sceptics appear hardly even to have noticed it - usually a sign that no one else has either.
Comment: Some people can channel enough negative entropic energy to make a difference... I have read this book and my only query is that it is difficult to transfer these abilities en masse to other healers. This is why people who pay high prices for initiations may not get what they think they are paying for. It's like those who can channel a river or those who can only just allow a few drips like a leaky tap, there is a huge difference in abilities and I think it is based on spiritual development... There is also the fact that people go to healers when they are desperate and want miracles on the cheap. They expect an instant hit, but they are not told that the energies often do not work in that manner, even the best healers work in real-time, slowly slowly... What is interesting is that he 'taught' students to cure but maybe these students were more like proxies and he was still the main gateway for the energy. The background to the experiments is interesting and the reaction of ignorant academics with no idea about the existence of negative entropic 'universal' energies is also quite interesting. Some of the experiments were a mess because at times, even the control mice were getting cured when they were no efforts were being made and in the end they had to take the control mice off site. I don't think we really understand what is going on in group efforts as opposed to people working on their own and why some people will get the wrong impression of their abilities when they are on a course. I think if you are interested in the subject, the book is worth reading and thinking about what is really happening. There is some good background information in the March 2010 edition of Edge Science, if it is still available online, see below:
This photograph was taken in a Sydney
University Laboratory in late 1986,
marking an historic event. It shows the
low-energy spiral field that surrounds a
carbon particle. The particle was placed
on a polymer-coated slide. Polymers
are used by scientists as a substitute for
human cells. They can act as sensitive
film emulsions and thus record an
impression of a physical event — in
this case, that of a previously
undetected field pattern surrounding
the carbon particle. Energy is believed
to flow in spirals. This photo is
considered to be evidence in support of
the Unified Field Theory, which
Einstein amongst others, believed to be
the basis of the physical universe.
Text from pg 214 Tuning the Diamonds: Electromagnetism & Spiritual Evolution, 2006, 2008 by Susan Joy Rennison
The slur “crackpot” is aimed at Erik Andrulis, whom I had not heard of before today and whose article
I have not read. I don't need to read it because this defense is not a defense of Andrulis' theory, it is a
defense of Andrulis' right to publish his theory without being called a crackpot by mainstream
gatekeepers and propagandists. Emspak's article is clearly a hatchet job by a paid insider, and I don't
like poorly done hatchet jobs. I say I have a bigger and sharper hatchet than Emspak does, and I will
now prove it by shredding his article at Space.com.
Erik Andrulis is a university biochemist who got a paper published in the peer-reviewed journal Life.
Apparently his paper was interesting enough that it was taking attention away from this year's
mainstream talking points, and someone in some endowed chair somewhere decided it was dangerous.
They then hired Emspak to come in and rough Andrulis up a bit. Who is Jesse Emspak? A top
physicist or chemist? No. He is a freelance journalist who is a mutual funds reporter for Investor's
Business Daily and other such places when he isn't providing agitprop for Discovery News or
Space.com. Sounds fishy to me already.
Comment: Sorry Miles Mathis, I am not impressed with your defense either, don't you know that knowledge is power? The fracas over Erik Andrulis paper is not over yet... I had a quick look but I am busy busy busy.... It looks like Andrulis is trying to explain that the gyre is a delivery mechanism for information and energy-matter from the Universal Field but he does not want to say that so he has just said from the environment. He believes there are quite a few types which seem to be modified by what they are delivering. Now, when I quickly skimmed over this paper, it reminded me of a gyre in my book that was discovered during experimental research 25 YEARS AGO IN AUSTRALIA AND DUPLICATED BY THE EXTREMELY PRESTIGIOUS MAX PLANCK INSTITUTE IN GERMANY. I will repeat for the record, Andrulis has some experimental proof that is 25 years old already... The wheels of science grind extremely slowly but I think he will be vindicated... Like so many scientists ahead of their peers who prefer to be middle of the road but 'safe' in Tier 2 - 4 mode... Poor quality sells very well in todays world when there are so many dumb-dumbs about... I am busy, but I will make an effort to contact this Erik Andrulis and point out some reality, old reality at that... It really makes you wonder.... If you think you can help to make sure Erik Andrulis gets some support, please download this file of 5 pages, 4 pages of my book with 1 page of references and we will see if we can make a difference... Download .pdf here
Barsamian Gyre/Vortex TTD excerpt with references Btw, the Australian author Mark Balfour is dead, so don't try to contact him...
'Crackpot' Theory of Everything Reveals Dark Side of Peer Review
Space.com, 31st January 2012
A "theory of everything" from a scientist at Case Western Reserve University got a lot of attention for positing that inanimate objects, from planets and water to strands of DNA, are alive. Not only is the assertion bunk, but the scientific and media phenomena surrounding the study reveals how sometimes crackpot ideas can get traction.
The paper, by CWRU biochemist Erik Andrulis, was published in the journal Life, and says all physical phenomena can be explained by "gyres." Gyres, according to his theory, transform energy, matter and information to create the physical systems we're all familiar with, such as the phase transitions of water and the chemicals life is made of. It also includes a few that aren't familiar, like quantum gravity (a theory which hasn't been invented yet).
Comment: I wonder where he got his inspiration from, it does seem quite familiar to other ideas out there... Scientists are always quick to call stuff from a particularly different perspective 'crackpot'... James Clerk Maxwell's vortex model of the aether was probably called crackpot too, but by 1861, Maxwell believed that magnetic fields are filled with vortices of whirling ether, but because his derived formulas worked so well, his peers decided to ignore HOW he got to the answers. Personally, I don't see much difference between crackpot whirling aether and whirling gyres... It's like saying everything has a bit of magnetic field [with aether] whirling through it.... Now, quite frankly, that does not sound too crackpot at all.... However, I am wondering why a Erik Andrulis, a biochemist is writing a paper proposing his theories and attempting to challenge some fundamental ideas in physics. Well, thinking about it, there are some big questions not answered in any subject with a prefix of bio... Well, I still think you really have to know your enemy well before you can make this kind of attempt of upsetting the status quo...
Hilarious "Theory of Everything" Paper Provokes Kerfuffle Journal editor resigns after publishing "an incommensurable, trans-disciplinary, neologistical, axiomatic theory of life from quantum gravity to the living cell"
PopSci News, 2nd February 2012
Download paper: "Theory of the Origin, Evolution, and Nature of Life" here (.pdf)
MDPI Publishing, January 2012
"The 19th century found Helmholtz rediscovering the Democritean law and
Lord Kelvin and Maxwell using the gyre as the basis of different electromagnetic theories. In the early
20th century, Bostick used the gyre in his spiraling helicon fiber model and Thomson proposed that
atoms were vortex rings. Many others have promulgated the gyre as core model of nature."
I was right! Andrulis links his theory to Maxwell and others... No wonder the establishment has got upset, a little too close to some real understanding of the true nature of reality... This paper is 105 pages long, thus only for the brave...
It is not often, in liberal north London, that you come face to face with a heretic, but Rupert Sheldrake has worn that mantle, pretty cheerfully, for 30 years now. Sitting in his book-lined study, overlooking Hampstead Heath, he appears a highly unlikely candidate for apostasy; he seems more like the Cambridge biochemistry don he once was, one of the brightest Darwinians of his generation, winner of the university botany prize, researcher at the Royal Society, Harvard scholar and fellow of Clare College.
All that, though, was before he was cast out into the wilderness. Sheldrake's untouchable status was conferred one morning in 1981 when, a couple of months after the publication of his first book, A New Science of Life, he woke up to read an editorial in the journal Nature, which announced to all right-thinking men and women that his was a "book for burning" and that Sheldrake was to be "condemned in exactly the language that the pope used to condemn Galileo, and for the same reason. It is heresy".
Comment: Rupert Sheldrake needs to be added to the Heretics Hall of Fame, if there is one.... Certainly Sheldrake reached superstar status when he was stabbed by some madman who disagreed with his point of view and obviously, was determined to stop any kind of enlightenment for himself and anyone else for that matter. As far as I am concerned, Sheldrake has only pointed out the obvious for those with blinkers on...
How atheism became a religion in all but name
Spiked Online, 1st February 2012
There was a time when it was very dangerous not to believe in God. In ancient Athens, Socrates was hounded and eventually executed for questioning the city-state’s gods. Throughout most of history, to be ‘godless’ was considered a form of moral decadence deserving punishment. In the seventeenth century, even John Locke, the great liberal philosopher who promoted the idea of religious toleration, regarded atheism as intolerable. He said atheists should not be tolerated because ‘promises, covenants, and oaths, which are the bonds of human society, can have no hold upon an atheist’.
Paradoxically, today, when atheism enjoys unprecedented respectability, it is being turned into a new cause. Over the past decade, books celebrating atheism and denouncing belief in God have frequently appeared on bestseller lists. [...]
It was inevitable that sooner or later the New Atheist crusade would mutate into a quasi-religion. Alain de Botton’s recently published Religion for Atheists: A Non-Believer’s Guide to the Uses of Religion is an attempt to absorb into atheism the current therapeutic and spiritual fads that influence Western elite culture. De Botton has proposed building temples for atheists through the UK. ‘It’s time atheists had their own versions of the great churches and cathedrals’, he says. Comment: This isn't strange at all... As I have come to understand just about any belief can be used to create a cult, sect or religion, where believers can be told what to do and how to think. An interesting modern comparison is 'Green' Religion and those who tried to jump on the bandwagon by encouraging people to confess their green sins. I believe that is the point where the subtlety ends...
Two Diamonds Linked by Strange Quantum Entanglement
Live Science, 1st December 2011
Scientists have linked two diamonds in a mysterious process called entanglement that is normally only seen on the quantum scale. [...]
But now physicists have succeeded in entangling two macroscopic diamonds, demonstrating that quantum mechanical effects are not limited to the microscopic scale.
"I think it's an important step into a new regime of thinking about quantum phenomena," physicist Ian Walmsley of England's University of Oxford said."That is, in this regime of the bigger world, room temperatures, ambient conditions. Although the phenomenon was expected to exist, actually being able to observe it in such a system we think is quite exciting." [...]
Walmsley, along with a team of physicists led by Oxford graduate student Ka Chung Lee, accomplished this feat by entangling the vibration of two diamond crystals. To do so, the researchers set up an apparatus to send a laser pulse at both diamonds simultaneously. Sometimes, the laser light changed color, to a lower frequency, after hitting the diamonds. That told the scientists it had lost a bit of energy. [...]
Instead, because the two diamonds were linked, they found that one detector measured the change every time, and the other detector never fired. The two diamonds, it seemed, were so connected they reacted as a single entity, rather than two individual objects.
Comment: From my years of collecting esoteric and metaphysical information, this should not be a surprise, but it is.... So, diamonds can generate quantum mechanical effects at the macroscopic scale, I wonder how many orders of magnitude are we talking about?
Neurosurgeon Dr. Eben Alexander’s Near-Death Experience Defies Medical Model of Consciousness
Skeptico, 22nd November 2011
Today we welcome Dr. Eben Alexander to Skeptiko. Dr. Alexander has been an academic neurosurgeon for more than 25 years, including 15 years at Harvard Medical School in Boston. In November of 2008, he had a near-death experience that changed his life and caused him to rethink everything he thought he knew about the human brain and consciousness. [...]
Dr. Eben Alexander: What I think is going to happen is that science and spirituality, which will be mainly be an acknowledgement of the profound nature of our consciousness, will grow closer and closer together.
One thing that we will have to let go of is this kind of addiction to simplistic, primitive reductive materialism because there’s really no way that I can see a reductive materialist model coming remotely in the right ballpark to explain what we really know about consciousness now.
Coming from a neurosurgeon who, before my coma, thought I was quite certain how the brain and the mind interacted and it was clear to me that there were many things I could do or see done on my patients and it would eliminate consciousness. It was very clear in that realm that the brain gives you consciousness and everything else and when the brain dies there goes consciousness, soul, mind—it’s all gone. And it was clear.
Now, having been through my coma, I can tell you that’s exactly wrong and that in fact the mind and consciousness are independent of the brain. It’s very hard to explain that, certainly if you’re limiting yourself to that reductive materialist view.
Comment: I think this is quite an amazing interview because this is a neuroscientist who really did not believe the whole NDE paradigm until he had his own experience. I suppose this is a clash of theoretical beliefs with technical knowledge versus real experience. However, I still can't deny my own feelings that I don't think you need to be nearly dead to have these types of experiences. I have had 'stuff happening' all my life. Maybe it's mild in comparison but I know that there are other realities and stuff is happening all around us that we can't normally see but every now and there are glimpses...
Join Skeptiko host Alex Tsakiris for an interview with NDE researcher and author, P.M.H. Atwater. During the interview Atwater discusses the after-effects associated with NDEs: [...]
PMH Atwater: How deeply affected that individual is. If they’re deeply affected enough that it changes the body as well as the brain as well as the spirit. When you look further into what’s happening to the human being, you begin to see what I saw and that is that this can become a biological thing.
One of the things I noticed in my research, and I spent a lot of time talking about it in the second half of the book, is that the near-death experience is not any kind of anomaly. It is rather part of the larger genre of transformations of consciousness. I say that again because of the after-effects and how deep those after-effects or intense those after-effects might be.
If you go even further and realize that near-death experiences, Kundalini breakthroughs, baptism of the Holy Spirit, spiritual transformations, on and on and on, all of these different parts of this broader genre, they all change the human being in significant ways almost as if a transmutation.
So if you study history, which I have done, and you look at those times in history throughout our globe, and you notice this communing throughout the evolutionary phase, a lot of people are suddenly coming out and being born this way, being changed this way, experiencing this kind of thing. What I began to notice is that near-death experiences are really a biological imperative. Comment: All I can say is Amen! This woman has nailed this!
In a recent interview with the The Guardian’s John Harris, Dawkins said, about faith and religion, “It’s infectious. It’s something that grips the mind in the same way that a conventional virus grips the body.”
Comment: Yes, I know, this is totally politically incorrect but I simply think this headline is hilarious... I am not really sympathetic towards Richard Dawkins or is ideas, but I don't think many religious people would be happy with my views either. Whatever, I am grateful for being able to understand my reality in a way that is not polarisied between that of a believer or a non-believer. What's more, I can see plus and minuses on both sides of the debate and I am not forced to join either camp. Please note: Dawkins is a staunch supporter of Darwin but many evolutionary biologists have been forced to abandon these old ideas because the evidence is not supportive; for instance, new discoveries about genetics and epigenetics allows for rapid evolutionary change, but these discoveries do not necessarily support a religious view either. I will admit, I am not an expert because I don't have time to study the differences because I am trying to integrate science and metaphysics to help as many people as possible understand the transition we are currently experiencing on Earth and that is a serious enough commitment. Click on the image icon to properly read the witty riposte to atheists.
Why near-death events are tricks of mind
Medical Express, 24th October 2011
Psychologists who reviewed a range of phenomena such as out-of-body experiences, visions of tunnels of light or encounters with dead relatives, say they are tricks of the mind rather than a glimpse of the afterlife.
Researchers at the Universities of Edinburgh and Cambridge say that most of the experiences can be explained by a reaction in the brain prompted by a traumatic and sometimes harmless event.
The researchers say that many common near-death experiences could be caused by the brain’s attempt to make sense of unusual sensations and perceptions occurring during a traumatic event.
Comment: The problem with this analysis is scientists cannot prove that the mind is a function of the brain or what the relationship is between the mind and the brain. They do know that the body actually has a mind and that is why there is a new study of the mindbody, normally referred to as psychoneuroimmunology. So trying to blame mind experiences as a brain malfunction is not really science it's guesswork. Yes, the brain can be re-wired due to the massive electrical discharge in the brain at the time of near death (and that is why so many of these shaman types try to nearly kill their followers by trying to literally electrically "shock" the brain to reconfigure, other religious traditions do exactly the same thing by various methods in the hope of advancement, but it is extremely dangerous), but how that affects the mind-brain relationship is not understood.
EdgeScience Magazine - issue 9
Society for Scientific Exploration, October 2011
Edge Science is a new magazine from the SSE. Why Edge Science? Because scientific knowledge is still full of unknowns. What remains to be discovered—what we don't know—very likely dwarfs what we do know. And what we think we know may not be entirely correct or fully understood. Anomalies, which researchers tend to sweep under the rug, should be actively pursued as clues to potential breakthroughs and new directions in science.
Comment: No. 9 is free but apparently, this may be the last issue because there is not enough funding support. Download here. The most interesting articles are: The Plasma Universe of Hannes Alfvén, Coincidence Studies, In Memory of William Corliss.
What is really interesting is that in the bio write-up about David Talbott who wrote the article The Plasma Universe of Hannes Alfvén, there is no mention that Talbott has no scientific qualifications and in fact is a mythologist! He is on a team of people that aim to introduce the Electric Universe to the masses, that does include physicists and engineers but he is an educated and qualified mythologist, described here as a scholar. At least that is better than Mayan researchers who get called scholars who have no higher education qualifications at all...
Your clever body: Thinking from head to toe
New Scientist, 21st October 2011 (subscribers only)
There's more to your mind than your brain--your body plays a part
in everything from social savvy to mathematical ability
TAKE a minute out of the hustle and bustle of your busy life and sit
very still. Now, place your hands on the arms of the chair or the
desk in front of you, and try to focus your attention on counting
your heartbeats. Can you feel a throbbing drum roll, a slight murmur
or nothing at all? How does your bladder feel--is it empty or will
you need to dash for the bathroom within the next half hour? You may
be surprised to learn that these bodily sensations are helping you
think.
We tend to view the mind as an aloof, disembodied entity but it is
becoming increasingly clear that the whole body is involved in the
thinking process. Without input from your body, your mind would be
unable to generate a sense of self or process emotions properly.
Your body even plays a role in thinking about language and
mathematics. And physiological sensations, such as those from your
heart and bladder, influence such diverse personal attributes as the
strength of your tendency to conform, your willpower and whether you
are swayed by your intuitions or governed by rational thought.
In the past few years, discoveries about mind-body connections have
overturned the long-held view of the body as a passive vehicle
driven by the brain. Instead there is more of a partnership, with
bodily experiences playing an active role in your mental life. "The
brain cannot act independently of the body," says [36]Arthur
Glenberg at Arizona State University in Tempe. Tune in to the body's
signals, and you can exploit this to improve your creativity, memory
and self-control.
Comment: This interesting article is behind the New Scientist paywall, but here is a copy that might disappear soon... I thought this was a rather interesting statement:
"Since people who are naturally sensitive to their internal signals are not as easily hoodwinked by body illusions, they may be less affected by this kind of social manipulation, and less empathic as a result."
I would say it's good to know when you are being manipulated by a professional. I am very empathic, but I now realise that even my kindness towards people has been used against me. Since my enlightenment on this matter, I find that the manipulators don't hang around for very long, but at the same time, I think the sense of self must be very strong because I can sometimes pick up internal signals that provide me with interesting information.
The Spiritual Nature of Cancer
Henry Makow, 28th August 2011 How the patient takes the news will determine if there will be metastasis and if other cancers form in the lungs, liver or kidneys. (Metastasis is very rare in animals.)
In response to the many differing cancer cure claims, I wish to address the ignorance surrounding this class of dreaded diseases.
The science of oncology is based upon certain unproven assumptions, thus obscuring the understanding of the true nature of cancer. [...]
SPIRITUAL CAUSE & CURE
I work with cancer clients by helping to see the emotional conflictual connection to their disease. Once the connection is seen, I help them to resolve the root conflicts. Most often these conflicts involve fear, lack of forgiveness, rancor, judgment and/or shame and guilt.
When the conflict is resolved, the body begins to heal naturally.
The sorry fact is people survive cancer from alternative methods because conventional medicine didn't kill them. But many also die while using alternative methods because the alternative community does not understand the true nature of cancer.
I know people that have died on carrot juice, Essiac tea, B17, Hulda Clark or chemotherapy. All of these methods are outright dangerous if the psyche is not taken into account.
Then there are some within alternative health community that are just as corrupt as any within the industrial medical complex. Some write against the truth for purposes of self promotion and profit and they are fully aware of it. Comment: An interesting read.... but some tough talk...
The amazing phenomenon of Ninel Kulagina
Pravda News, 26th August 2011
Many Russians may remember a black and white documentary of the years of perestroika in which a woman moved small objects sitting before her on a table and rotated direction of the magnetic devices. Ninel Kulagina is still considered one of the most mysterious phenomena in the field of ESP.
Ninel Kulagina was born on July 30, 1921 in Leningrad. In April of 1942, a young girl volunteered for the army. She was wounded and underwent several surgeries. She was awarded the Order of "World War I level," and many medals.
Her "supernatural" ability manifested in early adolescence. During dinner, she was too lazy to reach out for bread and the pieces "crawled" to her plate. [How about that!]
The experiments were frequently broadcast on TV, described in newspapers and magazines. Click here to see the video of Ninel Kulagina.
Once a magazine accused Kulagina of fraud, and she sued them. The scientists she worked with witnessed in the court and she won the case.
Comment: I briefly mentioned Ninel Kulagina in my book, but I am quite pleased to find this article as I did not know she was a synaesthete, as she could detect colour by touch! Do not miss the video where it discusses her issues with kundalini energies and the impact of solar storms on the human energy field, psychokinesis and psychic powers... This article and the video, is quite an amazing synopsis of Russian views on hidden human powers but it seems that Ninel Kulagina was just a forerunner demonstrating the direction that some humans are already evolving towards. Anyway, I am glad she won her case after being called a fraud.... what do the ignoramuses think 40 scientists (including 2 nobel laureates) were doing whilst taking years to check her out?
The Spiritual Nature of Cancer
Henry Makow, 28th August 2011 How the patient takes the news will determine if there will be metastasis and if other cancers form in the lungs, liver or kidneys. (Metastasis is very rare in animals.)
In response to the many differing cancer cure claims, I wish to address the ignorance surrounding this class of dreaded diseases.
The science of oncology is based upon certain unproven assumptions, thus obscuring the understanding of the true nature of cancer. [...]
SPIRITUAL CAUSE & CURE
I work with cancer clients by helping to see the emotional conflictual connection to their disease. Once the connection is seen, I help them to resolve the root conflicts. Most often these conflicts involve fear, lack of forgiveness, rancor, judgment and/or shame and guilt.
When the conflict is resolved, the body begins to heal naturally.
The sorry fact is people survive cancer from alternative methods because conventional medicine didn't kill them. But many also die while using alternative methods because the alternative community does not understand the true nature of cancer.
I know people that have died on carrot juice, Essiac tea, B17, Hulda Clark or chemotherapy. All of these methods are outright dangerous if the psyche is not taken into account.
Then there are some within alternative health community that are just as corrupt as any within the industrial medical complex. Some write against the truth for purposes of self promotion and profit and they are fully aware of it. Comment: An interesting read.... but some tough talk...
EdgeScience Magazine - issue 8
Society for Scientific Exploration, July 2011
Edge Science is a new magazine from the SSE.
Why Edge Science? Because scientific knowledge is still full of unknowns. What remains to be discovered—what we don't know—very likely dwarfs what we do know. And what we think we know may not be entirely correct or fully understood. Anomalies, which researchers tend to sweep under the rug, should be actively pursued as clues to potential breakthroughs and new directions in science.
Comment: No. 8 is free! Download here. Lots of interesting info including: Pseudo-Science in Science, How Evolution Occurs: Was Lamarck Also Right?, Remote Viewing: State of the Field, Mass Bird Deaths, Why Don’t the Data Move Like They Should? A Global Consciousness Project Update.
Journal of Anthropoligical Approaches to the Paranormal Paranthropology - July 2011
Paranthropology, July 2011
The new issue, which can be downloaded for free in PDF form, includes "Capturing Intention? The PIP Photography and Shamanic Intervention" by Zoe Bran, "The Ka in Ancient Egyptian" by Callum E. Cooper, "Anthropology, Evolution and Anomalous Experience" by James McClenon; "Supernatural Abductions: UFO and Folklore Narratives" by Franco Bejarano; and "Paul Devereux Live at the Rhine: Naturalizing Psi as the Anthropology of Consciousness" by Ryan Hurd.
Comment: I have not read any of the articles but the journal is free and some of the articles are about research that I think is useful to know. Since this journal has an old format, I presume that this is the revival of an old journal, but old information tends to be less polluted by popularisation, so from my point of view that is better.
Special Comment - 7th June 2011
I am still looking at the mess of the Gregorian Calendar, how that relates to precession and the various astrological zodiacs because it is impossible otherwise, to understand why estimates for the start time of an astrological age, that is only supposed to last 2150 years, can vary by over 1000 years. Amongst the detailed analysis by various scholars, I have come across the research of John Charles Webb, Jr who states:
We are now in the third millennium and our Macro cosmic timekeeping has been virtually ignored. It's like knowing what day it is but not knowing the week, month, year or century. According to the present scheme (no precessional adjustments) of The Gregorian Calendar we will NEVER enter the Age of Aquarius!
Since the the Gregorian Calendar is an invention of the 'Holy' Church that is anything but holy, it seems that the current state of affairs is deliberate. What's more, astrologers who stick to the Tropical/Sidereal zodiacs are actually mostly unwittingly conspiring to maintain this unenlightened state of affairs by fixing these zodiacs to a 4th century map of the stars. Hence, astronomers are correct to point out that we are actually in the Age of Aquarius and Space Weather is the ultimate proof. No amount of fiddling with any calendars can stop the outpouring of spiritual energy onto our planet, the Universe rules supreme, nothing can stop reality.
This is a great performance by the Broadway cast of HAIR on Letterman. It gets quite wild at the end and reminds me of black pentecostal church.... Anyway, I have been doing a little investigation and it looks like back in the 1960s, the hippies were indeed right! If you ask an astronomer what astrological age we are in, and if they are willing to comment, they will say The Age of Aquarius because the vernal equinox has just recently moved into the constellation Aquarius. I actually found this information on an astronomer teaching website, but other astronomers are saying the same.... Folks, after the business with the constellation of Ophiuchus being on the ecliptic and astronomers claiming there should be 13 constellations in the Zodiac, I thought astronomers were only trying to annoy astrologers, but it's a fact that the planet is under severe bombardment and the Earth's magnetic shield is in tatters.... Space Weather is the reality of the Age of Aquarius and folk need to wake up.... Ancient astronomers from past advanced civilisations, did not leave important information about the 26,0000 year precessional cycle for no reason!
More:
This is a nice simple article that highlights why astrological beliefs now stand in conflict with scientific fact.
Astronomers agree, but the cosmic phenomenon, known as the earth’s precession, causes the positions of the stars as measured along the equinox to shift over a 26,000-year cycle, and both astronomers and astrologers have known about it for thousands of years.
“As the earth goes round the sun, it wobbles like a top,” VonStein explained. “That wobble makes the entire star background slightly shift by one degree every 72 years.”
The precession causes our spring equinox to gradually migrate westward to an adjacent constellation, according to Herb Schwartz, Drake University Observatory lecturer and astronomy instructor. While the spring equinox was once in the House of Aries, thousands of years of precession caused it to shift through the House of Pisces and has landed it in the constellation of Aquarius, which astronomers say is why the astrological beliefs now stand in conflict with scientific fact.
I have been quite amused by reading a large selection of articles by astrologers who were mostly apoplectic that an astronomer had the nerve to point out some reality... See the Star Tribune 14th January 2011, article; Sign of the times: Astrology story soars like a comet. Yet, I have found a few astrologers who can actually read astronomical charts and have already adapted... For the record, I am mostly interested in the messages left by ancient astronomers and most of this has been retained in ancient religious text, philosophy, mythology and monuments. Yet, since astronomers have been acting very strange recently, like the prior upset when astronomers voted to demote Pluto to a 'dwarf' planet, I am now convinced that we are experiencing major 'winds of change'....
P.S. I have noticed there are a lot of people talking about the Age of Aquarius arriving in 700 years, but these are people repeating other people's opinions. There are some who claim the Age of Aquarius has already started and the estimates vary from the 15th century CE to the start of the new millenium! To be honest, I am only really interested in the opinions of those who can actually point a telescope in the right direction on the 21st March (Vernal Equinox) to see what constellation actually rises just before dawn because this is what how ancient astronomers determined the astrological age. According to astronomers who have, the constellation of Aquarius has been the heliacal rising constellation for some centuries! Now the other argument is that this is only true because of all the 'adjustments' made to the Gregorian calendar. I can't disagree with this argument as there are too many historians who simply refuse to believe that most of the history that has been passed down to us is even remotely true before the 11th century, (the dates of historical astrological charts are rejected too.) If you have studied this subject, you will know that a certain well known religious establishment has a well documented and well earned reputation for extensive forgery and they were the ones in charge of the calendars and we know that the constant changing of dates completely wrecked the calendars to the point where the priests themselves actually had no idea what century they were living in. If you don't know this, then check the facts! That is why Mayan Timekeepers and Elders have rather curtly pointed out that they don't have a problem with their calendars....
So, this state of affairs is so bad that I am only really interested in hard facts and Space Weather is a reality. The other thing of real interest is why religious and metaphysical folk have not pointed out the importance of Space Weather because there has been extensive literature about the arrival of new energies associated with a New World Age. This period of time has been given many names by different cultures, religious, metaphysical and esoteric groups. Interestingly, The Age of Aquarius has been associated with an outpouring of The Holy Spirit and this reminds me of Gioacchino da Fiore, or Joachim of Fiore (1135-1202), an Italian mystic, theologian, and philosopher of history, today despised by The 'Holy' Church because he pointed out that when the Holy Spirit arrives, their time will be up! Quite frankly, I have come to the conclusion that many who claim to be spiritual are anything but.... they simply have no interest in reality because reality is spiritual.
EdgeScience Magazine - issue 7
Society for Scientific Exploration, April 2011
Edge Science is a new magazine from the SSE.
Why Edge Science? Because scientific knowledge is still full of unknowns. What remains to be discovered—what we don't know—very likely dwarfs what we do know. And what we think we know may not be entirely correct or fully understood. Anomalies, which researchers tend to sweep under the rug, should be actively pursued as clues to potential breakthroughs and new directions in science.
Comment: No. 7 is free! Download here
Are the Religious Prone to Obesity? Study found regularly attending services was linked to raised risk in middle age
Business Week, 23rd March 2011
WEDNESDAY, March 23 (HealthDay News) -- New research finds that people who frequently attend religious services are significantly more likely to become obese by the time they reach middle age.
The study doesn't prove that attending services is fattening, nor does it explain why weight might be related to faith. Even so, the finding is surprising, especially considering that religious people tend to be in better health than others, said study author Matthew J. Feinstein, a medical student at Northwestern University in Chicago.
"It highlights a particular group that appears to be at a greater risk of becoming obese and remaining obese," he said. "It's a group that may benefit from targeted anti-obesity interventions and from obesity prevention programs."
Comment: This is a subject that is often considered in metaphysical world and it's a particular issue for healers. From a personal point of view I wonder whether it is related to the need to provide protection. Spiritual people have to deal with others who cannot process spiritual energies very well and therefore are constantly being drained by those who prefer to get this energy second hand. I know because I went through many years of this and it can get very nasty. Most of this is unconscious but at some level of awareness protection mechanisms are put in place and I think the extra weight seems to help. Hence the confused analysis here and no understanding of the spiritual dynamics involved.
Tiny Diamonds Shrink Cancerous Tumors
News Max health, 10th March 2011
U.S. researchers said Wednesday they have found a way to attack late-stage breast and liver cancer tumors by attaching a potent chemotherapy drug to tiny carbon particles known as nanodiamonds.
The technique was tested in mice and showed that nanodiamonds helped the drug, doxorubicin, get inside the normally chemo-resistant tumor and shrink it, said the study published in the journal Science Translational Medicine.
Without the nanodiamonds, the drug was either rejected by the body and failed to work on the tumor, or in higher doses it was too powerful and lethal for the patient.
"This is the first work to demonstrate the significance and translational potential of nanodiamonds in the treatment of chemotherapy-resistant cancers," said the study.
Comment: Geometry is the key...
Why many historians no longer see alchemy as an occult practice
PhysOrg.com, 24th February 2011
No, wizards have not learned how to transmute lead into gold and they haven't found any rejuvenating elixir of life. But the scholars who write the history of science and technology no longer lump alchemy in with witchcraft as a pseudo-science.
Instead they see alchemy as the proper precursor to modern chemistry.
The modern word "alchemy" comes from the Arabic word "al kemia," which incorporated a spectrum of knowledge of chemical properties and practices from ancient times. [...]
"We're in an alchemical revolution," said Principe during a meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in February. Principe said that just in the past 30 years articles about alchemy were being accepted into Isis, one of the leading journals devoted to the history of science. Before that a prohibition on alchemical subjects had been in place.
The reason for this change is that historians are now recognizing the huge role alchemists had in producing valuable things, even if the alchemists never succeeded in turning lead into gold. By the way, making new gold was of great concern to kings since it would have interfered with the valuation of coins. This is why transmutation was considered a crime and why alchemists often had to do their research in secret. Comment: I imagine that people that are now claiming they are turning copper to gold and platinum (see article Real Alchemy - Dr Joe Champion is Turning Copper to Gold), will have the same problem with the Kings considering that this is a crime. However at least one metaphysical source claims that soon we will be able to make gold easily and it will become abundant and used for household articles. I think that will be in the future after a few major shocks forces us to do business on this planet in a different, more holistic way.
The drugs won't work if you don't believe in them "Pain really is all in the mind, according to scientists who have discovered that positive thoughts can double a painkiller's effect while negative thoughts can cancel them out."
The Telegraph, 16th February 2011
Researchers from Oxford, Cambridge and two German universities made their conclusions after a novel experiment examining the role of conscious thought in pain perception. First, 22 volunteers had a pain device put on their skin that was too hot for comfort.
Each then had an intravenous line attached to deliver a powerful opiate-based painkiller. The volunteers were asked to rate the pain before any painkiller was introduced. The average score, from 0 to 100, was 66. Then the researchers started providing the painkiller, without telling the volunteers they had done so. The average score dropped to 55. But when the scientists told them they had started administering the painkiller the score dropped again to 39. When they said they had stopped providing the painkiller, the score rose to 64 - even though the opiate was still flowing. [...]
Professor Irene Tracey of the Centre for Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging of the Brain at Oxford University, who led the research, said: "Doctors shouldn’t underestimate the significant influence that patients’ negative expectations can have on outcome.
Comment: Drug companies are facing a huge problem as new drugs are failing to beat placebo and the rules of consciousness associated with the power of intent that generates self-healing are actually changing. Based on the rules of consciousness, you can't tell people NOT to believe in either a real drug or a placebo because then nothing will work and that is exactly what scientists are finding.
Pharma Crisis: The Placebo Effect [Video]
CNBC News, 31st August 2010
"Many new drugs [half] are failing in late-stage trials because they can't beat out sugar pills. Dr. Erika Schwartz, medical director at Cinergy Health, and Steve Silberman, of Wired magazine, discuss the issue."
Placebos work, even when patients are in the know, study finds In what researchers call a novel 'mind-body' therapy, most patients in a study suffering from irritable bowel syndrome reported relief after receiving pills they were told contained no real medicine. Los Angeles Times, 22nd December 2010
Health advice by Dr. Weiss: The Placebo Effect
Naples Daily News, 4th January 2011
"Today, double-blind controlled studies show that some of the treatments and medications we use are only minimally better than placebos. When six leading antidepressants were compared to a placebo, the findings were disquieting. The placebo was 75% as effective as the 'real' medication. The learning: Just having a medication prescribed by a caring physician is helpful."
Mindfulness meditation training changes brain structure in eight weeks
Science Daily, 21st January 2011
ScienceDaily (Jan. 21, 2011) — Participating in an 8-week mindfulness meditation program appears to make measurable changes in brain regions associated with memory, sense of self, empathy and stress. In a study that will appear in the January 30 issue of Psychiatry Research: Neuroimaging, a team led by Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) researchers report the results of their study, the first to document meditation-produced changes over time in the brain's grey matter.
Comment: Well, there seems to be a lot of scientific interest these days in meditation, hopefully these will be scientists who are interested in the truth and not promoting a particular belief system.
Electronic Healing - Dr Valerie Hunt [1/7]
Red Ice Creations, 4th January 2011
In the 1980s, radio station KABC carried the ground-breaking radio program "OPEN MIND" with host Bill Jenkins. The subject matter covered UFOs, alternative energy, spirituality, ancient religions, remote viewing, astral projection, out of body, crystal skulls, near death, past life, and psychic healing.
Comment: Wow! We can say a big thanks to Fredrik & Henrik at Red Ice Creations. Direct YouTube link It looks like a section is missing at the end of the question time in after about 3:50 minutes, but I will say this is a truly wonderful interview with Valerie Hunt. She seems to be still alive and working and I am guessing she is in her 90s. Total class...
Note:
Apparently this is part of a rare archive collection that has recently become available and can now be downloaded by torrent, see the Pirate Bay website for more details, here.
EdgeScience Magazine - issue 6
Society for Scientific Exploration, January 2011
Edge Science is a new magazine from the SSE.
Why Edge Science? Because scientific knowledge is still full of unknowns. What remains to be discovered—what we don't know—very likely dwarfs what we do know. And what we think we know may not be entirely correct or fully understood. Anomalies, which researchers tend to sweep under the rug, should be actively pursued as clues to potential breakthroughs and new directions in science.
Comment: No. 6 is free! Download here
Placebos work, even when patients are in the know, study finds In what researchers call a novel 'mind-body' therapy, most patients in a study suffering from irritable bowel syndrome reported relief after receiving pills they were told contained no real medicine. Los Angeles Times, 22nd December 2010
A simple sugar pill may help treat a disease — even if patients know they're getting fake medicine.
The finding, reported online Wednesday in the journal PloS One, may point the way to wider — and more ethical — applications of the well-known "placebo effect."
"The conventional wisdom is you need to make a patient think they're taking a drug; you have to use deception and lies," said lead author Ted Kaptchuk, an associate professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School. And, Kaptchuk added, it seems many doctors do this: In one report, as many as half of rheumatologists and internists surveyed said they had intentionally given patients ineffective medication in the hopes it would have a positive result.
Kaptchuk, however, wondered whether the deception was needed. When he first tried to persuade fellow researchers to explore a sort of "honest" placebo, "they said it was nuts," he said. After all, didn't the whole effect hinge on people believing they were getting real treatment?
Patients were easier to enlist. "People said, 'Wow, that's weird,' and we said, 'Yeah, we think it might work.' "
The researchers enrolled 80 people suffering from irritable bowel syndrome, explaining the experiment while framing it positively — they called it a novel "mind-body" therapy.
Half the patients were given a bottle with the word "placebo" printed on it. The pills it held, they were told, were like sugar pills. The patients were told they didn't even need to believe in the placebo effect, but had to take the pills twice daily.
The other half were given no treatment at all.
At the end of the three-week trial, 59% of the patients taking the placebo said their symptoms had been adequately relieved, far outstripping the 35% in the non-treatment group.
Comment: Is it any wonder that the major pharmaceutical companies are in a panic! We need to see more and more studies that chart the rise of the Placebo Effect, which I believe is in direct correlation to the impact of morphogenetic fields being upgraded due by the arrival of Space Weather and New Energies on the planet.
Pharma Crisis: The Placebo Effect [Video]
CNBC News, 31st August 2010
"Many new drugs [half] are failing in late-stage trials because they can't beat out sugar pills. Dr. Erika Schwartz, medical director at Cinergy Health, and Steve Silberman, of Wired magazine, discuss the issue."
Note the language of the scientist who thinks that people self-healing due to a sugar pill is a problem!
Neurotheology: This Is Your Brain On Religion
NPR, 14th December 2010
For thousands of years, religion has posed some unanswerable questions: Who are we? What's the meaning of life? What does it mean to be religious?
In an effort to address those questions, Dr. Andrew Newberg has scanned the brains of praying nuns, chanting Sikhs and meditating Buddhists. He studies the relationship between the brain and religious experience, a field called neurotheology. [...]
Comment: It looks like during meditation, more of the brain connects up better, except the Reptilian part. How interesting! This is advertising a book and maybe there is a religious agenda too. Well, continuing my stance on bait. You can think of meditation being taught by various groups or gurus, to be like cheese or even chocolate on a mousetrap. There is nothing wrong with cheese or chocolate, but on a mousetrap, that's another issue...
Update
Well, I have learnt something new. It seems that the science of the evolution of the brain has moved on and that ideas that have been well established and popularised by many respected scientists can be completely ignored. According to Virginia Campbell, MD who runs the website, Brain Science Podcast, in her October 2008 broadcast BSP-47: Brain Evolution, we learn:
Paraphrased: Newer techniques have proven that the old model that saw veterbrate brain evolution as the result of the successive addition of novel parts such as the Triune brain model have been proven false. Instead we know that all veterbrate brains are built according to a common plan that varies only in the details. [52:00]
Being part of a church congregation surrounded by friends is more important to your happiness than prayer, the study concluded.
Forming friendships with like-minded people makes people more happier than the theology or spirituality of a choosen faith.
While past studies have revealed a positive connection between religiosity and life satisfaction, American researchers claim a sense of 'belonging' made people more 'extremely satisfied' with life's lot.
Comment:Are religious groups mainly happy, clappy clubs? This is the reason why I would now NEVER be involved in any religious group, because I value my independent mind and would never compromise my ability to think, just to fit in with people who are confined by their religious beliefs (this also applies to science). When I was younger, I played along because there are some benefits but I kept my mouth shut, these days that would be impossible. However, even worse, are the prominent members of the New Age movement that are advocating not thinking at all! These are the really cynical mind control experts. If you don't understand this, I would recommend you spend a few hundred hours reading the research and opinion of those who have studied this issue and you can start at the Rick Ross Cult Education Forum. My view these days is work out what is truth and used as bait and what are the blatant lies - stay in control of your own mind!!!
Join Skeptiko host Alex Tsakiris for an interview with cardiologist and author of Consciousness Beyond Life: The Science of the Near-Death Experience, Dr. Pim van Lommel. During the interview Dr. van Lommel explains how he began his research, and how what he learned from his patients led him to a personal transformation,
“I started to ask my patients who survived cardiac arrest if they could remember something of the period of unconsciousness. To my big surprise, out of 50 patients asked, 12 of them told me about their NDEs. This was the start of my scientific curiosity, how could people have an enhanced consciousness when they are unconscious, when the heart doesn’t work, and there is no breathing, and their brain has stopped functioning?”
Van Lommel continues, “When you have spoken to patients who have had a near-death experience, their emotions, their reluctance to share their experience with you… it’s so honest. You just believe them because they’re so honest. You get convinced that there is more than what we can see, what we can measure.” [...]
Today’s guest is a world-class cardiologist and one of the leading medical experts on near-death experiences. His book titled, Consciousness Beyond Life: The Science of Near-Death Experience, covers his more than 25 years
researching NDEs in the Netherlands and around the world.
Comment: It's very interesting to find out how well accepted this research is in The Netherlands. amongst the medical community.
Feeling The Future: Is Precognition Possible?
Wired News, 15th November 2010
Most science papers don’t begin with a description of psi, those “anomalous processes of information or energy transfer” that have no material explanation. (Popular examples of psi include telepathy, clairvoyance and psychokinesis.) It’s even less common for a serious science paper, published in an elite journal, to show that psi is a real phenomenon. But that’s exactly what Daryl Bem of Cornell University has demonstrated in his new paper, “Feeling the Future: Experimental Evidence for Anomalous Retroactive Influences on Cognition and Affect,” which was just published in The Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.
Most science papers don’t begin with a description of psi, those “anomalous processes of information or energy transfer” that have no material explanation. (Popular examples of psi include telepathy, clairvoyance and psychokinesis.) It’s even less common for a serious science paper, published in an elite journal, to show that psi is a real phenomenon. But that’s exactly what Daryl Bem of Cornell University has demonstrated in his new paper, “Feeling the Future: Experimental Evidence for Anomalous Retroactive Influences on Cognition and Affect,” which was just published in The Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.
Comment: The fact that this research has been quite widely reported is a sign of the times after the 'dark' decades of scientists having to be ultra discreet about this kind of research and hiding behind the use of semantics to make sure they get adequate funding. Anyway, some of the research highlighted here is particularly interesting because it reveals that when emotions are involved, people have greater psi power. This is because our emotions are outside of time and space and humans often get a "bleed-through" into our "now" from what we think of as our past and our future. This was first discovered by the scientists in the old, Soviet Union who also noted that our psi ability is effected by natural magnetic fields. If scientists don't take these factors into consideration, then results will be more inconsistent as many scientists have found. The comments are quite interesting and generally intelligent here.
Is this proof that spooky auras are real?
New Scientist, 14th November 2010
Glowing visions of light that emanate from a person's body, often seen by those claiming to be psychic, really do exist, for some people at least. That's the tantalising conclusion of a study on a new form of emotion-colour synaesthesia which projects itself as coloured auras.
Other forms of synaesthesia include numbers and letters that evoke colours, touch that evokes emotions and colours with their own fragrances. Now, Vilayanur Ramachandran and colleagues at the University of California, San Diego, have identified a new type of synaesthesia in a man whose emotions give rise to colours, which can take the form of auras surrounding other people. [...]
"Some people who claim to be psychic may be telling the truth when they say they can see auras, perhaps they are on this spectrum of synaesthesia," says Elizabeth Seckel, who also worked on the project. They could be empathising with another person's emotions and projecting this onto the person as a coloured aura, adds Miller.
Comment: These scientists are only just updating the knowledge database and scientific proof for the existence of the aura that is already at least fifty years old!!!!! We can also assume that before this time, the Russians had already made a significant contribution, as they were early leaders in the field of bioelectromagnetism. and aura research. Anyway, I wrote about the research of US based Dr Valerie Hunt, who proved that a good sensitive could see the aura, because they consistently matched colour with the aura's frequency signature, which was achieved using NASA astronaut technology (telemetry) that had been adapted to detect biolectric energy.
PRINCETON: Local firm explores mind over matter
CentralJersey.com, 20th October 2010 Ever get that feeling that someone is staring at you? Ever wonder how you got that feeling? Psyleron provides products for the public and researchers to explore mind-matter effects, such as the sense of knowing someone is staring at you.
”That kind of sense, where does it come from?” said Herb Mertz, chairman of the board and co-founder of Psyleron. “It’s a mechanism we don’t understand and has to do with the mind’s influence on things.”
The Princeton-based company’s main product is the $189 mind lamp, an electric lamp with a random-event generator built in. When plugged in, the lamp throws off a white light before it cycles through eight colors. The theory behind the lamp is that users can influence what color the lamp turns by thinking about one of the eight colors.
”We produce devices that people use to explore the idea that the mind can influence the physical world,” said John Valentino, CEO and co-founder of Psyleron. “Our goal is to put this stuff out there and let people play with it themselves, rather than taking our word for it.”
Quantum-level probabilistic events drive the lamp to change color. “We are taking something that science says should be totally random, and we have evidence that suggests it’s not actually random, that people’s thoughts influence it,” Mr. Valentino said.
Comment: The science of mind over matter is now very well established. The Psyleron Mind Lamp, is a little bit pricey, but no doubt, it will be bought by pretentious New Agers.
Have Scientists Finally Discovered Evidence for Psychic Phenomena?!
Psychology Today, 11th October 2010
In Lewis Carroll's Through the Looking Glass, the White Queen tells Alice that in her land, "memory works both ways." Not only can the Queen remember things from the past, but she also remembers "things that happened the week after next."
Alice attempts to argue with the Queen, stating "I'm sure mine only works one way...I can't remember things before they happen." The Queen replies, "It's a poor sort of memory that only works backwards."
How much better would our lives be if we could live in the White Queen's kingdom, where ours memory would work backwards and forewords? For instance, in such a world, you could take an exam and then study for it afterwards to make sure you performed well in the past. Well, the good news is that according to a recent series of scientific studies by Daryl Bem, you already live in that world!
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Dr. Bem, a social psychologist at Cornell University, conducted a series of studies that will soon be published in one of the most prestigious psychology journals (Journal of Personality and Social Psychology). Across nine experiments, Bem examined the idea that our brain has the ability to not only reflect on past experiences, but also anticipate future experiences. This ability for the brain to "see into the future" is often referred to as psi phenomena.
Comment: We have had undisputed evidence since the 1970s, for anyone prepared to decode the hermetic jargon or scientific babble.
EdgeScience Magazine - issue 5
Society for Scientific Exploration, September 2010
EdgeScience is a new magazine from the SSE.
Why EdgeScience? Because scientific knowledge is still full of unknowns. What remains to be discovered—what we don't know—very likely dwarfs what we do know. And what we think we know may not be entirely correct or fully understood. Anomalies, which researchers tend to sweep under the rug, should be actively pursued as clues to potential breakthroughs and new directions in science. pdf link issue 5 here Comment: No. 5 is free with some very interesting articles!
EdgeScience Magazine - issue 4 EdgeScience, July 2010
EdgeScience is a new magazine from the SSE.
Why EdgeScience? Because scientific knowledge is still full of unknowns. What remains to be discovered—what we don't know—very likely dwarfs what we do know. And what we think we know may not be entirely correct or fully understood. Anomalies, which researchers tend to sweep under the rug, should be actively pursued as clues to potential breakthroughs and new directions in science. pdf link issue 4 here Comment: No. 4 is free with some very interesting articles!
Seeking to Illuminate the Mysterious Placebo Effect
New York Times, 21st June 2010
The phrase “mind-body connection” has many connotations. For some, it’s shorthand for New Age quackery. For others, it’s a source of hope and a way to reconcile their spiritual life with modern science. [...]
That persistent question — why some people are more responsive to placebos than others — has long frustrated scientists. “There’s decades of research that has more or less failed,” Dr. Wager said. “New methods are going to let us get a lot more out of it.”
Solving the mystery would potentially unlock whole new areas for therapy. Dr. Wager recently attended a meeting sponsored by the National Institutes of Health about enlisting multiple institutions in an effort to understand placebos. Several drug companies were present; some have begun their own research into the mystery.
Dr. Wager (who receives financing from the N.I.H., the National Science Foundation and the Michael J. Fox Foundation) says drug companies were cautious about bringing too much attention to placebos, but recognized a potential for better therapies.
But for him it is a deeper question, tied to his childhood religion and the way he sees the world.
“What is the placebo effect?” he asked. “It’s not some weird magical thing that just kind of happened out of the blue.
“I think it’s connected to systems that generate emotional responses,” he continued. “It’s a window into ways in which psychological factors can affect brain and body factors that are related to health.” Comment: Adequate research has been ongoing for decades, maybe this researcher could not be bothered to explain it. However the link here with emotions is very important as it points to the healthy state of the human electromagnetic field. The closed down unemotional zombies will NOT benefit from "The Placebo Effect".
It is believed he was in the pond at his grandparents' house for several minutes before his grandfather saw him and pulled him out. His father gave him heart massage and mouth-to-mouth during the ten minutes it took a helicopter to arrive. Paramedics then took over and Paul was taken the ten-minute journey to hospital. Doctors tried to resuscitate him for hours. They had just given up when, three hours and 18 minutes after he was brought in, Paul's heart started beating independently. Professor Lothar Schweigerer, director of the Helios Clinic where Paul was taken, said: 'I have never experienced anything like it.
'When children have been underwater for a few minutes they mostly don't make it. This is a most extraordinary case.' The boy said that while unconscious he saw his great grandmother Emmi, who had turned him back from a gate and urged him to go back to his parents.
Paul said: 'There was a lot of light and I was floating. I came to a gate and I saw Grandma Emmi on the other side. 'She said to me, "What are you doing here Paul? You must go back to mummy and daddy. I will wait for you here." 'I knew I was in heaven. But grandma said I had to come home. She said that I should go back very quickly. 'Heaven looked nice. But I am glad I am back with mummy and daddy now.' Paul is now back at home in Lychen, north of Berlin in Germany, and there appears to be no sign of brain damage.
Comment: A Miracle? Dead for 3 hours and 18 minutes?
Can troops find hidden bombs with sixth sense?
American Chronicle, 28th March 2010 Recent research has determined that some U.S. military personnel are better than others in the ability to detect hidden improvised explosive devices (IEDs). But why?
According to a U.S. Army research project, troops raised in rural and forested areas seemed to be better at it. Troops who grew up in tough urban areas also seem to excel in this kind of perception.
The common denominator is "situational awareness (SA)" that is key to hunting and being aware in the natural environment as well as in dangerous neighborhoods where people can become a victim of violence or other crime.
But what other important factors might be in play? And how might the understanding of human perception and consciousness benefit all of us?
In the first issue of the fascinating new magazine EdgeScience (October 2009 edition), editor Patrick Huyghe's article "Straight from the Gut" explored the two-year Army study on perception led by researcher and psychologist Steven Burnett. Huyghe also took a look at some of the media coverage on the study.
Comment: Long article. More evidence of the paranormal research undertaken by the military over the last 50+ years. The military are very aware that psychic ability or presentiment as it is described here can save your life, but most people just laugh, not fully comprehending that in a situation where one's life is in the balance, this ability can make the difference. Free Edge Science magazine issue 1. here
'Starving yogi' astounds Indian scientists
PhysOrg.com, 10th May 2010 An 83-year-old Indian holy man who says he has spent seven decades without food or water has astounded a team of military doctors who studied him during a two-week observation period.
Prahlad Jani spent a fortnight in a hospital in the western India state of Gujarat under constant surveillance from a team of 30 medics equipped with cameras and closed circuit television.
During the period, he neither ate nor drank and did not go to the toilet.
"We still do not know how he survives," neurologist Sudhir Shah told reporters after the end of the experiment. "It is still a mystery what kind of phenomenon this is."
The long-haired and bearded yogi was sealed in a hospital in the city of Ahmedabad in a study initiated by India's Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO), the state defence and military research institute.
Comment: Why are they surprised? There has been many other examples of people doing the same, but few claim they have done it for 70 years. The question scientists need to ask themselves is: how can some people live directly off aetheric energies?
The latest research, reported in the journal Science, looked at whether the phenomenon extends to decisions with little or no moral implications by asking a set of volunteers to pick between two CDs or two jams. Scientists found the 40 volunteers were less likely to try to justify their choice if they washed their hands just after making it. [...]
The idea that it is possible to wash away our sins is deep rooted in many cultures and religions, including Christianity. Water is a cornerstone of baptism ceremonies and, in the Bible, Pontius Pilate washed his hands after condemning Jesus to death.
Comment: Hmmm.... learning about the sources of our unconscious programming and how it determines our behaviour ....
Good and Evil Deeds Stimulate Surprising 'Superpowers'
Live Science, 4th May 2010
The mere act of kindness, or one of evil, can boost willpower and physical strength, a new study suggests.
The results, based on three experiments, show that those who performed good deeds, or envisioned themselves acting charitably, were able to hold a weight or squeeze a hand grip significantly longer than those who didn't perform or think about such deeds. But evil acts appeared to confer similar and perhaps even greater superpowers.
Comment: The science is interesting but the spirtual truth is missing. It's the strength of our emotions that are linked to other realms of consciousness that makes the difference, whether we consider these emotions good or evil. It takes a lot of energy to be so hateful and that is why such people will go out of their way to drain those around them. However, people who are more optimistic and loving are able to tap into universal forces much more easily without realising it, but often don't realise the power available to them. Remember, the programming in society is to be meek and mild.
Improbable research: The repetitive physics of Om
Indian scientists wield sophisticated mathematics to dissect and analyse the traditional meditation chanting sound 'Om'
The Guardian, 3rd May 2010
Two Indian scientists are wielding sophisticated mathematics to dissect and analyse the traditional meditation chanting sound "Om". The Om team has published six monographs in academic journals. These plumb certain acoustic subtleties of Om, which these researchers say is "the divine sound". Om has many variations. In a study published in the International Journal of Computer Science and Network Security, the researchers explain: "It may be very fast, several cycles per second. [...]
In the introductory paper, Gurjar and Ladhake explain (in case there is someone unaware of the basics): "Om is a spiritual mantra, outstanding to fetch peace and calm. The entire psychological pressure and worldly thoughts are taken away by the chanting of Om mantra."
No one has explained the biophysical processes that underlie this fetching of calm and taking away of thoughts. Gurjar and Ladhake's time-frequency analysis is a tiny step along that hitherto little-taken branch of the path of enlightenment.
Comment: Om.....
Once skeptical researchers investigating the 10-year Global Consciousness Project are finding solid data to support the conclusion that we’re all connected.
Comment: I may be wrong but I believe the Global Consciousness Project will prove to be a very useful indicator of what is taking place on this planet. I am thrilled because we have a major indicator for WHY the pharmaceutical industry is having problems with the placebo effect.
Prahlad Jani’s claims are being put to the test at a hospital in Ahmedabad, where he is being closely monitored and studied by India’s Defence Research Development Organisation, which believes he may have a quality which could help save lives, The Telegraph reports.
He has so far spent six days without food or water under the strict observation of doctors who say his body is yet to show any signs of hunger or dehydration.
Mr Jani is regarded as a "breatharian" who can live a "spiritual life-force" alone. He believes he is sustained by the "elixir" of a goddess.
Comment: It's interesting to note that the military has taken an interest, and they are positive! I am wondering if the results will be released in plain language and made available to the world.
Brain shuts off in response to healer's prayer
New Scientist, 27th April 2010
WHEN we fall under the spell of a charismatic figure, areas of the brain responsible for scepticism and vigilance become less active. That's the finding of a study which looked at people's response to prayers spoken by someone purportedly possessing divine healing powers.
To identify the brain processes underlying the influence of charismatic individuals, Uffe Schjødt of Aarhus University in Denmark and colleagues turned to Pentecostal Christians, who believe that some people have divinely inspired powers of healing, wisdom and prophecy.
Comment: Well, this is only another form of scientific validation for what is going on when we fall under another person's spell. I realised this myself not that long ago when I felt driven to understand how a New Age guru could cook three people to death and then carry on as if nothing had happened and then for his followers to try and brush the incident under the New Age carpet under the guise of 'oh well nevermind, those folks "attracted" their own deaths'. After hundreds of hours of reading I discovered Snapping: America's Epidemic of Sudden Personality Change [1978, 1979, 1995, 2005] by Flo Conway and Jim Siegelman. Well, I was truly enlightened!
However, I have realised it is even more insiduous than becoming a brain dead idiot unthinking, unreasoning and undiscerning. It's the sociopathic tendencies that then arise due to the lack of empathy. All of a sudden 'victims' are blamed for the actions of sociopaths, malignant narcissists, psychopaths and predators! The reasoning is that you are supposed to be born able to discern these folks when some of them are so sly that they can fool trained professionals. Psychologists only study these types in order to help their victims, not because they think they can be helped. Anyway, you don't need to believe me, just hang out with ardent New Agers who just repeat the mantras, associated with the "Law of Attraction". It is quite clear when the reasoning pathways in the brain have atrophied... Go looking on the Internet and find the ex-devotees who paid serious money to a "school of enlightenment" to find that they have been seriously conned. They believed and believed and believed in the "Law of Attraction" and it simply did not work as they were told. It's a teaching that is just used as bait to help some upsell to the next book or the next seminar or the next course etc.
An entire laboratory has been set up by Georgia's top scientists to investigate the Zurab Bedia phenomenon. They have discovered that Bedia’s geomagnetic field is several times more intense than that of most humans.
However, scientists are not only intrigued by Bedia’s ability to light bulbs but, more importantly, the possible effect this could have on medicine and science.
Comment:Please note: the emphasis in the video of scientists studying psychosomatic imbalances that can be detected in the human energy field and then later on become an illness. These Georgain scientists are way way way ahead in the understanding of the relationship to health in the human energy field and physical health. Incredible news.
They have the power to switch off your brain
Sydney Morning Herald, 25th April 2010 CERTAIN parts of the brain - which control scepticism and vigilance - appear to deactivate in some people when they're in the presence of a speaker who they believe has divine healing powers, scientists in Denmark have found.
Researchers recruited 36 male and female participants; about half were devout Christians from the Pentecostal church, while the other half were non-religious.
Comment: This is a major problem in religious, metaphysical and cult-like groups. Once you switch off the critical thinking you are fair game. In the process of seeking enlightenment many people are tricked into following a leader that will use as many 'techniques' as possible to get you to become a follower and give up your money and/or your resources for THEIR benefit. Once you stop thinking and start repeating the mantras, then it does not take much time before people, become unthinking and unfeeling zombies. Once this happens your discernment vanishes. For those with a Christian background, please check out the Marjoe Gortner documentary and an interview with another Ex-faith healer who have both revealed some of the tricks use by the most unsavoury Charismatics.
EdgeScience Magazine Edge Science, April 2010
Introducing EdgeScience - the new magazine from the SSE. Why EdgeScience? Because scientific knowledge is still full of unknowns. What remains to be discovered—what we don't know—very likely dwarfs what we do know. And what we think we know may not be entirely correct or fully understood. Anomalies, which researchers tend to sweep under the rug, should be actively pursued as clues to potential breakthroughs and new directions in science.
Comment: No. 3 Free! Download here.
Placebo Treatments Much Stronger than Previously Thought
Natural News, 14th April 2010
A recent study published in the British medical journal, Lancet, has found that placebo, or fake, medical treatments exhibit a noticeable biological effect on patients. A panel of international researchers pored through a series of studies they believe illustrate concrete evidence that physical changes in patients occur in response to placebos.
Comment: This short article that does not even give a hint of the pressure that drug companies are under, see, Placebos Are Getting More Effective. Drugmakers Are Desperate to Know Why. Many new and old drugs are no better than placebo and when drug trials are repeated placebos just get stronger! I'm quite excited but it's because we may have some solid proof of the impact of the New Energies on planet and how it is changing global consciousness. Scientists have done some nice studies in consciousness in the past few decades and now the thinkers have to draw some valid conclusions...
Edge Science: Breakthrough: Clues to healing with Intentions
Edge Science, March 2010
[...] I used healing techniques that Bennett and I developed through introspection, trial and error, and simple intuition. The techniques are completely belief-free and involve a process of extremely fast visualization of a series of personal images done in conjunction with the laying-on of hands, in which the person tries, with as little effort as possible, to feel an energy flowing out from the palms of his or her hands.
The images each person uses are generated by a personal list, prepared prior to the experiment, of 20 outcomes wanted in his or her life, specific goals that involve their own health, ideal jobs, material aspirations, or other people. Each item on the list is translated into an image that represents the achievement of that particular goal. These personal images are then memorized and the prospective healer practices cycling through them in a kind of mental filmstrip loop. This technique, rather than slowing down brain activity through some sort of meditative technique, actually speeds up brain functioning and activity through the rapid visualization. At the same time the handson
technique is done in a very detached manner on the assumption that focus or belief would only get in the way.
[...]
The idea that a placebo could produce real physiological effects was unthinkable in medicine 50 years ago, but by now medicine recognizes that placebos do work, even as the mechanism by which they work and the circumstances under which they work remain a mystery. Yet, in fact, it turns out that placebo effects increase over time to the point where up to 80 percent of the effects of drugs can be mirrored in placebos.
Comment: To say this research blows out a lot of conventional thinking about working with healing energies and techniques is to put it mildly. The discussion that this scientist has solved the problem of the placebo effect is amazing, lets say I am absolutely thrilled with what I have read about this research so far. THIS IS ALL VERY INTERESTING AS THE PHARMACEUTICAL COMPANIES ARE STRUGGLING TO BEAT THE PLACEBO EFFECT! According to someone called Judith, she persuaded Dr William Bengston to start teaching. According to her, the Bengston method is hit and miss and if you read her blog it is most likely to do with resonance, see William Bengston, Chasing the Cure: A commentary, also see the
Further commentary.
Please remember, the person who started this all off was called Bennett Mayrick who was a natural healer who had acquired a high level of healing abilities on his own efforts. He did not need any "initiations" from anyone, then Dr. William Bengston spent a lot of time with him and picked up the frequencies as they worked out their process of visualisation. From what Judith says, Dr William Bengston does not seem to know how to pass on these frequencies properly and I think this is an area that needs thorough investigation and research, especially as there are many different schools and organisations and groups charging money for techniques and initiations. Btw, even if you spend years in a healing school like Barbara Brennan's, a few of her graduates have told me that there is no guarantee that you will evolve and pick up abilities like high sense perception (hsp). It seems that the sheep dip approach does not always work.
Darkness Begets Dishonesty, Study Finds
Yahoo News, 1st March 2010 Dim lights can make it seem as if no one is watching, triggering moral transgressions in many people, a new study suggests.
Past research has shown that when people are concealed from view by others, say when they are wearing hoods, these individuals will be more likely to commit criminal acts and other bad behaviors.
But what about times when we're not actually anonymous - people can see us - yet we feel like we're hidden? The researchers of the new study describe it as the adult version of hide-and-seek: Kids often believe no one can see them when they cover their eyes even though they are hiding in plain sight. Turns out, a dark room can have a similar psychological effect on adults.
Comment: How interesting! These days I have started to question those who talk about light and dark and what kind of message is really being suggested. In my own experience, the only people I have known who talked about light and dark being aspects of the whole, had very dark aspects to their personality and I now wonder whether they were just trying to justify this to themselves and others.
Do Our Organs Have Memories?
Care 2, 21st February 2010
Glenda lost her husband, David, in a car crash. She made his organs available for transplant. A few years later, as part of a study by neuropsychologist Paul Pearsall, she met the young Spanish-speaking man who had received her late husband’s heart. Filled with emotion, Glenda asked if she could lay her hand on his chest. “I love you, David,” she said. “Everything’s copacetic.”
The young man’s mother, also present, was startled. “My son uses that word now,” she said. “He never said it before his heart transplant. I don’t know that word; it doesn’t exist in Spanish. But it was the first thing he said after the operation.”
Her son appeared to have changed in other ways too. Before, he had been a health-conscious vegetarian; now he craved meat and greasy food. He had loved heavy metal music; now he played nothing but fifties rock ’n’ roll. Glenda’s husband had been an ardent meat-lover and played in a rock ’n’ roll band.
Comment: This is fascinating stuff and a problem for scientists who wish to believe that there is nothing sacred about human body parts. I believe that consciousness is transferable and that even our body organs have access to multi-dimensional realms where our memories and emotions are stored. Scientists tell us that the mind cannot be separated from the body and we know that certain memories can become trapped in the body. I have started to think of this in terms of an overload situation where memories can be downloaded from higher dimensional space if there is too much trauma, but in reality, it's not that straight forward because humans also retain information in their electromagnetic field. There are now quite a few books about this subject and on going research but no signs that transplant specialists are trying to match the human traits of donors with those of the recipients and so it seems there are going to be many more of these startingly stories.
Prayer Increases Forgiveness, Study Shows
Science Daily, 1st February 2010 We have all been guilty of a transgression at one time or another. That's because we're not perfect. We all commit hurtful acts, violate trust, and hope for forgiveness.
That's simply a fact, and here's another one: Nine out of 10 Americans say that they pray -- at least on occasion.
Florida State University psychologist Nathaniel Lambert put these two facts together and came up with an idea: Why not take all that prayer and direct it at the people who have wronged us? Is it possible that directed prayer might spark forgiveness in those doing the praying -- and in the process preserve relationships?
Comment: It certainly interesting what people are researching these days and then getting it reported in the mainstream media.
Global Consciousness Project Welcomes Collaboration With Skeptics
Skeptico, 16th January 2010
When it comes to claims of a global consciousness linking us all to tragedies like the earthquake in Haiti, or the terrorist attacks of 9/11, there are many skeptics.
While the research results of the 12 year old Global Consciousness Project have withstood serious skeptical examination from researchers who’ve dug into the millions of test results collected on the publicly available website, skepticism persists.
But according to Alex Tsakiris, host of the Skeptiko science podcast, dialog between controversial science researchers and their doubters is a good for science, “it’s easy to have a knee-jerk reaction to unconventional science - that’s what makes it unconventional - but skeptics need to look deeper… critical thinking demands we’re sometimes critical of our own cherished beliefs.”
Comment: Well, true scientists welcome other scientists being able to find flaws in their theories and data interpretations etc. However, it does look like that scientists at the Global Consciousness Project have discovered at least part of the field of consciousness that is associated with the Global Mind. As I have stated before, the most interesting aspect of the research is the evidence of increasing global human interconnection over time, which is something that metaphysical sources have been adamant would be the result of the changing energies on the planet.
After all, a brain dead patient can’t hallucinate. But, does a flat EEG really mean no brain activity? NDE doubters have claimed activity deep inside the brain, beyond the reach of EEG instruments, must account for the complex “realer than real” experiences reported by those who briefly pass into the afterlife. Now, University of Toledo Neuroscience researcher, and EEG expert, Dr. John Greenfield explains why this claim doesn’t hold up. [...]
The timing of NDE memories is the research question Dr. Penny Sartori sought to answer, “I worked in the intensive care unit and because of the nature of my job, of course, I’d come across a lot of death. And of course makes you wonder what happens when we die. For five years I gathered data, where I spoke to patients in the intensive care unit and particularly patients who’d had a cardiac arrest. When these patients revived, as soon as they were medically fit, I approached them and asked the simple question, ‘Did you have any memory of the time that you were unconscious?’”
“For the people who had a near-death experience and out of body experience [their recollection of resuscitation] was really quite accurate and I decided then to ask the control group, the people who’d had a cardiac arrest but had no recollection of anything at all. I asked them if they would reenact their resuscitation scenario and tell me what they thought that we had done to resuscitate them. And what I found is that many of the patients couldn’t even guess as to what we’d done. They had no idea at all.
Comment: Interesting research.....
Two 19th century NDEs [Near Death Experiences]
Michael Prescott, 30th November 2009
I find older reports of near-death experiences interesting, because they predate the popular interest in the subject that developed once Life After Life was published in 1975. Such reports can be traced back at least as far as the Middle Ages, and arguably earlier. Two that recently came to my attention are mentioned in Guided by Spirit, by Charles Emmons and Penelope Emmons (p. 219).
Comment: Two 19th century stories are given here and are quite interesting from an historical point of view as explained in this article. I have only come across two people who claimed that they had a NDE experience. One was an athelete who whilst running, had been knocked over by a car that had skidded on ice and was left for dead, if I remember rightly she needed an operation and died on the operating table for 3/4 minutes, it could be longer. The other I don't know any details about. The athelete came back with the ability to see auras and heal and she did say that she thought she was enlightened, but because of my short dealings with this person I am not so sure, but she herself stated that enlightenment could be compared with a light bulb that can get brighter and brighter and I think that is completely true. The other person was quite a dubious character who used the tidbit of her NDE as a marketing ploy. Neither of these people gave me the feeling that they were anywhere near the high levels of consciousness that characterises people who have NDEs, according to the research of the psychologist Sir David Hawkins, but I think this is a fascinating area to study. The book, "Biography of Mrs. J. H. Conant, the World's Medium of the Nineteenth Century" is available online here.
Meditation 'cuts risk of heart attack by half'
Meditation is good for the body as well as the mind, scientists have discovered, as the practice significantly reduces the risk of a heart attack for people with heart disease.
The Telegraph, 17th November 2009
Patients with heart disease who practised Transcendental Meditation cut their chances of a heart attack, stroke and death by half, compared with non-meditating patients, the first study of its kind has found.
Stress is a major factor in heart disease and meditation experts say the technique can help control it.
Comment: The problem I have is that some people get addicted to meditating by hormones that get generated in the brain, this is not my opinion, but that of people who have practised meditation for decades who recognise that there are pitfalls. What's more, I am even less enthusiastic for the Transcendental Meditation Movement after recently coming across the TM-Free Blog. I found the blog as a link from the Cult Education Forum, where I was having my eyes opened reading about James Ray and his use of various techniques including NLP to control people's thoughts with multilevel communications. I have to say I learnt a lot, especially about The New Wage.... LOL!!
OK I am sure there are people who will be upset that I don't unconditionally promote meditation, but since any meditation I do is completely unstructured and I have had good and bad experiences, so I am not willing to promote something that people need to be aware is not all plain sailing. I am also highly suspicious of any technique or organisation that does not encourage critical thinking. I would be interested to know who sponsored this research.
A New Magazine: EdgeScience
Unbelievable, 16th November 2009
I’m so excited about this new magazine EdgeScience! And it’s coming out from the Society for Scientific Exploration. You can download the first issue for free.
There’s an article about the Global Consciousness Project by Roger D. Nelson that I look forward to reading. Consciousness is one of the areas I’m most curious about.
The article has a great Pierre Teilhard de Chardin pull quote. “It is our duty—as men and women—to behave as though limits to our ability do not exist. We are collaborators in creation of the Universe.”
Comment: Download Free no. 2 here. The article called Is The Global Mind Real? Is quite a nice straightforward read and we are told about the EEG or the Electro-GaiaGram that consists of a worldwide network of data cllection points that can be compared to how EEG electrodes collect data from a human head. The most interesting aspect of this report is the final section and graph that seems to be some evidence of increasing global interconnection, which is something that metaphysical sources have been adamant would be the result of the changing energies on the planet. Very interesting stuff.
Download Free no. 1 here.
Edge Science/Society for Scientific Exploration, March 2009
Iraq Swears by Bomb Detector U.S. Sees as Useless
New York Times, 3rd November 2009
"Despite major bombings that have rattled the nation, and fears of rising violence as American troops withdraw, Iraq’s security forces have been relying on a device to detect bombs and weapons that the United States military and technical experts say is useless.
The small hand-held wand, with a telescopic antenna on a swivel, is being used at hundreds of checkpoints in Iraq. But the device works “on the same principle as a Ouija board” — the power of suggestion — said a retired United States Air Force officer, Lt. Col. Hal Bidlack, who described the wand as nothing more than an explosives divining rod. Comment: I think this is a case of the kettle calling the pot black as it becomes more widely known that US military trained psychic spies and once ran a Jedi program to train their elite in the art of the utilising 'The Force'.
Out of your head: Leaving the body behind
New Scientist News, 13th October 2009
THE young man woke feeling dizzy. He got up and turned around, only to see himself still lying in bed. He shouted at his sleeping body, shook it, and jumped on it. The next thing he knew he was lying down again, but now seeing himself standing by the bed and shaking his sleeping body. Stricken with fear, he jumped out of the window. His room was on the third floor. He was found later, badly injured.
What this 21-year-old had just experienced was an out-of-body experience, one of the most peculiar states of consciousness. It was probably triggered by his epilepsy (Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery and Psychiatry, vol 57, p 838). "He didn't want to commit suicide," says Peter Brugger, the young man's neuropsychologist at University Hospital Zurich in Switzerland. "He jumped to find a match between body and self. He must have been having a seizure."
Comment: This is really the study of self-consciousness, something that scientists admit they really don't understand well at all.
It’s not quite like that and first of all there haven’t been that many attempts. He did a staring experiment, I think it was the first thing that he did that was related to my own work. He used different methods than ones I’d used and his student came up with a result that was statistically significant by one test and not significant by another.
Probably the one that they used was the most appropriate, but it was on the borderline of significance, so I asked for the data, to analyze it using different statistical procedures. They’d used a t-test and there were other ways of doing the analysis. I just wanted to see how that would work. He said oh, well, I couldn’t do that cause they’d discarded the data. So I wouldn’t say that was an unambiguous failure. I think that it was interesting result and it was on the borderline of significance. It all depended on which tests you did.
Comment: I have to say I listened to the 28th September 2009, Skeptico interview with Dr Chris French and I thought he basically had NOTHING to say about Sheldrake's research, accept that he could not duplicate the same results. In fact, I thought the 50 minute interview was complete and utter waste of time listening to this person. However, here we find that in one experiment, Sheldrake wanted to check the raw data and French comes out with the excuse that the dog ate the data, where have we heard that before..... My attitude is that if you are going to be a sceptic, then be a good one! You need to be on top form with facts and figures, hand waving is not good enough. Sheldrake's analogy of comparing the experience of psychic phenomena to "erection on demand" in an environment of men with clip-boards is quite hilarious..... It's also interesting that no one wants to work with sceptical scientists and they actually have had a hard time trying to recruit subjects.... Maybe, people don't want that negative energy around themselves....
Scientists discover bacterium that transmutes gold, were the alchemists right?
NY Holistic Science & Spirit Examiner, 10th October 2009
"Gold is in the news, not only because of its record high at $1,060 an ounce according to the Globe and Mail, but also through Australian scientists’ recent study of a bacterium that plays a basic role in the cycle of solid gold formation.
From prehistoric times and Egyptian goldmines; from the gifts of the Magi in the New Testament to King Midas’ coins, not only were alchemists captivated by this shiny yellow metal, but once upon a time, we converted our skills and energy into this precious metal when our society’s monetary system was based on the gold standard."
Comment: There are some interesting spiritual concepts in this article, like 'cosmic alchemy' and natural evolutionary law that applies to metals. The subject focuses our attention on the universal principles that make up our reality as we are in a time of rapid evolutionary change, which means ever increasing complexity. At the same time, we have to remind ourselves that those who understood spiritual evolution in the past, knew themselves to be 'beings of light' and they were primarily interested in transmutation of themselves into a higher expression of universal energy. The evolution of base materials to pure gold, is often expressed as 'spiritual' alchemy.
Brain Waves Surge Moments Before Death
Discovery News, 6th October 2009
"A study of seven terminally ill patients found identical surges in brain activity moments before death, providing what may be physiological evidence of "out of body" experiences reported by people who survive near-death ordeals. Doctors at George Washington University Medical Faculty Associates recorded brain activity of people dying from critical illnesses, such as cancer or heart attacks.
Moments before death, the patients experienced a burst in brain wave activity, with the spikes occurring at the same time before death and at comparable intensity and duration."
Comment: This discovery of a brain surge just prior to death, that is measured as a burst of high voltage energy, may explain why those that have a near death experience [NDE], have brains that have been rewired and the experience propels them into the higher levels of consciousness, on a permanent basis. This later article tries to debunk peoples experience. See also, Doctor says near-death experiences are in the mind
Almost half of healers’ patients report immediate benefit
Paranormal Review, 4th October 2009 "Eighty patients have co-operated with Scottish psychic researcher Patricia Robertson in a study of the benefits they have received at the hands of two English healers, Gary Mannion and Nina Knowland. The healers also participated in the research.
Robertson revealed some early findings in a lecture on paranormal healing to the Society for Psychical Research in London on Thursday, 1 October, titled “Do Miracles Happen?”
She reported that 86 per cent felt heat from the healer’s hands during treatment, half experienced a quick cessation of pain, and four out of ten said they sensed “internal manipulation” during treatment."
Comment: This website is new to me and looks quite interesting. Well, this kind of research, utilising scientific protocols is only required to prove to sceptics and the insensitive that universal energies exist and can be harnessed for spiritual health and well being. If you are interested, this is a great healing story,
Catholic Church investigates inexplicable healing of dying man
Can We Really Read Minds?
Psychology Today, 30th September 2009
The belief in telepathy is deeply rooted in many of us, and not only science fiction fans. Mothers ring their daughters thousands of miles away, and their daughters say,
"How did you know? I was just thinking of you". We walk into a room and we just get a feeling about someone: it is as if we knew what they were thinking, and what they will say next.
Professors of parapsychology--and there are a few--have been unable to replicate these results in the laboratory. Minds they have to conclude cannot pass thoughts or images to other minds directly. Perhaps this should not be a surprise. After all, we do pass thoughts and images to each other pretty effectively by speaking, drawing, singing, and so on. More to the point, our minds are our own, and we want them to remain so. We fight to keep our original thoughts. So is telepathy just wishful thinking, born out of our wish to be close to our loved ones and not feel that they have minds that will be for ever closed to us? Or is it a more general feeling against the scientists and others who seem to want to reduce everything to atoms without allowing for the connectedness that joins us to the universe?
Comment: Maybe these parapsychologists need to redesign their experiments, as others have proven that signals are being passed between brains were there is an EMOTIONAL attachment, like between husbands and wives.
New study: What really happens when you die?
AWARE project harnesses technology to probe ‘out-of-body experiences’
MSNBC News, 28th September 2009
People often talk about seeing their lives flash before their eyes, but a select few — some of those who have been resuscitated after nearly dying — have reported on the experience of death, or at least coming very close to it. It’s a rarer phenomenon, and one that has captured the interest of scientists who are trying to answer the question of just what constitutes death, and when death actually occurs. A new international study is endeavoring to apply hard science to one of life’s biggest mysteries — its end. [...]
“At least 10 to 20 percent of people who have been brought back to life will tell us they had consciousness present, and a proportion of them will tell us they were able to see doctors and nurses working on them as if they’re looking from above,” Parnia told Vieira. “When people have died, their brain goes into a flatline state, so consciousness shouldn’t be present.
Comment: The article does not seem to distinguish between a 'near-death experience' (NDE) and an 'out of body experience' that can occur at anytime, which seems strange to me. Well, the most interesting thing is that research reveals that people who have had a NDE come back with a different brain pattern and become more evolved. According to psychologist Sir David Hawkins, they are propelled into higher states of consciousness to the levels of peace at about 600, on the Map of Consciousness that is calibrated from 1 – 1000, 700 and above is considered enlightenment and the re-wiring of the brain is proof, as psychologists who have studied human development tell us this is required for human evolution.
Stressed out: The debate over reiki’s benefits spills over at Roman Catholic hospitals
The Boston Globe, 22nd September 2009
Debbie Griseuk is a reiki practitioner and teacher who volunteered her time to elderly nuns in Manchester, N.H., and patients at St. Joseph Hospital in Nashua. In fact, she first became interested in the Japanese hands-on healing technique at St. Joseph, where she attended a lecture along with some nuns. She went through a training course at the Roman Catholic hospital, eventually becoming a reiki master.
But last spring the US Conference of Catholic Bishops announced that reiki - hailed by many as therapy, derided by others as quackery - would no longer be practiced in the church’s hospitals and retreat centers. Reiki, according to the bishops, is not grounded in science or Christianity and is therefore inappropriate for Catholic institutions. [...]
Apparently, St. Joseph Hospital agreed. A hospital brochure on reiki called it one of “the most popular forms of integrated therapies’’ at the hospital. The manager of volunteer services is quoted as saying: “This energy is deeply relaxing and enables the patient to release stress and anxiety. This state of relaxation facilitates our bodies’ natural healing.’’
[...]
Patients at St. Joseph still call Griseuk and she occasionally goes to their hospital rooms to perform reiki. “Galileo was denounced by the Catholic Church,’’ she says. “I don’t mind being in his company.’’
Comment: Interesting article. Well, the science is available, but generally ignored. The Russians have done the most research and now they can offer certification to prove that a healer has the abilitiy to tune into universal energies, see Russia licenses faith healers. Still, the Catholic Church should read the Bible if they think healing people by the laying on of hands is not grounded in Christianity, because it begs the question: what exactly was Jesus Christ doing then?
Placebos Are Getting More Effective. Drugmakers Are Desperate to Know Why.
Wired News, September 2009
[...]"It's not only trials of new drugs that are crossing the futility boundary. Some products that have been on the market for decades, like Prozac, are faltering in more recent follow-up tests. In many cases, these are the compounds that, in the late '90s, made Big Pharma more profitable than Big Oil. But if these same drugs were vetted now, the FDA might not approve some of them. Two comprehensive analyses of antidepressant trials have uncovered a dramatic increase in placebo response since the 1980s. One estimated that the so-called effect size (a measure of statistical significance) in placebo groups had nearly doubled over that time.
It's not that the old meds are getting weaker, drug developers say. It's as if the placebo effect is somehow getting stronger. [..]
The fact that an increasing number of medications are unable to beat sugar pills has thrown the industry into crisis. The stakes could hardly be higher. In today's economy, the fate of a long-established company can hang on the outcome of a handful of tests.
Why are inert pills suddenly overwhelming promising new drugs and established medicines alike? The reasons are only just beginning to be understood. A network of independent researchers is doggedly uncovering the inner workings—and potential therapeutic applications—of the placebo effect. At the same time, drugmakers are realizing they need to fully understand the mechanisms behind it so they can design trials that differentiate more clearly between the beneficial effects of their products and the body's innate ability to heal itself. A special task force of the Foundation for the National Institutes of Health is seeking to stem the crisis by quietly undertaking one of the most ambitious data-sharing efforts in the history of the drug industry. After decades in the jungles of fringe science, the placebo effect has become the elephant in the boardroom.
Comment: From a metaphysical point of view, this is some real evidence that there has been a notable change in the direction of the positive, i.e. when human's apply the power of intent the result is much more evident. This is a long report, but highly informative!
Trust your gut? Study explores religion, morality and trust in authority
A Science Centric, 14th September 2009
"In a world filled with dogma, doctrine and discipline, it is accurate to say most of us strive to do what we believe is 'right.' These convictions and beliefs permeate every aspect of our lives, including education, ethics and even common law.
Psychologists Daniel C. Wisneski, Brad L. Lytle and Linda J. Skitka from the University of Illinois at Chicago explored this interplay of moral convictions and religious beliefs as it relates to our trust in authority. Specifically, the researchers provided a nationally-represented sample of adults - 53% female, 72% White, 12% Black and 11% Hispanic - with an online survey about the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling on physician-assisted suicide.
As the findings suggest in a recent issue of Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, the more religious participants tended to trust the Supreme Court's ability to make the right decision while the group with strong moral convictions felt distrust. And both groups, as it turned out, based their beliefs on a gut reaction rather than on thoughtful, careful deliberation."
Comment: As I have spiritual evolved, I have realised that I can't make false assumptions about anything, it's not a matter of distrust, yes I use my intuition, but making the wrong assumption can lead to massive disappointments.
Placebos Are Getting More Effective. Drugmakers Are Desperate to Know Why.
Wired News, September 2009
[...] "It's not only trials of new drugs that are crossing the futility boundary. Some products that have been on the market for decades, like Prozac, are faltering in more recent follow-up tests. In many cases, these are the compounds that, in the late '90s, made Big Pharma more profitable than Big Oil. But if these same drugs were vetted now, the FDA might not approve some of them.
Two comprehensive analyses of antidepressant trials have uncovered a dramatic increase in placebo response since the 1980s. One estimated that the so-called effect size (a measure of statistical significance) in placebo groups had nearly doubled over that time.
It's not that the old meds are getting weaker, drug developers say. It's as if the placebo effect is somehow getting stronger. [..]
The fact that an increasing number of medications are unable to beat sugar pills has thrown the industry into crisis. The stakes could hardly be higher. In today's economy, the fate of a long-established company can hang on the outcome of a handful of tests.
Why are inert pills suddenly overwhelming promising new drugs and established medicines alike? The reasons are only just beginning to be understood. A network of independent researchers is doggedly uncovering the inner workings—and potential therapeutic applications—of the placebo effect.
At the same time, drugmakers are realizing they need to fully understand the mechanisms behind it so they can design trials that differentiate more clearly between the beneficial effects of their products and the body's innate ability to heal itself. A special task force of the Foundation for the National Institutes of Health is seeking to stem the crisis by quietly undertaking one of the most ambitious data-sharing efforts in the history of the drug industry. After decades in the jungles of fringe science, the placebo effect has become the elephant in the boardroom.
Comment: From a metaphysical point of view, this is some real evidence that there has been a notable change in the direction of the positive, i.e. when human's apply the power of intent the result is much more evident. This is a long report, but highly informative!
The Holy Grail of the Unconscious
New York Times, 20th September 2009 This is a story about a nearly 100-year-old book, bound in red leather, which has spent the last quarter century secreted away in a bank vault in Switzerland. [...]
Carl Jung founded the field of analytical psychology and, along with Sigmund Freud, was responsible for popularizing the idea that a person’s interior life merited not just attention but dedicated exploration — a notion that has since propelled tens of millions of people into psychotherapy.
The book tells the story of Jung trying to face down his own demons as they emerged from the shadows. The results are humiliating, sometimes unsavory. [...]
He worked on his red book — and he called it just that, the Red Book — on and off for about 16 years, long after his personal crisis had passed, but he never managed to finish it. He actively fretted over it, wondering whether to have it published and face ridicule from his scientifically oriented peers or to put it in a drawer and forget it. Regarding the significance of what the book contained, however, Jung was unequivocal. “All my works, all my creative activity,” he would recall later, “has come from those initial fantasies and dreams.”
Comment: This article is good background reading as an introduction to the phenomenon of Carl Jung. The comment towards the end that people are setting up conferences to exploit the interest in this infamous "red book" when they will not have been enough time to study its contents properly, just about sums up the culture of superficiality, the exact opposite of Jung's message of going inward and examining the soul, which is a time consuming affair.
New Charles Darwin film is 'too controversial' for religious American audiences
Daily Mail, 13th September 2009
"A new British film about Charles Darwin has failed to land a distribution deal in the States because his theories on human evolution are too controversial for religious American audiences, according to the film's producer. Creation follows the British naturalist's 'struggle between faith and reason' as he wrote his 1859 book, On The Origin Of The Species.
The film, directed by Jon Amielm was chosen to open the Toronto Film Festival and has now been sold to almost every territory in the world.
Christian film review website Movieguide.org described Darwin as 'a racist, a bigot and a 1800s naturalist whose legacy is mass murder.' The site also stated that his 'half-baked theory' influenced Adolf Hitler and led to 'atrocities, crimes against humanity, cloning and generic engineering.' Jeremy Thomas, the Oscar-winning producer of Creation, said he was astonished that such attitudes exist 150 years after On The Origin of Species was published. 'That's what we're up against. In 2009. It's amazing,' he said.
'The film has no distributor in America."
Comment: I think the opinion of the Christian flim review guide is a bit rough.... Well, I think my views mean that I am neither a creationist or an evolutionist, but I can see valid points from both sides. As far as I am concerned, the evidence points to evolutionary change being determined by cosmic blueprints and universal forces. Experts in this field realise that the evolution of humans has not been a smooth uninterupted process and there are many questions about why humans have such flawed DNA. What's more, Darwin has been criticised for his famous book, The Origin of Species (1872), for not even defining what he meant by species and the notion of the 'Tree of Life' is now looking unprovable. Quite frankly, we are experiencing rapid evolutionary change right now, so it will be interesting to see how both sides of the argument react, evolutionary biologists are already puzzled.
Andrew Usher, dean of the British Institute of Homeopathy, and a (non-clinical) partner in an NHS practice in Scotland, is working with a GP to determine if RV can save lives. Usher's Med RV project uses a team of remote viewers around the world who try to detect illnesses that have been missed by conventional scientific and medical procedures.
The scheme has been running for just over a year. Usher, the complementary medicine consultant at Dunbeath Surgery in Caithness, says it is too early for conclusive results. "I've worked on 30 cases but I need at least 100 before I can make statistical correlations. RV is never 100 per cent accurate, so it could only ever be a supplementary form of data acquisition."
Up to six remote viewers at a time are involved in a single case. They are not given any information about the patient – whose consent must be sought – other than a case number."
Comment: It seems that governments using psychic spies but using the acronym, RV (Remote Viewing) has made this human ability seem more respectable. In the United States, people who work with doctors to diagnose medical conditions are known as 'Medical Intuitives' and the best are very accurate.
The Way of the Explorer - interview with astronaut Dr. Edgar Mitchell
The Examiner, 26th August 2009
Excerpt: "Kala: I was wondering, it seems to me that for a while, there was a great avenue of space exploration and so much going on and that it seems to have stopped so cold and of course I know there was a tragic event that happened with one of the space shuttles. You talk in your book as well as about the terrible accident and why aren’t we traveling more, why aren’t we going further with more space shuttle trips.
Dr. Edgar Mitchell: Well, we will in due course, but it so happens that if you really look at the details of it, John Kennedy did create the Apollo Program, going to the Moon, somewhat out of time, ahead of its time. Actually as a civilization we really weren’t ready to do that yet. It was a political move, because the Soviets had gone into space and Kennedy realized that we didn’t want to be second best and so we set out to this really, really ambitious mission to go to the Moon. That’s fine. We did it.
That's wonderful, but I have pointed out a few times in my lectures over the years, that we will go to Mars, in due course, and back to the Moon, in due course. When we do that, it’s going to sound a little when we say, “I came from the United States, Canada, or Brittain, or Germany, or Israel, or Russia. No, we came from the Earth and we haven't got our act together yet because we're still too busy killing each other over whose god is the best god. We are not learning to view ourselves as an advanced, evolving civilization. That is what we really must learn to do, in due course, if we were to survive. All of that will take place, in due course, and we will be able to explore solar system. We will be able to go beyond it, provided we get our act together and learn to live as a civilization. Right now, it’s hard to think of that, or that we use the word you may think of as civilization."
Comment: Astronaut Dr. Edgar Mitchell is now famous for becoming very spirtual after experiencing expanded consciousness in space. NASA does admit that astronauts very often have 'hallucinations' in space, but I have never come across a description and there have been mainstream articles devoted to the fact that there are procedures that astonauts must use if one of them goes beserk in space. Hence, it does seem that there are issues if consciousness is expanded too quickly but it looks like this ex-astronaut greatly benefitted from being in space. This article is in two parts, the second half can be found here
Russian camera can see human soul
Russia Today, 30th July 2009
"A wonder device can see the soul of a dead man pass away… or at least that’s what the inventor claims. A publication of the popular Russian tabloid Life.ru gives a dramatic account of the experiments of an inventor from St Petersburg, who has created a device able to see human aura. [...]
The instrument, which was presented to us as something involved in the study of death, turned out to have been designed as a medical diagnosis tool. With about 15 years of development behind it, its inventor claims that it’s an affordable early-diagnosis tool, capable of identifying any disease, from an ulcer to a brain tumor, by scanning irregularities in an aura. Sort of a spiritual healer in metal and plastic, available to everyone for a small fee. No mystical stuff here – a patient can see his own aura on the computer screen, all thanks to the “gas discharge visualization” or GDV."
Comment: Like many wonderful Russian press releases, the meaning is a little lost in translation, but I think the scepticism is that this device is being used to diagnose the aura at death and this is NOT the original intention for the use of this equipment.
Health Ministry to hypnotists: Stop helping clients explore past lives
Haaretz News, 24th July 2009
"Israeli hypnotists were told to refrain from helping clients explore past lives, following a recent decision on the matter by a special Health Ministry advisory committee. The Advisory Committee on the Law on Hypnosis made the ruling following complaints by clients who said that they had sustained serious emotional damage because of reincarnation hypnosis sessions.
Israel has several experts on reincarnation hypnosis, who give sessions that aim to "discover who they were in past lives," as Dr. Lianna Sofer defines her treatments. "The reincarnation hypnosis allows us to return to the prenatal stage." The ministry decided not to completely ban the practice, in keeping with the decision to allow a host of other practices which are not recognized as therapeutic by modern medicine but are believed by some to be remedial."
Comment: I suppose the problem here is the skill of therapists and that nobody is guaranteed that bringing up past/other life information will be unproblematic. From my own experience of "energy balancing", some clients are just not able to cope with a blast of energy that quickly re-arranges their energy field, in these cases, efforts to balance them only makes them worse. I was warned about one client and I dutifully only carried out a 15-20 minutes of energy balancing but afterwards she still complained by email that it was "too powerful" and she had decided to go back to Reiki!
Strange! Humans Glow in Visible Light
Live Science, 22nd July 2009
"The human body literally glows, emitting a visible light in extremely small quantities at levels that rise and fall with the day, scientists now reveal. Past research has shown that the body emits visible light, 1,000 times less intense than the levels to which our naked eyes are sensitive. In fact, virtually all living creatures emit very weak light, which is thought to be a byproduct of biochemical reactions involving free radicals."
Comment: The study of biophotons is most widely known due to the research of German biophysicist Fritz-Albert Popp, who started his work in the early 1980s, but this is old news for most people in the religious/spiritual/metaphysical communities. It is well known that mystics and saints are noted for their glowing auras and there is an example of a Sufi mystic, where history records that he gave off so much light that people could read by it!
Knowing Me, Myself, And I: What Psychology Can Contribute To Self-Knowledge
Medical News Today, 17th July 2009
"How well do you know yourself? It's a question many of us struggle with, as we try to figure out how close we are to who we actually want to be. In a new report in Perspectives on Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, psychologist Timothy D. Wilson from the University of Virginia describes theories behind self-knowledge (that is, how people form beliefs about themselves), cites challenges psychologists encounter while studying it, and offers ways we can get to know ourselves a little better."
Comment: A strange little article.... Well, I can recommend Spiral Dynamics, first developed by late emeritus psychologist Clare Graves in the 1950s, who initially called it "The Emergent, Cyclical, Double-Helix Model of Adult Bio-psychosocial Systems Development." and then simplified to "The Theory of Levels of Human Existence." It will help anyone going through issues with people who obviously think differently to oneself. I have been tremendously enlightened after my own problems with people who I thought were further down the evolutionary path than me until I found out what kind of people I had been dealing with. I can even see the funny side now of little despots who cannot deal with complexity pretending to be enlightened!
In Search of the Science Behind the Healing Powers of Art
Wall Street Journal, 3rd July 2009
"Julia Strecher was 9 years old when she had her second heart transplant. Her body had rejected the first heart she received with particular vehemence: She went into cardiac arrest six times in two hours. As doctors struggled to revive her, she recalls, she could hear them debating whether to give up.
“I was trapped in my body,” says Ms. Strecher, now 18. “I was trying to tell people I was alive and not to pull the plug.” A few months after she went home with her second new heart, she began having nightmares in which she watched herself suffering cardiac arrest.
But then, she began writing down her thoughts about being helpless. Eventually she turned the details into poems and stories. “It was extremely emotionally healing and freeing,” she said. “It helped me relieve a lot of stress and provided a distraction from pain and depression.” The nightmares went away.
Ms. Strecher’s case seems a striking illustration of the healing potential of creative expression. But is it science? Can the power of the arts to soothe, transform and inspire be enlisted to treat—and perhaps even prevent—heart disease?"
Comment: This is the Wall Street Journal article teaching people that they can heal themselves through art and self-expression. It's a new world!
Father of 'Reincarnated' WWII Pilot Says Christian Faith Undeterred
Christian Post, 10th June 2009
"The father of a boy who he believes his son was a World War II fighter pilot in "a past life" says his Christian faith has remained in tact despite his new belief while his wife says the situation has "enhanced my belief system."
"I am a Christian, and this has only reaffirmed the strength of my Christian faith," Bruce C. Leininger said in an appearance Monday on Good Morning America. "It's a new reality," he added. Around nine years ago, Leininger's then two-year-old son, James, began to have recurring nightmares of a plane crash that got worse and more frequent as time went on."
Comment: If you do the research, you will find out that many scholars believe that references to reincarnation were "removed" from the Bible. If you want to read, I can recommend from my bookshelf,
Reincarnation: The Missing Link in Christianity (1997) by Elizabeth Clare Phrophet
Reincarnation, The Phoenix Fire Mystery: An East-West dialogue on death and rebirth from the worlds of religion, science, psychology, art and literature (1998)
Journey of Souls: Case Studies of Life Between Lives (1994) by Michael Newton PH.D
Destiny of Souls: New Case Studies of Life Between Lives (2000) by Michael Newton PH.D.
Michael Newton is a state certified hynotherapist who made a mistake one day and accidentally went back too far and ended up bringing up information from in-between lives and other 'past' lives. The other interesting thing is that I found out whilst living in Norway, that it's illegal to regress people to find out about their past lives, it seems that the Norwegian state wants citizens to be under the impression that their current life is their one and only opportunity.....
Prayer May Reshape Your Brain ... And Your Reality
National Public Radio, 20th May 2009
"A Sense Of Oneness With The Universe: Newberg did that with Michael Baime. Baime is a doctor at the University of Pennsylvania and a Tibetan Buddhist who has meditated at least an hour a day for the past 40 years. During a peak meditative experience, Baime says, he feels oneness with the universe, and time slips away.
"It's as if the present moment expands to fill all of eternity," he explains, "that there has never been anything but this eternal now." When Baime meditated in Newberg's brain scanner, his brain mirrored those feelings. As expected, his frontal lobes lit up on the screen: Meditation is sheer concentration, after all. But what fascinated Newberg was that Baime's parietal lobes went dark. "This is an area that normally takes our sensory information, tries to create for us a sense of ourselves and orient that self in the world," he explains. "When people lose their sense of self, feel a sense of oneness, a blurring of the boundary between self and other, we have found decreases in activity in that area."
Newberg found that result not only with Baime, but also with other monks he scanned. It was the same when he imaged the brains of Franciscan nuns praying and Sikhs chanting. They all felt the same oneness with the universe. When it comes to the brain, Newberg says, spiritual experience is spiritual experience.
"There is no Christian, there is no Jewish, there is no Muslim, it's just all one," Newberg says. A little theological dynamite there — but, remember, the research is just beginning."
Comment: Quite profound
When People Can't Stop Praying A Man Describes His Rare Religious Form of OCD
ABC News, 31st March 2008
"For centuries, Catholic priests wrote about how to subdue it. Some historians surmise Martin Luther had it, along with several renowned saints. When he was in seventh grade, Cole M., now 23, saw an episode of "20/20" and surmised he had it, though he didn't know its exact name: scrupulosity. Scrupulosity is a rare form of obsessive compulsive disorder focused on prayers, rituals or thoughts rather than the more common germ-phobia and compulsive hand washing. "Whatever thing that is most important to you, that's what the obsessive compulsive disorder will grab," Cole said"
Comment: Off-topic, but interesting anyway!
How to spot a hidden religious agenda
New Scientist, 28th February 2009
Full text: "As a book reviews editor at New Scientist, I often come across so-called science books which after a few pages reveal themselves to be harbouring ulterior motives. I have learned to recognise clues that the author is pushing a religious agenda. As creationists in the US continue to lose court battles over attempts to have intelligent design taught as science in federally funded schools, their strategy has been forced to... well, evolve. That means ensuring that references to pseudoscientific concepts like ID are more heavily veiled. So I thought I'd share a few tips for spotting what may be religion in science's clothing."
Red flag number one: the term "scientific materialism". "Materialism" is most often used in contrast to something else - something non-material, or supernatural. Proponents of ID frequently lament the scientific claim that humans are the product of purely material forces. At the same time, they never define how non-material forces might work. I have yet to find a definition that characterises non-materialism by what it is, rather than by what it is not."
Comment: Apparently, due to 'objections', this was 'pulled' from New Scientist, and reading the article, it seems this writer is still living in the 'dark ages'. I am not a Creationist or an Evolutionist but when someone seems so totally unaware of advances in scientific thinking and stuck in some old scientific paradigm, then you have to really wonder. Well it seems that tolerance and the desire for some balance has won the day here.
Brains 'are hardwired to believe in God and imaginary friends'
Daily Mail, 5th February 2009
"Religion is part of human nature and our brains are hard wired to believe in God, scientists believe. The evidence includes studies of babies and children which have shown the brain is programmed to think of the mind as being separate from the body. This distinction allows us to believe in the supernatural, to conjure up imaginary friends - and to conceive of gods, this week's New Scientist reports.[...]
New Scientist says: 'All of the researchers involved stress that none of this says anything about the existence or otherwise of gods: whether or not a belief is true is independent of why people believe it.'"
Comment: As the dimensions merge, we can only speculate how soon many start to clearly perceive our new reality. Already it seems that some are awed by their encounters with multi-dimensional entities, but it will be interesting to here accounts of others who attempt to downplay their experiences, especially if they are occur in a group setting.
Our world may be a giant hologram
New Scientist, 15th January 2009
"For the past seven years, this German set-up has been looking for gravitational waves - ripples in space-time thrown off by super-dense astronomical objects such as neutron stars and black holes. GEO600 has not detected any gravitational waves so far, but it might inadvertently have made the most important discovery in physics for half a century. For many months, the GEO600 team-members had been scratching their heads over inexplicable noise that is plaguing their giant detector. Then, out of the blue, a researcher approached them with an explanation. In fact, he had even predicted the noise before he knew they were detecting it.
According to Craig Hogan, a physicist at the Fermilab particle physics lab in Batavia, Illinois, GEO600 has stumbled upon the fundamental limit of space-time - the point where space-time stops behaving like the smooth continuum Einstein described and instead dissolves into "grains", just as a newspaper photograph dissolves into dots as you zoom in. "It looks like GEO600 is being buffeted by the microscopic quantum convulsions of space-time," says Hogan."
Comment: The scientists are looking for ripples in space-time but the detector is being "buffetted" left right and centre by "noise" then someone comes along and tells them, er that's exactly what you should expect.... isn't the scientific method wonderful.... Maybe an explanation is that space-time is under constant bombardment, rather than the occasional ripple, space-time is in a maelstrom as wave after wave of cosmic energies pass through from the galactic center. Scientific studies state that everything in this dimension is dependent on space-time or higher dimensions held in space-time, we know that something fundamental is taking place, but for all the millions spent of detectors, we are none the wiser and those who are interested can only rely on information from metaphysical sources.
Russia licenses faith healers
Miami Herald, 21st December 2008
"For the past two years, the Federal Health Service has been issuing licenses to practitioners of what it calls "traditional medicine," meaning anything from the use of herbal treatments to the manipulation of "auras." His claims buttressed by officialdom, Fadkin charges patients 3,500 rubles ($150) per session. And he says business is very good.
"Every day I learn something new," the smiling Muscovite says, gesturing to what he says is an invisible aura surrounding him - "because all the information I need is out there, in the vast energy field surrounding us." So far, 130 healers, including Fadkin, have passed the service's voluntary testing program, which promoters in the government say can determine whether someone has the inherent ability to cure. The program is limited to Moscow, but a Russian lawmaker is pushing to extend it nationwide and make it mandatory. [...]
The program includes a background check, a scan of electrical activity in the brain and a committee review of the results. The agency charges applicants 10,000 rubles ($428) for the tests. Andrei Karpeev, director of the Federal Scientific Clinical Center for Traditional Methods of Diagnostics and Healing, which administers the tests, insists that folk medicine, including psychic healing, is backed by scientific studies. While he acknowledges some of the criteria for determining who has healing powers are subjective, he claims the tests are able to wean out "charlatans." According to Karpeev, there are perhaps 100,000 people in Russia offering to use magic, psychic or other extra-sensory methods to cure illnesses, read minds or cast spells."
Comment: Well, quite frankly I have been scandalised by what goes on in the New Age community. However, there are so many scientific studies that have proven that genuine healers are most certainly generating unique brain waves patterns when they are channelling energies from the the Universal field. The Russians are right, this is measureable.
Selflessness, Core Of All Major World Religions, Has Neuropsychological Connection
Science Daily, 17th December 2008
"All spiritual experiences are based in the brain. That statement is truer than ever before, according to a University of Missouri neuropsychologist. An MU study has data to support a neuropsychological model that proposes spiritual experiences associated with selflessness are related to decreased activity in the right parietal lobe of the brain.
The study is one of the first to use individuals with traumatic brain injury to determine this connection. Researchers say the implication of this connection means people in many disciplines, including peace studies, health care or religion can learn different ways to attain selflessness, to experience transcendence, and to help themselves and others.
This study, along with other recent neuroradiological studies of Buddhist meditators and Francescan nuns, suggests that all individuals, regardless of cultural background or religion, experience the same neuropsychological functions during spiritual experiences, such as transcendence. Transcendence, feelings of universal unity and decreased sense of self, is a core tenet of all major religions. Meditation and prayer are the primary vehicles by which such spiritual transcendence is achieved.
Comment: The analysis here is very misleading and leads some people to think that by using certain meditation techniques or drugs that work on the pineal gland, they have reached the pinnacle of spiritual attainment. Others think that because they have developed the use of extra-sensory perception that they have reached a level of 'enlightenment'. Unfortunatrely, the 'guru' culture that now exists is insidious and infiltrated by many who have zero interest in the spiritual development of their devotees. Thus, I would like to take the opportunity to provide an excerpt from an interview with Mata Amritanandamayi (aka Amma, "the hugging saint"). "When You Go Beyond the Ego You Become an Offering to the World" by Amy Edlestein (from What Is Enlightenment? magazine, issue 17/Spring-Summer 2000). See the Joyfire article Spiritual Intelligence.
Does the Human Mind Have Potential "Super Powers"?
Daily Galaxy, 10th November 2008
"However, some of the most incredible minds on Earth lack this ability to filter irrelevant facts, or perhaps it is more accurate to say that to a savant, the irrelevant IS relevant, and incredibly so. Somehow their brains are able to store and access incredible loads of information, even perceiving and relating to this information in an entirely different way.
Stephen Wiltshire is considered an autistic savant. He has an ability which can certainly be described as a "super power".
Sometimes referred to as the "human camera", Wilshire has the unnerving ability to draw exact replicas of intricate structures, buildings and landscapes—virtually anything he lays eyes on—after a quick glance. Without taking notes or drawing rough sketches, Wiltshire methodically replicates what his eyes have seen down to the exact number of windows in tall skyscrapers."
Comment: I find it really interesting that various organisations and military establishments have been investigating and developing the use of certain "super powers" like remote viewing for decades, but in the mainstream media these same "super powers" are questioned. I radically changed my opinion about the use of intuition and other "super powers" after the Asian Tsunami in December 2003 when I heard about animals and isolated tribes running for the hills, but saw the most terrible pictures of hundreds of the rotting bodies of tourists caught by the tsunami. In a so-called modern technological world, there wasn't even the ability to warn people by mobile phone using an emergency text messaging system. I was absolutely apalled, people have been so fooled.
Why faith in God really can relieve pain
Daily Mail, 28th September 2008
"For centuries, religious believers have endured suffering with impressive fortitude. Now scientists claim to have discovered that faith in God really can relieve pain.
New research at Oxford University has found that the Christian martyrs may well have been able to draw on their religion to reduce the agony of, for example, being burnt at the stake. In a bizarre experiment, academics at The Oxford Centre For Science Of The Mind 'tortured' 12 Roman Catholics and 12 atheists with electric shocks as they studied a painting of the Virgin Mary. They found that the Catholics seemed to be able to block out much of the pain."
Comment: It seems that our scientists can prove that there are real benefits from believing in a higher power.
Military wants to study mind-reading
CNN, 15th August 2008
"The U.S. military is paying scientists to study ways to read people's thoughts.
Scientists use electroencephalography, or brain wave-reading technology, to measure brain activity. The hope is that the research could someday lead to a gadget capable of translating the thoughts of soldiers who suffered brain injuries in combat or even stroke patients in hospitals.
But the research also raises concerns that such mind-reading technology could be used to interrogate the enemy. Armed with a $4 million grant from the Army, scientists are studying brain signals to try to decipher what a person is thinking and to whom the person wants to direct the message."
Comment: Historical sources tell us that this type of research has been ongoing for at least 50 years.
Einstein letter says religion "childish superstitions"
Guardian, 13th May 2008
"Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind." So said Albert Einstein, and his famous aphorism has been the source of endless debate between believers and non-believers wanting to claim the greatest scientist of the 20th century as their own.
A little known letter written by him, however, may help to settle the argument - or at least provoke further controversy about his views.
Due to be auctioned this week in London after being in a private collection for more than 50 years, the document leaves no doubt that the theoretical physicist was no supporter of religious beliefs, which he regarded as "childish superstitions".
"In the 1970’s it was generally believed that the Earth must be the centre of life in the whole universe, an antithesis of Buddhist cosmology of course," said the Cardiff University Mathematician and Astronomer Professor Chandra Wickramasinghe in an interview with this writer.
"It became amply clear to me that Buddhist cosmology was incredibly modern in its outlook, even perhaps post-modern. According to Buddhist texts, life is prevalent across the universe and life is not confined to Earth. Buddhism talks about a multitude of planetary systems and an infinity of "inhabited worlds". In common with Hindu and Vedic ideas, Buddhism holds that "life is a truly cosmic phenomenon," the reputed astronomer added."
Could there be proof to the theory that we're ALL psychic?
Daily Mail, 28th January 2008
"While Dr Roe's work may appear controversial, he is starting to garner the support of eminent academics such as Professor Brian Josephson, a Nobel Prize-winning physicist from Cambridge University, who says: "The experiments have been designed to rule out luck and chance. I consider the evidence for remote viewing to be pretty clear-cut."
The military is also taking a keen interest. The Ministry of Defence takes the phenomena seriously enough to have commissioned its own research."
"She says: "Using the standards applied to any other area of science, you have to conclude that certain psychic phenomena, such as remote viewing, have been well established. "The results are not due to chance or flaws in the experiments." Comment: Scientists just rehashing the same experiments, over and over again.
Geometry is all A shape could describe the cosmos and all it contains
Economist.com, 28 November, 2007 "ONE of the mysteries of the universe is why it should speak the language of mathematics. Numbers and the relationships between them are, after all, just abstract reasoning. Yet mathematics has shown itself to be particularly adept at describing both the contents of the universe and the forces that act on them."
"Using geometry to describe the world is not new. Murray Gell-Mann performed a similar trick 50 years ago in an attempt to make sense of the plethora of particles that was then emerging from experiments. He placed these on the points of a geometric structure known as SU(3), and found that, by manipulating the structure, he was able to reproduce the interactions of the real world."
Comment: Nice, straight forward article. Now imagine that those particles are just whirlwinds of interdimensional and hyperdimensional plasma, and then imagine that these intelligent particles occasionally re-arrange themselves based on universal cycles, then finally consider that you are made up of these intelligent particles and can choose to incorporate the most intelligent and intuitive particles that can existence. Next, ask yourself the question, what is the Holy Spirit?
Why quantum physicists talk like mystics
Inquirer.net, 12th November 2007
"Psychics and mystics have found an unexpected ally within the ranks of a relatively new scientific field called by various names like quantum mechanics, modern physics, particle physics and, lately, quantum physics."
Comment: Nice short article, but I can't say I believe that psychics and mystics deserve unreserved credibility though, there are just far too many without any principals.
Brain stimulation sparks out-of-body experience
Reuters, 1st November 2007
"Electrodes implanted into the brain to treat a man with a stubborn case of ringing in the ear instead sparked an out-of-body sensation, doctors in Belgium reported on Wednesday. Stimulating the electrodes made the 63-year-old patient feel like he was outside his body twice, for 15 and 21 seconds, and allowed the doctors to use a PET scanner to track which parts of the brain became active during the experience."
Comment: Hmmm...
Scientists Study Out-Of-Body Experiences
Associated Press, 24th August 2007
"Researchers in England and Switzerland have figured out ways to confuse the sensory signals received by the brain, allowing people to seem to be standing aside and watching themselves."
Comment: This article does not tell us anything knew, these scientists can only confirm what many people know as fact.
Scientists admit yoga can relieve stress
News.com.au, 17 July 2007
"Indian researcher Ratna Sharma has told the World Congress of Neuroscience in Melbourne she has the first scientific evidence that yoga helps PMS." [...]
"The fact that it appears to influence symptoms and also change levels of an important hormone is very significant indeed."
Boeing's Psychic Lab
Blog Wired, 5th July 2007
The headline refers to one 1960s experiment that can be found on the online archives of the Defense Technical Information Center .
Comment: History tells us that many countries and elite organisations, investigated psychic phenomena and proved that human consciounsess could be used for ESPionage.
Pentagon's Psychic Vision Revisited
Wired Blog Network, 28 June 2007
"John Alexander, a former Green Beret, earned a reputation in the 1990s as a vocal advocate of nonlethal weapons research. He was also a champion of the government’s now defunct “Remote Viewing” program, which, until its termination in 1995, sought to use psychics in the service of national security. Today, he continues to advise the military and frequently writes on national security issues. We met for dinner earlier this month and it was about the time that Alexander started talking about witches that I asked him if I could record some of our dinner conversation. After all, it’s not too often that you get to talk about witchcraft in the context of national security.
Excerpts of the interview follow:"
Comment: This interview with a military adviser to the US government, once again confirms the use of "nonlethal weapons research" and the use of psychics in the service of national security i.e "Remote Viewing". We are told that RV [Remote Viewing] program was successful but it ended in 1995.
Evolutionary Cognitive Neuroscience
Dual Use Discipline for Understanding & Managing Complexity and Altering Warfare
Cryptome, 24 June 2007 This is the final paragraph of this article. "Dangers:
Neuroweapons may be an outcome of ECN R&D programs. It is likely that DOD may classify as Top Secret programs that seek to turn the speed of thought into a weapon, or programs that blur the line between human and machine. With classification, no one may ever know of the existence of such programs.
Some in the scientific community have suggested that, beyond the development of neuro-biomachinery and genetic manipulation, non-traceable neuroweapons with viral genetic payloads may be used to disrupt the brain and central nervous system. As a result, the creation of neurosecurity advisory and/or ethics boards may be required to keep R&D and testing efforts in bounds."
Comment: My opinion is that if people are balanced and empowered with evolutionary energies then regardless, there is no neuroweapon that can be used against them, it will simply bounce off the human energy field as it will act as a shield.
Pentagon Spends $78 Billion a Year on Weapons and Space Research, Some of it Whacky Fringe Science Yields 'Gay Bombs' and Psychic Teleportation
ABC News, 21 June 2007 Comment: Interesting! The mainstream press are telling Joe Public that the military has discovered that psychic teleportation is real. "Just three years ago, the military funded a specious study of psychic teleportation, according to the Federation of American Scientists. An 88-page report prepared by the Air Force Research Lab contended that moving through mind powers is "quite real and can be controlled."
This long article tells us that the budget for military spending is so large that made-up enemies are required to justify the expense. Hence, the following statement; "Living here in Washington, you have no idea how we are inventing enemies," said Debat. "Hundreds of people are trying to figure out how to make China our enemy because there is so much money and power in the Pentagon." Does anyone else think there is something wrong here? See also Laughing bullets
Scientist takes on the psychic THE WASHINGTON TIMES, 23 April 2007
"Many people claim expertise on psychic phenomena such as telepathy. But few can boast top-notch scientific credentials.
That's what separates Rupert Sheldrake from the New Age pack. A botanist who earned a doctorate in biochemistry from Cambridge University and later studied at Harvard University, Mr. Sheldrake has earned an international reputation for applying scientific method to quasi-scientific subjects. "
Comment: Article about Rupert Sheldrakes and his theory of morphogenesis. Again we see reporting of the religious zeal of scientists. Sheldrake is described as "a heretic in the church of science." We find his theory likened to that of "the Force" in "Star Wars" and Sheldrake's books "the best candidate there has been for book burning in many years."
Researchers polled 1,144 doctors for the study, which was published in the Archives of Internal Medicine, The Los Angeles Times reported. Only 1 percent said they believe religious faith and spirituality have a negative effect, while 2 percent said it has no effect and 12 percent said they think the positive and negative effects are balanced.
Asked about their own religious beliefs, 54 percent said they think God sometimes intervenes to help patients, 28 percent do not and 18 percent are agnostic."
Comment: Well, even the medical establishment are becoming enlightened! After decades of seeing the "placebo effect" work, how else could they respond?
Power of prayer flunks an unusual test
Large study had Christians pray for heart-surgery patients
MSNBC, March 30, 2007 Comment: I think there are some major issues with this type of research caused by not understanding how the universe works. Even though some may think that prayer is about asking a higher power to help a fellow human being, we are actually commanding spiritual energy inherent in the universe and programming that energy in such a way that sometimes it may become less effective for the person we are trying to help. These days I send golden energy with the intent for balance, which means that this intelligent spiritual energy works with the consciousness of the recipient in their best interest, whatever that maybe. For example, it could be that the recipient is looking for peace of mind not healing from a particular physical ailment etc, we don't know what the best option is for another, but we can command energy to provide support. Also there are so many factors to consider with how experiments are conducted that one failure means nothing. The Daily Show take on this study is hilarious. See link here
Meditation Sharpens the Mind
Live Science, 7th May 2007 Comment: The problem I have here is that people who become meditators sometimes start thinking they are somehow more spiritual than people who don't meditate. I've met these people and they are unaware that meditation and any form of spiritual practice is not that helpful unless the heart chakra is open and the spiritual practice actually changes the person for the better. There are reports of meditators becoming depressed because they become too rigid in their practice too. The other factor is that meditation can open people up to quite dramatic mystical experiences and when that happens, some people end up in a situation where there is no one to turn to for help. I know these things, because it has happened to me.
UK military experiments with ESP
ParanormalReview.com, March 1st 2007 Comment: The UK Military have been dabbling in Remote Viewing and a recently released previously classified report proves it. The British government utilise psychics and the clearest historical example must be when teams of psychics were used to break Hitler's communication encryption on a daily basis. There is NO way that this could have been done any other way. I sometimes feel sorry for skeptics, they must really feel betrayed!
Recommended!
Project Identification: 
Positive Skepticism 
The Book of Destiny 
Spiritual Evolution 
It is hard to know how our future descendants will regard the little sliver of history that we live in. It is hard to know what events will seem important to them, what the narrative of now will look like to the twenty-fifth century mind. We tend to think of our time as one uniquely shaped by the advance of technology, but more and more I suspect that this will be remembered as an age of cosmology---as the moment when the human mind first internalized the cosmos that gave rise to it. Over the past century, since the discovery that our universe is expanding, science has quietly begun to sketch the structure of the entire cosmos, extending its explanatory powers across a hundred billion galaxies, to the dawn of space and time itself. It is breathtaking to consider how quickly we have come to understand the basics of everything from star formation to galaxy formation to universe formation. And now, equipped with the predictive power of quantum physics, theoretical physicists are beginning to push even further, into new universes and new physics, into controversies once thought to be squarely within the domain of theology or philosophy.
Sometimes it really is the thinking that makes it so. Spend your days focusing on your vibrant health and you will be vibrantly healthy. In contrast you could make it known that you lack a healthy lifestyle, and as a result you will continue to live an unhealthy lifestyle. While this belief is held by many, a recent study has come out with even mainstream scientists proclaiming the very real power of thought.
For the past two and a half years the SSE has been offering copies of EdgeScience to the public free of charge. In order to continue doing so, we need your help. Obviously, we would like you to become a member of SSE, in which case you would receive the latest digital issue of EdgeScience as it is published. You would also receive the quarterly Journal of Scientific Exploration, as well as other member benefits.
A "theory of everything" from a scientist at Case Western Reserve University got a lot of attention for positing that inanimate objects, from planets and water to strands of DNA, are alive. Not only is the assertion bunk, but the scientific and media phenomena surrounding the study reveals how sometimes crackpot ideas can get traction.
Rupert Sheldrake has researched telepathy in dogs, crystals and Chinese medicine in his quest to explore phenomena that science finds hard to explain
There was a time when it was very dangerous not to believe in God. In ancient Athens, Socrates was hounded and eventually executed for questioning the city-state’s gods. Throughout most of history, to be ‘godless’ was considered a form of moral decadence deserving punishment. In the seventeenth century, even John Locke, the great liberal philosopher who promoted the idea of religious toleration, regarded atheism as intolerable. He said atheists should not be tolerated because ‘promises, covenants, and oaths, which are the bonds of human society, can have no hold upon an atheist’.
Scientists have linked two diamonds in a mysterious process called entanglement that is normally only seen on the quantum scale. [...]
Today we welcome Dr. Eben Alexander to Skeptiko. Dr. Alexander has been an academic neurosurgeon for more than 25 years, including 15 years at Harvard Medical School in Boston. In November of 2008, he had a near-death experience that changed his life and caused him to rethink everything he thought he knew about the human brain and consciousness. [...]
Long-time NDE researchers and author P.M.H. Atwater reveals what she’s learned from the nearly 4,000 near-death experieners she’s interviewed.
Edge Science is a new magazine from the SSE. Why Edge Science? Because scientific knowledge is still full of unknowns. What remains to be discovered—what we don't know—very likely dwarfs what we do know. And what we think we know may not be entirely correct or fully understood. Anomalies, which researchers tend to sweep under the rug, should be actively pursued as clues to potential breakthroughs and new directions in science.
There's more to your mind than your brain--your body plays a part
in everything from social savvy to mathematical ability
How the patient takes the news will determine if there will be metastasis and if other cancers form in the lungs, liver or kidneys. (Metastasis is very rare in animals.)
Many Russians may remember a black and white documentary of the years of perestroika in which a woman moved small objects sitting before her on a table and rotated direction of the magnetic devices. Ninel Kulagina is still considered one of the most mysterious phenomena in the field of ESP.
Edge Science is a new magazine from the SSE.
Why Edge Science? Because scientific knowledge is still full of unknowns. What remains to be discovered—what we don't know—very likely dwarfs what we do know. And what we think we know may not be entirely correct or fully understood. Anomalies, which researchers tend to sweep under the rug, should be actively pursued as clues to potential breakthroughs and new directions in science.
The new issue, which can be downloaded for free in PDF form, includes "Capturing Intention? The PIP Photography and Shamanic Intervention" by Zoe Bran, "The Ka in Ancient Egyptian" by Callum E. Cooper, "Anthropology, Evolution and Anomalous Experience" by James McClenon; "Supernatural Abductions: UFO and Folklore Narratives" by Franco Bejarano; and "Paul Devereux Live at the Rhine: Naturalizing Psi as the Anthropology of Consciousness" by Ryan Hurd.
P.S. I have noticed there are a lot of people talking about the Age of Aquarius arriving in 700 years, but these are people repeating other people's opinions. There are some who claim the Age of Aquarius has already started and the estimates vary from the 15th century CE to the start of the new millenium! To be honest, I am only really interested in the opinions of those who can actually point a telescope in the right direction on the 21st March (Vernal Equinox) to see what constellation actually rises just before dawn because this is what how ancient astronomers determined the astrological age. According to astronomers who have, the constellation of Aquarius has been the heliacal rising constellation for some centuries! Now the other argument is that this is only true because of all the 'adjustments' made to the Gregorian calendar. I can't disagree with this argument as there are too many historians who simply refuse to believe that most of the history that has been passed down to us is even remotely true before the 11th century, (the dates of historical astrological charts are rejected too.) If you have studied this subject, you will know that a certain well known religious establishment has a well documented and well earned reputation for extensive forgery and they were the ones in charge of the calendars and we know that the constant changing of dates completely wrecked the calendars to the point where the priests themselves actually had no idea what century they were living in. If you don't know this, then check the facts! That is why Mayan Timekeepers and Elders have rather curtly pointed out that they don't have a problem with their calendars....
So, this state of affairs is so bad that I am only really interested in hard facts and Space Weather is a reality. The other thing of real interest is why religious and metaphysical folk have not pointed out the importance of Space Weather because there has been extensive literature about the arrival of new energies associated with a New World Age. This period of time has been given many names by different cultures, religious, metaphysical and esoteric groups. Interestingly, The Age of Aquarius has been associated with an outpouring of The Holy Spirit and this reminds me of Gioacchino da Fiore, or Joachim of Fiore (1135-1202), an Italian mystic, theologian, and philosopher of history, today despised by The 'Holy' Church because he pointed out that when the Holy Spirit arrives, their time will be up! Quite frankly, I have come to the conclusion that many who claim to be spiritual are anything but.... they simply have no interest in reality because reality is spiritual.
Edge Science is a new magazine from the SSE.
Why Edge Science? Because scientific knowledge is still full of unknowns. What remains to be discovered—what we don't know—very likely dwarfs what we do know. And what we think we know may not be entirely correct or fully understood. Anomalies, which researchers tend to sweep under the rug, should be actively pursued as clues to potential breakthroughs and new directions in science.
WEDNESDAY, March 23 (HealthDay News) -- New research finds that people who frequently attend religious services are significantly more likely to become obese by the time they reach middle age.
U.S. researchers said Wednesday they have found a way to attack late-stage breast and liver cancer tumors by attaching a potent chemotherapy drug to tiny carbon particles known as nanodiamonds.
No, wizards have not learned how to transmute lead into gold and they haven't found any rejuvenating elixir of life. But the scholars who write the history of science and technology no longer lump alchemy in with witchcraft as a pseudo-science.
Researchers from Oxford, Cambridge and two German universities made their conclusions after a novel experiment examining the role of conscious thought in pain perception. First, 22 volunteers had a pain device put on their skin that was too hot for comfort.
ScienceDaily (Jan. 21, 2011) — Participating in an 8-week mindfulness meditation program appears to make measurable changes in brain regions associated with memory, sense of self, empathy and stress. In a study that will appear in the January 30 issue of Psychiatry Research: Neuroimaging, a team led by Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) researchers report the results of their study, the first to document meditation-produced changes over time in the brain's grey matter.
Edge Science is a new magazine from the SSE.
Why Edge Science? Because scientific knowledge is still full of unknowns. What remains to be discovered—what we don't know—very likely dwarfs what we do know. And what we think we know may not be entirely correct or fully understood. Anomalies, which researchers tend to sweep under the rug, should be actively pursued as clues to potential breakthroughs and new directions in science.
A simple sugar pill may help treat a disease — even if patients know they're getting fake medicine.
The finding, reported online Wednesday in the journal PloS One, may point the way to wider — and more ethical — applications of the well-known "placebo effect."
For thousands of years, religion has posed some unanswerable questions: Who are we? What's the meaning of life? What does it mean to be religious?
Religion makes you happy because of its social rather than spiritual aspects, scientists have revealed.
Cardiologist and NDE Researcher Dr. Pim van Lommel discuses how his research with near-death experiencers has changed his beliefs about life and consciousness.
Most science papers don’t begin with a description of psi, those “anomalous processes of information or energy transfer” that have no material explanation. (Popular examples of psi include telepathy, clairvoyance and psychokinesis.) It’s even less common for a serious science paper, published in an elite journal, to show that psi is a real phenomenon. But that’s exactly what Daryl Bem of Cornell University has demonstrated in his new paper, “Feeling the Future: Experimental Evidence for Anomalous Retroactive Influences on Cognition and Affect,” which was just published in The Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.
Ever get that feeling that someone is staring at you? Ever wonder how you got that feeling? Psyleron provides products for the public and researchers to explore mind-matter effects, such as the sense of knowing someone is staring at you.
EdgeScience is a new magazine from the SSE.
Why EdgeScience? Because scientific knowledge is still full of unknowns. What remains to be discovered—what we don't know—very likely dwarfs what we do know. And what we think we know may not be entirely correct or fully understood. Anomalies, which researchers tend to sweep under the rug, should be actively pursued as clues to potential breakthroughs and new directions in science. pdf link issue 5 
EdgeScience is a new magazine from the SSE.
Why EdgeScience? Because scientific knowledge is still full of unknowns. What remains to be discovered—what we don't know—very likely dwarfs what we do know. And what we think we know may not be entirely correct or fully understood. Anomalies, which researchers tend to sweep under the rug, should be actively pursued as clues to potential breakthroughs and new directions in science. pdf link issue 4 
A boy of three claims he saw his great grandmother in heaven while he was clinically dead after falling into a pond. Paul Eicke came back to life more than three hours after his heart stopped beating.
Recent research has determined that some U.S. military personnel are better than others in the ability to detect hidden improvised explosive devices (IEDs). But why?
An 83-year-old Indian holy man who says he has spent seven decades without food or water has astounded a team of military doctors who studied him during a two-week observation period.
Prahlad Jani spent a fortnight in a hospital in the western India state of Gujarat under constant surveillance from a team of 30 medics equipped with cameras and closed circuit television.
If you have made a difficult decision and want to stick to it, go and wash your hands. A study has revealed that hand washing, long associated with absolving the mind of guilt, can also erase any doubts about everyday choices.
The mere act of kindness, or one of evil, can boost willpower and physical strength, a new study suggests.
The results, based on three experiments, show that those who performed good deeds, or envisioned themselves acting charitably, were able to hold a weight or squeeze a hand grip significantly longer than those who didn't perform or think about such deeds. But evil acts appeared to confer similar and perhaps even greater superpowers.
Two Indian scientists are wielding sophisticated mathematics to dissect and analyse the traditional meditation chanting sound "Om". The Om team has published six monographs in academic journals. These plumb certain acoustic subtleties of Om, which these researchers say is "the divine sound". Om has many variations. In a study published in the International Journal of Computer Science and Network Security, the researchers explain: "It may be very fast, several cycles per second. [...]
The notion of a collective global consciousness is accepted truth within many cultures, but scoffed at by modern scientists. That may change.
WHEN we fall under the spell of a charismatic figure, areas of the brain responsible for scepticism and vigilance become less active. That's the finding of a study which looked at people's response to prayers spoken by someone purportedly possessing divine healing powers.
CERTAIN parts of the brain - which control scepticism and vigilance - appear to deactivate in some people when they're in the presence of a speaker who they believe has divine healing powers, scientists in Denmark have found.
Introducing EdgeScience - the new magazine from the SSE. Why EdgeScience? Because scientific knowledge is still full of unknowns. What remains to be discovered—what we don't know—very likely dwarfs what we do know. And what we think we know may not be entirely correct or fully understood. Anomalies, which researchers tend to sweep under the rug, should be actively pursued as clues to potential breakthroughs and new directions in science.
Dim lights can make it seem as if no one is watching, triggering moral transgressions in many people, a new study suggests.
Past research has shown that when people are concealed from view by others, say when they are wearing hoods, these individuals will be more likely to commit criminal acts and other bad behaviors.
Glenda lost her husband, David, in a car crash. She made his organs available for transplant. A few years later, as part of a study by neuropsychologist Paul Pearsall, she met the young Spanish-speaking man who had received her late husband’s heart. Filled with emotion, Glenda asked if she could lay her hand on his chest. “I love you, David,” she said. “Everything’s copacetic.”
We have all been guilty of a transgression at one time or another. That's because we're not perfect. We all commit hurtful acts, violate trust, and hope for forgiveness.
I’m so excited about this new magazine 
THE young man woke feeling dizzy. He got up and turned around, only to see himself still lying in bed. He shouted at his sleeping body, shook it, and jumped on it. The next thing he knew he was lying down again, but now seeing himself standing by the bed and shaking his sleeping body. Stricken with fear, he jumped out of the window. His room was on the third floor. He was found later, badly injured.
Dr. Rupert Sheldrake: Well yes. I mean it sounds as if he’s tried really hard over a long period of time and nothing I do ever works when they do it.
"Gold is in the news, not only because of its record high at $1,060 an ounce according to the Globe and Mail, but also through Australian scientists’ recent study of a bacterium that plays a basic role in the cycle of solid gold formation.
The belief in telepathy is deeply rooted in many of us, and not only science fiction fans. Mothers ring their daughters thousands of miles away, and their daughters say,
"In a world filled with dogma, doctrine and discipline, it is accurate to say most of us strive to do what we believe is 'right.' These convictions and beliefs permeate every aspect of our lives, including education, ethics and even common law.
This is a story about a nearly 100-year-old book, bound in red leather, which has spent the last quarter century secreted away in a bank vault in Switzerland. [...]
"A new British film about Charles Darwin has failed to land a distribution deal in the States because his theories on human evolution are too controversial for religious American audiences, according to the film's producer. Creation follows the British naturalist's 'struggle between faith and reason' as he wrote his 1859 book, On The Origin Of The Species.
The film, directed by Jon Amielm was chosen to open the Toronto Film Festival and has now been sold to almost every territory in the world.
"So far, so spooky – and frankly unbelievable. Or is it? The NHS is involved in an ongoing trial to establish whether RV has social and medical applications.
Excerpt: "Kala: I was wondering, it seems to me that for a while, there was a great avenue of space exploration and so much going on and that it seems to have stopped so cold and of course I know there was a tragic event that happened with one of the space shuttles. You talk in your book as well as about the terrible accident and why aren’t we traveling more, why aren’t we going further with more space shuttle trips.
"A wonder device can see the soul of a dead man pass away… or at least that’s what the inventor claims. A publication of the popular Russian tabloid Life.ru gives a dramatic account of the experiments of an inventor from St Petersburg, who has created a device able to see human aura. [...]
"The human body literally glows, emitting a visible light in extremely small quantities at levels that rise and fall with the day, scientists now reveal. Past research has shown that the body emits visible light, 1,000 times less intense than the levels to which our naked eyes are sensitive. In fact, virtually all living creatures emit very weak light, which is thought to be a byproduct of biochemical reactions involving free radicals."
"How well do you know yourself? It's a question many of us struggle with, as we try to figure out how close we are to who we actually want to be. In a new report in Perspectives on Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, psychologist Timothy D. Wilson from the University of Virginia describes theories behind self-knowledge (that is, how people form beliefs about themselves), cites challenges psychologists encounter while studying it, and offers ways we can get to know ourselves a little better."
"For centuries, Catholic priests wrote about how to subdue it. Some historians surmise Martin Luther had it, along with several renowned saints. When he was in seventh grade, Cole M., now 23, saw an episode of "20/20" and surmised he had it, though he didn't know its exact name: scrupulosity. Scrupulosity is a rare form of obsessive compulsive disorder focused on prayers, rituals or thoughts rather than the more common germ-phobia and compulsive hand washing. "Whatever thing that is most important to you, that's what the obsessive compulsive disorder will grab," Cole said"
Full text: "As a book reviews editor at New Scientist, I often come across so-called science books which after a few pages reveal themselves to be harbouring ulterior motives. I have learned to recognise clues that the author is pushing a religious agenda. As creationists in the US continue to lose court battles over attempts to have intelligent design taught as science in federally funded schools, their strategy has been forced to... well, evolve. That means ensuring that references to pseudoscientific concepts like ID are more heavily veiled. So I thought I'd share a few tips for spotting what may be religion in science's clothing."
"Religion is part of human nature and our brains are hard wired to believe in God, scientists believe. The evidence includes studies of babies and children which have shown the brain is programmed to think of the mind as being separate from the body. This distinction allows us to believe in the supernatural, to conjure up imaginary friends - and to conceive of gods, this week's New Scientist reports.[...]
"For the past seven years, this German set-up has been looking for gravitational waves - ripples in space-time thrown off by super-dense astronomical objects such as neutron stars and black holes. GEO600 has not detected any gravitational waves so far, but it might inadvertently have made the most important discovery in physics for half a century. For many months, the GEO600 team-members had been scratching their heads over inexplicable noise that is plaguing their giant detector. Then, out of the blue, a researcher approached them with an explanation. In fact, he had even predicted the noise before he knew they were detecting it.
"For the past two years, the Federal Health Service has been issuing licenses to practitioners of what it calls "traditional medicine," meaning anything from the use of herbal treatments to the manipulation of "auras." His claims buttressed by officialdom, Fadkin charges patients 3,500 rubles ($150) per session. And he says business is very good.
"The U.S. military is paying scientists to study ways to read people's thoughts.
Scientists use electroencephalography, or brain wave-reading technology, to measure brain activity. The hope is that the research could someday lead to a gadget capable of translating the thoughts of soldiers who suffered brain injuries in combat or even stroke patients in hospitals.
"Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind." So said Albert Einstein, and his famous aphorism has been the source of endless debate between believers and non-believers wanting to claim the greatest scientist of the 20th century as their own.
"The world’s chief exponent of the theory that tells life began in deep space and reached earth riding on comets said the philosophical backdrop for his theory was provided by Buddhism.
"Electrodes implanted into the brain to treat a man with a stubborn case of ringing in the ear instead sparked an out-of-body sensation, doctors in Belgium reported on Wednesday. Stimulating the electrodes made the 63-year-old patient feel like he was outside his body twice, for 15 and 21 seconds, and allowed the doctors to use a PET scanner to track which parts of the brain became active during the experience."
"Indian researcher Ratna Sharma has told the World Congress of Neuroscience in Melbourne she has the first scientific evidence that yoga helps PMS." [...]
"A new survey finds that 85 percent of U.S. doctors believe religious faith can help patients have a good outcome.
