Silva Method and the Ultimate Mind

On Oct. 8-9, 2009, the Dalai Lama will participate in our Washington D.C. conference, Educating World Citizens for the 21st Century. The goal of this ML XIX conference is to explore the value of integrating emotional, intellectual and social learning into today’s educational programs with the intention to promote education research into these areas. Leading educators, scientists and policy makers will discuss the importance of researching what effects the inclusion of mindfulness-based curriculums and programs can have in educational environments, especially for students exposed to risk factors such as poverty, violence and divorce.

Research indicates that school-based programs may be the best way for children to develop the non-academic but equally important skills necessary to be successful in our society. Programs across the country that teach mindfulness of the self and others have significantly improved academic performance, work habits and self-esteem.

“We hope to draw more attention to expanding research into mindfulness-based educational approaches, such as social and emotional learning, and how such reforms can improve attention, self-motivation, self-esteem, and healthy decision-making skills among school-aged children and teenagers,” said Adam Engle, Chairman of The Mind and Life Institute.

Read more about the Dalai Lama and The Mind and Life Institute’s Washington D.C. conference

(Via The Medical News.)

Key Concepts

Charles Darwin argued that a continuity of mind exists between humans and other animals, a view that subsequent scholars have supported.

But mounting evidence indicates that, in fact, a large mental gap separates us from our fellow creatures. Recently the author identified four unique aspects of human cognition.

The origin and evolution of these distinctive mental traits remain largely mysterious, but clues are emerging slowly.

Not too long ago three aliens descended to Earth to evaluate the status of intelligent life. One specialized in engineering, one in chemistry and one in computation. Turning to his colleagues, the engineer reported (translation follows):

“All of the creatures here are solid, some segmented, with capacities to move on the ground, through the water or air. All extremely slow. Unimpressive.”

The chemist then commented:

“All quite similar, derived from different sequences of four chemical ingredients.”

Next the computational expert opined:

“Limited computing abilities. But one, the hairless biped, is unlike the others. It exchanges information in a manner that is primitive and inefficient but remarkably different from the others. It creates many odd objects, including ones that are consumable, others that produce symbols, and yet others that destroy members of its tribe.”

“But how can this be?” the engineer mused.

Continue reading about The Origin of the Mind here!

(Via Scientific American.)

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PHILADELPHIA (Reuters) - Buddhist monks and Catholic nuns boost their brain power through meditation and prayer, but even atheists can enjoy the mental benefits that believers derive from faith, according to a popular neuroscience author.

The key, Andrew Newberg argues in his new book “How God Changes Your Brain,” lies in the concentrating and calming effects that meditation or intense prayer have inside our heads.

Brain scanners show that intense meditation alters our gray matter, strengthening regions that focus the mind and foster compassion while calming those linked to fear and anger.

Whether the meditator believes in the supernatural or is an atheist repeating a mantra, he says, the outcome can be the same - a growth in the compassion that virtually every religion teaches and a decline in negative feelings and emotions.

“In essence, when you think about the really big questions in life — be they religious, scientific or psychological — your brain is going to grow,” says Newberg, head of the Center for Spirituality and the Mind at the University of Pennsylvania.

Read more about this article, here.

(Via Reuters - Health.)

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New research from the US suggests that when we look for something in our environment, our attention scans one thing at a time, using a serial as opposed to a parallel process whose clock speed is controlled by brain waves or “neuron population oscillations”.

Thus next time you arrange to meet a friend in a crowded bar or restaurant, remember that your attention searches the room like a superfast spotlight, pausing on each face for only 1/25th of a second, before settling on the one familiar to you, or at least that is what postdoctoral associate Timothy J Buschman, and Picower Professor of Neuroscience Earl Miller suggest in a paper published in the 13 August online issue of the journal Neuron.

Both authors are from the Picower Institute for Learning and Memory and Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

The control of attention, the process that manages the information that floods in via our senses, is somewhat of a mystery, yet if we knew more about it, we might also find out more about cognition, or what happens when we think about what the information coming in through our senses is telling us.

Read more about Do Brain Waves Run Our Attention Clock? here.

(Via Medical News Today.)

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Try a Little Powerlessness — Pitfalls of Self-Control

We admire self-discipline, but could too much control be a bad thing?

Self-control is one of our most cherished values. We applaud those who have the discipline to regulate their appetites and actions, and we try hard to instill this virtue in our children. Think of the marketing slogans that key off the desire for restraint: “Just say no.” “Just do it.” We celebrate the power of the mind to make hard choices, despite our emotions or other temptations, and keep us on course.

But what if we can’t just do it? What if “it” is too difficult or if our strategy for success is misguided? Is it possible that willpower actually might be an obstacle rather than a means to happiness and harmony? Can we have too much of a good thing?

Two Tufts University psychologists believe there may be some truth to this possibility. Evan P. Apfelbaum and Samuel R. Sommers were intrigued by the notion that too much self-control may indeed have a downside—and that relinquishing some personal power might be paradoxically tonic, both for individuals and for society. They decided to test this idea in the laboratory.

Read more about this article from Scientific American.

(Via Scientific American.)

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