| | Sam,
Brain waves are said to be four.
First, we have that of the cerebral cortex, which can double in Hz when we think a lot. That means consuming lots of oxygen.
Next, we have sleep, which basically cleans our brain of biotoxins caused by the consumption of oxygen. That there are said to be several levels of sleep is interesting, but a definitive fixing of Hz into discreet levels remains problematic, at best.
Then there's the core, involuntary 'medulla', which hums along at a low frequency, keeping us alive.
Lastly, there's the pulse of the thalmic center--- optic-, hypocampus, amylglada, et al...rather complex. This is said to control our emotions.
Meditation is a technique derived by Buddhism to do just that. This is because Buddhist theology believes that we should release ourselves from desires, as such (See 'Fire sermon' for more.).
In this regard, what some research has found is that meditating lessens the Hz output coming from the amylglada. Moreover, because we (somewhat) understand that emotive states do influence cerebral output, it can be fairly said that meditation influences thought in ways poorly understood.
While not overtly hostile to the notion that meditation ('transcendental' or otherwise) may act to the betterment of some thought, all that I've read suggests radically to the contrary. I will moreover say that my future research on the individual and learning will emphasize, empirically, precisely how much a stimulated emotive state assists in learning.
My hypotheses, in fact, is more or less construued to demonstrate how emotive suppression lessens the possibility of learning ,thereby decreasing the development of individualism. In other words, even in plain daylight, all meditative cats are grey.
On a theo-philosophic level then, I would say that the buddiks are simply wrong. This is hardly surprising, since the Christian, Moslem, and Hindoo are equally wrong, too, equally mumbo-jumbo.
It's therefore only of interest on a social-psychological level of the type done by mom that many Americans cut the wearers of the saffron bathrobe an enormous amount of slack. Perhaps it's that zen coach Jackson, meditating away while Kobe, Shack and Jordan slam dunk the unenlightened into the oblivion of losing. Or the wonderous words of C.Turlington, chain-smoking bimbette supermodel who discovered, upon the development of emphysema, that tobacco was un-karmalike.
And then there's Hollywood....
Yet assumed by anyone who has actually had to think, the process of thinking requires an emotive stimulus. This is accomplished because, when emotively stimulated, the thalmic center sends a command to the adrenal gland to kick in, to produce.
That the use of all this adrenlin might serve to scream the Lakers on to victory--as opposed, say, to reading Kahneman and Tversky--is of no biological consequence. This is simply how we're rigged up.
Therefore, western traditions win, asiatics lose, big time. What we're about is to take the emotive as a given, and then ask, 'to what uses are our faculties best employed? For more, I encourage a reading of Aristotle, Spinoza, Kant, Nietzsche, and Deleuze. among countless others.
What 'eastern thought' is about is suppression, pure and simple. But in a large scale ethical sense, this emotive dis-engagement is positively deadly. In horrible times of human strife, war being te best example, the only possibility of respecting the lives of innocent civilains comes with the emotive engagement of empathy: how would I feel to be in these shoes?
While war crimes have been committed by everyone, most perpetrators apologize. When I was in Crete, stories were told as to how ex-German soldiers returned to beg forgiveness for the events of 1941 ('So your great -granfather was here?' 'Uh, no I'm an American!").
Except for the Japs, who because of their zen, possess absolutely no remorse. Rather, murdering everywhere, with a sense of detatchment, they felt nothing : such was their meditative state, or beliefs thereby. No apologies are forthcoming
Lastly, we do have a Tibetian buddist house on campus. Once, last spring, my now- ex boyfriend took me inside, I for giggles, he more seriously to 'learn'. A big argument ensued in which was called "culturaly insensitive." Imagine that!
Eva
(Edited by Matthews on 1/12, 7:13pm)
|
|