mind training

When the infamous fictional character, Carrie White, left her high school prom hall ablaze, and brought terror upon her town, she relied on her powers of telekinesis, the ability to manipulate physical objects using the power of the mind alone.

But while Carrie is just a fictional film based upon a fictional book, belief in telekinesis isn’t fictional at all.

For centuries, humans have claimed they really do have the power to control the motion of objects using only their minds. Levitation, opening doors at will and spoon bending are all intriguing examples.

It happens in the Matrix when Neo freezes bullets midair, and it’s a skill that Yoda has honed to a T.

But is telekinesis real, or just as fictional as Carrie, Yoda and Neo combined?

To investigate, we need to evaluate telekinetic claims through a scientific lens using the scientific method. Telekinesis is part of the discipline called parapsychology, in which researchers study psychic phenomena. Parapsychologists regard what they do as a science, but other scientists disagree.

Is telekinesis possible ? Let’s start with a few basic observations.

Observation #1

While there are loads of anecdotes out there about telekinesis, there’s no scientific proof that it exists; no studies conducted according to the scientific method and repeated under lab conditions can show that it’s real.

In the 1930s, the so-called father of parapsychology, Joseph Banks Rhine, tested in the lab whether people could use telekinesis to make a dice roll the way they wanted it to. But afterwards, scientists couldn’t replicate his results, and since replication is key to proving an idea, that was a problem.

Aside from scientists, there are also countless self-proclaimed telekinetics, but all have been exposed as tricksters, or can’t perform under conditions where they’re not totally in control, suggesting that they manipulate the situation to get the results they want. Today, there’s even a huge stash of prize money available from lots of organizations for anyone who can prove that psychic abilities, like telekinesis, are real. But these riches remain unclaimed.

Observation #2

When we investigate telekinesis, there’s no consensus about what exactly is being measured. Are powerful, Yoda-like brainwaves at work perhaps? Since nobody agrees, it’s difficult to apply a research standard, something required in all other types of science to test the validity of ideas.

Observation #3

The point of science is to discover the unknown, and in the history of scientific investigation, it’s definitely happened that new discoveries have gone against established science, and even overturned whole branches of science. Such discoveries must be proven extra carefully to withstand skepticism. In the case of telekinesis, the idea goes against established science, but lacks the powerful evidence in favor of it. Our universe is controlled and explained by the laws of physics, and one of these laws tells us that brain waves can’t control objects because they’re neither strong nor far-reaching enough to influence anything outside of our skulls.

Physics also tells us that the only forces that can influence objects from afar are magnetic and gravitational. Probably the closest thing to telekinesis that science can explain is the use of thoughts to control a robotic arm. In the brains of stroke patients who can’t move, researchers can implant tiny wires into the region that controls movement, and then train the patient to concentrate on moving a robotic arm, which acts like an extension of their minds, and it works. It’s amazing, but it isn’t telekinesis. The patients’ thoughts aren’t just vague, undetectable things. They’re measurable brain signals, translated through wires into a robot.

Science can measure, test and explain the motion, and that’s how we’ve shown that this kind of mind control is real. Science is a slow process of accumulating the evidence that either stands for or against an idea. When we stack up evidence, we can see which tower grows tallest, and in the case of telekinesis, it’s not the tower showing that it exists. Some say this mystical phenomenon can’t fit within the confines of science, and that’s okay.

But then telekinesis becomes purely a matter of personal conviction. If something can’t be assessed scientifically, then it can’t be described as scientific either. So the results of our investigation reveal that however much we may want to believe that the force really is within us, the case for telekinesis remains weak.

Sorry Neo, Carrie and Yoda. Your skills are mind-blowing, but for now, they belong in the movies.

Source: Is telekinesis real? – Emma Bryce

Dealing with stress the wrong way

When we are placed in situations of pressure or stress, our body responds in very negative ways. Such outcomes are mental fatigue, anxiety attacks, anger, frustration and all these can lead to other problems of the physical body. Many people tend to deal with such ‘problems’ with listen to music, resorting to drugs or alcohol, physical exercise and many others. But the solution is not to turn away from it but be able to control, reduce and on a higher level not be affected by it at all.

Now a team of researchers from China and the University of Oregon have developed an approach for neuroscientists to study how meditation might provide improvements in a person’s attention and response to stress. The study, done in China, randomly assigned college undergraduate students to 40-

person experimental or control groups. The experimental group received five days of meditation training using a technique called the integrative body-mind training (IBMT). The control group got five days of relaxation training. Before and after training both groups took tests involving attention and reaction to mental stress.
The experimental group showed greater improvement than the control in an attention test designed to measure the subjects’ abilities to resolve conflict among stimuli. Stress was induced by mental arithmetic. Both groups initially showed elevated release of the stress hormone cortisol following the math task, but after training the experimental group showed less cortisol release, indicating a greater improvement stress regulation. The experimental group also showed lower levels of anxiety, depression, anger and fatigue than was the case in the control group.
“This study improves the prospect for examining brain mechanisms involved in the changes in attention and self-regulation that occur following meditation training,” said co-author Michael I. Posner, professor emeritus of psychology at the University of Oregon. “The study took only five days, so it was possible to randomly assign the subjects and do a thorough before-and-after analysis of the training effects.”

Integrative body-mind training

The IBMT approach was developed in the 1990s. Its effects have been studied in China since 1995. The technique avoids struggles to control thought, relying instead on a state of restful alertness, allowing for a high degree of body-mind awareness while receiving instructions from a coach, who provides breath-adjustment guidance and mental imagery while soothing music plays in the background. Thought control is achieved gradually through posture, relaxation, body-mind harmony and balanced breathing. The authors noted in the study that IBMT may be effective during short-term application because of its integrative use of these components.

IBMT has been found to improve emotional and cognitive performance, as well as social behavior, in people, said lead author Yi-Yuan Tang, a professor in the Institute of Neuroinformatics and Laboratory for Body and Mind at Dalian University of Technology in Dalian, China. Tang currently is a visiting scholar at the University of Oregon, where he is working with Posner on a new and larger study to be conducted in the United States.

The current study did not include direct measures of brain changes, although previous studies have suggested alterations have occurred in brain networks. Posner said the planned studies in the United States will include functional magnetic resonance imaging to examine any brain network changes induced by training.
In summary, the 11-member team wrote: “IBMT is an easy, effective way for improvement in self-regulation in cognition, emotion and social behavior. Our study is consistent with the idea that attention, affective processes and the quality of moment-to-moment awareness are flexible skills that can be trained.”
At this point, the findings suggest a measurable benefit that people could achieve through body-mind meditation, especially involving an effective training regimen, but larger studies are needed to fully test the findings of this small, short-term study, Posner said.