Reviews

Today, another article by drew hempel who wrote several intriguing articles before, including The Highest Technology of All Technologies: The Yan Xin Secret article. This article is a bit heavy and requires reading it with attention.

The Purloined Phantom Limb: Solving Sack’s Syncopation Susceptibility

By drew hempel, MA
Anti-copyright (free distribution)

Professor Oliver Sack’s new book Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain is a treasure-trove of analysis on the mind-body conundrum. Sack previews neuroscientist Patel’s forthcoming book focusing on rhythm as subcortical binding for motor coordination with language. But as Sack notes Patel’s take on the Thai elephant orchestra music (of which I’m a big fan) may be questioned by some readers. The issue is do humans have a unique capacity or, as William James’ stated a “susceptibility” towards music, in contrast to the rest of Nature (and nonwestern cultures) seeming noise? Does this supposed unique ability of human rhythm processing also solves the “binding” problem of the mind-body paradox—also seen as the mystery of long-term potentiation (synapse growth) as an unknown function frequency and amplitude?

The answer is amazingly found in the most famous short-story of Edgar Allen Poe who, as Edmund Wilson quotes, wrote that his goal in writing was the “indeterminateness of music.” Poe, the creator of the mystery story, gives the reversal to Freud who, Sacks states: “despised music.” In Poe’s psychoanalysis we find a direct answer to Sack’s contradiction of the phantom limb as an “overflow” of neuron sensations, in contrast to the overflowing OBE as related to a musical hallucination. It’s exactly in the primal language of rhythm, more specifically Sack’s susceptibility for syncopation, that we also solve the mind-body mystery which Poe also addressed in his famous solution composed as his short story The Purloined Letter.

I’ve written before about my first qigong lesson. Nowadays, I still go the classes and am much more knowledgable on the subject.

But first, what is Qigong, anyway? Qigong (pronounced like chee-kong) is an ancient Chinese system of working with the Qi (Chi) energy. The translation from Chinese is something in the lines of “energy cultivation” or “Working with energy”. It is a system of exercises involving postures, movement, breathing, meditation and mind body interaction. Qigong was the basis both for the Chinese healing and to martial arts. As such there are many variations to qigong and some are more relevant to combat while others to healing.

I’ve learned that the specific form of qigong that I study is called YiQuan qigong (pronounced e-chuan). This specific form of qigong was founded in the 1920ies by master Wang Xiangzhai, who developed it out of another martial arts system, xingyiquan. Although it started as a form of martial arts qigong it is now studied mostly for health benefits. In many places it still learned as a martial arts qigong, similarly to kungfu. At the end of the post I attached two videos of master Yao Zongxun (1917-1985), who was the formal successor of Wang Xiangzhai. In these videos one can see the exercises.

As I wrote before, there are several types of exercises in the Yiquan. One type is call Shi li and they are motion exercises. The motion is usually slow and has many aspects to mastering it, including body control, relaxed and diaphragmic breathing, synchronous movements of various joints and energy control. You can see many Shi Li performed in the first video of Yao Zongxun starting with around 2:43 minutes.

This is a second articles in the series on Retro-PK by Bryan Williams. The first article was A Brief Intro to Retro-PK.

A Lunar Modulation Effect on Retro-PK?

It has been thought that one way in which we might come to better understand (and perhaps eventually predict) the workings of psi phenomena is to search for any physical variables whose changes might be connected in some way with psi performance, and might therefore have a modulating effect on psi. One possible variable that has come to light in recent years is the Earth’s own internally-generated magnetic field, which studies suggest may decrease successful ESP performance as it increases in intensity (Persinger, 1989). A few recent studies are beginning to suggest the possibility that there may be another, lesser-known variable: certain phases of the monthly lunar cycle.

A great deal of myth and folklore has been traditionally associated with the phases of the moon throughout many human cultures since ancient times (Guiley, 1991). For example, in Celtic lore, midnight at the time of a full moon was considered “the witching hour,” and people were assumed to turn into werewolves under the full moon. Certain major holidays in the Christian and Jewish religions (Easter and Passover, respectively) are timed according to the lunar cycle. Even the term “lunatic” derives from the ages-old assumption that the light of the full moon made people crazy. In order to separate fact from fiction, several psychological studies have been done over the past few decades to see if any kind of human activity (e.g., murders, suicide attempts, crimes, trauma & mental hospital admissions, traffic accidents, stock market activity) might be tied in some way to the lunar cycle. Some of these studies found positive indications (Alonso, 1993; Geller & Shannon, 1976; Lieber & Sherin, 1972) while others found none (Coates et al., 1989; Culver et al., 1988; Rotton & Kelly, 1985), suggesting that any possible relation between the moon and human behavior was unclear and that the case was still up in the air.

The very known movie “The Secret”, which stirred big waves across the world and in the US in particular, will have a sequel soon. Apparently, the movie will continue where “The Secret” left off and focus on an action plan. It is about half way shot already and is planned to be released in November this year. It will have a similar cast. Following is my review of the original “The Secret” movie and my thoughts about its concepts.

I’ve seen “The Secret” movie a long time ago, before it hit the US strong through Oprah’s show. I’ve watched it with several friends and I liked it. Although basically the idea (Law of Attraction) was not new to me as I’ve heard it through various sources, beginning with Brian Tracy’s motivational books through many current spiritual coaches, I still found the movie well produced and the visualizations of the process are effective, in my opinion.

Law of Attraction, as it is presented in the movie, is also called “manifestation” in modern literature and it promotes the idea that our life flows in the direction of our energized thoughts, i.e. one’s desires, reinforced through visualization and other manifestation techniques help create the reality which realizes (manifests) this original desire or goal. Creative visualization, Jose Silva’s Method and many similar techniques were developed years earlier than this movie to achieve the same goal.

The movie, though, also presents the Law of Attraction in its “negative form”, when our negative thoughts “attract” negative events in our life. Although I find it hard to attribute every negative or positive event to the Law of Attraction, I think that basically this works. Even if the mechanism of this work is not “paranormal” in any way, I believe that focusing your mind on your goals activates the brain so that it builds the plan and pays attention to the opportunities that come across the way and may help achieve the goals. It is possible that if one wouldn’t do these visualizations which focus the brain on the target, one wouldn’t have recognized the opportunity coming his way. It also makes one more optimistic and able, while being pessimistic (thinking about bad things that might happen) will not allow you to progress in the desired direction.

Of course, many people who stick to manifestation tell about amazing coincidences happening in their life after they actively engage in this process, like you can read in my story at Belief and money manifestation and I’m not sure if all of them can be attributed to simple focused awareness, as many of these things seem to be externally driven.

I’ve previously reviewed Immrama’s Insight CD. That CD is a great tool to relax the mind and expand its possibilities using binaural beat brainwave technology. Another product that Immrama Institute offers is a 2-CD set called “Focus” and it is intended for a totally different purpose.

As the name “Focus” might suggest, the audio on this set is intended to let you perform your work better, more productively. It achieves this by utilizing the same binaural beats technology overlaid over the soothing sound of rain, as the in Insight CD. On the pure auditory level, both sets sound literally the same, since the binaural beats, which create the different brainwave patterns, cannot be discerned from the audio of the rain.

• Improve your levels of focus and concentration
• Enhance your memory
• Increase your focus and attention while reading or working
• Improve your retention of information while studying
• Achieve a mental zone while exercising
• Improve your thinking speed and performance
• Improve concentration and attention in people with ADD or ADHD

One of the prizes in the Psi Experiments that I run is Immrama’s Institute’s Insight CD. “This CD utilizes harmonically layered brainwave audio technology combined with soothing sounds of natural rain to help your brain quickly and effortlessly reach extraordinary levels of enhanced performance not normally attainable without years of training” (from the Insight CD back cover).

The CD consists of three tracks, each 24 minutes in length:

• Track 1, titled “Journey”, guides the mind down from Beta state through the Alpha and Theta states into a deeply relaxed, meditative Delta state.
• Track 2, Exploration, begins in a Deep Delta and guides deeper to Low Delta.
• Track 3, Insight, begins in a Deep Delta state and holds the mind in this state the majority of the time, then it gradually guides your mind back up through Theta and into the Alpha.

One of the prizes of the Psi Experiments is a DVD from Bradley Gilbert. The DVD, called “Reduce Your Stress, Improve Your Health. Daoist Healing Qigong”. Brad has sent me one of the DVDs for a review. Bradley is a Master of Medical Qigong.

This DVD, produced in 2005, plays for a little more than an hour and is divided into to major parts:

1. A basic Qigong posture, followed by description and demonstration of 13 exercises (about 43 minutes)
2. A 20-minute video where the whole exercsise set is performed without narration, with only a background music. As I understand it, this part is a do-along track.

This program is based a healing qigong and is not for learning martial arts qigong. Its purpose is to release the stress and balance your body’s energies. The back of the DVD cover lists the following benefits of the Doaist Healing Qigong:

• Strengthen your energy
• Release tension in your body
• Feel relaxed and invigorated
• Calm your mind by releasing mental tension
• Know that you an be proactive in your health
• Enjoy your life more fully – your health, relationships

I’ve finished listening to an audio version of this great book by Gary Zukav. Gary Zukav is a spirituality teacher and is author of several books, most known of which is “The Seat of the Soul” (Gary Zukav) from 1989. What I’ve read is an earlier books of his called “Dancing Wu Li Masters: An Overview of the New Physics. This was a really great experience.

The Dancing Wu Li Masters book explains the difficult matters of modern physics such as quantum mechanics and the relativity theories of Albert Einstein in plain english, for non-scientist. I actually could grasp more of the history and implications of quantum physics and relativity theory than in my modern physics classes at university.

Please note, this is a paid review.

You must have heard about the benefits of Omega-3 fat. If not, here’s a short introduction:

A Purdue University study has showed that kids low in Omega-3 essential fatty acids are significantly more likely to be hyperactive, have learning disorders, and to display behavioral problems. Omega-3 deficiencies have also been tied to many conditions, including the following: dyslexia, violence, depression, memory problems, weight gain, cancer, heart disease, eczema, allergies, inflammatory diseases, arthritis, diabetes.

Over 2,000 scientific studies have demonstrated the wide range of problems associated with Omega-3 deficiencies. The American diet is almost devoid of Omega 3’s, except for certain types of fish. In fact, researchers believe that about 60% of Americans are deficient in Omega-3 fatty acids, and about 20% have so little that test methods cannot even detect any in their blood. 74-9)

So, it seems that almost anyone who doesn’t take a close look at his diet needs to consider getting more omega-3 into his body. It is possible to get omega-3 through food supplements.

One such source is Omax3, a product of Cenestra Health. Omax3™ was specially developed by physicians and scientists from the Yale University School of Medicine to provide an ultra-pure and optimally balanced Omega-3 supplement.

Omax3 is 100% natural and provides an optimal balance of EPA and DHA (the two key health-promoting Omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids). The development of Omax3 comes from the rapidly growing evidence showing the overall health benefits of Omega-3 fatty acids, and more specifically, the importance of achieving an optimal balance of EPA and DHA in the diet.

The pricing of Omax3 is competitive with prices per bottle for orders in the amount of 1 to 6 bottles of about $35 or about $32 for orders of more than bottles. Each box of Omax3 contains a full month supply of 60 Softgels, delivering a total of 1500mg of Omega-3 per serving. International orders are accepted.

Dear readers, please note that I do these reviews to help me fund the site. If you find that reviews like this are inappropriate, please tell me so in the comments to this review or in the contact form on the site.

The kit has several components in it:

Please not that the following is a paid review:

I’ve recently signed up for a new online service that allows bloggers review products or services provided by some other companies. So it is possible, that in the future, there will be some more blog posts like this. Yet I don’t expect that their volume will be high and I promise that will stay on topic of this website.