Effects of Meditation on Brain Coherence and Intelligence

Click here to watch the video. Quantum physicist and educator John Hagelin PhD, presents research findings on the effects of meditation on the brain and intelligence, and advocates for meditation as a method of promoting a host of positive benefits, from relaxation to increased creativity. Transcript from the video: What were talking about is the effect on the brain. And here it is again. This is a top view, front view, of the brain. And this is a subject sitting relaxed, with the eyes closed, and these dots indicate where the electrodes are placed to measure the ordinary EEG to look at the electrical activity of the brain. And occasionally you find these little bars connect neighboring points. Not very often, but what that means is these neighboring points of the brain are talking to each other. Theyre communicating. Theres a

correlated or integrated functioning of the brain, at least among a few neighboring points. But not much. Really this hemisphere doesnt know what this (other) hemisphere is doing. But this is the same subject three months later in the meditative state. And what you see is something you would never see, if youre a brain scientist, in any other state of consciousness: hypnosis, sleeping, waking, dreaming. The whole brain functions coherently. And thats an extremely significant finding. Its interesting, but beyond that, significant, because EEG coherence is powerfully correlated with intelligence. And rising intelligence, creativity, learning ability, memory, academic performance, moral reasoning, psychological stability, emotional maturity, alertness, reaction time. Everything good about the brain depends on its orderly functioning. And whats fun as an educator, exciting as an educator, is that you can systematically develop the orderly functioning of the brainamong anyone, of any age. And youll actually start to see in anyone, of any age, intelligence--for example, IQ--increasing. Now thats not supposed to happen beyond adolescence. Intelligence is not supposed to rise. In fact, by the time, say, youre mid-30s, youre expected to see a precipitous drop in intelligence, in the shrinking of the brain. I know we tell our kids, you should listen to me anyway despite my massive raw intelligence, because of the wisdom and lack of experience. But its an obsolete view of human potential. The thing about the brain is, and these are other measures of intelligence IQ is just one, so many other ways to measure the creativity and intelligence of the brainand they are all highly statistically significantly improved by transcending. By developing and engaging the total brain. In the absence of this experience, you see too much of this. This is a stressed brain. You dont have to look hard or far to find them. You see what are called functional holes, not actual holes, but functional holes in the prefrontal cortex, the so-called higher brain.

Thats important. This is the higher brain. It separates us from the primitive species. Its called the CEO or executive center. It sits over the primitive brain, it exerts executive control. Its responsible for higher human function: judgement, planning, moral reasoning, control of the attention. And what we have, in the presence of stress, is the prefrontal cortex shuts down. And under chronic stress, it shuts down chronically and it fails to develop properly. And we really are living to a good degree in an underdeveloped world, world of arrested development. And if you really question that, just look around you. Look at the reality tv show, look whats happening in the news. But even those functional holes on the brain are quickly filled in as the entire brain is engaged and as blood flow returns to the total brain, and you see things like: in maximum-security prisons where stressed brains are ubiquitous, a marked reduction in the rate of return to prison; in children with ADHD, which is a stress-related learning disorder that has to do with this underdevelopment of the prefrontal cortex that controls the attention, a profound reversal of ADHD and elimination of symptoms, in 10, 12 weeks of twice daily meditation. Its a powerful tool. Because of that, finally were starting to see an impact on society, where schoolsabout 350 of them anywayand hundreds of thousands of students have incorporated transcending or TM into the curriculum. And thats the beginning of something really exciting. Its really happening here. It started in the Bay Area and its spreading throughout the world. About John Hagelin John Hagelin, Ph.D., is a world-renowned quantum physicist, educator, public policy expert, and leading proponent of peace.

Dr. Hagelin has conducted pioneering research at CERN (the European Center for Particle Physics) and SLAC (the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center). Author of more than 70 papers published in journals such as Physics Letters, Nuclear Physics, and the Physical Review, his scientific contributions in the fields of electroweak unification, grand unification, supersymmetry, and cosmology include some of the most cited references in the physical sciences. He is responsible for the development of a highly successful grand unified field theory based on the superstringa theory that was featured in a cover story of Discover magazine. Dr. Hagelin has pioneered the use of unified fieldbased technologies proven to reduce crime, violence, terrorism, and war and to promote peace throughout societytechnologies derived from the ancient Vedic science of consciousness. He has published groundbreaking research establishing the existence of longrange field effects of consciousness generated through collective meditation, and has shown that large meditating groups can effectively defuse acute societal stressthereby preventing violence and social conflict, and providing a practical foundation for permanent world peace. Dr. Hagelin is currently Director of the Institute of Science, Technology and Public Policy, a leading science and technology think tank, and President of the Global Union of Scientists for Peace, an organization of leading scientists throughout the world dedicated to ending nuclear proliferation and establishing lasting world peace. He can be reached at his website: http://www.hagelin.org For more related videos, visit: MeditationPlex.com