Consciousness has less control than believed, according to new theory

Consciousness -- the internal dialogue that seems to govern one's thoughts and actions -- is far less powerful than people believe, serving as a passive conduit rather than an active force that exerts control, according to a new theory proposed by an SF State researcher.

Associate Professor of Psychology Ezequiel Morsella's "Passive Frame Theory" suggests that the conscious mind is like an interpreter helping speakers of different languages communicate.

"The interpreter presents the information but is not the one making any arguments or acting upon the knowledge that is shared," Morsella said. "Similarly, the information we perceive in our consciousness is not created by conscious processes, nor is it reacted to by conscious processes. Consciousness is the middle-man, and it doesn't do as much work as you think."

Morsella and his coauthors' groundbreaking theory, published online on June 22 by the journal Behavioral and Brain Sciences, contradicts intuitive beliefs about human consciousness and the notion of self.

Consciousness, per Morsella's theory, is more reflexive and less purposeful than conventional wisdom would dictate. Because the human mind experiences its own consciousness as sifting through urges, thoughts, feelings and physical actions, people understand their consciousness to be in control of these myriad impulses. But in reality, Morsella argues, consciousness does the same simple task over and over, giving the impression that it is doing more than it actually is.

"We have long thought consciousness solved problems and had many moving parts, but it's much more basic and static," Morsella said. "This theory is very counterintuitive. It goes against our everyday way of thinking."

According to Morsella's framework, the "free will" that people typically attribute to their conscious mind -- the idea that our consciousness, as a "decider," guides us to a course of action -- does not exist. Instead, consciousness only relays information to control "voluntary" action, or goal-oriented movement involving the skeletal muscle system.

Compare consciousness to the Internet, Morsella suggested. The Internet can be used to buy books, reserve a hotel room and complete thousands of other tasks. Taken at face value, it would seem incredibly powerful. But, in actuality, a person in front of a laptop or clicking away on a smartphone is running the show -- the Internet is just being made to perform the same basic process, without any free will of its own.

The Passive Frame Theory also defies the intuitive belief that one conscious thought leads to another. "One thought doesn't know about the other, they just often have access to and are acting upon the same, unconscious information," Morsella said. "You have one thought and then another, and you think that one thought leads to the next, but this doesn't seem to be the way the process actually works."The theory, which took Morsella and his team more than 10 years to develop, can be difficult to accept at first, he said.
"The number one reason it's taken so long to reach this conclusion is because people confuse what consciousness is for with what they think they use it for," Morsella said. "Also, most approaches to consciousness focus on perception rather than action."

The theory has major implications for the study of mental disorders, Morsella said. "Why do you have an urge or thought that you shouldn't be having? Because, in a sense, the consciousness system doesn't know that you shouldn't be thinking about something," Morsella said. "An urge generator doesn't know that an urge is irrelevant to other thoughts or ongoing action."
The study of consciousness is complicated, Morsella added, because of the inherent difficulty of applying the conscious mind to study itself.

"For the vast majority of human history, we were hunting and gathering and had more pressing concerns that required rapidly executed voluntary actions," Morsella said. "Consciousness seems to have evolved for these types of actions rather than to understand itself."

 https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/06/150623141911.htm

Smoking effects on the body

Smoking in considered the largest preventable cause of death worldwide. Every day we are attacked with the side effects of smoking, but it does not seem to convince smokers that smoking truly is the worst thing for their health. To round up, regular smoking cuts half an hour of your life with every two cigarettes. On average smokers die 10 years earlier than non-smokers.
Here is a list of the effects of smoking:

• CANCER

Lung cancer develops in 95% of patients with a positive history of smoking. Smoking is also associated with other cancers such as bladder cancer, kidney cancer, throat cancer, mouth cancer, esophagus cancer, pancreatic cancer, stomach cancer, cervical cancer, bowel cancer, ovarian cancer, cancer of the nose and sinuses and some forms of leukemia.
There are over 4,000 compounds in a cigarette smoke. A large number of them are toxic and harm our cells; some of them are carcinogenic meaning that they cause cancer.
Cigarette smoke primarily consists of:
Nicotine: this is not the carcinogenic compound, but it is responsible for the addictiveness of smoking. Nicotine acts very fast, it reaches the neurons in 15 seconds after being inhaled. If there were no nicotine in cigarettes the number of smokers wouldn’t be this concerning and the tobacco industry would surely fail.
Nicotine exposure leads to depression of the nervous system, growth retardation and in pregnancy to improper fetal development.
Carbon Monoxide: it is a tasteless and poisonous gas. It is highly soluble in blood and interacts easily with hemoglobin. If there is enough carbon monoxide in the air inhaling it will cause fatigue, weakness, dizziness, decreased muscle and heart function and gradually coma and death.
Tar from the inhaled cigarette smoke 70% of the tar remains in the lugs. It is a harmful chemical residue that coats everything with a brownish-yellow film. The tar in cigarette smoke harms the cilia predisposing to many diseases such as emphysema, chronic bronchitis and lung cancer.
Nitrosamines: NNN, NAT and NNK are the three compounds unique to tobacco that are known carcinogens.
Other compounds found in cigarette smoking include: cyanide, benzene, formaldehyde, methanol, acetylene, ammonia, cresol, lead and many more.
NERVOUS SYSTEM
The stimulant effect of nicotine only lasts very short, after this effect it leaves you tired and craving for more. Smoking also leads to poor eye sight because it causes macular degeneration and cataracts.
RESPIRATORY SYSTEM
Smoking damages the cilia function, predisposing to infections. It is also related with emphysema, the destruction of air sacs, chronic bronchitis, where the lining of the bronchi get inflamed and the condition called chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.
CARDIOVASCULAR SYSTEM
Smoking is one of the leading causes of atherosclerosis, the accumulation of fatty substances in the lumen of arteries. This condition leads to coronary heart disease predisposing to heart attack.
Smoking also increases blood sugar, causes vasoconstriction, hypertension, raises the risk of forming blood clots and aortic aneurism.
INTEGUMENTARY SYSTEM
Skin involvement by smoking presents with discoloration, wrinkles, and premature aging. The presence of tar manifests as a brownish-yellow stain on the nails, fingers and teeth. The bad smell of the cigarette smoke also clings to the hair and skin.
DIGESTIVE SYSTEM
Oral problems are very common in smokers, presenting with gingivitis and periodontists. These conditions lead to tooth decay, tooth loss and of course to bad breath. Smoking can also decrease your appetite predisposing you to malnutrition.
ENDOCRINE SYSTEM
Smoking has harmful effects on insulin function thus increasing the chances of developing type 2 diabetes. Cortisol lowers the effects of nicotine. In high stress situation, when your body produces lots of cortisol you’ll need more nicotine to achieve its desired effects.
REPRODUCTIVE SYSTEM
Smokers have difficulty achieving orgasm, and the vasoconstriction caused by smoking effects the man’s ability to get an erection. Smoking also increases the risk of infertility and causes menopause earlier than expected.
Pregnant women experience more complications such as premature delivery, miscarriage and placental problems.

  http://wespeakscience.com/smoking-effects-on-the-body/

ALCOHOL and the BRAIN

Most of us have witnessed the outward signs of heavy drinking: the stumbling walk, slurred words and memory lapses. People who have been drinking have trouble with their balance, judgment and coordination. They react slowly to stimuli, which is why drinking before driving is so dangerous. All of these physical signs occur because of the way alcohol affects the brain and central nervous system.
Alcohol affects brain chemistry by altering levels of neurotransmitters. Neurotransmitters are chemical messengers that transmit the signals throughout the body that control thought processes, behavior and emotion. Neurotransmitters are either excitatory, meaning that they stimulate brain electrical activity, or inhibitory, meaning that they decrease brain electrical activity. Alcohol increases the effects of the inhibitory neurotransmitter GABA in the brain. GABA causes the sluggish movements and slurred speech that often occur in alcoholics. At the same time, alcohol inhibits the excitatory neurotransmitter glutamate. Suppressing this stimulant results in a similar type of physiological slowdown. In addition to increasing the GABA and decreasing the glutamate in the brain, alcohol increases the amount of the chemical dopamine in the brain's reward center, which creates the feeling of pleasure that occurs when someone takes a drink.

Alcohol affects the different regions of the brain in different ways:

• Cerebral cortex: In this region, where thought processing and consciousness are centered, alcohol depresses the behavioral inhibitory centers, making the person less inhibited; it slows down the processing of information from the eyes, ears, mouth and other senses; and it inhibits the thought processes, making it difficult to think clearly.
• Cerebellum: Alcohol affects this center of movement and balance, resulting in the staggering, off-balance swagger we associate with the so-called "falling-down drunk."
• Hypothalamus and pituitary: The hypothalamus and pituitary coordinate automatic brain functions and hormone release. Alcohol depresses nerve centers in the hypothalamus that control sexual arousal and performance. Although sexual urge may increase, sexual performance decreases.
• Medulla: This area of the brain handles such automatic functions as breathing, consciousness and body temperature. By acting on the medulla, alcohol induces sleepiness. It can also slow breathing and lower body temperature, which can be life threatening.

In the short term, alcohol can cause blackouts -- short-term memory lapses in which people forget what occurred over entire stretches of time. The long-term effects on the brain can be even more damaging.
http://science.howstuffworks.com/life/inside-the-mind/human-brain/alcoholism4.htm

5 Scientifically Supported Benefits of Prayer

According to a 2013 Pew Research Poll, over half of Americans pray every day. A 2012 poll found that over 75 percent of Americans believe that prayer is an important part of daily life. Other polls indicate that even some atheists and religiously unaffiliated individuals admit that they sometimes pray.
Our species has probably been praying for as long as we have been able to contemplate our existence. And though we may never be able to establish evidence that a deity or spiritual force actually hears our prayers, in recent years, scientists have begun to consider the potential tangible (i.e., measurable) effects of prayer. And this research suggests that prayer may be very beneficial.
So here are five scientifically-supported benefits of prayer:

1. Prayer improves self-control
Studies have demonstrated that self-control is like a muscle. That is, it gets fatigued. You can only do so many push-ups before your muscles give out. Similarly, activities that require self-control are fatiguing, making it more difficult to make good choices the more you have to use your "self-control muscle." Think about it. You are more likely to lose your cool or engage in mindless eating when you are mentally exhausted. 
Recent research indicates that prayer can help you get more out of your "self-control muscle." Research participants who said a prayer prior to a mentally exhausting task were better able to exercise self-control following that task. In addition, other studies demonstrate the prayer reduces alcohol consumption, which may reflect the exercise of self-control. Findings such as these suggest that prayer has an energizing effect.

2. Prayer makes you nicer
Researchers found that having people pray for those in need reduced the amount of aggression they expressed following an anger-inducing experience. In other words, prayer helps you not lose your cool.

3. Prayer makes you more forgiving
Researchers found that having people pray for a romantic partner or friend made them more willing to forgive those individuals.  

4. Prayer increases trust
Recent studies found that having people pray together with a close friend increased feelings of unity and trust. This finding is interesting because it suggests that praying with others can be an experience that brings people closer together. Social prayer may thus help build close relationships.

5. Prayer offsets the negative health effects of stress
Researchers found that people who prayed for others were less vulnerable to the negative physical health effects associated with financial stress. Also, it was the focus on others that seemed to be contributing to the stress-buffering effects of prayer. Praying for material gain did not counter the effects of stress. So thinking about the welfare of others may be a crucial component of receiving personal benefits from prayer.
Scientists and public intellectuals who are critical of religion, focus on what they believe to be the irrationality of religious belief. Why waste time believing in things that have no supporting scientific evidence? These critics typically fail to consider the fact that scientific studies are finding measureable benefits of religious faith. As I have discussed here and here, religion is complicated. It can be both good and bad for your health depending on a number of variables. However, there is a growing body of evidence indicating that prayer, a behavior often associated with religion, can be beneficial for individuals and society.

 https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/more-mortal/201406/5-scientifically-supported-benefits-prayer

Neuroscientist Shows What Fasting Does To Your Brain & Why Big Pharma Won’t Study It

Below is a TEDx talk given by Mark Mattson, the current Chief of the Laboratory of Neuroscience at the National Institute on Aging. He is also a professor of Neuroscience at The Johns Hopkins University, and one of the foremost researchers in the area of cellular and molecular mechanisms underlying multiple neurodegenerative disorders, like Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s disease.

I chose to include ‘Big Pharma’ in the title because that’s exactly what it is. There have been countless examples of the manipulation of published research at the hands of pharmaceutical companies in recent years. This is why Harvard Professor of Medicine Arnold Symour Relman told the world that the medical profession has been bought by the pharmaceutical industry. It’s why Dr. Richard Horton, Editor in Chief of The Lancet, recently stated that much of the sceintific literature published today is simply untrue. It’s why Dr. Marcia Angell, former Editor in Chief of The New England Journal of Medicine, said that the “pharmaceutical industry likes to depict itself as a research-based industry, as the source of innovative drugs. Nothing could be further from the truth.” And it’s why John Ioannidis, an epidemiologist at the Stanford University School of Medicine, published an article titled “Why Most Published Research Findings Are False” which subsequently became the most widely accessed article in the history of the Public Library of Science (PLoS).

I also chose to mention ‘Big Pharma’ because of Dr. Mattson’s comments towards the end of the video.

“Why is it that the normal diet is three meals a day plus snacks? It isn’t that it’s the healthiest eating pattern, now that’s my opinion but I think there is a lot of evidence to support that. There are a lot of pressures to have that eating pattern, there’s a lot of money involved. The food industry — are they going to make money from skipping breakfast like I did today? No, they’re going to lose money. If people fast, the food industry loses money. What about the pharmaceutical industries? What if people do some intermittent fasting, exercise periodically and are very healthy, is the pharmaceutical industry going to make any money on healthy people?”  

Mark and his team have published several papers that discuss how fasting twice a week could significantly lower the risk of developing both Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s disease.

“Dietary changes have long been known to have an effect on the brain. Children who suffer from epileptic seizures have fewer of them when placed on caloric restriction or fasts. It is believed that fasting helps kick-start protective measures that help counteract the overexcited signals that epileptic brains often exhibit. (Some children with epilepsy have also benefited from a specific high-fat, low-carbohydrate diet.) Normal brains, when overfed, can experience another kind of uncontrolled excitation, impairing the brain’s function, Mattson and another researcher reported in January in the journal Nature Reviews Neuroscience.”(source)

Basically, when you take a look at caloric restriction studies, many of them show a prolonged lifespan as well as an increased ability to fight chronic disease.

“Calorie restriction (CR) extends life span and retards age-related chronic diseases in a variety of species, including rats, mice, fish, flies, worms, and yeast. The mechanism or mechanisms through which this occurs are unclear.”

The quote above is from a review of the literature that is more than 10 years old. The work presented here is now showing some of these mechanisms that were previously unclear.

Fasting does good things for the brain, and this is evident by all of the beneficial neurochemical changes that happen in the brain when we fast. It also improves cognitive function, increases neurotrophic factors, increases stress resistance, and reduces inflammation.

Fasting is a challenge to your brain, and your brain responds to that challenge by adapting stress response pathways which help your brain cope with stress and risk for disease. The same changes that occur in the brain during fasting mimic the changes that occur with regular exercise. They both increase the production of protein in the brain (neurotrophic factors), which in turn promotes the growth of neurons, the connection between neurons, and the strength of synapses.

“Challenges to your brain, whether it’s intermittent fasting [or] vigorous exercise . . . is cognitive challenges. When this happens neuro-circuits are activated, levels of neurotrophic factors increase, that promotes the growth of neurons [and] the formation and strengthening of synapses. . . .” 

Fasting can also stimulate the production of new nerve cells from stem cells in the hippocampus. He also mentions ketones (an energy source for neurons), and how fasting stimulates the production of ketones and that it may also increase the number of mitochondria in neurons. Fasting also increases the number of mitochondria in nerve cells; this comes as a result of the neurons adapting to the stress of fasting (by producing more mitochondria).

By increasing the number of mitochondria in the neurons, the ability for nerons to form and maintain the connections between each other also increases, thereby improving learning and memory ability.

“Intermittent fasting enhances the ability of nerve cells to repair DNA.” 

He also goes into the evolutionary aspect of this theory – how our ancestors adapted and were built for going long periods of time without food.

A study published in the June 5 issue of Cell Stem Cell by researchers from the University of Southern California showed that cycles of prolonged fasting protect against immune system damage and, moreover, induce immune system regeneration. They concluded that fasting shifts stem cells from a dormant state to a state of self-renewal. It triggers stem cell based regeneration of an organ or system. (source)

Human clinical trials were conducted using patients who were receiving chemotherapy. For long periods of time, patients did not eat, which significantly lowered their white blood cell counts. In mice, fasting cycles “flipped a regenerative switch, changing the signalling pathways for hematopoietic stem cells, which are responsible for the generation of blood and immune systems.”

This means that fasting kills off old and damaged immune cells, and when the body rebounds it uses stem cells to create brand new, completely healthy cells.

“We could not predict that prolonged fasting would have such a remarkable effect in promoting stem cell-based regeneration of the heatopoietic system. . . . When you starve, the system tries to save energy, and one of the things it can do to save energy is to recycle a lot of the immune cells that are not needed, especially those that may be damaged.  What we started noticing in both our human work and animal work is that the white blood cell count goes down with prolonged fasting. Then when you re-feed, the blood cells come back. ” – Valter Longo, corresponding author (source)

A scientific review of multiple scientific studies regarding fasting was published in The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition in 2007. It examined a multitude of both human and animal studies and determined that fasting is an effective way to reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease and cancer. It also showed significant potential in treating diabetes. (source)

Before You Fast

Before you fast, make sure you do your research. Personally, I’ve been fasting for years, so it is something that comes easy for me.

One recommended way of doing it — which was tested by the BBC’s Michael Mosley in order to reverse his diabetes, high cholesterol, and other problems that were associated with his obesity — is what is known as the “5:2 Diet.” On the 5:2 plan, you cut your food down to one-fourth of your normal daily calories on fasting days (about 600 calories for men and about 500 for women), while consuming plenty of water and tea. On the other five days of the week, you can eat normally.

Another way to do it, as mentioned above, is to restrict your food intake between the hours of 11am and 7pm daily, while not eating during the hours outside of that time.

Bottom line, how you think about you’re diet is, in my opinion, one of the most, if not the most important part of staying healthy. How you think about what you are putting in your body is important, and I believe this will eventually be firmly established in the untainted, unbiased, uninfluenced medical literature of the future.

Below is a video of Dr. Joseph Mercola explaining the benefits of intermittent fasting. Here is a great article by him that explains how he believes intermittent fasting can help you live a healthier life.

http://www.collective-evolution.com/2015/12/11/neuroscientist-shows-what-fasting-does-to-your-brain-why-big-pharma-wont-study-it/

HOW THOUGHT CREATES YOUR REALITY

Good morning! Have you ever wondered what a thought is? Where does a thought come from? Where do sensations register? Where do we experience images, sensations, feelings, emotions and thoughts? Science has not been able to answer these questions. Because science looks at the outside world and has never really focused on "who is looking". "Who is looking" is a field of Pure Consciousness and the mechanics of seeing, touching, tasting, smelling is all through the mechanism of thought. So, when you understand consciousness; the you realize that is your core being and thoughts, feelings, images, sensations, these are impulses of Intelligence that make experience possible. So, thought makes experience possible. Because, fundamentally everything we call  "an experience"  is a thought. At the most fundamental level, all experiences are a thought. Thought transforms the unmanifest consciousness into the manifest reality. And that manifest realityis first mental and then physical. So, it includes your mind and body. Your mind, your body and the entire universe are the manifestation of thought, impuselses of intelligence that transform the unmanifest into the manifest.           

Deepak Chopra 

https://www.deepakchopra.com/blog/article/4734

Experts think your crappy genes can be rewired with diet and exercise

The nature vs. nurture debate just got hotter with Deepak Chopra and Rudolph E. Tanzi’s “Super Genes” (out Tuesday from Harmony Books), which looks like it’ll do just as well as their best-selling 2012 tome, “Super Brain.”
The general idea is simple: Genes aren’t as immutable as you may think.

“Gene activity responds to your lifestyle — your thoughts, your feelings, your actions, your stress levels, your diet,” Tanzi, a neuroscientist at Harvard’s Massachusetts General Hospital, tells The Post.

Nope, you can’t modify the DNA sequence that’s passed on from your family. But Tanzi notes that “most of what you inherit is written in clay rather than in stone. That means you have a chance to be the sculptor.”

Pushing the reasoning further, the book suggests those changes might be passed on: “Human beings could be the first creatures in the history of life on Earth to self-direct where their evolution is going.”

Their theory is not without its detractors in the scientific community.
“There’s not a shred of evidence that humans can change their genes in a permanent way via changes in our lifestyle,” writes Jerry Coyne, from the University of Chicago’s Department of Ecology & Evolution, in response to Chopra and Tanzi’s big idea.

Still, whether or not you buy the science, “Super Genes” offers common-sense advice for a healthier life.
Chopra and Tanzi single out six areas that can potentially change your well-being for the better, with easy, hard and experimental options.

Diet

“There is clearly a gut-brain axis,” says Tanzi, who’s been a vegetarian since college. “It brings a whole new meaning to the term ‘gut feeling.’  ” But since science has yet to formulate the perfect array of intestinal bacteria for overall health, the authors claim that following an anti-inflammatory diet is the next best thing, helping to combat an array of health issues, from chronic disease to obesity.
To fight inflammation, Chopra and Tanzi recommend eating more fiber and probiotics, and cutting down on processed foods. If you’re going to eat beef, grass-fed is better than grain-fed — the authors allow that, unfortunately, eating better also costs more.

Meditation

“Super Genes” acknowledges that the practice is “a major lifestyle change,” but well worth the effort. While meditation is often seen as a spiritual matter, the book argues it can have a physical impact by helping you battle stress, and even suggests the practice can help turn down stress-response genes. It can also prep you better for success by improving focus, the ability to make sound decisions and so on — a line of argument that should be familiar to regular Chopra readers.

Sleep
We all know a good night’s rest is essential, but the authors argue that sleep could affect what they call the “clock genes.” To activate them, which will impact appetite, mood and energy levels, they recommend you “avoid reading or watching TV [a half-hour] before you go to sleep.”
Stress
It’s “the first area where the mind-body connection could be proved” and guess what? It’s bad for you! Stress hormones can lead to a cascade of physical reactions, which, if experienced chronically, can “damage tissues and organs throughout the body,” according to the book.
Since the authors equate modern life with stress, they argue that it’s easier to “stop being the cause of stress for others.” How? For one, stop complaining and criticizing, start listening and address issues before they snowball into major problems.

Emotions

While it’s “highly unlikely” there’s anything like a “happiness gene,” the book suggests you can still do much to improve your emotions — which in turn impact your physical being. To reduce fear and anxiety, seek “emotional intelligence and happiness” by controlling your impulses, empathizing with others and making sure your needs are met by developing “the courage to find the right people” — even if that means risking rejection.

Exercise

Despite his busy schedule, Tanzi does yoga every morning and plays six hours of basketball a week. If your schedule’s too packed, the book recommends yoga, “the single activity that does the most for body and mind together.”

 http://nypost.com/2015/11/10/can-some-yoga-fix-your-familys-crappy-genes/