By Sanchit Khera
I heard an interesting podcast episode the other day from Radio Labs. It was called 9 volt Nirvana, and the guest Sally Adee spoke about a simulation training exercise used by DARPA.
She was asked to aim, shoot, reload and continue on as a sniper for 20 minutes in this simulation game. She performed quite poorly, being a rookie, and got less than half her targets on-point. And then came the 2 milliamps of electricity. They hooked her up to a brainwave electrode mechanism (trans-cranial direct current stimulation) and juiced her up near her temples. With this increase in stimulation in her temporal and pre-frontal cortex region, she played the simulation again. She got more than 90% of her targets correct, and completed the simulation with almost super-human quickness. The perception of time, for her, also sped up. 20 minutes felt like 3 minutes to her.
Theoretically, this could be applied to enhance all functions of our brains to a more superior level of cognition. Learning new languages, cracking a test wide open, performing better at sports, or even building better weapons of mass defence/destruction. Bruce Lee would shock himself to build endurance, according to his co-stars, and pro-athletes recover their muscle strength with mild electro-therapy after a hard day’s work in the field. Or even abuse this to extend their mental sharpness.
Imagine a world where athletes competed by increasing their mental quickness and agility by shocking themselves with mild electric current. No governing body would be able to control this, as the effects of small amounts of currents couldn’t be tested or penalized against any anti-doping regulation. Imagine watching the Tour D’France, and all your favourite cyclists are going 10 miles an hour faster than before, or your favourite football superstar score goals effortlessly from the 40 yard line, because he’s been practising at a higher level of mental focus and agility. It would elevate the game to a point where the limits of perfection would be superseded by our own imagination.
Now what about our CEOs? What if they start using this technology to make decisions quicker, and become sharper at work? Create more shareholder value, per minute spent at work. What happens when this drive to succeed in life reaches the everyday human being? Would we be zapping ourselves everyday instead of drinking a cup of coffee in the morning – just so we can keep up with Susan from accounting. Probably not.
Or probably yes. There’s a group of people that are picking up the equipment for $20 from Radioshack and assembling it themselves on YouTube – just so they can perform better at whatever tasks they want to. There’s blogs like GetLimitless that can teach you how you can do that for yourself.
Which brings me to talk about intelligence, in general and our constant drive to enhance it to accomplish self-created objectives that lead us to greatness. Intelligence is strongly related to our environment, and hence the more stimulating our environment is, the smarter we are. Tried and tested on lab rats and monkeys.
There’s even a strong love for intelligent people, that emerges in society, as the more intelligent a person is – the more able he is to survive and thrive on this planet. But what happens when we fulfil our basic necessities? Would we then want to be smarter, knowing fully well that we don’t need to be in order to survive better? At that point, intelligence would serve no additional purpose, except to be just smart enough until all of our basic needs and our future security is taken care of.
Nowhere to go, except to enjoy the present moment. And hence, calling someone or something stupid, doesn’t make us any smarter, it only implies that they choose to remain content with their present. The entire human race is always going somewhere constantly. Going on and on. Evolving trends, healthcare, technology, and flat screen TVs ad infinitum. We’ll live longer, drive faster, perform better, and we’ll be able to have any experience that we could dream of. We could reach Tokyo in 15 minutes, and watch the sunset in Monte Carlo by supper time. The game would become even more interesting to us, with different people talking about different experiences. We’d immerse ourselves completely, until we get bored of our existence and want something more.
The desire for more, more, more, would keep us hooked and plugged to things that we wished we had, and experiences we wished we could grab onto. Sure everyone would be richer in the bargain, but would we be happy? Would we attain the one thing that we’re trying to attain endeavour after endeavour.
Or is only the alleviation of pain the point of our enhanced technology? and the greater question – is there inner peace, with the advent of our enhanced technology?
About the Author: Sometimes when my ego gets ahead of me, I refer to it as your I-ness. I love the fact that everyone is equally lost in a world that everyone is a part of equally. I also love music, and how the drums are similar to the crashing of the waves, and the guitar is a lion's roar in the deep jungles of our earth. I think re-incarnation is jazz, and nirvana is only yours to achieve and yours to deceive. For nirvana is like fine wine, everyone's got their preferences - but its still old grape juice.
http://www.learning-mind.com/electrical-brain-stimulation-shocking-ourselves-into-greatness/
Avatar: I find this subject highly fascinating because I've been making electrical devices for years using a 9 volt lantern battery, an extension cord, a couple of sponges and a few other odds and ends for healing purposes. I've used these devices on deep puncture wounds which was causing fever and severe pain, poisonous spider bites, infected teeth, strained muscles, sore throats, broken bones and purifying the blood with great success. Now to think these devices can be used for learning is absolutely amazing and certainly worth a try.
Comments
Good :)
@AO
My husband IS an electrical professional but most professionals have helpers and I'm very aware of houses burning down due to faulty electrical wiring and is why I'm very conscious if what I'm doing when I'm doing it..
@avatar
if you wire the house yourself instead of letting a professional do it, you SHOULD be nervous, as that is one of the most stupid things a non-electrician person could do today. Many houses burn down due to faulty wiring you know. That's why at least Europe have laws that forbid peoeple to even try to wire their own houses. :)
Well, when you're working with 6 volt batteries it's really not too hard to understand but there are certain rules but they are few and easy to understand. It's wiring houses that make me nervous...you really need to be very careful. I was once helping my husband wire in the plugs on a house and he showed me how to do it on the first plug...so I went to work and finished up and when the husb turned on the electricity the plugs in the bedroom where I was working would not work. He told me I had done them wrong and to go back and rewire them and so I did but they still wouldn't work....if one is wired wrong none of them will work if they're on the same circuit. He got disgusted with me so I thought let me rewire the one plug he wired and guess what? His was the one that was wired wrong...we all make mistakes even the boss. LOL
I have a sort of block when it comes to understanding electricity. As an auto-mechanic for a few years, I was very good at the metal work nuts-and-bolts stuff, but never could quite grasp a fundamental understanding of the whys and hows of electrical components.
I'm funny that way. If I can't understand something completely, then my own mind gets in the way of any partial understanding. I confuse myself with infinite possibilities wherever there are unknowns. I make the simple extremely complicated unless my mind can penetrate its secrets completely.
This makes me drive to get to very deep levels of understanding or, if that understanding remains beyond my grasp, I seem to be unable to work with something on shallower, yet practical, levels. I have a need to know what I'm doing that goes beyond just making it work. The plus side is I do actually succeed at reaching knowledge of some things that is rare.
Electricity is one of those things that, if I were to become interested in understanding it, I would become obsessed with understanding it completely and devote decades, if necessary to its study. It must be a scorpio thing.
That is fantastic, Phylos!! I love hearing the experiences and so glad it helped you but not surprised. It's also been found that you can hook up two needles to the electrical device and insert them into a tumor and it will destroy it from the inside out. Some of us make metered devices which helps with the current. I'm a DIYer so this kind of stuff really interests me. If you're in a survival situation you never know when they might come in handy.
Thank you so much for sharing your experience. <3
You are full of surprises, Avatar. An insightful inventor, no less! I have a story of electrical healing.
About five years ago, I came down with severe cramps that started in my left forearm and went all the way up my arm and shoulder, lodging underneath my shoulder blade and along the left side of my neck and upper backbone. I had no idea of the cause and literally suffered for weeks. I was taking 4 to 6 ibuprophen at a time and still ccouldn't sleep because of the unrelenting pain. A conventional Doctor could do nothing other than advise pain pills..hence the ibuprophen.
Luckily, I have a friend who is a lisenced Naturopath Dr. Also, he is a Dr. of chiropactic, and a high spiritual being, teacher, and all-around alternative healer. By using muscle testing techniques, we were able to determine that what was causing the cramps was the un-released deep memories from an ancient trama. While we couldn't recover the specifics, it was something that, according to the muscle-testing responses, I had experienced over 90 lifetimes ago. Perhaps a spear through the shoulder or worse?
He tried deep massage, nutritional supplements and it didn't work. A week later, when the second attempt with deep massage was to take place, My body was literally blue with bruises from the bodywork of the previous week. He was reluctant to work with more massage on already massaged to the point of damage tissue. I agreed. Then he tried acupuncture. About a dozen needles at points on my back, shoulder, and arm. That did little to help until he applied electricity to the needles. It was like a miracle! The mild shocks seem to have reached into my subconscious muscle memory and released the relentless tension, at least most of it. This was crippling me and absolutely ruining any potential to continue at playing my viols and guitar. The cramps were a symptom of deep issues coming to the surface to be cleared and that process continues. I believe it is ongoing for all of us living at this time and it is by pure Grace brought forth with the accompanying synchronicity of available healing. Good blog, Avatar. There are hundreds of brown recluses and black widows around here and I will be seeking your counsel if I ever get bit. :)
This is absolutely excellent, Malcolm...I'm so proud of you...such a great subject to research. I've had excellent results using electrical devices so I know they work. It's great to know the medical community is finally recognizing the benefits, When I was bitten by a brown recluse spider on my finger everyone tried to get me to go to the hospital but I refused because I did not want them to amputate my finger so I started using my 'Godzilla' on it and within several hours the swelling was nearly gone and I never ran a fever. This was not an over night cure because I had to keep with it for about 3 weeks but there was no more swelling or infection...just a small pus bump that finally dried up and fell out leaving a hole. Now you cannot even tell where I was bitten.
The good thing about the devices I make is they are so simple and can be made very easily. If you're on a camping trip and are bitten by something poisonous, get a strained muscle or broken bone or puncture wound you can find everything you need to address these health issues until medics can get to you.
For years those of us who've made these devices were laughed at my husband being one of them until he was shot in the hand with a gun nail. By the time he got home his hand was swollen twice it's size and he was running fever. I put my Godzilla on it and by morning it was so much better he got up and went to work but again I had to use it on him for several days before I felt confident he was going to be okay.
Now whenever he gets hurt he tell me..."heal me." LOL
AVATAR: here's a new treatment technique for depression that was my research project for a University of Texas class in the nursing program called "Alternative Medicine" (I got an A for the project, and a B in the class):
Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (TMS) Service
TMS is a non-invasive method of brain stimulation that relies on electromagnetic induction using an insulated coil placed over the scalp, focused on an area of the brain thought to play a role in mood regulation. The coil generates brief magnetic pulses, which pass easily and painlessly through the skull and into the brain. The pulses generated are of the same type and strength as those generated by magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) machines. When these pulses are administered in rapid succession, it is referred to as “repetitive TMS “ or “rTMS”, which can produce longer lasting changes in brain activity.
rTMS has been shown to be a safe and well-tolerated procedure that can be an effective treatment for patients with depression who have not benefitted from antidepressant medications or cannot tolerate antidepressant medications due to side-effects.
We offer rTMS at Johns Hopkins using the only TMS device approved by the FDA for the treatment of major depression. However, rTMS therapy is not appropriate for all patients. Before scheduling you for treatment, you must first be evaluated by one of our TMS psychiatrists to determine if rTMS would be safe and appropriate for you.
I never post video-suggestions without also including a possibility to view it for free.
There's a link to download the actual movie right below the trailer. Very poor quality though and I'm searching for a better release twice per day until I find one. Until I do, this cam-version will have to do. :)
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