A question I received: In his book, Mystery of the Mind, the great American neurosurgeon, Wilder Penfield, concludes that the mind is absolutely independent from the brain. The mind is higher even than our consciousness, and it is, in fact, an absolutely independent entity. The mind gives orders, the brain executes them like a computer, and sends them to the consciousness. What does Kabbalah say about this?

My Comment: This is already close to truth. He’s right in that our brain is like a computer. However, our mind is also material because it exists within the quality of reception for self and not for bestowal.

Physical researchers believe that the mind exists “outside of the body” because they aren’t yet capable of discovering its material form. However, in Kabbalah, “outside of the body” means something different: beyond the egoistic desire. Since the only thing that was created is the desire, everything is either a desire to fulfill oneself or a desire to fulfill others.

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In the News (from The Telegraph):“Showing anger ‘is good for career‘” Showing your anger rather than repressing emotions is the key to a successful professional and personal life, according to research. A recent study published in the Journal of Social Behaviour and Personality found that more than 55 per cent of people said an angry episode produced a positive outcome, while almost a third admitted the episode helped them see their own faults.

My Comment: Nothing was created in vain; everything has a purpose. You only have to find out how to use it correctly.

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In the News (from ScienceBlog): For the first time, scientists have successfully teleported information between two separate atoms in unconnected enclosures a meter apart. Quantum information, such as the spin of a particle or the polarization of a photon, is transferred from one place to another, without traveling through any physical medium.

Teleportation works because of a remarkable quantum phenomenon, called “entanglement.” Once two objects are put in an entangled state, their properties are inextricably entwined. …measuring either one of the objects instantly determines the characteristics of the other, no matter how far apart they are.

My Comment: It works the same way with our spiritual development: when a person acquires the Creator’s qualities, he becomes like the Creator! He teleports the Creator into himself.

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In the News (from Physorg): “Scientists Model Words as Entangled Quantum States in our Minds” Research has shown that words are stored in our memories not as isolated entities but as part of a network of related words. Researchers have modeled the human mental lexicon as consisting of words that cannot be separated from other words, which may explain why words have many associations, a feature which helps us communicate.

In trying to understand these connections, scientists visualize a map of links among words called the mental lexicon that shows how words in a vocabulary are interconnected through other words. The quantum-based model doesn’t assume that words are separate entities.

A question I received on this news story: But at the same time scientists talk about “memory shelves,” where separate bits of information are stored. So which theory is correct?

My Answer: Any particular part of the universe is similar to the entire universe and is a mini mirror-image of it. The only thing in creation is the World of Infinity, and it is divided into parts that perceive it. These parts are identical to their collective whole, just like in a holographic picture.

Although it’s easier for us to speak in terms of memory cells, whenever we speak about anything, we’re always talking about a mini-model of the only creation – the World of Infinity. The only thing that differentiates the mini-model is its infinitude: it is a finite, fixed desire to love and bestow. This is how the degrees of descent were formed, starting from the World of Infinity and ending down in our world.

In our world, the descent continues. However, it no longer happens in likeness to the quality of love and bestowal, but in different degrees of the desire, “to receive for one’s own sake.”

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In the News (from The New York Times): “The Unintended Consequences of Changing Nature’s Balance” In 1985, Australian scientists kicked off an ambitious plan: to kill off non-native cats that had been prowling the island’s slopes since the early 19th century. The program began out of apparent necessity — the cats were preying on native burrowing birds. Twenty-four years later, a team of scientists from the Australian Antarctic Division and the University of Tasmania reports that the cat removal unexpectedly wreaked havoc on the island ecosystem.

With the cats gone, the island’s rabbits (also non-native) began to breed out of control, ravaging native plants and sending ripple effects throughout the ecosystem. “Our findings show that it’s important for scientists to study the whole ecosystem before doing eradication programs,” said Arko Lucieer, a University of Tasmania remote-sensing expert and a co-author of the paper.

My Comment: We, too, must learn all about the system in which we exist – the forces influencing us as well as the forces through which we affect everything – before trying to change anything in the system. Because the system is integral, we now have a domino effect on the global scale, where any small, particular error causes a systemic, global collapse.

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In the News (from LMU): “The Law of the Weakest” LMU (University of Munich) researchers have now simulated the progression of a cyclic competition of three species. “In this kind of cyclical concurrence, the weakest species proves the winner almost without exception,” reports Professor Erwin Frey, who headed the study. This “law of the weakest” even held true when the difference between the competing species was slight. “Incidentally, in experiments that were conducted a couple of years ago on bacterial colonies, there was one clear result: The weakest of the three species emerged victorious from the competition,” said Prof. Frey.

My Comment: With these examples, nature shows us that the real power lies in the entire system, and the system’s priority is the survival of the weakest. The main objective in the struggle for survival that takes place in all of creation is to take care of every part of creation. So until we begin to care for everyone, equally and in inverse proportion to one’s ability to survive, we will remain “losers” in our development. By thinking and acting as if we’re above nature, we end up being stupid.

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In the News (from The Guardian): “Biofuels more harmful to humans than petrol and diesel, warn scientists” The study shows that corn-based bioethanol, which is produced extensively in the US, has a higher combined environmental and health burden than conventional fuels… With biofuels, the problems are caused by particles given off during their growth and manufacture… Before we dedicate major resources to new biofuels, we should be trying to quantify other likely impacts to society – water quality, biodiversity and so on – and put all of those into our analysis.

My Comment: There is only one way to avoid harm, which is to aspire toward similarity with Nature. The knowledge we will gain when we aspire toward bestowal and love will enable us to change correctly. We will understand how to change our social relations, how to build our trade and financial systems, which industries to develop, and so on.

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In the News (from National Geographic): “Cows With Names Yield More Milk, British Study Finds”  “By giving a cow a name and treating her as an individual, farmers can increase their annual milk yield by almost 500 pints,” scientists at Newcastle University in the UK say. “Just as people respond better to the personal touch, cows also feel happier and more relaxed if they are given a bit more one-to-one attention,” explains C. Douglas, who works in the School of Agriculture, Food and Rural Development at Newcastle University. “Calling a cow by her name or interacting with the animal more as it grows up, we can not only improve the animal’s welfare and her perception of humans, but also increase milk production.”

My Comment: You can achieve more through love and relaxation than through hatred and force. Maybe it’s time we tried the same approach with people?

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In the News (from Science Daily): “How A Brain Chemical Changes Locusts From Harmless Grasshoppers To Swarming Pests.” A collaboration between a team of scientists has identified an increase in the chemical serotonin [the “happiness hormone”] in specific parts of the insects’ nervous system as initiating the key changes in behavior that cause them to swarm… Vast swarms containing billions of locusts (grasshoppers that swarm) stretching over many square kilometers continue to inflict severe economic hardship on parts of Africa and China. In November 2008 swarms six kilometers (3.7 miles) long plagued Australia.

My Comment: The grasshoppers feel happy from being in a flock. This is the reason for their behavior, whereas the food is secondary. If the locusts stop feeling happy from working in a flock, they will stop destroying the vegetation. But this unconscious need for serotonin cannot be destroyed. These “plagues of Egypt” will disappear only when man rises above nature and begins to accumulate the feeling of happiness. This will affect all the lower levels of nature, and then the plagues will vanish.

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In the News (from Nine News): “’Catastrophic’ sun storm possible, NASA warns” A once-in-a-century solar storm would threaten catastrophic destruction if a worst-case scenario event transpired, a new NASA report has found… Governments would be powerless to curb the loss of crucial infrastructure, potentially crippling our way of life … scientists warn the consequences would be far more serious because modern technologies have made our infrastructure more inter-reliant.

My Comment: Because we disturb Nature’s balance, we should expect all kinds of negative influences from It – consequences of the imbalanced state. Our lives and well-being on the planet depend on us bringing Nature into balance. Kabbalah explains how to do this: by changing man’s consciousness from egoistic to altruistic. Kabbalah gives us the means to make the transition to the new state quickly and easily.

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