Consciousness/Brain

A New View of Consciousness and Reality :
A New Way of Envisioning Consciousness and the Brain

Based on quantum theory, Cardiologist Pim Van Lommel, in his landmark book on Near-Death Experiences Consciousness Beyond Life, posits that consciousness actually exists in a non-local space where time and distance play no role. Quantum theory suggests that all matter can exist as either a wave of spread out energy or as a discrete particle located in space and time. Furthermore, consciousness seems to play a decisive role in the transition from a wave of spread out energy to its collapse into a discrete particle located in time and space. For instance, an electron around the nucleus exists as a wave of probability until it is observed, whereby the numerous possibilities collapse and the electron is concentrated in a particular spot for everyone to see.25

Underlying reality, therefore, is a sea of infinite energy where all possibilities exist. If we want to describe consciousness, we could think of it as an infinite sea of light where everything is connected non-locally. The light acts like a unified field, whereby every part of the field is connected to every other part without the need for energy transfer. In the words of Van Lommel, “non-local space could also be called the absolute vacuum: it lacks structure, has no time, and is an empty space in which quarks (elementary particles and fundamental constituents of matter), electrons, gravity, and electricity have all become one and as such do not exist. This space forms the foundation for an infinite number of possibilities.” 26

I like to think of it as an infinite field of intelligent light that holds all knowledge, or information, encoded in wave functions. The material world, which we are so familiar with, can be seen as the collapse of these wave functions into a particular possibility.

In Van Lommel’s words, “The physical aspect of our consciousness in the material world, which we experience as waking consciousness and which can be compared to the particle aspect of light, stems from the wave aspect of the “complete” and “endless” consciousness created by collapse of the wave function in non-local space.” 27

In essence, an infinite consciousness underlies and forms the basis for our material world. This consciousness is in direct control of all energy manifest in the material realm because it is the source of that energy. It literally forms the material world by creating information, or specific patterns of energy, from an infinite number of possibilities of that energy configuration. The material world is but one manifestation of this consciousness and there is evidence that there are many more dimensions created by this consciousness. This process of creation is an ongoing and never ending process.

The real clincher in all of this is that our consciousnesses are essentially identical to this one consciousness, which can be labelled 'Source Consciousness'. The brain, then, operates as a receiver of an aspect of this Source Consciousness into the material dimension of space and time.

In Van Lommel’s words, “The brain and the body merely function as a relay station receiving part of the overall consciousness and part of our memories in our waking consciousness in the form of measurable and constantly changing electromagnetic fields.” 28

I propose that your waking consciousness is essentially the light from Source Consciousness manifesting through the brain and body to experience the energy patterns of the brain and body. However that energy is not just experienced by consciousness, but in-formed by consciousness. In other words, consciousness is in control of how that energy is configured. Consciousness is the creator of information. I believe the electro-chemical processes in the brain operate much the same way as DNA or language, on the idea of specified information which consciousness provides.

Different types of energy produce different experiences. The electro-chemical energy produced by the brain to create an image is different from the electro-chemical energy produced by the brain to create an emotion. Furthermore, the specific pattern of energy determines the specific image or emotion that is experienced. To experience a picture of the sun in your mind requires the “image energy” to be arranged in a specific pattern that is different from the specific pattern of “image energy” required to experience a different picture in the mind, say a tree.

Consciousness is the intelligence operating within the body to produce these specified energy patterns, which you will remember equates to information. So, consciousness underlies and collapses the energy in your brain to produce conscious experiences of thought, emotion, and action.

Briefly, I will discuss some of the evidence that consciousness plays a decisive role in the energy configuration of the brain. Although the brain is influenced by the environment, consciousness can control the brain activity through focused thought and belief. Study after study shows that processes within our bodies can be controlled and manipulated through conscious intention. We now know that the brain is not a fixed entity, but has a considerable degree of plasticity.29 It is our consciousness that can control the neuronal pathways developed in the brain.

Jeffrey Schwartz, a neuroscientist at UCLA, has demonstrated this plasticity of the brain in Obsessive-Compulsive patients. He figured out that the cause of their OCD was due to an overactive part of the brain that was "locked into a pattern of repetitive firing."30 His approach to dealing with this problem was to have patients consciously start thinking in a different way about their compulsions. This approach included having patients re-attribute their compulsive thoughts with sayings such as, "It's not me: it's my OCD!" Also, patients would re-assign their thoughts. For instance, they would substitute "go work in the garden" for "wash hands seven more times". These, along with a couple of other strategies, worked significantly in 12 of 18 patients who showed "significantly diminished metabolic activity after the treatment" in the areas of the brain that were responsible for their symptoms. As Schwartz pointed out after the study: "This was the first study ever to show that cognitive-behaviour therapy - or indeed, any psychiatric treatment that did not rely on drugs - has the power to change faulty brain chemistry in a well-identified brain circuit". 31

Experiments have also shown that people can control their emotional responses to stimuli which are designed to invoke an emotional response by consciously trying to detach themselves from that event. This requires a suppression of brain activity normally associated with emotional arousal.32 As Mario Beauregard and Denyse O’Leary say in their book The Spiritual Brain, “It appears that, in principle, normal humans are not feeling robots, but are quite capable of adjusting their emotional reactions.” 33

Other studies have shown that experienced meditators can adjust their brain waves through meditation. In one study, Buddhist monks, by focusing their thoughts on loving compassion for all living things, were able to shift their brain waves into a gamma-ray state and sustain that state.34 This state is characterized by heightened awareness, when the brain is in a state of rapt attention.35 Furthermore, the monks experienced “permanent emotional improvement, by activating the left anterior portion of the brain - the portion most associated with joy.”36

Not only can conscious intention activate or de-activate parts of the brain, but studies show that you can cause permanent changes in the brain through focused attention. Neuroscientist at Massachusetts General Hospital, Sara Lazar, scanned the brains of 20 Buddhist meditators who had long been practicing mindfulness meditation, whereby the practitioner focuses on heightening his/her perceptions of the senses in the current moment. She found that "those portions of the brain associated with attention, awareness of sensation, sensory stimuli, and sensory processing were thicker in the meditators than in the controls."37 Furthermore, she found that the longer the practitioner had been practicing meditation, the thicker these areas of the brain were.

In a similar vein, psychic Ingo Swann, who is well known for his gift in remote viewing - the perception of objects or events outside of one's sensory awareness - was tested to see what his brain activity was like when he used his psychic power. In the experiment, run by Dr. Michael Persinger, he was hooked up to an EEG machine and asked to identify objects in a distant room. "At the very moment that he was able to 'see' the items remotely, his brain showed bursts of fast activity in the high beta and gamma range...Those bursts of activity occurred primarily over the right occipital region, the portion of the brain relating to sight." Furthermore, an MRI scan showed that the large parieto-occipital right-hemisphere lobe of his brain, which is involved in sensory and visual input, was 'unusually large'. 38

Again, as with the Buddhist meditators, we see that advanced awareness and perception are associated with gamma-ray brain activity, which is the highest level of electromagnetic frequency. Moreover, we see that areas of the brain can grow and strengthen their neural connections through performing tasks that utilize those brain areas. Most importantly, it is conscious intention that lies behind it all. Without regularly exercising the large parieto-occipital region of his brain through the conscious intention to see faraway places and objects, would this area of the brain be as large in Swann as it is? It seems likely that it would not be in light of the Lazar study which showed that Buddhist meditators had thicker than normal brain areas that were activated during their many years of meditation. However, it could be that Swann was simply gifted from birth with an unusually large parieto-occipital region of his brain. Likewise, it could also be the case that people who are drawn to become meditating monks already possess thicker portions of the brain related to attention and sensory awareness. So, we can only tentatively conclude that focused intention can permanently change the structure of the brain. Further research will hopefully clarify this issue.

Now we've seen examples of people decreasing activity in certain areas of the brain, as with OCD patients and subjects trying to control emotional response to stimuli, and examples of people increasing activity in certain areas of their brain, as with Buddhist meditators and Ingo Swann. This all shows us that by consciously focusing our thoughts we can control the flow of energy in our brains and even control the brain's development; clearly, consciousness is the director of matter.

Another category of conscious control that deserves equal mention is belief. The focused attention of your thoughts is one thing, and deeply held beliefs are another. Everyone knows about the placebo effect, whereby someone's belief that they are receiving a medicine is all it takes to make them better, regardless of whether or not they are actually receiving a pharmaceutical drug. However, this effect takes many forms, not just in regards to pharmaceutical medicine.

One interesting study, run by University of Michigan researchers, tested the placebo effect by injecting saltwater into the jaws of young, healthy men. The saltwater should have created painful pressure in the subjects' jaws. However, the young men were actually told that they were receiving pain relief. Well, the suggestion worked. "They reported feeling better. The placebo treatment reduced the brain responses in a number of brain regions known to be implicated in the subjective experience of pain." 39 In other words, the person's belief that they were receiving pain relief triggered the brain to respond in accordance with that belief. Again, one's consciousness is in the driver's seat.

Another study looked at the effects of 'sham surgery'. This is where a person goes in for surgery, is put under, given incisions to look like something has been done, but no actual surgery takes place. The patient is simply cut open and sewn back up again. I will quote one example from The Spiritual Brain:

"...a 2004 study compared thirty patients who received controversial embryonic stem-cell implants for Parkinson's disease to patients who received only a sham surgery. Those who thought they had received the stem cells reported better quality of life a year later than those who thought they had received the sham surgery, regardless of which surgery patients had actually received."40 (emphasis added)

All of the evidence examined so far shows that consciousness has direct control over the body. By consciously directing your attention or thoughts, you can directly control the flow of neuronal activity in the brain. Furthermore, an ingrained belief also instantiates brain and bodily processes to conform to that belief.

In my view, the brain produces conscious awareness while you are in a physical body, your conscious awareness being what you actually experience. However, this electromagnetic energy of the brain is the result of consciousness operating through the brain. Consciousness is the light that sustains the body and moves the energy within it. Without conscious light, the body dies. There can be no zombies. The brain is constantly transmitting information about the body and outside world, as received through the senses, to conscious awareness. The brain is also being guided by consciousness to produce emotions, thoughts, direct awareness to certain sensations, memories, or other areas of focus, or to move some part of the body. A conscious thought could be said to be received by the brain, as if there were some transfer of energy. However, in my view, consciousness can directly control brain activity.

To me, consciousness is the intelligence using the brain as a medium to operate through. Consciousness, therefore, has no need to transfer anything to the brain. Rather, consciousness produces a thought by directly moving the energy of the brain to create the energy pattern associated with that thought. Since consciousness underlies and forms the energy, it is in control of how that energy is formed, or the pattern that it takes.

Consciousness is like the ocean, and the waves on the ocean are the energy that we see manifest in physical reality. The wave rests on the ocean and the ocean can direct that wave and manipulate it in any way it sees fit. So too can consciousness direct the energy of the material world. As the basis of the material world, consciousness can create any energy pattern it wants. Our individual aspect of consciousness can do the same with the brain, creating specific energy patterns in the brain to create the desired experience. Furthermore, consciousness stores all of the information ever experienced via wave patterns. When the brain is no longer functional (when you die), then consciousness no longer has an interface to operate through and so separates from the body and returns to its Source.

Now, we are ready to tie all of the preceding sections together. There is a Supreme Consciousness at the base of reality. It is an Intelligent Consciousness containing infinite possibilities. This Consciousness contains infinite energy in potential and manifests the energy of the material world from this infinite potential, at the same time determining the patterns which that energy takes. It directs the material universe via what we know as the laws of nature, which are really like habits of mind of the Creator. The laws of nature are no more than the ideas about how to run the universe in the Mind of God. DNA and cellular structures show clear evidence of intelligent design.

Now, based on this model we can easily postulate that the Consciousness underlying reality is the Intelligence that forms and directs all the energy of the material world. It is in direct control, not through some sort of transfer of energy, but because it manifests the energy in the first place. Instead of random evolution, then, we may speak of intelligently directed evolution of life. DNA was created by the consciousness underlying reality creating specific patterns of energy, or matter. DNA can then be said to be an intelligent formation of cosmic consciousness, just as our consciousness forms the energy patterns in our brain. Our individual consciousness is but a tiny aspect of this overall consciousness. Our brain acts as an interface for this aspect of consciousness to experience material reality.

Next: What Happens When We Die?