Plant Intelligence Studied in Lab

By Nicole Martinelli
Source: Wired

Professor Stefano Mancuso knows it isn't easy being green: He runs the world's only laboratory dedicated to plant intelligence.

At the International Laboratory of Plant Neurobiology (LINV), about seven miles outside Florence, Italy, Mancuso and his team of nine work to debunk the myth that plants are low-life. Research at the modern building combines physiology, ecology and molecular biology.

"If you define intelligence as the capacity to solve problems, plants have a lot to teach us," says Mancuso, dressed in harmonizing shades of his favorite color: green. "Not only are they 'smart' in how they grow, adapt and thrive, they do it without neuroses. Intelligence isn't only about having a brain."

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This is Your Brain on Advertising

By Amber Haq
Source: Business Week

Do you ever get the creepy feeling that advertisers know how to put a lump in your throat, inspire subconscious brand loyalty, or make your mouth water? Just wait: It could get worse.

An emerging technique called neuromarketing that uses brain scans to measure human response to promotional messages is starting to catch on in Europe—and soon ads may become even more effective at prompting you to pull out your wallet.

Orwellian, perhaps. But for companies looking to fine-tune their promotions and boost sales, neuromarketing offers the enticing prospect of a quantitative way to test the subconscious effectiveness of ads, jingles, and logos before spending big bucks on media placements. That's a godsend for marketers wary of the sometimes unreliable results of focus groups and other field testing.

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Marketing and Mind Control

By Wray Herbert
Source: Newsweek

Imagine that I have $100 and I offer you $20 of it, no strings attached. You'd take it, right? Any fool would; it's a windfall. But imagine further that you know I must give away part of my $100 or lose it all. All of a sudden my motives aren't entirely altruistic, but I'm still offering you free money. Take it or leave it, but no negotiation allowed. How would you feel? What would you do?

If you were like a lot of people who have answered these questions in a psychological experiment over the years, you would now feel conflicted. Many of these people actually walked away from the deal, even though it would have meant a no-strings-attached twenty bucks in their pockets. Why? Because the arrangement is fundamentally unfair, and once you know this your basic sense of moral indignation clicks in. Your emotions and principles trump your pure rationality.

Psychologists have demonstrated this in the laboratory, time and time again. It's known as the Ultimatum Game, and its counterintuitive findings are part of a broad new understanding of how the human brain and mind work. As it turns out, we are not very reasonable creatures much of the time, nor are we very aware. Indeed, we are under constant sway of our emotions and intuitions, and most of the time we are not even aware of just how quirky and emotional our everyday decisions are.

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Brainwave Entrainment, Why "The Secret" Doesn't Work, and Portuguese Translations...

3 quick bits of news today:

1. What the heck is Brainwave Entrainment?
Song Chengxiang is bringing out his limited edition box set of his best selling 'Quantum Mind Power' today. This is the physical CD package of his cutting edge brain entrainment system, and since it is a physical product, there is a limit of 1000 sets available. If you have been wondering about the power of Brainwave Entrainment, check out his offer at http://www.MindPowerNews.com/QMP.htm

2. FREE REPORT: Why "The Secret" Might Not be Working For You
If you're a student of "The Secret" you have no doubt run into many obstacles on your way to manifesting what you want. This free report describes exactly the three most common hurdles in implementing the secret and how to get beyond those stumbling blocks on your way to "living the life you are meant to live."

Download this free report at http://www.MindPowerNews.com/3UntoldSecrets.pdf

3. A Portuguese version of "Mind Over Money: Program Your Mind For Wealth"
One of the members of the Mind Power News community loved the book "Mind Over Money" so much she translated the entire text into her native language of Portuguese, so if you speak the language or know anyone who does, you can check it out at http://shanta.biz/a_mente_sobre_o_dinheiro.html

How to Fall Asleep in 3 Minutes

By Kacper Postawski
Creator of the Sleep Wiz Revitalizing Program

The inability to fall asleep can be frustrating and greatly impede one's ability to function on a day to day basis. The following tips will help you to fall asleep in no time. Pleasant dreams!

1. Food That Can Help You Fall Asleep. Trytophan is an amino acid that helps the brain produce serotonin, which helps you relax. Found in such things as turkey, milk, chicken, ice cream, tuna and peanuts, the soothing effect of trytophan can help you put your day's worries behind you and allow you to fall into blissful slumber. On the other hand, avoid spicy and fatty foods, which can give you heartburn and keep you awake. Similarly, too much liquid before bedtime can leave you running to the bathroom all night rather than sleeping.

2. Relax. One of the biggest culprits of sleep deprivation is the inability to stop the mind from racing with the day's event and ongoing worries. The key is to slow down, and try to leave your troubles behind. A warm bath, meditation, peaceful music, a good book and dimmed lights can have a soothing, therapeutic effect.

3. Avoid Stimulants. Caffeine, found in coffee and soda, and nicotine, found in cigarettes, are stimulants that inhibit your ability to slow down and get some rest. Herbal energy boosters can also keep you awake. Try to avoid stimulants for eight hours prior to bedtime.

CLICK HERE TO READ THE FULL STORY

Can Your Dog Read Your Mind?

Source: BrainMysteries.com

Dog owners who think their beloved pooch can read their mind may be right.

Canterbury University psychology student Michelle Maginnity has just completed a masters research project looking at whether the domestic dog has a theory of mind - that is, whether they can think about the thoughts and feelings of self and others.

She said after carrying out a range of experiments which tested the cognitive skills of dogs, she believed they were not only sensitive to human cues, but also had the ability to think about what their human companions may be thinking.

"So, in a way, dogs may be able to read minds," she said.

CLICK HERE TO READ THE FULL STORY

How to Learn Like a Genius

By Win Wenger, Ph.D.
Source: Project Renaissance

All of you reading this:

You have brains enough to run a galaxy. What are you doing with them?

One of the most frequently used paths to genius: find a knack that works for you. Get on a roll. Find ways to stay on that roll. Find ways to return to being on that roll, until so much else falls into that roll that even you begin to realize that you are, indeed, a genius.....

How to Learn Through a Periscope

We had enrolled our 4-year-old daughter in a neighborhood swim team, not for the sake of competing but simply for safety reasons, to ensure she would be competent in the water. During one of the team's meets, in one heat a clerical error had her swim as the only small kid among 8-, 9- and 10-year-olds. To our amazement, she swam far faster than ever before and finished right in the middle of the pack. "How did you do that?!?" we asked her. Her reply: "I made believe I was one of the big kids."

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Ending Aging: How One Scientist Plans to Live to 1,000

By Joel Garreau
Washington Post Staff Writer

Aubrey de Grey may be wrong but, evidence suggests, he's not nuts. This is a no small assertion. De Grey argues that some people alive today will live in a robust and youthful fashion for 1,000 years.

In 2005, an authoritative publication offered $20,000 to any molecular biologist who could demonstrate that de Grey's plan for treating aging as a disease -- and curing it -- was "so wrong that it was unworthy of learned debate."

Now mere mortals -- who may wish to be significantly less mortal -- can judge whether de Grey's proposals are "science or fantasy," as the magazine put it. De Grey's much-awaited "Ending Aging: The Rejuvenation Breakthroughs That Could Reverse Human Aging in Our Lifetime" has just been published.

The judges were formidable for that MIT Technology Review challenge prize. They included Rodney Brooks, then director of MIT's Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory; Nathan Myhrvold, former chief technology officer of Microsoft; and J. Craig Venter, who shares credit for first sequencing the human genome.

In the end, they decided no scientist had succeeded in blowing de Grey out of the water. "At issue is the conflict between the scientific process and the ambiguous status of ideas that have not yet been subjected to that process," Myhrvold wrote for the judges.

Well yes, that. Plus the question that has tantalized humans forever. What if the only certainty is taxes?

CLICK HERE TO READ THE FULL STORY

FREE REPORT: How to Set and Achieve a Goal

Arina Nikitina, the author of How to Set and Achieve a Goal has created a free report for all members of the Mind Power News community called "7 Goal Setting Tips: How to Turn Your Vague Dreams into Tangible Reality."

There is no need to sign up for anything, just go to the link below and download your free report:

CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FREE REPORT

The Science of Walking on Fire

By Matt Nisbet
Generation SXeptic

David Willey is not your ordinary science teacher. To put it mildly, he goes to extremes. Willey, an instructor of Physics at the University of Pittsburgh at Johnstown, walks across hot coals, sinks his hand in molten lead, strides across broken glass, and has concrete blocks smashed across his body while lying on a bed of nails.

Each daring feat is a demonstration in science that Willey performs at venues ranging from college classrooms to NBC's Tonight Show with Jay Leno.

When I heard that Willey was scheduled to perform and lecture at the Center for Inquiry-International in Buffalo, New York, headquarters to the Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal (CSICOP), and Skeptical Inquirer magazine, I was compelled to investigate.

On a Saturday afternoon in mid-September, I drove in from Ithaca, New York, to meet and interview Willey just before he began preparations for the evening's firewalk and demonstrations.

CLICK HERE TO READ THE FULL STORY

Happiness Comes Cheap - Even for Millionaires

Source: PhysOrg.com

In a study commissioned by the National Lottery, Dr Richard Tunney of the University's School of Psychology found that it's the simple things in life that impact most positively on our sense of well being.

The study compared the 'happiness levels' of lottery jackpot winners with a control group, using a 'Satisfaction with Life Scale' developed by the University of Illinois. Respondents were asked how satisfied they were in relation to different elements of their life, their different mood states explored, how often they treated themselves and what form this took.

Surprisingly, it wasn't the flashy cars and diamond jewellery that upped the jackpot winners' happiness quotient. It was the listening to music, reading a book, or enjoying a bottle of wine with a takeaway that really made the difference.

CLICK HERE TO READ THE FULL STORY

The Truth About Brainwave Entrainment

By Morry Zelcovitch
Creator of Quantum Mind Power

The purpose of this article is to introduce you to the world of brainwave entrainment (BWE) and its incredible benefits and effects.

Much of what is currently written about brainwave entrainment (especially on the internet) is just plain wrong and after personally analyzing much of what is out there it became apparent to me that there was a need for people to know the truth and not the marketing hype. Its truly amazing how so many so called experts out there tell us things as if they new what they were talking about. This articles intension is to give people a clear look at BWE and its value to us all.

Entrainment is a term borrowed from physics which simply means the tendency for two vibrating bodies to lock into phase so that they vibrate in harmony. For example, one tuning fork when struck and placed next to another tuning fork will cause the second one to vibrate at the same frequency.

What if this same phenomenon could be repeated in training the brain to lock into the vibrations of an outside stimulus? Many scientific studies have shown that this is in fact possible. For centuries people have been using outside rhythmic stimulus in the form of drumbeats, chants and singing to induce various feelings.

When the brain is stimulated with pulsed sounds (neuro-electrical activity via the nerves originating from the ears), the overall activity of the brain will respond to and align with these pulses. By selecting the desired rate, the brain via the frequency following response (entrainment) can be naturally induced towards the selected brainwave state.

The applications for this technology are unlimited. Stimulation in the theta range appears to be a beneficial approach to accelerated learning. Research also indicates that using BWE in the alpha brainwave range may result in benefits similarly found with Zen or Transcendental Meditation.

These benefits extend throughout the body including improved breathing patterns and higher physical energy levels, not to mention an improved outlook, better performance in both sports and career, improved relationships and increased workplace satisfaction. Recently, many studies have shown that the use of guided imagery while in altered states of consciousness can be a very effective stimulant in psycho immunology, corporate performance and sports enhancement.

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Watch This: Mind-Controlled Video Games and Machines

The World's Largest Manifestation Portal

My good friends Barry Goss and Heather Vale over at the Manifestation Portal have slashed the price in half for the next three days, so now is a great time to check out the massive library of wisdom which they have to offer you.

This is the world's first, and still largest, Multimedia Manifestation Portal which hands you the deepest, darkest, nitty-gritty secrets of the world's greatest manifesting masters.



If you've been searching for a one-stop-self-growth vault for getting you the inner-world makeover you need so you can turn whatever you want into personal reality,this is it.

And here's the best part... for the next 3 days, until October 31, Barry and Heather are offering access to the Manifestation Portal at less than half the regular price (save 55%).

CLICK HERE NOW TO ACCELERATE YOUR THOUGHTS AND MASTER THE PHYSICAL WORLD AROUND YOU

The Future of Science: We Will Have the Power of Gods

By Roger Highfield
Source: The Telegraph

Just before Sir Isaac Newton died, he described how humbled he felt by the thought that he had glimpsed only a fraction of the potential of the great scientific revolution he had helped to launch: "I seem to have been only like a boy playing on the seashore and diverting myself in now and then finding a smoother pebble or prettier shell than ordinary, while the great ocean of truth lay all undiscovered before me."

Three centuries later, that great ocean of truth is not so mysterious. According to the theoretical physicist Professor Michio Kaku of the City College of New York, we are entering an empowered new era: "We have unlocked the secrets of matter. We have unravelled the molecule of life, DNA. And we have created a form of artificial intelligence, the computer. We are making the historic transition from the age of scientific discovery to the age of scientific mastery in which we will be able to manipulate and mould nature almost to our wishes."

Among the technologies he believes will change our lives in the coming decades are cars that drive themselves, lab-grown human organs, 3D television, robots that can perform household tasks, eye glasses that double as home-entertainment centres, the exploitation of genes that alter human ageing and the possibility of invisibility and forms of teleportation.

"We will have the power to animate the inanimate, the power to create life itself," says Prof Kaku. "We will have the power of gods. But will we also have the wisdom of Solomon?"

In a new BBC4 series called Visions of the Future, Prof Kaku talks to today's pioneers about how we are moving from being passive observers of nature to its choreographers. Here are their remarkable speculations about how the scientific and technological revolution will transform life and society in the 21st century.

CLICK HERE TO READ THE FULL STORY

How to Live Forever (or at least to 100)

By Jason Wilson
Source: TheSmartSet.com

The Mediterranean island of Sardinia is dotted with prehistoric stone ruins called nuraghi. Little is known about the nuraghi, or the ancient people who built them, except that they predate the earliest invaders to Sardinia, the Phoenicians, who arrived here about 9,000 years ago.

I passed a number of nuraghi as I drove up into the island’s interior through mountains of limestone and granite, on a terrifying road, into a region called the Ogliastra. It’s never been an easy ramble into Sardinia’s mountains. Neither the Phoenicians nor any of other invaders who came to Sardinia later — Romans, Vandals, Byzantines, Carthaginians, Arabs, Genoese, Catalans — were ever able to the penetrate them.

The villages of Ogliastra have had very little contact with the outside world since about the 11th century. Even now, the region is considered by many to be a wild, dangerous place and travelers like me are regularly warned about bandits and kidnappers.

Ignoring those overheated warnings, I traveled into the Ogliastra anyway. I’d been sent into the wild interior of Sardinia on assignment by AARP Magazine. Researchers had recently documented an abnormal cluster of modern-day Methuselahs residing here. At least one man in this region lived to 112 and, until his death, was the oldest man in the world. And there were many other centenarians living in isolated Ogliastra villages.

Basically, my AARP assignment called for me to barge in on very old Sardinians and ask: How can our readers, too, live such a long life?

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Optimism Won't Cure Cancer

Source: BBC Health

The power of the mind has been overestimated when it comes to fighting cancer, US scientists say.

They said they found that a patient's positive or negative emotional state had no direct bearing on cancer survival or disease progression.

The University of Pennsylvania team followed more than 1,000 patients with head and neck cancer.

But experts said the Cancer journal study should not deter people from adopting a "fighting spirit".

Indeed, a positive outlook can help patients cope with gruelling cancer therapies and resume a "normal" life, a spokeswoman for Macmillan Cancer Support said.

CLICK HERE TO READ THE FULL STORY

Life's Top 5 Illusions

By Barry Goss,
Creator of The Manifestation Portal

WARNING: These new paradigms may well be somewhat controversial, or even, dare I say it, shocking to your system of thought; but I did not invent these visionary views of life. But, only through intense gut-level questioning and critical-thinking, come to understand that it is the knowledge and brief understanding of these that will either cause you to throw-up or wave on the unpalatable taste of more good medicine. You’ll either be moved to ‘consume’ something sweet, easy, mundane and valueless, like a newspaper, magazine, or cheap novel or you’ll continue to take the good medicine knowing that your mind viruses will eventually cure themselves from the insideout.

Illusion #1: God is a personality
God is a personality - an oversized white male with a flowing beard who sits "up there" watching our every move.

My New Paradigm: Like the electrical source from an outlet, God is formless, infinite, nonlinear, as well as unperceivable. God is that First Force that expressed Itself as and through you, as and through me, as and through All Things everywhere.

CLICK HERE TO READ THE FULL STORY

Top 10 Bizarre Mental Disorders

Source: The List Universe

Mental disorders effect millions of people in the world and can lead to years of psychotherapy. In some cases, the psychological problem suffered is extremely rare or bizarre. This is a list of the ten most bizarre mental disorders.

10. Stockholm Syndrome

Stockholm syndrome is a psychological response sometimes seen in an abducted hostage, in which the hostage shows signs of sympathy, loyalty or even voluntary compliance with the hostage taker, regardless of the risk in which the hostage has been placed. The syndrome is also discussed in other cases, including those of wife-beating, rape and child abuse.

The syndrome is named after a bank robbery in Stockholm, Sweden, in which the bank robbers held bank employees hostage from August 23 to August 28 in 1973. In this case, the victims became emotionally attached to their victimizers, and even defended their captors after they were freed from their six-day ordeal, refusing to testify against them. Later, after the gang were tried and sentenced to jail, one of them married a woman who had been his hostage.

A famous example of Stockholm syndrome is the story of Patty Hearst, a millionaire’s daughter who was kidnapped in 1974, seemed to develop sympathy with her captors, and later took part in a robbery they were orchestrating.

CLICK HERE TO READ THE FULL LIST

The Spiritual Brain

The new issue of Mind Power News is now available to be read at www.MindPowerNews.com/188.htm

This Week:

--> The Spiritual Brain: A Neuroscientist's Case for the Existence of the Soul
--> Genome Scientist Peers into the Mind of God
--> Karma of the Brain: Why Good Things Happen to Good People
--> Scientist Claims Proof of Afterlife

And much more...

CLICK HERE TO READ THE LATEST ISSUE OF MIND POWER NEWS