Forty Times a Second is Just Right
It was Pi Day, March 14th, Einstein's birthday, and I was reading about how a new computer program had figured out Pi to five trillion digits and I was thinking, "So what... Why do humans need to know this stuff? Can't we just accept that it doesn't repeat or end? It's just a ratio." A few days later, I was tv shopping and ran smack into the new 4K resolution benchmark for the "best" new tvs. You mean my "old" tv with the 1080p hi-def screen is now four times not as good as the new ones? Feels suddenly ancient, doesn't have enough dots. Pixels. Little colored bits... Guess I need more tiny flashing blips of color... Maybe 8 million will be enough...
In Warrnambool, Australia, some researchers have just discovered "middens,” which are charred remains of possible human settlements that date from 120,000 years ago, effectively doubling the age that has been the accepted figure for humans being on that continent. North of there, in the Pilbara region, are rock paintings that are conclusively dated to 40,000 years ago, making them the oldest art pieces on the planet. To this day, Aboriginal artists make imagery of the creation of the cosmos, art rooted in dreamings, the "Dreamtime," when the spirit/hero/wanderers traveled across the formlessness. The tradition of these paintings and carvings manifests the energy of "dreaming," the energy of an individual that existed before birth and continues after death. We are all of our ancestors as we are of ourselves, moment to moment, inseparable from our place and our time, yet bound to the continuum. The art from this tradition spans at least forty millennia and is overwhelmingly characterized by dot patterns. Thought, spirit, the cosmos is organized, rhythmic, small blips of color. (I highly recommend a book called, "Dreamings, the Art of Aboriginal Australia," published in 1988).
In 2015, Dr Li-Huei Tsai at MIT made the first mouse disco. The mice invited to the strobe-lit box for an hour every day were genetically engineered to have Alzheimer's disease. After a few (sq)weeks of getting down with their bad selves on the maze floor, the dissected mice showed significantly lower levels of two different brain proteins that form the plaque characterizing the disease. Cells called "microglia," debris clearing and cleaning cells, were stimulated by the light pulses, which seemed to be most effective strobing at a frequency of 40 times a second (40 hertz). This is the first proven cellular response to manipulated brain waves. Further, when sound at this same frequency was added to the treatment, it significantly improved function in other parts of the brain--the hippocampus, which is used for memory formation, storage and retrieval, and the pre-frontal cortex, which is the seat of judgement, attention, and higher-order reasoning. (I need this for sure).
Researchers have discovered the firings of neurons in the brain work rhythmically. Gamma waves sweep through the brain at 25 to 140 hertz during peak concentration. (That's networks of neurons firing 140 times a second, just to be clear). Deep delta wave sleep is .5 to 4 hertz. Meditative adults have theta waves around 4 to 8 hertz. Dr. Tsai has formed a company, Cognito Therapeutics, using gamma wave entrainment to potentially alter the course of Parkinson's, Alzheimer's and other neurological disabilities faced by an aging global population. Therapy without drugs is a paradigm shift of massive scale.
The didgeridoo originated in northern Australia and is believed to be the oldest surviving instrument. Cave paintings show it being played 3,000-4,000 years ago and anthropologists suggest it may be as old as the 40,000-year culture to which it is attached. The strongest frequencies played are in the 40 to 200 hertz range, although many have infra-sonic waves below the 20 hertz threshold of common human hearing. Anyone who has listened to a group of didgeridoo players can attest to the sound as being frequencies you feel and hear, as well as being sound from a different time. Primitive music, absolutely. Gamma wave entrainment? Maybe.
Did the Aboriginals figure out how to have healthy brains? Maybe. Will I buy the 8 million pixels so my mythological beings in the movies are really contrasty? Maybe. Should teenagers be allowed to pump 40 hertz into their ear canals? Maybe. Maybe I need more music and sparkly lights for my brain fitness. Maybe all these light manipulations I play with every day will let me live as long as my kids. Add music and that sounds like a grand plan.
Rock steady, and I mean steady, my friends. Apparently, it's really, really important.
And buy art. That way, in 40,000 years, people will recognize my initials and know you had great taste.
And, as always, before time and after, while the petroglyphs fade and before this walkabout we call life ceases, love love, everyday....
We don't repeat and we don't end either. Like Pi. Yep.
Bruce
