Filed under: ecology | Tags: awareness, illusion, insight, perception, random musings, society, wisdom
Source: Hermit Musings (author)
Scientific research discoveries often fascinate me; they can get me to meditating upon our world and how it came to be. It often leads me to speculation about the message. Of course, the species that the majority of scientific studies focus on, and is endlessly fascinating, is us: Homo sapient.
A recent example: the results of a British study identified a key region of our brain which encourages us to be adventurous creatures. It seems as if we humans are sometimes inclined to go after an unfamiliar option—rather than choose a habitual one—particularly when we sense the reward might be greater. Our life may sometimes seem as if we generally trudge the old, familiar path, day after day, following the same safe steps we’ve taken many times before. But if a new, unknown path presents itself one day, we can feel an urge to check it out.
The British researchers say that this propensity for taking a risk may have provided us with an evolutionary advantage over competing species. Those of our ancestors who were willing to take the chance to explore new territory may have been rewarded with a more beneficial environment or found a new and more nutritious food source. They prospered and passed those inquisitive genes on. (Of course, some made bad choices and perished, but we don’t know about them.)
Several million years ago, when our hominid ancestors were forced down out of the tropical trees by a changing climate (which killed off many of those trees), an adventurous spirit helped us to adapt better than our cousins who timidly clung to the few remaining trees. (Chimpanzees are still up there.) When living conditions in various parts of the pre-industrial world became wretched a couple of centuries ago, an adventurous few folks struggled to reach America. Many of them prospered. (And isn’t that what drives oppressed folks from Latin America to brave the hostile unknown and attempt to migrate to the US today?)
The British researchers found that when we choose the untried, take that risk, and find a prize awaiting us for our gamble, we are also rewarded by a release of pleasant neurotransmitters such as dopamine. This can create a feedback process that makes us desire even more. The scientists feel that this can explain why re-branding of familiar products keeps consumers coming back for more.
Evolutionary advantages, however, can sometimes be a double-edged sword. A particular trait that provides an advantage—in the way of making a species more fit—can sometimes lead to too much success. Locusts, finding a plentiful food supply, will exponentially increase their numbers until the source is gone and their population crashes. Has Homo sapient become so successful that we are overrunning the earth, crowding into every niche, bloating our numbers to the point that we’ve become unsustainable—and about to cause our own crash? Is our propensity for adventurousness gotten us into a dangerous runaway situation? Can we learn to find a balance between our dangerous adventurousness and stagnancy?
Source: Flow Therapy
Water is the basis of all life and that includes your body.About 75% of the body is water. The blood fluid, of a person weighing 150 pounds has about 10 lbs or 5 qts of water and is 92% water; red blood cells = 65% water, white blood cells = 70% , general body cells – 80% , protoplasm = 75% , saliva (about 3 pts, daily) = 99%, gastric juice (1-2 quarts daily) = 99%, skin perspiration (1-5 pts. daily) = 99%. lungs use up to one quart; kidneys use 1-2 quarts,; brain is 85% water, nerves 75%, heart=75%, lungs 75%, liver 70%, kidneys = 80%.
Water is the body’s solvent; it is the medium of all chemical activities in the body, which are many. Water is the medium of exchange of all life-giving supplies from one point to another until they reach the cells , and of all wastes from one point to another until they are removed by excretion. Without water, the blood could not move.
Water is the lubricant of all moving parts. It is the regulator of body temperature. The body cells are “water-cooled!” Violent exercise continued for 26 minutes would generate enough heat to coagulate the albuminous substances in the body–similar to cooking the white of an egg– unless this heat were promptly released. The cells are surrounded by water and thus are “water–cooled!”
When there is there is a deficiency of water, the process of elimination will continue, but to do so the blood and tissues will be robbed of some of their water content. This will hinder their normal procedures. If this continues, it may lower blood pressure; headaches , tiredness, and other conditions may result. Constipation may develop. Kidneys , lungs and pores will be hindered in eliminating waste from the body and so the wastes will accumulate all the way back to each cell, and the inside of the body becomes like a stagnated pool.
If one loses all of the stored glycogen (blood sugar) , all of the reserve fat, and even half the body protein, the life is not in danger, but 10% of the body’s water is serious, and a loss of 20-22% of the body’s water is fatal. A person deprived of water will die in 60 to 80 hours.
Psychologically, in going with the flow you strive to always be like water and remembering that water is gentle, and yet it is powerful.It can be still or in motion.It can absorb.It can go over, under, around, and through things.It can dissolve things, float them, or float atop them.It can become hot, cold, heavy, light, invisible, and solid—it can even vaporize.It is formless, and it can adapt to any container.
To be sure, going with the flow of water is embedded deep in our nature. It’s about interrelating with life at the highest possible level and putting our attention on those things that fuel our deepest Self in a world that is ever-changing.
