Noise in TM'ers brains??Even after his death, though, Lynch may remain the best gateway to TM—not because of his foundation or advocacy, but simply because of who he was. Consider Andrés Canales-Johnson, a neuroscientist at Cambridge University’s Consciousness and Cognition Lab. His work, which is supported by the DLF, is at the forefront of TM research.
Canales-Johnson got into TM during the pandemic, and quickly realized that the practice was uniquely suitable for clinical research. TM is very easy to study scientifically, because you learn TM in exactly the same way, even learning Cambridge, or if I'm learning in Japan, because the teacher has a standardized way of teaching it,” he explained. In other words, it’s easy to study consistently against control groups.
His research confirms that TM does something to our brains. Long-term practitioners consistently produce synchronized brainwaves at 10 Hz (think about that reintegration scene in Severance—those waves). Different forms of meditation produce different frequencies. But Canales-Johnson studies what’s known as neural noise: what happens between the waves. The neural noise is where consciousness coalesces. “Noise has to do with putting things together, and the waves have to do with maintaining information,” said Canales-Johnson. And it turns out that noise is an even better indicator of whether or not someone practices TM. Their brains aren’t necessarily “noisier,” but they are, to extend the metaphor, making a unique sound in the part of the brain where consciousness happens.
What does that mean? That’s
