X-Message-Number: 4213
Date: Sat, 15 Apr 1995 21:35:51 -0400 (EDT)
From: Robin Helweg-Larsen <>
Subject: SCI.CRYONICS - Brain deterioration

This posting comes with a thank you to Mike Darwin for sharing some 
thought-provoking (not to say terrifying) photos and scans of brains.

The ability of the brain's blood vessels to function under adverse 
conditions;
the ability of the brain's blood vessels to maintain their health while 
aging (and avoid strokes, etc);
the ability of the brain to maintain elastic blood vessels and high blood 
flows, 
and thereby reduce loss of circulation to cells,
and thereby reduce loss of cells, 
and thereby reduce loss of memory, loss of function, loss of personality, etc

Perhaps all these are related.

Perhaps therefore the yogis are right to recommend daily headstands, a 
kind of enforced stretching exercise for the brain's blood vessels, with 
a subsequent relaxation, and therefore the maintenance (or even 
enhancement) of elasticity and high blood flow capabilities.

Because of Mike's worrying photos, I have returned (after a long 
interval) to daily 5-minute headstands.  The first couple of times you do 
headstands, you feel an enormous pressure in the head.  This does not 
occur after a few headstands, which to me is indicative of the brain 
being better able to deal with changing requirements (i.e. it becomes a 
healthier and more responsive organ).

Yoga teaches that the benefit of headstands does not begin until after 
the first three minutes.  As with all yoga teaching, it is based on 
inference from experience and observation, with data accumulating as lore 
(not religious lore, because not divinely-inspired, and always open to new 
advances in understanding; and not folklore, because too rigorously 
analyzed and debated).  It is not scientific, in the sense of repeatable 
double-blind experiments; and I do not think it is all valid; and I do 
not adhere to the yogic world-view.  But the observations are worth 
considering.

I would not recommend that people beginning headstands begin with 5 
minutes; begin with doing a headstand (against a wall is easiest, but 
does not develop balance, body-awareness, and other muscles to the same 
degree); don't continue a headstand for more than say 10 seconds with a 
powerful feeling of pressure in the head (but expect that that feeling 
will go away with practice); and build the length of time slowly.

One modification of the headstand which I believe has originated in 
California is to strap the feet into boots which can be hoisted into the 
air upside down: this requires simple apparatus (but still higher-tech 
than just standing on your head) and usually an assistant; the advantages 
are all the benefits of the regular headstand, without resting your body 
on your skull and forearms; and it stretches the spine, rather than 
compressing the upper spine with greater weight.

But no matter what we do, I guess we can expect some inevitable 
downsizing of the brain....  As I teach management skills, and claim to 
be an optimist, I can regard this with a certain amount of equanimity: it 
provides an opportunity for restructuring, greater efficiency, increased 
productivity, all summed up as "doing more with less". 

After all, why not?  Don't we all agree that "Age and treachery can 
always defeat youth and energy"?  Why shouldn't there be a physiological 
basis to the idea that you can learn to think smarter?  Besides, if the 
brain (which is so vital to our evolutionary advantage) should prove to 
have - let's hypothesize - triple redundancy, then we can live with a lot 
of loss: whether age-related, dying-related, freezing-related, or whatever.

(So cheer up Mike!  Everyone feels like this when they turn 40!  Happy 
birthday!)

Always optimistically,

Robin HL


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