Losing Our Senses

This is an excerpt from a newsletter a friend sent to me, today.
I thought it was interesting, in that, there have been discussions here regarding
kids and their ipods and what has happened with the loudness wars and what-not.
I have to laugh a bit when it comes to terms like "new brain" and "turbo brain"
because the brain is too complex to can, but hopefully you get the gist of the
article and how it relates to sound.

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The excerpt:

"Losing Our Senses"


...An excerpt from Completing the Circle
...by Thomas Poplawski
...(available in The Company of Angels)

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The Rational Psychology Association (Gesellschaft Rationelle Psychologie

or GRP) in Munich, Germany, has been conducting research for several decades on
the processing of stimuli in the brain and the emotions. Some four thousand
subjects are involved in the study. About twenty years ago researchers began to
note a striking phenomenon: the receptivity of the senses of smell and taste was
deteriorating significantly. According to psychologist Henner Ertel:
Other GRP studies indicate that the ability to distinguish sounds is also
declining. Sixteen years ago the average German could distinguish 300,000 sounds,
while today that number is only 180,000. For many children the level is only
100,000. This is enough for rap or pop music, but not for classical music, which
includes many more subtle sounds. This decline in auditory sensitivity may be a
major reason for the declining interest in classical music.
The sense of smell is also deteriorating and may account for changing olfactory
preferences. In rural Germany, marriage proposals were often made beneath fragrant
blossoming chestnut trees. Today most young people consider the fragrance
repulsive.

Accompanying this decrease in sensitivity to sensory stimuli is a lessening of
the pleasure derived from daily, mundane experiences. In 197 1, GRP researchers
began to study the enjoyment that people experienced with certain foods. They
prepared a package of basic foodstuffs-bread, fish, grapefruit, coffee, and so on and
asked subjects to rate the enjoyment value of each item. Repeated at five-year
intervals, this ongoing study has shown that the enjoyment ratings have moved
steadily downward. Researchers note that with women the drop was not as great
as with men and that those under the age of forty showed more of a decrease than


those over forty. The only products that now give more pleasure than before are
beer and mineral waters. The general trend, though, is that the threshold of
sensation and pleasure has risen. Nothing seems to taste as good as it used to.

The researchers at GRP now feel that over the past twenty-five years the brain of the
average individual has undergone significant changes in its organization. The decrease in
sensitivity to sensory stimuli implies that stimuli are being processed
in a different way than before. Researchers hypothesize that there are fewer cross linkag-
es or networks in the brain; therefore primarily optical stimuli go directly to
the optical center without activating other sensory or emotional centers. Thus
human beings can take in very powerful stimuli that are discordant, senseless, or
contradictory without being bothered. The trend researcher Gert Gerken has
labeled this phenomenon "the new indifference." Drug rehabilitation researcher,
Felicitas Vogt, emphasizing the higher threshold needed to gain satisfaction, has
coined the term "turbo-brain." The researchers at GRP use the more conservative
term "the new brain."

One may of course respond to this phenomenon with the query: So what?
The brain now has reset the level at which it reacts. This probably has happened
in history at other times when great changes were taking place. Is not this just the
brain's way of adapting to the realities of a new world, to our modern way of life?
Our world today is full of powerful and exciting stimuli, and to deal with these we
have lost sensitivity to impressions at the subtle end of the spectrum. Is this
necessarily bad?

Obviously, we have changed. The speed and intensity of our time have dulled
the sensitivity of every person. Children and young people have been particularly
affected. Loud music, violent movies, fast computer games, shrill colors, powerful
drugs are reducing our sensitivity to stimuli, so that louder music, faster and more
engrossing computer games, shriller colors, more powerful drugs-legal and
illegal-are necessary to grab and hold our attention, to interest, and to stimulate
US. Without this hyper-stimulation we are in danger of not feeling anything at all.
The world we live in is a complex and subtle one. It cannot be grasped fully
by words, numbers, or reason. We can begin to truly comprehend it only through
capacities of the soul that involve calm, sensitivity, and refinement. Traditionally
these capacities were schooled through observation of and contact with the subtle
beauties of the natural world and through the practice of the arts. Once the most
treasured of human capacities, these are now being subverted and destroyed. The
new brain begins to lose connection with this entire realm. Incapable of responding
to subtle stimuli, it must be thrilled. Gentleness, calm, sensitivity-these are
attributes that do not apply to the new brain.

Boredom and depression increase. Because the "little things in life" no longer
delight, and because delicate and soft perceptions and feelings are less possible
(leaving only sentimentality), the perceived world becomes ever more empty, ever
less able to stimulate interest. The world must always be more radically and more


artificially enhanced in order to provide enjoyment. Ertel estimates that the new
brain will completely establish itself in the West by the first half of the next century.
This new brain has dangerous implications for the near and distant future.
What can we do to stop and perhaps reverse this disturbing trend? What can
we do to protect and regain our own and our child's sensitivity to the world?
Today many techniques to develop "mindfulness," as well as many meditation
practices based in the various religious traditions, are available. These can be a
great help to adults in "keeping their senses." While the new brain will make it
even more difficult to sit and practice such exercises, the variety of techniques,
teachers, and aids (tapes, drumming, and so on) makes it possible for virtually
everyone to find something that is appropriate and helpful.

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