You already knew that Ken has no heart, now we find out that he has
no brain, either!
That's right, Ken can stop his brainwaves on demand. Actually—and
in a more serious vein—this is the famous EEG machine recording where
Ken enters various meditative states, one of which is a type of "thoughtless,"
"image-less," or "formless" state, whose correlate
is that his brainwaves come to an almost complete stop, as clearly recorded
on this portable electroencephalograph (EEG) machine. (This video is
discussed in One Taste, April 10 entry.)
We asked Ken to do a short 10-minute commentary on these various meditative
states and the corresponding brain-wave patterns that are shown on the
EEG machine in the video. Ken enters four meditative states (nirvikalpa
closed eyes, nirvikalpa open eyes, sahaj, and mantra-savikalpa), each
of which has a very distinctive brain-wave pattern. In his commentary,
Ken emphasizes that the patterns shown on this machine may or may not
be typical, but they do emphasize that profound consciousness states
can be evoked at will, and these show immediate correlation in brain-wave
patterns.
If nothing else, seeing somebody's brainwaves flatline in about 4 seconds
is a sight not easily forgotten! It also explains why we once heard
Ken's girlfriend say, upon delivering news that she thought might not
be happily received, "Now, um, honey, make your brain waves go
to zero...."
More seriously, as Ken often says, "If you want to know God, you've
got to get your brain out of the way first. It's just one big stupid
filter...."