Museum of Tibetology |
My first
night of sleep in Gangtok went well. I slept
about 6 hours and was awakened only a few times by barking dogs. Not bad at all really. Best of all, I don’t feel much jet lag. Maybe the melatonin is working.
In the
morning, I made a cup of room-brewed instant coffee with powdered creamer, and then
had a bowl of porridge and piece of toast for breakfast. Then it was off to the first day of
class. The workshop is being held at the Namgyal Institute of Tibetology. The attendees are
monks who were invited by the Science for Monks program. The monks in the workshop come from all
over: India, Bhutan, Nepal and
Tibet. At lunch, a monk mentioned to me
that rarely do monks from such different places ever come together. I replied that it was great that a common
interest in science is what helped bring them together.
During
class today, I introduced myself and gave everyone a bit about my background. I mentioned that I am a research professor in
the Department of Bioengineering at the University of Washington in Seattle and
that I also work at the Center for Neurotechnology. I gave the monks some examples of the type of
research going on in my lab and also at the Center.
Ordering events |
We also
discussed the history of neuroscience discoveries. I printed out pictures showing 17 different neuroscientific
discoveries or events. For example, one
picture showed acupuncture needles, another showed a phrenology bust and
another showed an MRI machine. Three
groups of monks had to order the 17 pictures in chronological order from the
earliest to the latest. They did a good job
although no one got them all in the correct order.
Next was a
quick discussion of the importance learning about the brain. All of the monks agreed that they should know
about the brain and gave some good answers about why they wanted to learn
neuroscience. At question time, the
first three questions were about the relationship between the brain, mind and
consciousness. I mentioned that these
were common questions that the monks always had for me and try to hold them off
until my lecture about consciousness.
The day
ended with a short walk back to the hotel.
As I descended the small hill to the main portion of town, I was “welcomed”
by music blaring from loudspeakers. My
room is just across the street from the speakers and it seems as if the music
is inside my room. I am not sure if this
is for a party or festival, but I hope it doesn’t last into the night.
View From My Room
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