Science of Meditation part I

The More You Know The More You Realise You Don’t Know -Aristotle

It has always intrigued me how ancient humans knew so much about the mind, body, and health in absence of modern technology we see today.

While on one hand, ancient knowledge is valued when they support or supplement scientific evidence, if they challenge scientific truths then they are questioned and dismissed as myths.

Science is promoted as objective, quantifiable, and the foundation of genuine knowledge whereas ancient knowledge is largely seen as anecdotal, imprecise, and unfamiliar in form.

Being trained in the rigour of evidence-based research and critical thinking myself, I can see why one would resist to keep an open mind. However, we have no insight into the minds of our ancient humans to dismiss their understanding. What if there are multiple points of entry into the knowledge of the world? While we sought to enter it with science today, the ancients had developed their own methods and technologies. Some of what we are discovering today is a rediscovery of what had been known to a more prehistoric civilization. Like in the case of meditation, modern science is just catching up with ancient knowledge.

The earliest written records on meditation belong to Hindu traditions, in India, of Vendatism from around 1500 BCE…