Un violinista en el metro... de qué nos perdemos en la vida

Un hombre se sentó en una estación del metro en Washington y comenzó a tocar el violín, en una fría mañana de enero. Durante los siguientes 45 minutos, interpretó seis obras de Bach. Durante el mismo tiempo, se calcula que pasaron por esa estación algo más de mil personas, casi todas camino a sus trabajos.

Transcurrieron tres minutos hasta que alguien se detuvo ante el músico. Un hombre de mediana edad alteró por un segundo su paso y advirtió que había una persona tocando música.

Un minuto más tarde, el violinista recibió su primera donación: una mujer arrojó un dólar en la lata y continuó su marcha.

Algunos minutos más tarde, alguien se apoyó contra la pared a escuchar, pero enseguida miró su reloj y retomó su camino.

Quien más atención prestó fue un niño de 3 años. Su madre tiraba del brazo, apurada, pero el niño se plantó ante el músico. Cuando su madre logró arrancarlo del lugar, el niño continuó volteando su cabeza para mirar al artista. Esto se repitió con otros niños. Todos los padres, sin excepción, los forzaron a seguir la marcha.

En los tres cuartos de hora que el músico tocó, sólo siete personas se detuvieron y otras veinte dieron dinero, sin interrumpir su camino. El violinista recaudó 32 dólares. Cuando terminó de tocar y se hizo silencio, nadie pareció advertirlo. No hubo aplausos, ni reconocimientos.

Nadie lo sabía, pero ese violinista era Joshua Bell, uno de los mejores músicos del mundo, tocando las obras más complejas que se escribieron alguna vez, en un violín tasado en 3.5 millones de dólares. Dos días antes de su actuación en el metro, Bell colmó un teatro en Boston, con localidades que promediaban los 100 dólares.

Esta es una historia real. La actuación de Joshua Bell de incógnito en el metro fue organizada por el diario The Washington Post como parte de un experimento social sobre la percepción, el gusto y las prioridades de las personas. La consigna era: en un ambiente banal y a una hora inconveniente, ¿percibimos la belleza? ¿Nos detenemos a apreciarla? ¿Reconocemos el talento en un contexto inesperado?

Una de las conclusiones de esta experiencia, podría ser la siguiente: Si no tenemos un instante para detenernos a escuchar a uno de los mejores músicos interpretar la mejor música escrita, ¿¿¿¿¿qué otras cosas nos estaremos perdiendo?????????

Music training linked to enhanced verbal skills

EVANSTON, Ill. --- Music training, with its pervasive effects on the nervous system�s ability to process sight and sound, may be more important for enhancing verbal communication skills than learning phonics, according to a new Northwestern University study.

Musicians use all of their senses to practice and perform a musical piece. They watch other musicians, read lips, and feel, hear and perform music, thus, engaging multi-sensory skills. As it turns out, the brain�s alteration from the multi-sensory process of music training enhances the same communication skills needed for speaking and reading, the study concludes.

�Audiovisual processing was much enhanced in musicians� brains compared to non-musician counterparts, and musicians also were more sensitive to subtle changes in both speech and music sounds,� said Nina Kraus, Hugh Knowles Professor of Communication Sciences and Neurobiology and director of Northwestern�s Auditory

Neuroscience Laboratory, where the work was performed. �Our study indicates that the high-level cognitive processing of music affects automatic processing that occurs early in the processing stream and fundamentally shapes sensory circuitry.�

The nervous system�s multi-sensory processing begins in the brainstem, an evolutionarily ancient part of the brain previously thought to be relatively unmalleable.

�Musicians have a specialized neural system for processing sight and sound in the brainstem, the neural gateway to the brain,� said Northwestern doctoral student Gabriella Musacchia, lead author of the study.

For many years, scientists believed that the brainstem simply relayed sensory information from the ear to the cortex, a part of the brain known for cognitive processing.

Because the brainstem offers a common pathway that processes music and speech, the study suggests that musical training conceivably could help children develop literacy skills and combat literacy disorders.

The study, �Musicians Have Enhanced Subcortical Auditory and Audiovisual Processing of Speech and Music,� will be published online the week of Sept. 24 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS). The co-investigators are Gabriella Musacchia, Mikko Sams, Erika Skoe and Nina Kraus.

Study participants, who had varying amounts of musical training or none at all, wore scalp electrodes that measured their multi-sensory brain responses to audio and video of a cellist playing and a person speaking.

The data showed that the number of years that a person practiced music strongly correlated with enhanced basic sound encoding mechanisms that also are relevant for speech. Beyond revealing super-accurate pitch coding vital to recognizing a speaker�s identity and emotional intent, the study showed enhanced transcription of timbre and timing cues common to speech and music.

�The study underscores the extreme malleability of auditory function by music training and the potential of music to tune our neural response to the world around us, � Kraus said.

Previous research has shown brainstem transcription errors in some children with literacy disorders.

Since music is inherently more accessible to children than phonics, the new research suggests, music training may have considerable benefits for engendering literacy skills.

Contact: Pat Vaughan Tremmel
p-tremmel@northwestern.edu
847-491-4892
Northwestern University

La felicidad es contagiosa

La felicidad es contagiosa, según un grupo de investigadores.
El mismo equipo que demostró que la obesidad y fumar se extienden en redes ha demostrado que cuantas más personas felices conozcas más probable es que tú seas feliz.
Y conectar con personas felices mejora tu propia felicidad, informaron en el British Medical Journal.
"Estamos lidiando con una estampida emocional", declaró Nicholas Christakis, profesor de sociología médica en la Harvard Medical School en Boston, en una entrevista telefónica.
Christakis y James Fowler, un politólogo de la University of California, en San Diego, han usado datos de 4.700 niños de voluntarios en el estudio Framingham Heart, una gigantesca investigación sanitaria iniciada en Framingham, Massachusetts, en 1948.
Los expertos analizaron un tesoro de datos de las fichas de seguimiento que se remontan a 1971, siguiendo nacimientos, matrimonios, muertes y divorcios.
Los voluntarios también aportaron información de contacto de sus amigos más cercanos, compañeros de trabajo y vecinos.
Han valorado la felicidad usando un sencillo test de cuatro preguntas.
"Se les ha preguntado con qué frecuencia la semana pasada, uno: disfrutaron de la vida; dos: fueron felices; tres: se sintieron esperanzados sobre el futuro y cuatro: sintieron que eran tan buenos como otras personas", dijo Fouler.
El 60 por ciento de las personas que dieron una puntuación alta a estas cuatro preguntas fueron calificados como felices, mientras que el resto fueron designados infelices.
Las personas con más conexiones sociales -amigos, pareja, vecinos, familia- también eran los más felices, según los datos. "Cada persona feliz adicional, te hace más feliz", dijo Christakis.
También descubrieron que la felicidad es más contagiosa que la infelicidad.
"Si un contacto social es feliz, aumenta la probabilidad de que tú lo seas en un 15 por ciento", dijo Fowler. "Un amigo de un amigo, o el amigo de una esposa o un hermano, si son felices, incrementa tus probabilidades un 10 por ciento", añadió.
Un amigo feliz en tercer grado -el amigo o un amigo de un amigo- sube las posibilidades de una persona de ser feliz en un 6 por ciento.
El equipo también está examinando la difusión de la depresión, la soledad y las tendencias de alcoholismo.
(Traducido por Emma Pinedo en la Redacción de Madrid; Editado por Lucila Sigal) REUTERS

STARSSS HUNTER

Hoy uno de mis primos favoritos creó su propio blog y me encantó motivarlo a hacer esto.
http://starssshunter.blogspot.com/

'Esta es su introducción. STARSSS HUNTER
Las estrellas se caracterizan por poseer brillo y luz propia, y por encender llamas de alegría a todo su alrededor, mediante la expansión de un resplendor fulgurante y lleno de vida.
Mediante la creación de este blog se pretenden encontrar personas que tengan las características fundamentales que las estrellas poseen y se destaquen por poseer una luz y esplendor propio.
Esas estrellas deben de estar representadas por personas esforzadas y llenas de energía para la vida, personas que amen el vivir y que tengan la pasión de ayudar y coolaborar con los demás, personas que disfruten los privilegios que la vida presenta para cada uno de ellos y de tomar provecho de ello para beneficio propio y de los demás.
Personas que se olviden de la mediocridad cotidiana que muchas veces caracteriza a la raza humana y quieran resaltar y sobrepasar sus límites mentales y espirituales; personas que tengan actitudes 1000% positivas y que deseen en su corazón dejar un buen campo para que Dios entre en sus vidas.
Ese cazador de estrellasss (o Starsss Hunter) busca personas humildes pero con ganas de superarse cada día más, con deseos de aprender muchísimo cada día y de motivar a los demás a seguir adelante en esta experiencia enriquecedora que es la vida.
Su nombre: DIOS!"

besos!

MIEDO? Benedetti

Tengo miedo de verte
necesidad de verte
esperanza de verte
desazones de verte

tengo ganas de hallarte
preocupación de hallarte
certidumbre de hallarte
pobres dudas de hallarte

tengo urgencia de oírte
alegría de oírte
buena suerte de oírte
y temores de oírte

o sea resumiendo
estoy jodido
y radiante
quizá más lo primero
que lo segundo
y también viceversa.

“Another peaceful pizza evening, please”…

The Menu of Life:
By me.

Lemon green: it’s a kind of a magic issue for me. Almost all the time when something lemon green coloured appears in my life, it means that something is going to be OK or better than that. I love that color!
Well, this Wednesday night wasn’t the exception. When I had decided to put my green shoes on I couldn’t preview the funny evening that I would enjoy/was about to enjoy with good friends.
Maybe because of that or because my Irish teacher asked me to, I’ve started my blog in English today. It could be nice, right? At least, it will be helpful to improve my English.
Well, the real truth is that night was funny, interesting and magic. Unforgettable “just because”, like the Americans used to say.
You know, it’s always an amazing exercise to share with people, who you think you had already known well, in other different scenarios. I mean: with some alcohol in the blood, some people became innocent, honest and childish; without rules or worries.
‘Our party ride’ started at 9:20 p.m.
After English class, the teacher Siobhan, a lawyer called Jesua, Diego, the computer scientist, the architect Alvaro and I decided to eat some pizza because of Jesua’s birthday, but then, Alvaro said: “Pizza again? Why don’t we change the place?,” They had been there the previous Wednesday.
Then, Alvaro explained to us that there was a kind of electronic night at the Lebanese restaurant called Lubnan and finally we changed plans. Instead of pizza, we decided to go there.
On the way
The first funny thing of the night was Siobhan’s laughs at Jesua’s car. We’re still wondering what happened there, but it sounds exciting. Really, it was incredible to hear the laughs from across the street. “Did you hear it?,” Alvaro asked Diego, car to car.
I was in Diego’s car. Meanwhile I said to Diego that Jesua has a great sense of humor. “He is hilarious,” I said.
We were at Lubnan almost at 10 p.m. “Do you want to know your future?”, some guy at the entrance asked me.
“I already know my future will be great not because I’m a arrogant selfish person but because I love my life and people and I think I deserve it,” I thought.
The meeting began looking at the menu and talking about the food: strange and delicious. I realise that I have been thinking about my Lebanese friend Odette Sarofin since then. She lived here in Costa Rica. I will write her.
FOCUS, Alejandra!!!
Well, that night Diego was the first one with the ‘food decisions’. He decided to try the humus, this … made with. It was great, by the way. Truly, it was the first time in my life that I tried some humus covered with tomatoes pieces.
Jesua, the lawyer, who was celebrating his birthday, was the next one. That was his first time in this restaurant and obviously, he asked for almost all of the meals trying to choose the best one.
“What’s this? And .. what’s that?,” he asked. “It is ‘rush’?, Does it have meat?,” he added.
“That is uncooked (or “raw”), you already know that?, right?,” asked I.
I asked him if he had ever tried the Falafel. “It’s a kind of an Arabic Pupusa”, I simplified. He smiled and ordered that.
I was the third one to order, but for me,it was so easy to choose. I just love the Fatush salad with chicken. It’s amazing and that night was also a kind of ‘challenge’ for me.
I have to recognize that when I went there I was feeling really scared because, the time before that I ate Fatush (at the same place) I got a terrible allergic reaction and I almost died.
At that moment my friends took me to the San Juan de Dios Hospital, the nearest one, and the doctors were so worried about my health. I had to spend all that night and the day after (?) at the hospital.
Well, I don’t have suicidal feelings but now I have been feeling very well and I thought that it was pretty fine to me to eat Fatush again. And I was right. That feels great. My health is fine again. Yippee!!!
It’s amazing how can we enjoy things and activities when we think we can lose them. I have to keep an eye out for that.
Teacher Siobhan was opposite me and didn’t order anything because she had already eaten pizza.
Finally, Alvaro ordered a meal with lamb. I’m not sure of the name of the meal but it looked fine to me and there were no complaints from him.
When we were waiting for the meals, the talk started. One topic ran into another one so many times.
We talked about travelling across Europe. Alvaro said that he loves Spain, Barcelona to be more specific. He also commented that he loves to plan almost everything when he travels.
“I think you are the kind of traveler that spends a lot of money on food. Am I right?”, I asked to him.
He agreed and explained me that he loves to have a formal meal just to taste the typical food of each place that he has been to. “I also love to go to museums and that kind of thing”, said he.
When I was listening to him, I thought “To me, he seems like a good partner to go on a trip with. I have to remember that. Maybe he doesn’t have any problems with my fascination with museums, because in this way, we are quite similar. But instead of Dalí I prefer Van Gogh but maybe just because I’ve never been to Barcelona. Could be, right?”.
When we were talking about Spain, Siobhan asked us about a nice and good Spanish restaurant in Costa Rica. Jesua answered that frequently he eats Spanish food at home because his mother is from Spain. “I’m not sure of restaurants”, he added.
Spain, Europe and wines are almost synonyms for us and that’s why we also talked about those ‘grape juices’.
It was evident: Alvaro has a passion for wine or at least a tremendous curiosity about it. I feel I can identify with him about this, that’s why I know.
He and Siobhan talked about the types of bottles and the temperatures and those issues.
Diego had been silent, just eating peaceful. But then, all of us were surprised when he said “A double Baileys for me, please!”. “I have never heard that: a double Baileys?”, I thought.
Then, Diego talked about a Whiskey ‘cata’ when he got almost drunk for drinking so many different brands of whiskey.
When the food came to the table the conversation had changed. The waiter had a crazy red hat on all night long and seemed like a monkey cartoon to me. The whole night I was looking around for the monkey!!! Maybe I’m not as good a girl that I had expected to be. What a pity!
I don’t know what the guys were talking about but Siobhan and I talked about Corcovado: our marvelous National Park. This is a natural jewel of the world plenty of jaguars, turtles, butterflies, monkeys (four species) and also millions of snakes
I was there two years ago and I just still love it. After Coco’s Island I’m sure it is the most beautiful place that I’ve ever visited/been to.
We finished the glorious food and went into the crowded bar.
Electronic-tquila shot!
The place had plenty of people: all kinds of them. We were standing because there wasn`t any place to sit. But it was fine.
I went to the restroom and, when I was queuing, some guy asked me to marry him. It was weird, but funny. He said he loved my green shoes…
“Jajaja! Yeah, of course!!!”, I responded. “I love them too”.
When I returned with the rest of my friends I almost fainted, when I saw a stupid Blondie around there. I’m not a jealous person or anything like that, but she had a terrible taste in clothes and they was so disgusting. She looked like a bitch and also behaved like one… It was so sad.
No more comments about her. If someone wants to know anymore they could ask Jesua. He was very interested in the ‘lanscape’ of the ‘place’
Maybe Alvaro was interested too but I didn’t catch him looking at the girl. Actually, he said that this kind of ‘look’ doesn’t appeal to him and then, said something about female hands. I think he was saying that he used to look at the hands of a woman before anything else. How weird! I mean, I had thought that it was (looking at hands) a female issue not a male one.
Diego didn’t see the bitch Blondie because he had left before. He was terrified about which one of the two guys (there were left) could give me a ride back home. “Are you sure you want to go with them”, he asked me.
Siobhan bought me a mojito. It was delicious. During the night Alvaro gave me and Jesua two tequilas each. The first was one at 1 a. m. and the other one, at 1:48 p. m.
When I asked “Why that?” Alvaro said that he wanted me to get drunk.
“Why? I’m the same all the time. No one has ever seen me drunk because I don’t want to”, I said.
I was very conscious the whole night because I was working for this report, you know?
Cheers! Alcohol has risen up.
I couldn´t believe it. “Actually all of them dance pretty well: Siobhan, Jesua and Alvaro”. Do they know how to dance salsa and meringue? It will be great to find some new dancers partners...
Then we started talking about going to the beach on New Year´s. I don’t remember how but then I asked Alvaro if we would spend a night together there. “What?, Is it a kind of proposition?”, he pointed out very suspiciously.
Jaja! Read it carefully… I was talking about a night on the beach with the entire English group at Priscilla’s beach house.
“I afraid this is not what you think. For trios I have my violin, sweetie. All or nothing”, I just thought but I didn’t say a word. It was just a funny misunderstanding.
At 2 a.m. the bar almost closed and finally we were sitting at a table talking in Spanglish.
“Like Albert Eistein had said: “If you are looking for different results, don’t do just the same things,” I remember that I said.
“Real happiness depends on the ability to celebrate the little victories. Don’t you think?”, I added.
Jesua was quiet and also ‘cute’. Tequila went into his blood. I was worried about him.
Siobhan agreed with me about my definition of ‘happiness’ and also about Jesua’s state.
We all left the place at 2:23 a. m. and Alvaro was the one who gave me a ride back home.
At 3 a. m. I returned to my place and went to bed. Two minutes after, I received Jesua and Alvaro´s text messages and I felt relieved.
“I’m fine, at home. We have to come back soon”, wrote me Jesua.
“At home. Good Night ;)”, wrote Alvaro.
How come? Something that had started like a peaceful pizza night ended at 3 a. m. with some tequilas, mojitos, beers and jokes inside.
In the end I was thinking about life, love, dreams but I’m not sure exactly why. Maybe because the talk had given me food for thought.
“It’s hard to flee from fun! But I have to sleep to recharge my batteries and go to work. Can it be any better? I’m on vacation and I don’t have to work tomorrow!!!”, I realised that and it was so much fun then.
I put my green shoes beside my bed.

Papi está aprendiendo a usar un blog conmigo

Hoy vamos a aprender a hacer páginas web. Ya hicimos un ejercicio con Seinvsa seinvsa.cr.googlepages.com/ pero faltan más: la de Hogarcitos de Niños y la de Aprosam. Ah y por supuesto la nueva página de papi.
Ciao

Estoy demasiado cansadita para escribir pero... NO TE QUIERO NADA!! ja!

No quiero deternerme
para encontrar vacío mi corazón
para darme cuenta que contigo no era yo
pensaba que el quererte
sería suficiente y no, no fue...

No quiero detenerme
para oir decirte que la vida es mejor
en tus brazos y yo me desprendo el corazón
no digas que me quieres
no significa nada, amor

Porque en tus ojos me encontraba y tantas me perdí
porque en el punto exacto de la oscuridad no supe más de tí
Regresa tu mirada
que ya no me desarma
Regresa las palabras con las que me hinoptizabas y le di sentido a mi vivir
y hoy no dicen nada
por eso no te quiero nada....
por eso no te quiero nada....
yop ya no te quiero nada

No quiero deternerme
para encontrar pedazos de mi corazón
y otra vez romperme al darme cuenta que era yo
la que te daba todo
y eso no fue lo mejor


Porque en tus ojos me encontraba y tantas me perdí
porque en el punto exacto de la oscuridad no supe más de tí
Regresa tu mirada
que ya no me desarma
Regresa las palabras con las que me hinoptizabas y le di sentido a mi vivir
y hoy no dicen nada

Esto es así :
Con corazones fríos
no hay que jugarse nada
porque no entra en ellos ni un rayito en la mañana
y donde el amor pierde camino y llega su morada

por eso no te quiero nada....
por eso no te quiero nada....

Esto es así :
Con corazones fríos
no hay que jugarse nada
porque no entra en ellos ni un rayito en la mañana
y donde el amor pierde camino y llega su morada

Siobhan!!?

Hoy hice mi buena obra de la semana. Ojalá que la ley de la vida sea cierta!!!
Qué rica la canela!!!
un beso y suerte, profe!

Musicians use both sides of their brains more frequently than average people

Me encontré esto en un servicio de información científica y me encantó, aunque creo que NO APLICA para algunas personas o quizá si... sus problemas mentales afectan TOOOODAS su decisiones. Es un estudio de Vanderbilt University Discovery Grant.

****Supporting what many of us who are not musically talented have often felt, new research reveals that trained musicians really do think differently than the rest of us. Vanderbilt University psychologists have found that professionally trained musicians more effectively use a creative technique called divergent thinking, and also use both the left and the right sides of their frontal cortex more heavily than the average person.
The research by Crystal Gibson, Bradley Folley and Sohee Park is currently in press at the journal Brain and Cognition.
"We were interested in how individuals who are naturally creative look at problems that are best solved by thinking 'out of the box'," Folley said. "We studied musicians because creative thinking is part of their daily experience, and we found that there were qualitative differences in the types of answers they gave to problems and in their associated brain activity."
One possible explanation the researchers offer for the musicians' elevated use of both brain hemispheres is that many musicians must be able to use both hands independently to play their instruments.
"Musicians may be particularly good at efficiently accessing and integrating competing information from both hemispheres," Folley said. "Instrumental musicians often integrate different melodic lines with both hands into a single musical piece, and they have to be very good at simultaneously reading the musical symbols, which are like left-hemisphere-based language, and integrating the written music with their own interpretation, which has been linked to the right hemisphere."
Previous studies of creativity have focused on divergent thinking, which is the ability to come up with new solutions to open-ended, multifaceted problems. Highly creative individuals often display more divergent thinking than their less creative counterparts.
To conduct the study, the researchers recruited 20 classical music students from the Vanderbilt Blair School of Music and 20 non-musicians from a Vanderbilt introductory psychology course. The musicians each had at least eight years of training. The instruments they played included the piano, woodwind, string and percussion instruments. The groups were matched based on age, gender, education, sex, high school grades and SAT scores.
The researchers conducted two experiments to compare the creative thinking processes of the musicians and the control subjects. In the first experiment, the researchers showed the research subjects a variety of household objects and asked them to make up new functions for them, and also gave them a written word association test. The musicians gave more correct responses than non-musicians on the word association test, which the researchers believe may be attributed to enhanced verbal ability among musicians. The musicians also suggested more novel uses for the household objects than their non-musical counterparts.
In the second experiment, the two groups again were asked to identify new uses for everyday objects as well as to perform a basic control task while the activity in their prefrontal lobes was monitored using a brain scanning technique called near-infrared spectroscopy, or NIRS. NIRS measures changes in blood oxygenation in the cortex while an individual is performing a cognitive task.
"When we measured subjects' prefrontal cortical activity while completing the alternate uses task, we found that trained musicians had greater activity in both sides of their frontal lobes. Because we equated musicians and non-musicians in terms of their performance, this finding was not simply due to the musicians inventing more uses; there seems to be a qualitative difference in how they think about this information," Folley said.
The researchers also found that, overall, the musicians had higher IQ scores than the non-musicians, supporting recent studies that intensive musical training is associated with an elevated IQ score.