Announcer: This is "A Psychology of the Future," the online summit. Learn about the principles of practical psychology from leaders in the field of self-development, spirituality, neuroscience, medicine, and more. Thank you for joining us.
Erik: Hello to everybody listening and thank you for joining us at "A Psychology of the Future," the online summit. This is your host, and I'm introducing Dr. James Hardt, who is one of the very early pioneers of brain wave biofeedback, and he's currently president and founder of The Biocybernaut Institute, holds a Bachelor of Science in physics from Carnegie Institute of Technology, as well as his Master of Science and Ph.D. in Psychology from Carnegie Mellon University.
And for the past 30 years, Dr. Hardt has been studying the electrophysiological basis of spiritual states. He studied advanced yogic meditators, Zen meditators, as well as Christian prayer and contemplation. And he trains people to achieve these states through brainwave biofeedback. So if there were ever an interview that were more relevant to the future of psychology, I think this would be the one. And so welcome, Jim, to our conference.
James: I'm pleased to be here. Thank you for the invitation.
Erik: Wonderful. So I'm really excited to invite you to share with us and share with me what it is that you've come to do over the past 30 years.
James: Well, there's an interesting founder's story, which begins with the physics major, Jim Hardt, coming out of the student union on the Carnegie campus after lunch, and seeing a big hand-painted sign, with every letter a different color, announcing that Dr. Joe Kamiya would speak on brain waves and consciousness at a time which was only 10 minutes hence, at a building a stone's throw away, and I didn't have a class that hour, so I went.
And I was fascinated, intrigued, and even charmed by the research results of Dr. Kamiya, who had just a few years earlier discovered, in defiance of conventional wisdom, that human brain waves, thought to be autonomic in nature and incapable of voluntary control, could in fact be voluntarily regulated. This discovery launched an entire new field, the field of neuronal self-regulation, or neurofeedback. And I was an early participant in the research. I wrote and won private and federal grants to do this research. And I also developed technology, producing in 1978 the world's first micro-computerized brain wave feedback and analyzing system.
Erik: Hello to everybody listening and thank you for joining us at "A Psychology of the Future," the online summit. This is your host, and I'm introducing Dr. James Hardt, who is one of the very early pioneers of brain wave biofeedback, and he's currently president and founder of The Biocybernaut Institute, holds a Bachelor of Science in physics from Carnegie Institute of Technology, as well as his Master of Science and Ph.D. in Psychology from Carnegie Mellon University.
And for the past 30 years, Dr. Hardt has been studying the electrophysiological basis of spiritual states. He studied advanced yogic meditators, Zen meditators, as well as Christian prayer and contemplation. And he trains people to achieve these states through brainwave biofeedback. So if there were ever an interview that were more relevant to the future of psychology, I think this would be the one. And so welcome, Jim, to our conference.
James: I'm pleased to be here. Thank you for the invitation.
Erik: Wonderful. So I'm really excited to invite you to share with us and share with me what it is that you've come to do over the past 30 years.
James: Well, there's an interesting founder's story, which begins with the physics major, Jim Hardt, coming out of the student union on the Carnegie campus after lunch, and seeing a big hand-painted sign, with every letter a different color, announcing that Dr. Joe Kamiya would speak on brain waves and consciousness at a time which was only 10 minutes hence, at a building a stone's throw away, and I didn't have a class that hour, so I went.
And I was fascinated, intrigued, and even charmed by the research results of Dr. Kamiya, who had just a few years earlier discovered, in defiance of conventional wisdom, that human brain waves, thought to be autonomic in nature and incapable of voluntary control, could in fact be voluntarily regulated. This discovery launched an entire new field, the field of neuronal self-regulation, or neurofeedback. And I was an early participant in the research. I wrote and won private and federal grants to do this research. And I also developed technology, producing in 1978 the world's first micro-computerized brain wave feedback and analyzing system.