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science explores meditation
- Kate Gowen
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11 years 11 months ago #15909
by Kate Gowen
science explores meditation was created by Kate Gowen
Excellent article from Jeff Warren--
"The veteran meditators could do each of the resting states perfectly, but when it came to creating a contrasting condition, they were helpless. They had lost the ability to “let their minds wander” because they had long ago shed the habit of entertaining discursive narrative thoughts. They no longer worried about how their hair looked, or their to-do lists, or whether people thought they were annoying. Their minds were largely quiet. When thoughts did come – and they did still come – these subjects reported that the thoughts had a different quality, an unfixated quality. The thought “This MRI machine is extremely loud” might arise, but it would quickly evaporate. Thoughts seemed to emerge as-needed in response to different situations and would then disappear crisply into the clear backdrop of consciousness. In other words, these practitioners were always meditating."
www.psychologytomorrowmagazine.com/insca...tenment-and-science/
"The veteran meditators could do each of the resting states perfectly, but when it came to creating a contrasting condition, they were helpless. They had lost the ability to “let their minds wander” because they had long ago shed the habit of entertaining discursive narrative thoughts. They no longer worried about how their hair looked, or their to-do lists, or whether people thought they were annoying. Their minds were largely quiet. When thoughts did come – and they did still come – these subjects reported that the thoughts had a different quality, an unfixated quality. The thought “This MRI machine is extremely loud” might arise, but it would quickly evaporate. Thoughts seemed to emerge as-needed in response to different situations and would then disappear crisply into the clear backdrop of consciousness. In other words, these practitioners were always meditating."
www.psychologytomorrowmagazine.com/insca...tenment-and-science/
11 years 11 months ago #15921
by Ona Kiser
Replied by Ona Kiser on topic science explores meditation
I was prepared to be annoyed, but that's actually rather interesting.
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11 years 11 months ago #15926
by Kate Gowen
Replied by Kate Gowen on topic science explores meditation
How could it not be? It's our old buddy, Jeff Warren, Shinzen student and author of The Head Trip.
His site, by the way, is a treasury of links, articles, videos, etc. He's one of those disarmingly modest polymaths who chalk it up to being ADHD. www.jeffwarren.org
His site, by the way, is a treasury of links, articles, videos, etc. He's one of those disarmingly modest polymaths who chalk it up to being ADHD. www.jeffwarren.org
11 years 11 months ago #15929
by Ona Kiser
Replied by Ona Kiser on topic science explores meditation
For anyone who wasn't around when we talked about The Head Trip - that's a great book. Super particularly for people who are worried about how they sleep (insomnia, etc.). Easy to read and a fun tour of the strange things the mind does.
11 years 11 months ago #15930
by Andy
Replied by Andy on topic science explores meditation
Thanks. Ordered it from my inter-library exchange.Ona Kiser wrote: For anyone who wasn't around when we talked about The Head Trip - that's a great book. Super particularly for people who are worried about how they sleep (insomnia, etc.). Easy to read and a fun tour of the strange things the mind does.
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11 years 11 months ago #15931
by every3rdthought
Replied by every3rdthought on topic science explores meditation
I did find this article interesting, and less irritating than most articles about science and practice, but then I hit this:
'In Young and in Vago’s hopeful view, a true “science of enlightenment” might be able to bring together and illuminate all the paradigms and experiences that lie at the heart of serious spiritual practice.'
which was more like what I had expected to find - Western science is somehow 'truer' than spiritual traditions and is able to find a single, identical 'core' at the centre of each which the traditions themselves couldn't do, stripping away the external/cultural (read: not in tune with Western paradigms and assumptions) aspects.
But for me this is like Hinduism absorbing Buddha as an avatar of Vishnu - it's fine, but it's just another system with the same relative value, not a more ultimate or truer one, and I'd like to see that paradigm deconstructed and questioned, if questioning what we think we know is the name of the game.
If the scientific framework helps some people come to meditation who otherwise wouldn't, that's cool, but otherwise... also, call me conservative, but I'm dubious and even a bit concerned about the idea of a 'techno-boost' which gives progress in meditation - it seems to me that it just doesn't work that way. And Shinzen's ideas remind me a lot of TM claims about how if everyone did TM the world would be happy and there would be less crime, and their 'studies' proving that.
It's McMahan's Buddhist Modernism (and maybe Lopez's Buddhism and Science , and The Scientific Buddha , which I haven't yet read..)
'In Young and in Vago’s hopeful view, a true “science of enlightenment” might be able to bring together and illuminate all the paradigms and experiences that lie at the heart of serious spiritual practice.'
which was more like what I had expected to find - Western science is somehow 'truer' than spiritual traditions and is able to find a single, identical 'core' at the centre of each which the traditions themselves couldn't do, stripping away the external/cultural (read: not in tune with Western paradigms and assumptions) aspects.
But for me this is like Hinduism absorbing Buddha as an avatar of Vishnu - it's fine, but it's just another system with the same relative value, not a more ultimate or truer one, and I'd like to see that paradigm deconstructed and questioned, if questioning what we think we know is the name of the game.
If the scientific framework helps some people come to meditation who otherwise wouldn't, that's cool, but otherwise... also, call me conservative, but I'm dubious and even a bit concerned about the idea of a 'techno-boost' which gives progress in meditation - it seems to me that it just doesn't work that way. And Shinzen's ideas remind me a lot of TM claims about how if everyone did TM the world would be happy and there would be less crime, and their 'studies' proving that.
It's McMahan's Buddhist Modernism (and maybe Lopez's Buddhism and Science , and The Scientific Buddha , which I haven't yet read..)
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11 years 11 months ago #15932
by Kate Gowen
Replied by Kate Gowen on topic science explores meditation
You're right of course-- and making the very points that I can usually be relied upon to make!
I have a soft spot for Jeff Warren; I think it's because he's a better writer (and more cautious about the more futuristic geeky claims) than most who tackle the subject. He seems to have at least an inkling that translating "Buddhism" into "Science" doesn't improve the information-- just serve it up to a different subset of people.
The particular thing that caught my eye was the bit about how one might lose the ability to generate and perpetuate "distraction mind."
I, too, have been a bit surprised at a deep streak of conservatism coloring my take on things in recent years.
I have a soft spot for Jeff Warren; I think it's because he's a better writer (and more cautious about the more futuristic geeky claims) than most who tackle the subject. He seems to have at least an inkling that translating "Buddhism" into "Science" doesn't improve the information-- just serve it up to a different subset of people.
The particular thing that caught my eye was the bit about how one might lose the ability to generate and perpetuate "distraction mind."
I, too, have been a bit surprised at a deep streak of conservatism coloring my take on things in recent years.
11 years 11 months ago #15933
by Ona Kiser
Replied by Ona Kiser on topic science explores meditation
What I particularly liked was that he pointed out this, which is often unsaid or unrecognized:
"Many people are eager to make comparisons between spirituality and science (usually involving quantum mechanics), a move that in most cases just annoys real scientists, who have a more nuanced view of these processes. But then, the scientific tendency to make a vague generalization about “meditation” – a hugely complex set of techniques and processes – equally annoys contemplatives. "
"Many people are eager to make comparisons between spirituality and science (usually involving quantum mechanics), a move that in most cases just annoys real scientists, who have a more nuanced view of these processes. But then, the scientific tendency to make a vague generalization about “meditation” – a hugely complex set of techniques and processes – equally annoys contemplatives. "
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11 years 11 months ago #15934
by every3rdthought
Replied by every3rdthought on topic science explores meditation
Ona and Kate, I quite agree! And, despite myself and despite not believing that the mind is reducible to the brain, I'm interested in whether there's any neurological correlation to a cessation. Anyway, reading this piece has just led me down an amazon wormhole which led to me buying Marilynne Robinson's
Absence of Mind
so there's a cool outcome of the fusing of meditation and science right there 
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11 years 11 months ago - 11 years 11 months ago #15935
by Kate Gowen
Replied by Kate Gowen on topic science explores meditation
I am in total agreement that "mind" is not a synonym for "brain"-- and every time the words are used interchangeably I go through a little inner dialog about how mind is the word we use for the functioning of the total cognitive apparatus, including but not limited to the nervous system, neurochemistry, and electromagnetic phenomena associated therewith..
That DMT film included some interesting thoughts on the subject. And new information about how plastic, in-constant-flux even those physical aspects are, likewise is of great interest.
And, ooh, you naughty guy: now I need the Marilynn Robinson book, too!
That DMT film included some interesting thoughts on the subject. And new information about how plastic, in-constant-flux even those physical aspects are, likewise is of great interest.
And, ooh, you naughty guy: now I need the Marilynn Robinson book, too!
Last edit: 11 years 11 months ago by Kate Gowen. Reason: add text
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11 years 11 months ago - 11 years 11 months ago #15951
by Chris Marti
Replied by Chris Marti on topic science explores meditation
This topic was given extended coverage at Buddhist Geeks 2013. Shinzen Young and David Vago presented a one and a half hour overview of their joint fMRI scanning project at Harvard. Jeff Warren was there listening. Young and Vago then held an informal Q&A "un-conference" session and entertained a lot of questions and explained more of the detail behind the science and the technology of fMRI. My take away was that Shinzen Young is very, very honest and is more willing to address the inadequacies of the fMRI scanning technology than Vago. Vago was, uh, sort of vague. Shinzen was sharp. It's clear that they really have no truly solid idea what it is they're reading. The way Shinzen and Vago explained it they get reams and reams of results from every scan and have to analyze the data and look for patterns and create stories to explain what they've got. They ignore a huge proportion of the data they collect during a scan because they have no idea what it is, or what it measures or what it means in terms of brain activity.
On the other hand, there will one day be much higher resolution scanning and we will know much more than we now know. I think being skeptical of the science is very appropriate, but there will come a day when we will all, as meditators and practitioners, have to face up to the idea that what happens to us may very well be reproducible using technology. I was at a neuroscience conference just a few weeks ago and what's starting to happen is that fMRI technology is being used to "rewire" human brains using feedback mechanisms from in real time fMRI scanning technology. It's rudimentary now but that will very likely not always be the case. That's technology assisted neuroplasticity.
On the other hand, there will one day be much higher resolution scanning and we will know much more than we now know. I think being skeptical of the science is very appropriate, but there will come a day when we will all, as meditators and practitioners, have to face up to the idea that what happens to us may very well be reproducible using technology. I was at a neuroscience conference just a few weeks ago and what's starting to happen is that fMRI technology is being used to "rewire" human brains using feedback mechanisms from in real time fMRI scanning technology. It's rudimentary now but that will very likely not always be the case. That's technology assisted neuroplasticity.
Last edit: 11 years 11 months ago by Chris Marti.
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11 years 11 months ago #15961
by every3rdthought
I dunno, my dubiousness about this has the same quality as if someone was to say, in the future technology will be able to achieve the same outcome that psychotherapy does now. Sure, that technology can assist with certain aspects (psychiatry, distinguishing different problems from a diagnostic point of view and deciding what intervention might be appropriate etc) but I don't see how it can take the place of the work of consciousness, psyche etc that happens dealing with one's own individual 'stuff,' path, etc, and takes place over time. Particularly now that in the PD community (or at least, here) we're seeing the journey not so much as a 'mechanically note it til you wake up' and more as a personalised investigative process regarding one's underlying 'stuff.'
Replied by every3rdthought on topic science explores meditation
Chris Marti wrote: there will come a day when we will all, as meditators and practitioners, have to face up to the idea that what happens to us may very well be reproducible using technology. I was at a neuroscience conference just a few weeks ago and what's starting to happen is that fMRI technology is being used to "rewire" human brains using feedback mechanisms from in real time fMRI scanning technology. It's rudimentary now but that will very likely not always be the case.
I dunno, my dubiousness about this has the same quality as if someone was to say, in the future technology will be able to achieve the same outcome that psychotherapy does now. Sure, that technology can assist with certain aspects (psychiatry, distinguishing different problems from a diagnostic point of view and deciding what intervention might be appropriate etc) but I don't see how it can take the place of the work of consciousness, psyche etc that happens dealing with one's own individual 'stuff,' path, etc, and takes place over time. Particularly now that in the PD community (or at least, here) we're seeing the journey not so much as a 'mechanically note it til you wake up' and more as a personalised investigative process regarding one's underlying 'stuff.'
11 years 11 months ago #15964
by Ona Kiser
Replied by Ona Kiser on topic science explores meditation
Perhaps a parallel would be how sometimes psychological conditions can be modified quite strongly with medication: emotional swings tamped down, anxiety reduced, hallucinations or mania controlled, etc. But for a real long-term benefit, the person usually needs to do some work - to explore what was causing the reaction (which might have been too scary without medication), to learn new ways of dealing with trigger situations, create new family dynamics and communication, etc etc. Given how disorienting awakening can be even for people with some practice years under their belts, if you popped that as a pill I'd guess you'd appreciate some years working with a coach or support group to integrate the new perceptions.
It also may be that there are many people out there who wake up quickly and smoothly, with no bumps and bruises - we just don't hear about them because they feel no need to reach out to forums, teachers, etc. But at least based on the dozens of people I've interacted with and my own experience some people find the process disorienting even when they have a background in meditation/spiritual practice. On very small anecdotal evidence, it does seem to be somewhat less disruptive for people with a longer, deeper more stable practice background and a pre-existing level of healthy social/psychological maturity. The several I know personally who had long consistent practices within a specific tradition have not had the same level of weird-out and struggle, though they certainly have had some.
It also may be that there are many people out there who wake up quickly and smoothly, with no bumps and bruises - we just don't hear about them because they feel no need to reach out to forums, teachers, etc. But at least based on the dozens of people I've interacted with and my own experience some people find the process disorienting even when they have a background in meditation/spiritual practice. On very small anecdotal evidence, it does seem to be somewhat less disruptive for people with a longer, deeper more stable practice background and a pre-existing level of healthy social/psychological maturity. The several I know personally who had long consistent practices within a specific tradition have not had the same level of weird-out and struggle, though they certainly have had some.
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11 years 11 months ago #15966
by Chris Marti
I think this is a common POV. It's really hard to think that what happens in the mind is algorithmic. I sort of hope it's not but I'm open to the possibility that it is. That would dash my hopes of being "special" in the sense that I can't be reduced to a mechanical process. But then I think that, too, might just be another "I" story that mind tells me.
I guess time will tell.
Replied by Chris Marti on topic science explores meditation
...but I don't see how it can take the place of the work of consciousness, psyche etc that happens dealing with one's own individual 'stuff,' path, etc, and takes place over time.
I think this is a common POV. It's really hard to think that what happens in the mind is algorithmic. I sort of hope it's not but I'm open to the possibility that it is. That would dash my hopes of being "special" in the sense that I can't be reduced to a mechanical process. But then I think that, too, might just be another "I" story that mind tells me.
I guess time will tell.
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11 years 11 months ago #15985
by Chris Marti
Replied by Chris Marti on topic science explores meditation
More in this topic from David Vago - can neuro-imaging (fMRI) reveal the biological correlates of enlightenment? He evaluates three alternatives: no, maybe, and cautiously yes:
www.frontiersin.org/consciousness_resear...psyg.2013.00870/full
www.frontiersin.org/consciousness_resear...psyg.2013.00870/full