Mind to Mind: Mr. Dennett & Mr. Gautama Exchange Ideas

I am talking about active thinking, the non-stop internal dialogue that is typically going on in a person's mind, plus all our imaginings . . . which taken together is essentially what constitutes "mind." Since most people can't stop it no matter what they do, it "streams" or runs along never under full control.




My experience is that "self" and the central "knower" are very different aspects of consciousness. When there is quiet, my "self" does indeed disappear, it is nothing but a dream-image that is sustained by conditioned mentality.

But the central aspect that worked to quiet the mind (and consequently dissolve self) becomes far more apparent. Unity with that imperturbable, rock-solid center, in fact, is exactly what holds consciousness still.




Of course, the Buddha did not write (or speak) the Heart Sutra, so it isn't the best reference to use to discuss what he might have meant by emptiness. Before I give my view, let me say I don't want get too far into the intricacies of Buddhism. All that matters in the problem of consciousness I've outlined is if, according to Dennett's model, it is possible to be conscious if one stills the mind.

But regarding the self concept the Buddha used in his teaching, that isn't what I'm talking about. The self the Buddha described was a conceptual identity, produced, as Dennett also claims, by our conditioned mentality that begins at birth. But unlike Dennett who claims that the conditioned self is all conscious is, the Buddha said that something remains once self is dissolved. If that were not so, what was talking when the Buddha spoke? A "point" existed from which he willed his body to move, his words to come forth, his wisdom to be shared. We can't call it something like "true self" because the Buddha wanted to avoid the term altogether; but nonetheless, something remained after the Buddha attained enlightenment that could be identified as a unique individual, and that willed activity.

So the emptiness the Heart Sutra describes isn't empty of being, it is empty of any conditioned influence (i.e., self) that distorts the pure clarity of nirvana.




What makes this so hard to understand is if one tries it without a devoted meditation practice. Virtually every single thing the Buddha talked about was the subtleties encountered in meditation, so it is extremely difficult to take those ideas out of that context and then try to make a philosophy out of it, or a way of life, or some sort of intellectual perspective separate from practice.

For example, you attempt to describe neither desiring or rejecting quietude, and the idea of a vast emptiness opening up.

While sitting in practice this morning, I began as usual by finding the light of my consciousness, and then hanging with that for awhile. I next took note of the natural vibrancy of my consciousness, and joined that. The subtle throb that moves my breath became prominent next, and that too I surrendered to.

Each step took me deeper into absorption only because years of practice have taught me that if I do anything but put myself in the presence of this inner realm, and let go to it, I will lose it as fast as wild bird flies away if you move towards it. The sweetest reward came about an hour into practice as I felt my consciousness absorbed into the greater realm I've learned to love so much. It only lasts a short time, but the aftereffects are nearly as good.

How does one master such an effortless effort? But more relevant, how can one possibly explain to someone else what was going on inside? A person so involved in his practice that he's reached the point of dealing with such inner subtleties has no familiar point of reference to explain to others who aren't practicing.

The teachings of the Buddha took place over 40 years, and so what's left behind are ideas that were often used to talk to very experienced monks who could follow along with him. Yet here we come along, often not practicing anything much like Samadhi meditation at all, and try to figure out what he was saying.




Now you are getting close to addressing the point of my question about Dennett's model. But to explain I have to disagree a bit first.

If the mind is quiet there is no running mind, but there is understanding. It is possible to view all sorts of things we've understood in the past, and view them with understanding without having to think them into place all over again.

In fact, when the mind is still, it is far easier to understand everything because one has access to all one's understandings simultaneously. So it isn't no-mind that happens when the mind is still, it is just an entirely different sort of mind. It is a unified mind, unbroken by incessant and conditioned thinking that one can't stop from running on and on.

But overall I think you have it right when you say "consciousness remains." The "different sort of mind" I refer to I believe is pure consciousness. As you said, without mind (the constantly-running, conditioned type) pure consciousness remains. That is why I am certain Dennett's model is dead wrong because according to him, if all cogitating were to stop, we'd be unable to function.

---------- Post added at 11:24 PM ---------- Previous post was at 11:15 PM ----------



I did write it, but let me suggest a different way to contemplate this. Close your eyes and see if you can stop thinking for five minutes.

I know it is impossible if you haven't practiced, but what if you were able to completely quiet the mind? Would you still be conscious?

According to Dennett, consciousness IS all that thinking, and so if you were actually able to stop thinking, then it seems to me you should become unconscious.

I say it very possible to stop thinking, and therefore, I ask: is there any possible way to salvage Dennett's model if one really can bring the mind to total quiet?

I appreciate you taking the time to respond, and offer further insight on your argument and its involved content, LWSleeth. Before continuing with that earlier train of thought, I'll admit that while I had done meditation back when I had been at my high point of yoga practice (while living with some folks from India), I have not been doing it since 1979, and did not go as far as you have. I do, nevertheless, know what you are basically talking about, and have experienced a quieting, but not total [as you should know, it's not that easy]. (and there have been a number of studies on meditative states)

Then, after going back over the thread again, I wonder if we do not yet have some definition differences which would best be taken care of firstly? One problem that I have noticed in the so many papers and works I have read on the subject (and some authors have taken notice too, and have tried to correct for it) is what to do with brain events that are not what we usually think of when we are talking about consciousness. English is the problem (as I have pointed out before here on the boards).

I have adopted, as a result, what seems to me (at least) to be a practical and fair (an application of Occam's Razor, if you will) approach which fits what is known so far, and that is, that alive and active ganglion tissue, and by extension, brain, is automatically conscious by that very modifier--alive and active. This much alone, does not amount to consciousness yet, however, but because we can observe, measure, and understand degrees of increase in power and output capacity in ganglion tissue builds along a line of continuum in life forms, we reach a point where we begin to have consciousness, that works up to the point of H. sapien consciousness.

Therefore, if a person completely sidesteps 'self-talk,' non-linguistical cognitive processing of memories, and all sensory input (something which never stops, but is just 'side stepped') even, the person will of course be conscious--even when in permanent vegetative states, a person will be conscious; just not having a consciousness grade conscious.


If you were to double check, you'll find that I did write, on page one, post number 9, the following:

[INDENT]As I think I have mentioned above, the answer to the question you have clarified (#4, last line before automerge; #6, par. 4; #8, final line) is positive.

(where mentioned 'above' had been in my #7, second paragraph, last sentence)
[/INDENT]
So actually, though it was couched in heavier wording, I had answered the question you had intended to ask in this thread. One reason why it may have been hard to catch the first time 'round was because I have spent more time on trying to deal with where the question itself can be shown to have gone wrong.


In Dennett's paper, Are we explaining consciousness yet? (Cognition, Vol 79, issue 1, 2 [special issue]; pp 221~237 ('01), he doesn't appear to be making the actual nuanced claim, that here seems is being pinned on him, actually (unless something had changed since he had written his book back in 1991 (although he has at least a few papers out since '01 which I have not read yet). He does appear (the paper is not as specific as a book would be, of course) to be following the general lines of discoveries and understandings procured by the neurosciences at large, however, in that respect is surely in agreement with those results--consciousness is projected from conscious. And, he does argue against that 'hard problem' (which I too see as overly dualistically presupposed) and he does appear to argue against the usage of the word 'qualia' which seems most natural.




Therefore, it will be true that you have made a statement on this thread which is being challenged, and thus it is fair and proper enough to me to ask you to defend that claim. To do so, of course, we will eventually have to go to the findings of neuroscience (just as Dennett and Chalmers and other modern philosophers do: Block, Searle, the Churchlands, etc. I encourage you there.


See above.


I wouldn't say we need to 'salvage' it, because it doesn't appear to have anything wrong with it; see above.


I see we'll have to refine definitions; I find a contradiction here...and see above.



Definitions appear to be getting in the way again. It is more in line with what is actually happening with the projection of consciousness which is pure in its fullest form; to reduce that (downgrade it) by closing down access to part of it, is surely not making it more pure...pure most usually means as in 100%, the best quality of whatever quality makes that thing being talked about.

[SIZE="3"]None of that is "known." That's why there is still a huge debate raging about what consciousness is. I do not mean to insult, but I don't think you are at all familiar with controversies surrounding the nature of consciousness. While you've apparently accepted neuroscience's theories hook, line and sinker, the rest of the world is caught up in fierce disagreements about what exactly consciousness is (or even if it exists at all).

If you were following my challenge to how Dennett attempts to solve the "problem of consciousness," you should be explaining how his multiple drafts concept, or some Jocean machine system, or his dumb homuncular hordes, etc. could conceptually survive a quieted mind.

Instead, as you have repeatedly done, you merely explain and interpret through the neuronal model as though I don't understand the theory.

If you or anyone attempted to defend the model, I would be arguing that Dennett merely dismisses sentience altogether; since that IS the "problem of consciousness," it hardly is much of an explanation. To get around sentience he introduces heterophenomenology, where he gets to discount subjective reports. He then adds that as a philosopher, he doesn't have to explain why all humans report they have a subjective aspect, only that he believes they don't understand their own consciousness and are reporting incorrectly.

That's a nice bit of sophistry, but with or without his dismissive tactic and we still have no explanation for either sentience or why the vast majority of people report they experience their own sentience.

In my opinion, his theory isn't due to objective thinking, but rather he starts from a physicalistic belief system, and then struggles to come up with a model of consciousness that fits his a priori beliefs.

In any case, I suggest we discontinue attempting to debate this, it doesn't seem up your alley.[/SIZE]

　
Yes, I get that. What you are talking about is a 'stream of mental events'. I think the term 'stream of consciousness' when used to refer to this 'stream of mental events' creates confusion. That was my point.


Okay.


You are either saying what you want to say incorrectly or you are confused. Consciousness doesn't move. So talking about 'holding consciousness still' is a nonsequitur. I think you are conflating consciousness with objects of consciousness. It's a very common error.


Given the issues at hand and that we talk as if 'one stills the mind', it should be acknowledged that whether there is a 'one' or self that does anything including stilling minds is an aspect of the ongoing debate as to the nature of consciousness,...(and the nature of self).


Well I certainly don't agree with Dennett. I think the best we can say is that what remains for Buddha is consciousness, but consciousness absent the usual observed objects and events; mental images, body sensations, breathing etc. Consciousness aware of itself as consciousness, as emptiness, nothingness, but absent all else. What remains is nothing. We are nothing. But that nothing as incomprehensible and unimaginable....
　
　

I think it has nothing to do with a, 'point' or being an individual or a unique individual.


Depends what is meant by 'being'. It is emptiness of being if being is an object of observation.

From the heart sutra:
So, in emptiness, there is no body,
no feeling, no thought,
no will, no consciousness.
There are no eyes, no ears,
no nose, no tongue,
no body, no mind.

I think what's being pointed out is that things have to be observed to be what they appear to be. That doesn't mean there are 'things' that are observed, but rather observation and that which is observed are one and the same. There is nothing apart from observation. No observation, no thing.
Nirvana and samsara are one and the same. I think its a matter of identifying that appears to create obscurity. That's not to say that there is anyone identified to anything.


We do not and cannot observe other peoples consciousness, or other consciousnesses. And we cannot observe our own consciousness; consciousness is not an object to itself. We cannot find something that is both an object of observation and conscious. There is nothing in the observable world that is conscious. Given that, there are no people or selves that are conscious. There is nothing that has consciousness. Consciousness is not a property of anything. Apart from practical everyday use, the statement, 'I am conscious', is absurd.

Do you agree?

[SIZE="3"]Well, I don't know how you are so sure of yourself. Have you, for example, practiced samadhi and achieved stillness on occasion? Is that why you believe you understand what "emptiness" is . . . because you've personally experienced it? Or is your opinion acquired from reading and thinking.

It is hard for me to respond to much you said because you didn't explain why you believe what you do, and what experience you have that might back up your beliefs. Also, you didn't frame your remarks in contrast to Dennett's model, which I what I thought we were talking about.

However, there is one thing you say that matches my experience in meditation, and also can serve as an argument against Dennett's functionalism.[/SIZE]




[SIZE="3"]I made no error, nor am I confused (at least about this). I spoke of consciousness as most people think of it. I was trying to be charitable to what others believe, and most believe everything they imagine and think is at least part of consciousness; in fact, a great many consciousness experts today believe consciousness is something that arises from thinking, or that the fact that humans can think is what makes us conscious.

Yet I agree with you that consciousness does not move. It is sentience, the very issue Dennett tries to dismiss and theorize around. In an interview I watched between Wright and Dennett . . . . Daniel Dennett . . . there is a point where Wright is trying to include a "product" of the processes that lead to consciousness, and Dennett stops Wright by telling him not to add anything to the processes; i.e., that's all consciousness is to Dennett . . . processes.

As I watched that I couldn't help but think that Dennett doesn't know his own being. He is so determined to produce a physicialistic model that allows external observation, he denies, dismisses, and ignores any introspection that might interfere with his beliefs (and to a point even denies first person introspective reports can be trusted).

Yet I think Dennett gives an absolutely brilliant description of the Buddha's idea of "acquired self." It is so perfect, I believe the Buddha would congratulate him for such extraordinary insight.

The big difference is that Dennett's model reflects what he knows, and that is only acquired self; likewise, the Buddha's explanation reflects what he knows, and that is the constancy behind all the mentality. So Dennett thinks all he is is processes, while the Buddha knew the foundation of sentience. As the Buddha said to his monks: "There is, monks, that plane where there is neither extension nor motion. . . there is no coming or going or remaining or deceasing or uprising. . . . There is, monks, an unborn, not become, not made, uncompounded . . . [and] because [that exists] . . . an escape can be shown for what is born, has become, is made, is compounded."[/SIZE]

Before getting back to that earlier point, then going from there, I'd like to ask if you offer a definition of 'sentience' (from the noun perspective or the adjective perspective) and then I'd like to ask what information (data) you happen to have on where sentience arises from.

I fully agree, nevertheless, that the usual definition of sentience is a necessary, though not sufficient (on its own) factor of our usual (and more practical) definition of consciousness. In order to answer to your claim, there are (as I have stated a couple or more times, as you have obviously taken note of, I feel) some elements (that earlier point) that we will have to get out of the way first, you see. I'll start that on a different thread, but will point to it as I go, here on this one. . . of course it's rather involved. Consciousness is most obviously an emerging-like matter, and is due to various systems working together and on each other, which is because that is how brain build is.



Now your impression is partially correct in the sense that I have not followed all of Dennett's detail, but otherwise I'm not worried about it. I must ask, however, what is your 'that' actually referring to in your clause, 'none of that is "known?' (as it is in response to the section you had quoted there). Your claim that

Catch you later. KJ

Wright makes so many mistakes in that interview that I'm fully surprised he is a professor.

[SIZE="3"]I liked most of what you said there, except I might challenge one thing: "we cannot observe our own consciousness." What is union but oneness with reality, which must necessarily include what we are? I experience "pure" consciousness as a vibrant light that subtlely breathes; in fact, it is that experience that leads to union, and union is merely a more solid experience of the subtle breathing vibrant light that led to union. So it would not be communicatively wrong to say union is self experience because conscious oneness includes awareness of the "stuff" of one's being (i.e., vibrant light that subtly throbs).[/SIZE]

You said: "what is known so far, and that is, that alive and active ganglion tissue, and by extension, brain, is automatically conscious by that very modifier--alive and active. This much alone, does not amount to consciousness yet, however, but because we can observe, measure, and understand degrees of increase in power and output capacity in ganglion tissue builds along a line of continuum in life forms, we reach a point where we begin to have consciousness"

When you said that is "known," I assumed you meant it is known that consciousness is created by the living action of neurons. If you didn't mean that, then I withdraw my statement.

This much for now, here...

It is for this very reason that I have been making an effort to encourage conscientiousness; how could you have missed the underlined bold section? The only thing I can think of (and I had pointed out that very same distinction earlier on, anyway) is that you may not have been thoughtfully reading as carefully as you should have.

You see, the evidence very clearly provides an understanding which is best defined/described in this manner. The older English terms are, simply, quite obscure, and do not fit present knowledge well enough. Ganglion means conscious material; living, active (a bit of a tautology, I'll admit) brain is conscious. Conscious alone, does not make consciousness--my substantia nigra are not said to be in a state of consciousness.

However, I'll point out more, and in much greater detail over the (porportionately) required much greater length of time and posts, how your next statement, namely, "But if you do mean it is scientifically "known" that consciousness is created by the action of neurons, then that is most definitely not so," is faulty in some major ways. That presentation, will best be carried out by cross-thread connection, I would urge.

I did see that, and read it many times trying to figure out your meaning, but your writing style is very difficult for me to follow. In the end I based my interpretation on what you seem to have been saying over the course of this thread . . . that science has essentially proven the brain creates consciousness.

I see. Thanks for letting me know. I do realize that my style of writing is a bit heavy; I try to put as much variable information as I can in as few sentences as possible which relies on much embedding style and more adjectives and adverbial phrasing. I would tend to think, at the same time, that in that you do read Dennett, you would be used to such style (as he seems to use somewhat the same much of the time). Of course, on line reading is hard too. I sometimes print out these pages to digest them more carefully, highlight and make notes on them, and make the heavy and important posts easier to read.

Also, we will find that there will be some vocabulary hardship in that I use some words without fully explaining them, from time to time (again, footnote usage is not really an internet forum style). I'll try to be careful.

However, your understanding on my presentation, as mentioned in your last clause there, is correct. I'm presently laying (ever so little by little) that out over on the other thread too. I'll be back here soon enough. KJ

LW-
i experienced samadhi only once, but i understand what you are saying. i too relied on this as proof of a particular view of reality. but i am now wondering if it cant be explained by neuroscience. i have some questions for you that i hope will help me understand the argument better.

if brain and mind are not the same, once the mind has been quieted yet has an awareness, how can the mind actually be said to be still? besides registering an awareness without any object, there is more. there may be no thinking going on and the mind is not paying attention to any outer stimuli, but it is only verbally quiet. what is it that keeps the mind from thinking? if it isnt holding itself still, then is there another component of sentience? what is controlling the brain, which must be working to maintain bodily functions-does it go on independently of the mind? and if the mind and the brain are the same, doesnt that support the theory that consciousness is only a function or process and the self is an illusion, both of which are dependent on the living, working brain?

You are asking some valid and important questions there, salima. Let me see if I can help work on some of them, after first giving a bit of an introduction here.


[INDENT]There's this movie I once saw (can't recall the name to save my skin) about a couple of guys and a gal from the New England area of the USA who had been arrested in Alabama on suspicion of having comitted a crime, and were on trail. At one particular point in the movie (and of course this was just fiction, the matter I'm pointing to is a real one from time to time though) the prosecution had brought in one expert on automobiles in an attempt to demonstrate how the details of tire burn marks and such left from the escape from the scene, would prove the car they had been found driving in to have been the one used.
[/INDENT]
[INDENT]
Here, the defense (one of the guys) finally brought up that girl to the stand to show a point, since she had expresses some knowledge in the automobile area. The prosecution then cross-examined her with a question (obviously designed to help his case) to which she wisely answered that she could not answer. The prosecuting attorney reminded her that she was under oath and had to answer the question, and repeated it. Again, she said she couldn't answer the question, and the judge intervened, after which she explained why the question could not be answered.

Due to the faultiness of the premise that the question had been based on, she, being in the know, realized that no answer would be true--neither the desired affirmative nor the negative--unless the premise were first corrected (which would then logically have destroyed the question). The prosecution guy turned and looked at the guy he had brought in and that guy was nodding with a kind of 'well, what can I say, she's right' look on his face. The defense won the case.
[/INDENT]If we were to look at what we are working on here, namely:

[INDENT]Well, let me make it clear what I mean by "quieting the mind" . . . So to be clear, I am not talking about the brain, since if it were wholly quiet we'd be dead.
[/INDENT]


as found in post #4 on page one. We'll find some problems up front.

Firstly, we'll have to admit that meditation is being talked about. Then, the expression, "if [the brain] were wholly quiet we'd be dead" appears to imply that the act of quieting is the act of destroying brain cells, perhaps? However, I personally know of no meditative act which kills any neuronal cells and their closest supporters at all. Can we conclude that it is thought that 'quieting the mind' would be understood to be killing areas of the neuronal matterial which makes brain? I am quite sure that we cannot.

What is happening in the quieting act, therefore, is simply more likely the synchronizing of neuronal maps of certain structures and cortical sheet areas--especially neocortical areas. To 'quiet the mind' therefore, cannot (and probably is not seen to) mean causing neurons to stop their baseline homoeostasis-keeping cellular activity (cease to live), but to simply focus attentional direction very sharply into a deeper region of midline sub-cortical structures (with a minimum of cortical connection exchange).

Even in the process of the normal brain's resting state baseline activity (a very midline cortical, sub-cortical event) much of sensory input is loosing out to other sensory input. In meditative states, that is being focused very sharply, and as in anything that requires brain, practice makes perfect. However, it is undeniable that due to the fact that we have memory of mediative state induced emotions, mind is still doing its thing to some extent.

The fault lies, therefore, in that 1)the premise that mind is something that is not brain is being held (in spite of the evidence otherwise), and that 2)the term 'quieting' is being couched (even if unintentionally) so as to insinuate total inactivity of the neuronal material of brain structures which deal with elements of 'higher level' cognition projections of 'real time' sensory input, and that 3) conscious is not being considered as it most evidently presents itself to be, a continuum of nueronal activity.

So, corrected, it is being said that certain functions of mind are being quieted due a synchronizing pattern of activity (similar to slow wave sleep), and a drop in action potentials, not that mind is totally quieted, or disappears, or brain cells die. That the neocortical areas are evidently quiet, it can be understood how in what has been called 'Mystical Experiences,' (such as samadhi) can allow a drop in the substrate that deals with the 'I' factor of that certain level of conscious activity, consciousness.

In finalizing the introduction then, the question which the thread has asked, in taking it as presented, cannot be answered. After corrections to the premise upon which the predicate is based, the answer is that there is no problem, so yes; Dennett's basic theory holds.

I'll get to some of your other points in due time, salima (I do hope and intend). This is long enough. Thanks for taking the time to read and digest it carefully and thoughtfully.








I'm going to cite some of the reference material for the above, just this once...it is not a normal internet forum style, but just to provided evidence of, and for, the evidence that I provide towards my understanding...for all.

Summerfield, Jennifer J.; Cortical midline involvement in autobiographical memory, NeuroImage Vol 44, pp 1188-1200; 2009

Hurlemann, Rene, et al.;Amygdala control of emotion-induced forgetting and remembering: Evidence from Urbach-Wiethe disease, Neuropsychologia Vol 45, pp 877-884; 2007

Panksepp, Jaak, Burgdorf, Jeffrey; The neurology of positive emotions, NEUROSCIENCE AND BIOBEHAVIORAL REVIEWS Vol 30, ppp 173-187; 2006

Feinberg, Todd, E., Keenan, Julian Paul; Where in the brain is the self?, Consciousness and Cognition Vol 14, pp 661-678; 2005

Pacherie, Elisabeth, et al.; Phenomenology and delusions: Who put the 'alien' in the alien control?, Consciousness and Cognition Vol 15, pp 566-577; 2006

Kuchinke, Lars, Kruegeer, Frank, Meer, Elke van der; Differences in processing of taxonomic and sequential relations in semantic memory: An fMRI investigation, Brain and Cognition Vol 69, pp 245-251, 2009

A couple of contributions (or areas) from the following works as well:

The Encyclopedia of Cognitive Science (Nature Pub.; 2003)
The Neurology of Consciousness (Academic press; 2009)
Encyclopedia of Consciousness, volumes 1 & 2 (Academic Press; 2009)
Human Physiology-The Mechanisms of body function , 10th Ed.(Mc Graw Hill; 2006)
Neuroscience-Exploring the Brain, 3rd Ed. (Lippincott Williams & Wilkins; 2007)

There is a perceptual issue behind all this. Basically if you have had certain centers activated or lit up, you see certain things. Without having had that experience, or realisation, no amount of argumentation will change your mind. It's like those Magic Eye illusions - if you see them correctly, an image emerges from the pattern. Without this cognitive step, you will only see dots. And indeed, there are dots there. It is just that some can't connect them.

Dennett sees only dots.

kj-
actually, the five questions i asked in my post #33 were directed to LW to further clarify his thoughts or the theory behind what he has said. out of necessity i am stating the questions within the framework he has been posting as best i understand it. they are not really general questions, but relate only to his particular view.
however, i had formerly asked you for more information about the working of the brain during the meditational state, and there is some of that in your post, for which i thank you.

[SIZE="3"]I will do my best to answer you. But just to clear up one thing first, I don't rely on my experiences with samadhi as a proof of anything except what I actually experience. I first experienced Samadhi in 1973, and since then I could be found every morning at dawn sitting in practice. I achieve Samadhi most days, and experience peace, joy, an expanded view, and over the years gradually being released from conditioning.

However, I haven't extrapolated an ironclad belief from that experience that all existence is some way or another. Rather, when I hear someone else's explanation, like the neuronal model, presented like it's the "truth," without doubt and as though it is proven . . . I resist such "believers" because nothing about consciousness is proven, and because it doesn't fit with my experience.

When you suggest consciousness can be explained by neuroscience, I would answer that it most certainly can be explained by neuroscience! It can be explained by the Bible, the Upanishads, claiming existence is a dream, and any other explanation we might invent.

Everybody who believes in their explanation fights hard to maintain it. Many people think if it's "science" then all its believers speak objectively, with only the facts. Well, that is most definitely NOT my experience. If it's pure science, as when scientists are conducting a non-controversial investigation, then yes, you can usually count on objectivity. But get anywhere near a subject that might suggest there is something more than physicalness going on in this universe, and most hardcore science believers turn into spin doctors . . . just like every other "believer" (whether religion, politics, or whatever) I've ever run into.

That is why one of my highest ideals for acquiring knowledge is to not believe anything once and for all, but instead to let my experience of reality shape my views as it will. All my certainties are tentative, and that's why I think the greatest epistemological discovery of the last three hundred years has been that experience is the basis of knowing. Before experience was accepted as the main path to knowing, philosophers sat around speculating endlessly, but never had to demonstrate the reality of their theories. Now if a claim is made, there must also be some way to observe it before it is allowed to be called a "fact."

I take it a radical step further and look at knowledge as only a history of how reality has behaved in the past; in a sense, we can never know anything permanently because we don't know if reality will continue to behave as it has.

I point this out because as I answer you, I don't want you to think I believe I "know" anything much except what I have experienced. I am not a "believer" in God, I just have experiences that feel like a vast consciousness, and as what others have described as God. I don't "believe" the neuronal model is false, I just have experiences that won't fit into that model.[/SIZE]




[SIZE="3"]There is another model (besides the neuronal model) that fits the facts. I am going to touch on it as I answer you, but keep in mind I am not claiming it is the "truth," or even that I "believe" it myself. It just better jives with my experiences.

Let me start with an analogy. If I went to the moon, I'd have to wear a life support system to walk around on the surface. Let's say you are a moon creature who's captured me, and now are studying me to see what makes me tick. You can't see inside my suit, so you don't know anyone is in there; i.e., all you can do is study my suit.

You hook up my space suit to your measuring equipment and notice as you take readings of the suit that every time I move or breathe your equipment detects changes in the suit. Even more interesting is that if you manipulate the suit's circuitry, it affects how I behave. Mess with one circuit and I start flopping around like fish out of water, mess with another circuit that stops the oxygen flow and the suit "dies." And even if I were to hold perfectly still within my suit, you'd nonetheless be able to register the suit's life-support functions keeping me alive. Based on your observations, you conclude the suit is all there is.[/SIZE]




[SIZE="3"]A truly excellent question because you are right to wonder how could something still itself that is defined by movement (i.e., the mind)? It is a delusion that even serious meditators fall for when they believe they can stop the mind by force of will or some other mental means.

But Samadhi works differently because one seeks something that is already still, and then to merge with that place. The Buddha referred to it as a "plane" that is rock solid and unchanging ("unborn, not become, not made, uncompounded"), but out of which all that which changes has emerged. The mind is one of those ever-changing things that has emerged from this underlying foundation of existence, and so the practice of Samadhi is one of learning how to be reabsorbed back into that foundation. In that merging, the foundation stills the mind automatically because that's its nature.

The experience of this foundation reveals just how vast it is, and how we've been drawn into a very tiny perspective by the body to peer through its central nervous system. Of course, I can say that because I've experienced it; without that personal experience, I don't see how anyone can believe it is true.[/SIZE]




[SIZE="3"]Because two things are intertwined or currently interdependent doesn't mean one is the cause of the other, or that they are eternally and wholly interdependant. Another analogy I'ved used is that of a radio that is, say, broadcasting a live Carnegie Hall concert taking place 3000 miles away in San Francisco. If someone were determined to explain the radio as the creator of the live radio broadcast, he might point to how the sound can be affected by manipulating different radio parts, or how the broadcast disappears if the radio is destroyed. But we know the live broadcast is totally dependent on being made present, not created in San Francisco by the radio, and that means changes to the radio system can impinge on the broadcast. There is something else we know, and that is we understand what music is and what it takes to produce it; so it is an easy matter for us to deduce that a radio lacks the wherewithal for creativity, writing music and mastering instruments.

Consciousness, however, is another story. As strange as it may seem for us to be something but not know what we are, that is exactly the situation. We are consciousness, yet the nature of consciousness is a huge mystery. The smartest people in the world agree that experience is both the basis of knowing and should lead the way to understanding. But most smart people are trying to understand consciousness without directly experiencing its nature, and that results in opinions about it that sells consciousness short.

What if the CNS isn't the creator of consciousness, but rather it's the means through which some more general principle is focused? For a moment imagine consciousness is a force, like gravity, with the potential to appear anywhere in the universe. Gravity is interesting because if you could go into space and create mass, the proportionate gravitational force would arrive on the scene like magic.

Where gravity comes from isn't clear, but if there were no matter, we'd never know the gravity potential exists. So do the conditions which make gravity show up create gravity, or do they merely cause it to manifest from some more basic (and unseen) state of affairs? Similarly, our knowledge of consciousness is coupled to conditions which make consciousness evident to us. True, as far as we remember we first became conscious within the body's central nervous system, but that doesn't mean we can assume the CNS creates consciousness.

It's not like we haven't been surprised by the inner workings of the universe before. Just a couple of hundred years ago who could've foreseen that quantum mechanics, relativity, DNA, and other root structures were determining how things look on the surface of reality? Better investigative techniques and detection equipment along with the humankind's accumulated experience and knowledge finally penetrated the veil of appearances.

Well, scientists aren't the only ones who've looked behind the fa?ade, others have looked too, but not "outward" through the senses. Instead they turned their attention 180 degrees around to experience consciousness directly, before consciousness is tangled in the senses and nervous system, to see that consciousness is indeed composed of something not included in physicalistic models.

The most dedicated practitioners stuck with the interior path, penetrating more deeply inward still, until finally experiencing where consciousness remains "one" with its source. They experienced how their CNS had been remarkably successful at giving them a sense of separation from that consciousness origin and foundation, yet individuating them as well within the general consciousness realm they'd rediscovered.[/SIZE]

True, but John Locke didn't practise samadhi either (worst luck)

[SIZE="3"]Lol, I suppose I should have said the greatest discovery by Western philosophers. Their acknowledgement of the role of experience in knowing helped bring that understanding more into our culture's activities. Yet as you imply, there seems to be at least one other epistemology we need to make more prominent.

I was a biology major when I first learned of samadhi; I had chosen science as my path in life precisely because it was so experience oriented. I believed it might be the avenue to knowing all the truths of existence.

I was shocked to find so many opinionated science professors, opinions that were very strong but that were also unsupported by enough supporting evidence to have such strong opinions. I was so disturbed by that I eventually dropped out of college for a couple of years to reconsider my course of study, and that's when I firmly committed to samadhi as a path to knowing the deeper things.

Since that time I have realized what I can know through science and what I can know from turning inward are not in the slightest conflict, they just each provide different sorts of knowledge. Science reveals the physical universe magnificently, samadhi superbly reveals the secrets of my being.[/SIZE]

Yes but the issue is that 'experience' was always understood by the empirical philosophers to be limited to the collection of data that could be experienced by any observer - meaning it must be 'objective', by definition. William James, and some of the other pioneers of psychology, tried to broaden the scope of empiricism to include 'data available to introspection', as did the phenomenologists. The problem is that, in the absence of the normative framework provided by Buddhism (or by 'dharma' more generally) there was nothing to prevent this 'introspective data' from being completely personal or idiosyncratic. And besides, your western empiricists always were, and remain, hostile towards anything resembling spirituality (none more so than Dennett).

The West has not had any equivalent of samadhi and the 'pragmatic transcendentalism' of the Buddha - not outside the monasteries, anyway, where it can be conveniently bundled with religion - and ignored - by the secular intelligensia, who also don't understand that Dharma is not religion.