| http://cup.columbia.edu/book/realizing-awakened-consciousness/9780231170758 |
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Here is an outline compressing the book and work since it was written into seven pages. This outline guides a journal article I'm presently writing.
OUTLINE OF THE
AWAKENING PROJECT
Richard Boyle,
February 2015
Introduction.
Buddhism and cognitive
science share an assumption that the content and structure of awareness at any
moment is heavily influenced by conceptual systems stored in our minds. Buddhism says that this is the cause of
delusion, from which it is possible to awaken. Cognitive science documents many
ways in which preexisting ideas alter perception, and philosophy recommends
examining the ideas carefully to discover and correct faults. At the heart of
both, therefore, is the conclusion that most people, most of the time, are
operating with an awareness that is filtered through and to some degree distorted
relative to the way their perceptual systems would otherwise present the moment.
That is a powerful
statement, with strong implications. Buddhism, especially, goes beyond the
specific examples of distortion that science has documented to claim that the
world of ideas that we carry around in our minds encloses us in a kind of bubble.
This bubble, or veil, or carapace, separates us from direct experience of the perceptual
world. Some people become tantalized by that notion and undertake a path recommended
for dissolving the bubble, for “awakening.” The model outlined here tries to
extend the scope of cognitive science to account for both ordinary and awakened
awareness.
A. The Evolution of Culture, Social Reality,
and Reification
(Chapter 14). Since concepts have been identified as the source of distorted
awareness, the first step must be to look at where ideas come from and what
kinds of conceptual systems they form.
1. In evolutionary
terms, concepts were not possible until some early members of the Homo genus began inventing language. This
required a social group, and it is hard to imagine a group with even a simple protolanguage
not sharing information and passing it on to their children. Presumably, then,
the construction of culture proceeded
parallel with the development of language, and gave major advantages to groups
doing it.
2. I define social reality as the version of a culture
that is internalized by an individual member. Heterogeneous, rapidly changing societies
like ours include an enormous variety of sub-cultures; defining social reality in
terms of individuals acknowledges this diversity. One’s social reality
therefore incorporates ideas, values, beliefs, attitudes, habits, etc. from all
the social groups to which one belongs or has belonged.
3. Thinking of social reality in terms of individuals is
also convenient for defining reification. A person’s social reality is reified
when it becomes, in that person’s mind, the taken-for-granted, unquestioned but
authoritative way of doing things and making sense of life. When it has
achieved this ontological status, social reality is layered with a texture of feelings
and emotions. These are what Buddhism calls “attachments” – you can’t do
something or think something without being affected by the associations within
which it is embedded.
4. Early human groups whose culture was reinforced through
reification must have enjoyed greater survival success than groups with a more
objective, detached relation to their culture, due to stronger motivation to
conform to group norms and sacrifice for group values. The question then
becomes, how did this evolutionary bias toward reification express itself?
Presumably a predisposition to reify is built into us biologically, just as a
strong ability and predisposition to acquire language is part of our DNA. Most
likely, neurological structures ensuring that children reify the culture that
their parents present to them were built onto feelings and emotions already
present in animals – but were elaborated on these themes to fit all the new
possibilities created when social reality was added onto the perceptual reality
of animals.
5. We take culture so for granted that we seldom look at it
closely – it is in many ways the 800 pound gorilla in the living room that we
tiptoe around and pretend does not exist. And when we do think of culture, we
accept reification as an inseparable part of it. It is in that context that
awakening presents its most dramatic assertion – reification is not necessary,
we can live free of it. We can have culture, and use ideas, without reifying
them. Social reality can be de-reified. Somehow, the neurological structures
involved in reification include a switching capacity, which is characteristic
of association networks like the Default Mode Network (DMN).
Therefore: Humans are born with
a strong predisposition to acquire and reify social reality, a predisposition
that is probably is the result of systems built into the brain at a fairly late
evolutionary stage. Because humans reify social reality at the same time that
they are learning it, unless this predisposition is corrected we go through
life thinking that the awareness we experience day after day is real.
Implication: Many, probably most,
of the world’s problems are and always have been caused by the human need to
maintain, support, and protect a reified social reality. (chapter 16). The
terrible mistake of evolution, after providing us with the capacity to develop
culture, was to saddle us with such a strong predisposition to reify that
culture. The remarkable assertion of awakening is that social reality, and
culture, can be de-reified.
B. Ordinary Awareness (chapter 17). A review
of the main factors involved in generating, at each moment, the subjective
experience of ordinary awareness. (While there is no “standard model” of
consciousness, there is some consensus about important parts. The model
proposed here tries to express that consensus in summary form.)
1. Perception:
bottom-up perceptual processing analyzes incoming sensory stimuli while top-down
processing tries to fit this with information stored in memory. When top-down
processing finds a match (which may be only approximate, even wrong) we have
object-recognition, perhaps also situation- and event-recognition.
2. Conceptual
processing involves words and other symbols.
a. After an object,
situation, or event has been recognized, a word or phrase that describes it is
activated in unconscious processing.
b. Sounds or written
patterns are recognized as words (and corresponding percepts are activated).
c. Inner speech may be
generated in conscious awareness whenever words are active in unconscious
processing.
3. Any conceptual
activity activates relevant portions of the person’s social reality.
a. Social reality is
structured in terms of scripts, plans, and stories which specify approved
means, desired ends, and appropriate emotions. These schema tell us how we
should live and provide explanations and meaning for life as it unfolds.
b. The ordinary self is
the way we experience, and have experienced, living in social reality.
c. Cultures provide
models for how self-awareness should be structured. In modern western societies
the self-model assumes a protagonist with free will who makes (or should make)
conscious decisions and assumes (or should assume) responsibility for their
outcomes.
4. If a perceptual
version of what is going on in the moment differs from the conceptual account
of what should be going on that social reality provides, then one or both is modified.
The dynamic for resolving the dissonance is to move toward consistency by modifying one or both versions. Note that this
consists of rearranging the contents of ordinary awareness, not changing its
structure.
Implication: All known human
societies have cultures, and their members therefore need to maintain some
degree of consistency between their culture and the facts their lives are
presenting them with. In times of change or trauma, or because the ideas making
up the culture are being questioned, or because group ties are weakening (or
all three together), people may experience dukkha,
or ontological insecurity. This can lead to social and individual
disintegration, to fanatical reassertion of core beliefs (especially religious),
to innovative changes in what one accepts as social reality, or to increased
interest in meditation and awakening. Chapter 16 discusses the Gautama-Giddens
theory of dukkha.
5. It is important to
distinguish between conscious and unconscious awareness. Unconscious
awareness is a hypothetical construct which merely says that we can act appropriately
in a situation even though we are not consciously aware of it (e.g., “blindsight”
demonstrates that action can proceed directly from unconscious visual
processing).
6. Unconscious
processing also controls three activities that we can both engage in and observe
ourselves doing in conscious awareness: action,
attention, and inner speech.
a. Action: research
stemming from Libet suggests that action slightly precedes its appearance in conscious
awareness. We then perceive ourselves acting but modify the perception to
conform with the stipulation of our self-model that conscious awareness
precedes action. Note, however, that unconscious processing can also prevent or
“pause” an action, put it on hold pending further processing.
b. Attention: We are
subjectively aware that attention can vary from focused to diffuse and from attentive
to inattentive. Attention is involved in the entire process of generating
awareness, from focusing the lens of the eye on the retina to generating the
final version in conscious awareness.
c. Inner speech is the
expression in conscious awareness of what we call “thinking.” Kahneman
distinguishes “fast” and “slow” thinking. Slow thinking is controlled by
attention in such a way that the inner speech expressing the thought appears in
conscious awareness but action is inhibited. Unconscious processing then
responds to the awareness as it would a new event, by considering its
implications and generating a new “thought” as inner speech. Slow thinking
continues until a “decision” is reached and action released. In fast thinking
the action occurs more or less simultaneously with the initial inner speech. I
add a third type, “wandering thinking,” to refer to inner conversations taking
place but with no attentional control over how one segment of inner speech
leads to another.
Therefore: In ordinary awareness
perception may be modified by conceptual systems, in a way that attempts to
negotiate consistency between the perceptual image and, especially, the systems
representing self and social reality. But inputs may also be initiated by
conceptual systems as inner speech, and can be experienced subjectively as one
of three forms of thinking. The self-model prevalent in our society emphasizes
conscious awareness and downplays or ignores the roles of social reality and
unconscious processing.
C. Preparation
for awakening (Chapter 12). Can we account for awakening by varying some of the
properties of the model just proposed for ordinary consciousness? The teachers
interviewed in the book told about special practices and training they followed
on their paths. These are discussed in three categories, along with their
implications:
1. Practices designed to quiet the mind. These include many forms of seated meditation,
techniques for maintaining mindful awareness of the perceptual moment whether
sitting or active, and other strategies for developing attentional control. Engaging
in these practices has causal consequences:
a. The experience of meditators is that with time and some discipline
there is a reduction in the amount of uncontrolled inner speech (wandering
thinking). Gradually the amount of attentional effort required diminishes as
the mind seems to learn and enjoy settling into silence.
b. This silence implies that the Default Mode Network (DMN)
in the brain can be turned off through attentional control. In ordinary
consciousness, when one is actively engaged in physical or mental activity the parts
of the brain comprising the DMN are quiet, but when one is not doing anything they
become intensely active and inner speech commences. As noted, inner speech may
take the form of slow thinking, but wandering thinking is also likely. During
meditation, however, the DMN remains inactive and inner speech is minimal. Therefore
the DMN appears to be switched on when our level of attentiveness is low, but
switched off during activities requiring attention – including mindfulness
during sitting meditation or other activities that would normally encourage
wandering thinking.
c. Another implication of quieting the mind is that with less
conceptual processing going on, perceptual information can play a larger role in
generating awareness. As a result, perceptual experience may seem clearer,
brighter, and more vivid.
2. Letting go of
attachments and de-reifying social
reality:
a. Practices intended to encourage letting go of
attachments to ideas, desires, habits, and emotions include:
-
Questioning
ideas previously taken for granted, especially re: self and social reality;
-
Using
attentional control to break old habits and cultivate new ones;
-
Adopting
a more relaxed and equanimous way of being;
-
Learning
to control desires and emotions by ceasing to indulge them;
-
Using
psychotherapy to loosen the ties of fear, anger, desires, depression, etc.
-
Changing
one’s life or environment, permanently or temporarily, or equivalently, doing
nothing at all for a day or so (no striving, no worrying, no planning).
b. The ordinary self is us living in social reality. On the
surface that self is familiar, but deeper levels are murky, difficult to
inspect in conscious awareness. We need to examine the self carefully, e.g. by
asking questions like “Who Am I?” The purpose is to cultivate awareness of the hidden
workings of the ordinary self, which in turn begins to reveal the difference
between the self that lives in social reality and the self that lives in
perceptual reality.
3. Developing compassion,
feelings of loving-kindness, etc. has been shown to assist in quieting the mind
and in loosening attachments associated with emotions (e.g. fears), desires,
etc., sometimes sweeping these away and bringing an experience of awakening as
part of the flow. However, on the basis of existing evidence, it appears that people
lacking in compassion can nevertheless realize awakened consciousness. (Chapter
13)
Therefore, practices recommended
in Buddhist teaching traditions appear to be effective for quieting the mind,
letting go of attachments, and cultivating compassion. While the first two
conditions appear to be necessary for
awakening, compassion appears to be a contributing but not a necessary
condition.
Implication: The fact that many
people, even in the modern Western world, have experienced awakening
demonstrates that the bonds of reification imposed by evolution can be broken (and suggests that the
brain mechanisms responsible for reification are relatively recent and
relatively simple, perhaps an association network analogous to the DMN).
D. Theory: How these preparatory practices act on ordinary awareness
to produce awakened awareness.
In a full experience of
awakening, conscious awareness is almost entirely dominated by perceptual
processing (i.e., inner speech is infrequent). Perceptual recognition of
objects, situations and events still activates corresponding words, phrases,
scripts, and meaning systems, but because social reality has been de-reified,
feelings and emotions associated with the concepts are not activated and do not modify the perceptual image that appears
in awareness. Conceptual processing remains active at unconscious levels,
enough to generate occasional inner speech (as “thinking” or “commenting”).
1. In ordinary consciousness perceptual processing is
modified to better fit social reality; in awakened awareness non-attachment to
(or de-reification of) social reality means that no modification is necessary. Without
modification, awakened awareness directly expresses the contents and structure
of perceptual processing.
2. Awakened awareness differs from ordinary awareness
primarily in terms of structure.
a. Ordinary awareness is structured in terms of social
reality, with time as an underlying dimension along which scripts (for socially
appropriate action) and plans (for using available means to achieve desired
ends) are generated. Scripts and plans therefore extend conscious awareness
through time by representing past and
future as real.
b. Awakened awareness is structured as perceptual systems
present it. Although memories of previous perceptual experience can be brought
into conscious awareness and extrapolations into the future can be imagined, this
is usually brief and conscious awakened awareness remains primarily
concentrated on the present moment. This is encouraged when the mind has become
quiet through practice – without inner speech to express scripts, plans, and stories,
awakened awareness is silent and without a time dimension.
c. Unconscious processing, however, knows about the past
and can project immediate situations into the future by drawing on memories of
previous events, stored as either percepts or concepts. Therefore, unconscious awakened awareness does
extend over time, and can use this capacity to generate appropriate action. Living
with awakened consciousness thus means living consciously in the present
moment, but with faith that unconscious processing will “do the right thing.”
This is made possible through training that quiets the mind and lets go of
attachments to social reality.
Therefore.
Experiencing awakened awareness requires settling into a world of perceptual
reality in which inner speech is mostly silent, both the structure of and
specific attachments to social reality have been de-reified, and unconscious
processing is trusted to take care of action.
Implication. Awakening is experienced as “sudden” because
although gradual preparation is necessary, there comes a point where no gradual
transition is possible. This is true for the transitions between between inner
speech and silence, between reified and de-reified social reality, and between
a self-conscious self and a self that trusts unconscious processing.
E. People describe their experience with awakened awareness
in ways that imply five properties (Chapter 13). How does the theory account for
these properties?
1. Conscious
awareness is silent of inner speech.
Theory: a.
Inner speech is muted when the Default Mode Network is inactive, because
mindfulness involves attentiveness.
b. The perceptual content of conscious awareness is
distinctly more vivid, because when the cognitive load required for conceptual
processing is reduced, perceptual processing is enhanced and conscious
awareness reflects this.
2. No Reification: no
emotional attachments to the structure or contents of social reality, which now
look like scripts for a movie in which we no longer need to be actors.
Theory: The practices summarized in section C.2 as
facilitating “letting go” of attachments have the effect of de-reifying social
reality, thus eliminating all emotional attachments to it. Austin proposes that
certain areas of the thalamus serve as the mechanism for switching “excessive”
emotional attachments off, and thus accomplishing de-reification.
3. No Separation: the
usual feeling of separation from the world around us vanishes; awareness switches
from a perspective of looking out at the world as a separated self (egocentric
orientation) to one of being an integral part of an interdependent and
interconnected system (allocentric orientation).
Theory: Ordinary
awareness structures the self as a responsible actor relating to others in a
social reality of scripts, plans, and stories. When the self of social reality
is de-reified, the self of awakened awareness is structured in terms perceptual
reality. The sense of encapsulation disappears and one’s awareness is of
coexisting as an equal part of one’s environment. Austin has identified neural
systems responsible for ordinary awareness (the egocentric system) and for
awakened awareness (the allocentric system).
5. Not Knowing: action
proceeds directly from unconscious processing.
Theory: Once
de-reification of self and social reality has taken place and inner speech has
been brought under control, conscious awareness is structured by perception and
its contents include only the present moment. Unconscious processing, however, can
draw on perceptual memory and carry out conceptual processing, which allow it to
take these cognitive resources into account in determining appropriate action
for the (next) moment. The trick lies in letting go of self-consciousness, i.e.
attachment to the ordinary self.
NOTE: Examples of unconscious processing competently
determining appropriate action include: skillful skiing or other cases of
“being in the zone” in sports; driving-while-thinking-about-soemthing-else
(where unconscious awareness serves as a monitor that can switch attention back
to the task of driving the car). The
processes implicated in switching between awakened and ordinary consciousness
need to be researched, especially if it is true that slow thinking is not
possible during awakened consciousness.
There is also an brief research design and proposal posted on:
| https://dana.io/realizing-awakened-consciousness Comments or questions can be sent to me at boylemmx@gmail.com |
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