Key point. He is not pretending to be a neuroscientist and does not expect others to completely understand Buddhist metaphysics. He wants to encourage the discussion - meeting of these minds for their mutual benefit.
David McGavock's List: Neuro-science - Learning - Perception - Emotion
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Sep 22, 14
"Those two dimensions of attention — locking in on what’s important while ignoring distractions — predicted both how well they would speak at age 2½ as well as their phonological awareness at age 5.
Parents direct their babies’ attention to what’s important with lots of warm, loving, face-to-face talk using that kind of singsong voice that dips and rises and stretches out vowel sounds.
And parents strengthen those connections as their children grow by reading aloud to them, asking open-ended questions, and practicing serve-and-return conversations that build vocabulary and basic knowledge about the world around them.
Children who have even one adult spending time with them like that can form those connections, regardless of family wealth and education, Kuhl said."-
she has found, in work that is not yet published, that the ability of 6-month-olds to tune in to the sounds of their native language — like the subtle difference between “pat” and “bat” — predicts a skill at age 5 that corresponds strongly with reading success.
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Mar 02, 14
"My objective in this website has been to bring together salient features of these assorted interpretations by science experts into a synthesis of my own understanding of consciousness. I consider these statements and interpretations to be a framework on which to build a fuller understanding as further data, concepts and insights develop from ongoing research."
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During the past 20 years or so, biological sciences have advanced to the point that scientists have begun researching biological mechanisms of brain function and suggesting some reasonably well-founded hypotheses for consciousness. Leading the way in these pioneering efforts, in my judgment, have been:
Gerald Edelman with his hypothesis of the Dynamic Core,
Antonio Damasio with his concepts of Protoself, Core Self, Autobiographical Self, Core Consciousness and Extended Consciousness,
Joseph LeDoux and his emphasis on the intricacies of synapses and the emotional brain,
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Rudolfo Llinás and his researches into ~40 Hz oscillations and synchronization,
György Buzsáki with his discussion and exploration of neural mechanisms related to oscillation and synchronization in the neocortex and hippocampus for perception and memory,
Joaquín Fuster, the world’s preeminent expert on the frontal lobes, and his concept of the "perception-action cycle,"
Susan Greenfield's notion of "neuronal gestalts" as a way of conceptualizing a highly variable aggregation of neurons that is temporarily recruited around a triggering epicenter. I use the neuronal gestalts idea in my way of visualizing the functionality of the dynamic core of the thalamocortical system,
Eric Kandel who has explored short-term and long-term memory,
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Feb 10, 14
"The goal here is not to prove Buddhism right or wrong - or even to bring people to Buddhism - but rather to take these methods out of the traditional context, study their potential benefits, and share the findings with anyone who might find them helpful."
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It is our discussions of neuroscience, however, that have proved particularly important. From these exchanges a vigorous research initiative has emerged, a collaboration between monks and neuroscientists, to explore how meditation might alter brain function.
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The goal here is not to prove Buddhism right or wrong - or even to bring people to Buddhism - but rather to take these methods out of the traditional context, study their potential benefits, and share the findings with anyone who might find them helpful.
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The effect of meditation on the brain becomes more exciting if you can first show that meditation has clinical benefits. Does it really make people happier? Perhaps, but clinical trials have so far produced mixed results.
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From what I've read the findings are not mixed. Perhaps this is old news.
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None of this is grounds for outrage. It's all to the good if the Dalai Lama's publicity tour invigorates a minor field, or if the hubbub surrounding his speech inspires more skeptical research into a promising alternative therapy.
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Feb 10, 14
The similarities between Buddhism and neuroscience that the Dalai Lama sees, however, extend beyond methodology. Practitioners of both disciplines—whether they're monks or psychiatrists—aim to replace sad feelings with happy ones. In this regard, he says, Buddhist inquiry has advanced far beyond Western mind science. Over a hundred generations, monks have used meditation as way of controlling their bad emotions. If neuroscientists really want to reduce suffering, they should study the effects of meditation on the brain and test it as a clinical tool.
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Lama-haters argued that a scientific society shouldn't play host to a religious figure who believes in reincarnation and hints at hidden causality in the history of life. The Dalai Lama's speech, they warned, could cause "significant divisions among SFN members."
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According to the Dalai Lama, a good Buddhist should embrace clear-cut scientific evidence; if a religious dictum is proven wrong, it must be amended. Monks, like scientists, study the world through investigation and experience and revise their beliefs to accommodate what they find.
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Jul 12, 11
Theory of mind is the ability to attribute mental states-beliefs, intents, desires, pretending, knowledge, etc.-to oneself and others and to understand that others have beliefs, desires and intentions that are different from one's own.[1] Though there are philosophical approaches to issues raised in such discussions, theory of mind as such is distinct from the philosophy of mind.
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The presumption that others have a mind is termed a theory of mind because each human can only intuit the existence of his or her own mind through introspection, and no one has direct access to the mind of another.
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The presumption that others have a mind is termed a theory of mind because each human can only intuit the existence of his/her own mind through introspection, and no one has direct access to the mind of another.
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Feb 06, 14
According to the synaptic homeostasis hypothesis, brain plasticity mostly takes place when we're awake and taking in new information from the environment. Functionally important information that's relevant to our daily function and survival prompts brain changes that lead to an overall increase in the strength and number of neural connections (synapses) in the brain as a whole.
But this increase cannot be sustained forever because higher synaptic strength requires lots of energy, cellular resources, and space. So the system becomes inefficient and signalling between neurons becomes more erratic, reducing the capacity for learning and memory.
This is where sleep comes in – it puts the brain into an "offline" state during which the synaptic strength accumulated during wakefulness can be surveyed through spontaneous electrical activity. And it ensures the process is uninterrupted by the external environment. -
Feb 06, 14
in order to experience a sacred moment, the moment needs to be imbued by the individual with these sacred qualities. Although extraordinary mystical experiences could also be considered sacred moments, the focus of this research was on those more ordinary day-to-day experiences.
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A large body of theory has described a broad spectrum of experiences that may or may not be considered a sacred moment. The key aspect of a sacred moment, as defined and described in the study that I did, is that it is a moment in time that is imbued with sacred qualities. What are sacred qualities? Good question. For the purposes of this study, sacred qualities were defined as having two components: (a) they inherently possess spiritual qualities as defined by Lynn Underwood and the World Health Organization, such as gratefulness, feeling of connection with and support from the transcendent, sweet- sadness, awe, compassion, and/or a deep sense of inner peace, and (b) they are imbued with descriptive qualities such as precious, dear, blessed, cherished, and/or holy.
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for the purposes of this study, sacred moments are defined as day-to-day personal moments that are imbued with sacred qualities, which seem like time-outs from daily busy-ness, where a sense of stillness arises or occurs and where concerns of the every day just seem to evaporate.
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Feb 04, 14
The brain does not simply gather and stockpile information as a computer's hard drive does. Facts are stored first in the hippocampus, a structure deep in the brain about the size and shape of a fat man's curled pinkie finger. But the information does not rest there. Every time we recall it, our brain writes it down again, and during this re-storage, it is also reprocessed. In time, the fact is gradually transferred to the cerebral cortex and is separated from the context in which it was originally learned. For example, you know that the capital of California is Sacramento, but you probably don't remember how you learned it.
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In today's New York Times, I have an editorial on the brain science of why people form false beliefs, co-written with my co-author, Sandra Aamodt
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I know many readers of Daily Kos are like me and want to see the supporting literature. So we thought we'd provide the text here, complete with embedded links to key papers.
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Feb 04, 14
How can neuroscience-based innovation enhance behavioral and brain health? This was the question asked at the SharpBrains Virtual Summit, which brought together 170 participants from 19 countries.
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How can neuroscience-based innovation enhance behavioral and brain health? This was the question asked at the SharpBrains Virtual Summit, which brought together 170 participants from 19 countries.
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There is no specific prescription that works across the board for brain fitness. Instead, experts talk about the following "pillars."
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Jan 28, 14
What cognitive science has taught us is that children do differ in their abilities with different modalities, but teaching the child in his best modality doesn't affect his educational achievement. What does matter is whether the child is taught in the content's best modality. All students learn more when content drives the choice of modality.
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What cognitive science has taught us is that children do differ in their abilities with different modalities, but teaching the child in his best modality doesn't affect his educational achievement.
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What does matter is whether the child is taught in the content's best modality. All students learn more when content drives the choice of modality
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Jan 28, 14
“We don’t understand, as a field, how aversive and attractive odors are differentially processed … but identifying the receptor gives us a handle on the neural circuits that are involved. Now that we have the receptor, we can ask basic questions about aversion and attraction circuitry in general.
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The question of why some animals are repelled and others attracted to a particular scent, scientists say, gets at one of the most basic and poorly understood mysteries in neuroscience: How does the brain encode likes and dislikes?
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What does it mean that something is an aversive or attractive odor? How are likes and dislikes encoded in the brain? Understanding the receptors that respond to those cues could give us a powerful inroad to understanding that.”
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Jan 28, 14
In short, you are more likely to get a stress response-more likely to subjectively feel stressed, more likely to get a stress-related disease-if you feel like you have no outlets for what's going on, no control, no predictability, you interpret things as getting worse, and if you have nobody's shoulder to cry on.
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In this excerpt from his talk, the best-selling author and Stanford University professor explains the difference between bad stress and good stress, and how we can manage the effects of chronic stress on our lives.
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Indeed, when you look at the diseases that do us in, they are predominantly diseases that can be caused, or made worse, by stress
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Jan 21, 14
"The free arts, among which Louth included reading as well as meditation, contemplation, and prayer, are those characterized, in one way or another, by “the search for knowledge for its own sake.” "
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Psychologists and neurobiologists have begun studying what goes on in our minds as we read literature, and what they’re discovering lends scientific weight to Emerson’s observation.
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” A work of literature, particularly narrative literature, takes hold of the brain in curious and powerful ways.
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Jan 17, 14
"The human brain is a unique structure that boasts a complex three-dimensional architecture. Neuroscientists are only beginning to understand how the different parts of this intricate configuration work together to produce behavior. In the numerous neuroimaging studies that are published weekly, researchers use common neuroanatomical terms to denote location, organization, and, at times, implied function."
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Though a complete discussion of neuroanatomy is worthy of a thick textbook full of elaborate illustrations, common terminology used in neuroscientific research is highlighted below.
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Dec 17, 13
"We examined the neural basis of self-regulation in individuals from a cohort of preschoolers who performed the delay-of-gratification task 4 decades ago. Nearly 60 individuals, now in their mid-forties, were tested on “hot” and “cool” versions of a go/nogo task to assess whether delay of gratification in childhood predicts impulse control abilities and sensitivity to alluring cues (happy faces). Individuals who were less able to delay gratification in preschool and consistently showed low self-control abilities in their twenties and thirties performed more poorly than did high delayers when having to suppress a response to a happy face but not to a neutral or fearful face. This finding suggests that sensitivity to environmental hot cues plays a significant role in individuals’ ability to suppress actions toward such stimuli. A subset of these participants (n = 26) underwent functional imaging for the first time to test for biased recruitment of frontostriatal circuitry when required to suppress responses to alluring cues. Whereas the prefrontal cortex differentiated between nogo and go trials to a greater extent in high delayers, the ventral striatum showed exaggerated recruitment in low delayers. Thus, resistance to temptation as measured originally by the delay-of-gratification task is a relatively stable individual difference that predicts reliable biases in frontostriatal circuitries that integrate motivational and control processes."
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This finding suggests that sensitivity to environmental hot cues plays a significant role in individuals’ ability to suppress actions toward such stimuli.
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Whereas the prefrontal cortex differentiated between nogo and go trials to a greater extent in high delayers, the ventral striatum showed exaggerated recruitment in low delayers.
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Oct 30, 13
Good overview of some research in neuroscience. No new news but useful summary.
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Why are some people at ease around others
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The answer lies in the mentalising system – a way of processing the signals we receive from other people, and our status in relation to them, which is entirely separate from more formal learning systems for taking on board facts and figures.
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Theory of mind
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Jun 21, 13
"It's a pattern as old as time. Somebody makes an important scientific breakthrough, which explains a piece of the world. But then people get caught up in the excitement of this breakthrough and try to use it to explain everything."
Good to read and raise your radar. Simplistic arguments for a complex topic. He offers 2 alternative views. What's that about?-
This is what’s happening right now with neuroscience.
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you get captivated by it and sometimes go off to extremes, as if understanding the brain is the solution to understanding all thought and behavior.
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The discussions during Mind and Life XVIII primarily focus on the subjective phenomenology, information-processing operations, and neural mechanisms of attention, memory and conscious awareness from both scientific and Buddhist perspectives.
Venue: His Holiness's Residence, Dharamsala, India
Date: 6-10 April 2009
Duration: 9 sessions (each approx. 2 hours)
Languages: English, Tibetan
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The ideas arising from the study of neuroscience have helped promote our understanding (dialogue) within other fields; social and personal psychology, consciousness, religion, meditation, learning and perception. Knowing about knowing and learning how we learn are useful, perhaps essential to our ...
Updated on May 26, 15
Created on Dec 14, 09
Category: Cultures & Community
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