Consciousness without Self

Transcription

1 Consciousness without Self Markus Echterhoff May 13, 2011

2 Contents 1 Motivation 1 2 A short history of (Non-)Dualism 1 3 Mysticism 2 4 Science 5 5 Conclusion 7

3 1 Motivation Who am I? This is without a doubt one of the most fundamental questions mankind has posed and as of now it is still unanswered. The constant feeling of existence separate from an environment, from that which is not oneself, the subject of one s actions and felt object of one s environment. The I, Ego, the private, intentional consciousness and sense of agency - I will henceforth call all of these the Self with a capital S to emphasize its unique position in all the selves as being one s own self: the only truly experiencing self in one s existence. How can we make sense of this Self? The question is closely related to consciousness: I am conscious. I am conscious of something. The Self seems to be that which is conscious. But is this true? Are we not searching for a Homunculus? Can we find an answer to the question of what Self is by treating it as an object of its own experience? Can it experience itself? Another question comes to mind: What could be gained from looking into this? First, through splitting Self from consciousness, the debate of what is consciousness can be reduced as we would know a little more about what it is not: the Self. Second, the possibility of touching a consciousness that transcends Self is of humanitarian interest. With transcendence of Self, emotions such as fear and greed become meaningless. If the experience can be had by an ordinary person, if only for a moment, it would no doubt change that person s view of the world and permanently enhance the quality of life by diminishing egocentric emotions. On a larger scale, when experienced by social groups, it may make them feel a new sense of connectedness and improve solidarity and compassion for all beings. In this essay I wish to explore such experiences as they present themselves in mysticism and science. 2 A short history of (Non-)Dualism The relationship between Self, dualism and subjectivity is one of causality. Because there is an experience of Self that is different from the experience of Other, dualism can be conceptualized. The two parts of dualism, then, are subjectivity and objectivity. They have been idealized into subjectivism and materialism, respectively. The point of view of the former is that the mind gives rise to the world, whereas the latter claims the world to give rise to the mind. In both views, the mind is very different from the physical world, but both views have the same origin in experience. If one were to agree with this alone, then an altered experience of Self would, by consequence, alter one s perception of the relationship between physical reality and the mind and question dualism itself. Without Self, there can be no Other, the whole of existence would be one. Therefore, all intentionality is lost: this consciousness could not be of something. Non-Intentional consciousness in itself is a controversial topic (s.b.). The western world of science has, with the rise of Behaviorism in the midtwentieth century, disregarded subjective accounts as unscientific. Great efforts 1

4 have been made to rule out any subjectivity from psychological experiments. In truly dualistic fashion phenomenology emerged placing strong emphasis on subjective experience. However, a clear dualistic view remains, e.g. Husserl cannot contemplate a non-intentional consciousness (Puligandla, 2000). At the end of the 20th century, scientific interest in human experience arose again and attempts are being made to reconcile subjectivism and objectivism philosophically (eg. Varela et al., 1993). Since then, advances in neuro-imaging (namely Electroencephalography (EEG), Positron Emission Tomography (PET) and functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fmri)) that allow for noninvasive observation of the brain enabled a search for correlates of brain states and experience, making experience tangible for science. In the eastern world mysticism developed into formal descriptions of the workings of the mind (see eg. Bodhi, 2000) and diverse practices have emerged that concentrate on the development of the mind. For the oldest Buddhist instructions I could find, see Thanissaro (2010a). These practices are manifold; they usually involve at some point what is called Samatha or calm abiding meditation to train voluntary control of attention. There are several kinds of techniques (Wallace, 1999) and other meditations that utilize the enhanced concentration to develop traits such as insight (Vipassana) (based on Thanissaro, 2010c)or compassion (loving kindness, Metta) (based on Thanissaro, 2010b). There is dispute as to which traditional practice does it the right way, whether meditations are to be taught separately or as one, but they agree on the possibility of a non-dual experience of the world. Now that western and eastern cultures get closer contact with one another, experiences can be compared and contrasted with studies of the brain. 3 Mysticism Throughout history people reported having experienced a temporary dissolution or transcendence of Self. A break in the ordinary mode of existence. These reports indicate that experience, Qualia, does not rely on an experiencer, that no subject of experience is necessary for consciousness, that there is something it is like to not-be, we could call it empty consciousness. Experiences such as this one are called mystic experiences. The word mystic is often mistaken for magic tricks or astrology. When it comes to mysticism, it is hard to come up with scientific sources to draw upon. This is because in the western world, mysticism has developed away from the mystic experience and has been conceptualized instead. Millions of Christians who believe in God without ever having had a mystic experience of their belief, bear witness to this fact. The west did come up with drugs that alter the state of consciousness and can temporarily dissolve the Self (referred to as Ego-Death, most notably attributed to intake of LSD or DMT), but due to their wide prohibition, again, there is a lack of scientific information surrounding them. Thus, I am left with but one western source for my inquiry of mystic experience that involves a loss of the Self: Varieties of Religious Experiences, by James (1902). 2

5 According to James, a mystic experience is one that bears these four characteristics. 1. Ineffability: It cannot be described or otherwise made clear to another person; it has to be experienced in order to understand it. 2. Noetic Quality: It carries with it the knowledge that what one has experienced is true and it has a lasting impact on the experiencer s view of the world. 3. Transiency: It does not last for a long time. James writes that it lasts up to half an hour, or two hours at most. 4. Passivity: During the actual experience, the experiencer is unable to voluntarily change it. An experience where the Self is dissolved clearly matches these criteria. The experience cannot be conveyed, it is followed by a lasting feeling of deep knowledge, does not last long and since the Self is gone, the sense of agency is gone as well. James (1902) contains several reports which are of direct relevance to a loss of the Self. A quote from Alfred Tennyson: I have never had any revelations through anesthetics, but a kind of waking trance this for lack of a better word I have frequently had, quite up from boyhood, when I have been all alone. This has come upon me through repeating my own name to myself silently, till all at once, as it were out of the intensity of the consciousness of individuality, individuality itself seemed to dissolve and fade away into boundless being, and this not a confused state but the clearest, the surest of the surest, utterly beyond words where death was an almost laughable impossibility the loss of personality (if so it were) seeming no extinction, but the only true life. I am ashamed of my feeble description. Have I not said the state is utterly beyond words? (p.183) Another report, author not named: In that time the consciousness of God s nearness came to me sometimes. I say God, to describe what is indescribable. A presence, I might say, yet that is too suggestive of personality, and the moments of which I speak did not hold the consciousness of a personality, but something in myself made me feel myself a part of something bigger than I, that was controlling. I felt myself one with the grass, the trees, birds, insects, everything in Nature. I exulted in the mere fact of existence, of being a part of it all the drizzling rain, the shadows of the clouds, the tree-trunks, and so on. In the years following, such moments continued to come, but I wanted them 3

6 constantly. I knew so well the satisfaction of losing self in a perception of supreme power and love, that I was unhappy because that perception was not constant. (p.189) A report by Dr. R. M. Bucke: [...] I did not merely come to believe, but I saw that the universe is not composed of dead matter, but is, on the contrary, a living Presence; I became conscious in myself of eternal life. It was not a conviction that I would have eternal life, but a consciousness that I possessed eternal life then; I saw that all men are immortal; that the cosmic order is such that without any peradventure all things work together for the good of each and all; that the foundation principle of the world, of all the worlds, is what we call love, and that the happiness of each and all is in the long run absolutely certain. The vision lasted a few seconds and was gone; but the memory of it and the sense of the reality of what it taught has remained during the quarter of a century which has since elapsed. I knew that what the vision showed was true. I had attained to a point of view from which I saw that it must be true. That view, that conviction, I may say that consciousness, has never, even during periods of the deepest depression, been lost. (p.191) Bucke later conceptualized his experience: Cosmic consciousness in its more striking instances is not simply an expansion or extension of the self-conscious mind with which we are all familiar, but the superaddition of a function as distinct from any possessed by the average man as SELF-consciousness is distinct from any function possessed by one of the higher animals. (p.191) In eastern mystical practices, the concepts are more clear and the experience has been idealized. James quotes Vivekananda (Yoga tradition): [...] the mind itself has a higher state of existence, beyond reason, a superconscious state, and that when the mind gets to that higher state, then this knowledge beyond reasoning comes.... All the different steps in yoga are intended to bring us scientifically to the superconscious state or Samadhi.... Just as unconscious work is beneath consciousness, so there is another work which is above consciousness, and which, also, is not accompanied with the feeling of egoism.... There is no feeling of I, and yet the mind works, desireless, free from restlessness, objectless, bodiless. Then the Truth shines in its full effulgence, and we know ourselves for Samadhi lies potential in us all for what we truly are, free, immortal, omnipotent, loosed from the finite, and its contrasts of good and evil altogether, and identical with the Atman or Universal Soul. (p.192) 4

7 Having such mystical experience is the sole goal of eastern religious practices. It is called Samadhi in Yoga, Enlightenment or Nirvana in Buddhism; it has also been called the Source (Young, 2005). After this experience, practitioners of Buddhist meditation often find themselves having problems integrating it into their life, returning from this extraordinary event to normal day-to-day routine. But when they eventually do, they seem to come to a new, subjectively improved relationship with their ordinary life (Kornfield, 2000). What is to make of such subjective accounts of a consciousness either without Self or with a transcending, universal Self? 4 Science In science, a loss of Self is usually accompanied by a loss of consciousness, e.g. in coma, vegetative state and under general anesthesia one is unconscious. During sleep one is either unconscious or in an altered state of consciousness, often with a diminished Self and except for cases of lucid dreaming, with a total loss of agency. Modern neuro-imaging techniques allow us to take a look at the brain during these states. As depicted in figure 1, blood flow is reduced during all states in the prefrontal cortex, mesiofrontal cortex, posterior parietal cortex and posterior cingulate/precuneus. It can also be seen that sleep clearly differs from the other states in the size of the area exhibiting diminished metabolic activity. In addition, there exist widely synchronized slow waveforms that take the place of the fast and flexible interactions needed for conscious functions [... and...] widely blocked functional connectivity, both corticocortical and thalamocortical (Baars, 2003). These results clearly show the existence of a neural correlate of consciousness and of Self located in the brain. However they neither distinguish between them, nor are they particularly specific about the location or make make any assumptions about the qualities of a correlate, e.g. is it in the location, the communication, specific activation patterns? The hypometabolic areas clearly play a role in the lack of consciousness, but that does not imply that they constitute it. Having demonstrated the existence of a neural correlate of human experience, we can now ask specifically for the correlate of self-related cognition. Identification of one s own face in pictures seems to be processed in the prefrontal cortex, with clear dominance of the right hemisphere for pictures of their on face when compared to pictures of others (Keenan et al., 2000, 2001). Compiling other results (most notably by Markowitsch), the authors conclude that self-processing, including autobiographic memory is performed in the right hemisphere as compared to processing of others and accessing memory about others, which is attributed to the left hemisphere. Csikszentmihalyi (1990) coined the term Flow for the experience of becoming immersed with an activity to the point where one literally loses oneself. This includes work, reading, playing a game, sport, meditation, or watching an intense movie. It seems that one can lose one s sense of self in these situations. What they have in common is that one is concentrated on external stimuli rather than 5

8 Figure 1: Positron Emission Tomography (PET) pictures of unconscious brains. F: prefrontal cortex, MF: mesiofrontal cortex, P: posterior parietal cortex, Pr: posterior cingulate/precuneus. (Baars, 2003) 6

9 engaged in reflective thought. Goldberg et al. (2006) found inhibition of brain areas that are active during introspective activity, during a rapid categorization task, giving credit to the concept of Flow. Due to the growing collaboration between scientists and meditation practitioners, a truly large body of brain imaging studies has been conducted with meditators as participants. Taken together, meditation appears to reflect changes in anterior cingulate cortex and dorsolateral prefrontal areas (Cahn and Polich, 2006). Of special interest to the Self is an increase of gamma activity in the right superior frontal gyrus during a meditation on dissolution of the Self (Lehmann et al., 2001). This area is known to be involved in depersonalization experiences (Cahn and Polich, 2006) and matches data from Keenan et al s and Goldberg et al s research mentioned previously. Inspired by reports of out-of-body experiences (OBE)(e.g. Irwin, 1985), the rubber hand illusion (Botvinick and Cohen, 1998) and research on phantom limbs (e.g. Noë and Hurley, 2003), cognitive neuroscientists started experimenting with the feeling of ownership of the body as a whole. Lenggenhager et al. (2007) placed a camera so that it would record the back of a participant from a distance of two meters. The video was live-streamed to a head-mounted display that presents the video to the participant in 3-D. Essentially the participants would see themselves from behind. By (for greater effect synchronous) stroking of the participant s back, enough information seems to have been generated for the participants to experience themselves two meters behind their bodily selves. From this and similar experiments, the authors conclude that Self can be dissociated from ones body. In a related experiment, Petkova and Ehrsson (2008) created a reportedly convincing illusion of shaking one s own hand from another person s body. These results demonstrate that Self is adaptive and can identify with whatever is agreeable with integrated multi-sensory information. 5 Conclusion It remains unclear whether the subjectivity of mystical experiences, flow states and self-dissolution meditations is comparable. This part will remain unclear as subjectivity cannot, by definition, be objectified. However, there exist neural correlates of experience which can be compared. Neuroscientific research suggests an interplay of diverse regions of the brain to correlate with Self, but it is still a mystery how the brain states correlate with subjective experience as there is no known process of mapping between them. If such a mapping mechanism were to be found, it would not doubt change everything. But can it be found? Or could it be that it is the dualistic way we think about these things that creates an unsolvable problem? As long as there is Self, there is Other and even if we found a correlate of every experience, how would we close the gap between Self and brain? As stated in the motivation and also apparent in the reports from James (1902) and others, experiencing Non-Self can have a positively transforming effect, relieving an experiencer of the human condition. On the other hand, 7

10 living without Self will most likely end in e.g. a car accident (as the driver may feel one with oncoming traffic), but it has been reported possible to switch between experiential modes (Young, 2005). It seems to me that scientists active in the field of consciousness studies should take great interest in eastern practices of developing the mind as it may present them with the tools necessary to close the mind/brain gap. I am looking forward to more fruitful interdisciplinary research and the losening of the Dualistic paradigm that I expect to follow from advances in consciousness studies. Understanding who we are may enable us to become who we want to be. 8

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