Ebook: Beyond the self: conversations between Buddhism and neuroscience

"Buddhism shares with science the task of examining the mind empirically; it has pursued, for two millennia, direct investigation of the mind through penetrating introspection. Neuroscience, on the other hand, relies on third-person knowledge in the form of scientific observation. In this book, Matthieu Ricard, a Buddhist monk trained as a molecular biologist, and Wolf Singer, a distinguished neuroscientist--close friends, continuing an ongoing dialogue--offer their perspectives on the mind, the self, consciousness, the unconscious, free will, epistemology, meditation, and neuroplasticity. Ricard and Singer's wide-ranging conversation stages an enlightening and engaging encounter between Buddhism's wealth of experiential findings and neuroscience's abundance of experimental results. They discuss, among many other things, the difference between rumination and meditation (rumination is the scourge of meditation, but psychotherapy depends on it); the distinction between pure awareness and its contents; the Buddhist idea (or lack of one) of the unconscious and neuroscience's precise criteria for conscious and unconscious processes; and the commonalities between cognitive behavioral therapy and meditation. Their views diverge (Ricard asserts that the third-person approach will never encounter consciousness as a primary experience) and converge (Singer points out that the neuroscientific understanding of perception as reconstruction is very like the Buddhist all-discriminating wisdom) but both keep their vision trained on understanding fundamental aspects of human life." -- Publisher's description;Meditation and the brain. A science of mind ; Awareness and mental constructs ; Working with emotions ; Gradual and lasting changes ; Outer and inner enrichment ; Processing of neuronal changes ; Emotional nuances ; Effortless skills ; Relating to the world ; How young can one start to meditate? ; Mental distortions ; Attention and cognitive control ; Attentional blink ; Attention, rumination, and open presence ; Mindfulness and distraction ; Consolidating learning through sleep ; Compassion and action ; Compassion, meditation, and brain coherence ; Altruism and well-being ; Magic moments ; Could feedback replace mind training? ; Are There Limits to Mind Training? ; Meditation and Action -- Dealing with Subconscious Processes and Emotions. On the Nature of the Unconscious ; Side Effects of Meditation ; Love versus Attachment ; On the joy of Inner Peace ; Watching the Mind, Training the Mind -- How Do We Know What We Know? What Reality Do We Perceive? ; How Do We Acquire Knowledge? ; Can There Be Valid Cognition of Some Aspects of Knowledge? ; Is Cognitive Delusion Inescapable? ; Each Person to His or Her Own Reality ; Is There an Objective Reality "Out There"? ; Causality as a Correlate of Interdependence ; Constructing and Deconstructing Reality ; Refining the Tools of Introspection ; First-, Second-, and Third-Person Experience ; A Physician and a Cure ; The Ethics of Practice and Science ; Three Aspects of Buddhist Philosophy ; A Summary -- Investigating the Self. Investigating the Self ; The Self Exists in a Conventional Way ; The Self and Freedom ; Weak Self, Strong Mind ; Ego and Egolessness ; The Scourge of Rumination ; Who's in Charge Here? -- Free Will, Responsibility, and Justice. The Process of Decision Making ; The Responsibility to Change ; Free Will and the Range of Choices ; Attenuating Circumstances ; Looking with the Eyes of a Doctor ; True Rehabilitation ; Horrendous Deviations ; Breaking the Cycle of Hate ; Is There a Self That Bears the Responsibility? ; Can One Prove Free Will? ; Architects of the Future -- The Nature of Consciousness. Something Rather Than Nothing ; Cultivating States of Subtle Consciousness or Pure Awareness ; On Various Levels of Consciousness ; Puzzling Experiences ; Remembering Past Lives? ; What Can Be Learned From Near-Death Experiences? ; Could Consciousness Be Made of Something Other Than Matter? -- A Concluding Note of Gratitude.