I’m not sure what cognitive artifacts you have in mind. “Enlightenment” is not any particular mental state. It has no particular qualities. In many ways it’s quite mundane. Just everyday life, minus some unhelpful kinds of cognition. No special relation to near death experiences that I can see, if that’s what you meant.
On the other hand, If what you meant is that near death experiences tend to play out in a certain pattern, which is like what I’m claiming about the regularity of meditation experiences, that’s an interesting comparison. I’d say it indicates that both phenomena have a strong biological basis (independent of culture) that is worth investigating. The biggest difference that I can see is that near-death experiences play out over a short period of time, whereas the progression of meditation experiences can unfold over days or weeks or more, with lots of everyday non-meditation experiences interspersed between them. (Described in Part 2)
Agree that “cultural differences” needs to be defined carefully so as not to make the hypothesis untestable.
Being completely honest about your thoughts is great advice for anyone. Meditation is really a different sort of exercise. Honesty happens anew in each moment in which there is something to be honest about. Meditation is something you do for awhile, and eventually, something that you can forget about.
near death experiences tend to play out in a certain pattern, which is like what I’m claiming about the regularity of meditation experiences
Yes, that’s all I meant. NDE accounts are claimed to be similar to each other by those advocating that they reflect some supernatural reality. I didn’t realize the ambiguity in what I wrote; I meant artifacts as in distortions inherent in the mechanism). I tend to explain any ‘universality of descriptions of subjective experience’ at least partially with ‘there may be something about the way our brains work that causes that’. Since you haven’t claimed meditation is about anything other than thinking/feeling in ordinary ways, I’m not making any other point.
Honesty without limit is ridiculous, of course (unless it really is the predominant terminal value). I was thinking, specifically, of noticing when something would be painful to admit, and then experimenting provisionally with admitting it. Usually it’s a relief.
Honesty without limit is unhelpful, but in many contexts, the value of honesty at the margin tends to be high, which is why I’d say it’s great advice.
Are there times where there is something that would be painful to admit, but you don’t realize until later that it was weighing on you? I wonder whether you would find doing an active search for such things beneficial (in the right social contexts).
Are there times where there is something that would be painful to admit, but you don’t realize until later that it was weighing on you?
Yes, of course. Sometimes I’m too focused to notice in the moment.
Focus (actually trying to perform well at a given task) has its advantages. Maybe it’s possible to train (or cue with some external trick) brief moments of global or introspective thinking, but quickly returning to the flow if adjustment isn’t needed. Probably there’s both a trade-off and a happy medium.
I haven’t tried it much in real time; mostly post-mortem. I guess I could experiment with low-stakes cases (nearly anything with strangers in the city).
I’m not sure what cognitive artifacts you have in mind. “Enlightenment” is not any particular mental state. It has no particular qualities. In many ways it’s quite mundane. Just everyday life, minus some unhelpful kinds of cognition. No special relation to near death experiences that I can see, if that’s what you meant.
On the other hand, If what you meant is that near death experiences tend to play out in a certain pattern, which is like what I’m claiming about the regularity of meditation experiences, that’s an interesting comparison. I’d say it indicates that both phenomena have a strong biological basis (independent of culture) that is worth investigating. The biggest difference that I can see is that near-death experiences play out over a short period of time, whereas the progression of meditation experiences can unfold over days or weeks or more, with lots of everyday non-meditation experiences interspersed between them. (Described in Part 2)
Agree that “cultural differences” needs to be defined carefully so as not to make the hypothesis untestable.
Being completely honest about your thoughts is great advice for anyone. Meditation is really a different sort of exercise. Honesty happens anew in each moment in which there is something to be honest about. Meditation is something you do for awhile, and eventually, something that you can forget about.
Yes, that’s all I meant. NDE accounts are claimed to be similar to each other by those advocating that they reflect some supernatural reality. I didn’t realize the ambiguity in what I wrote; I meant artifacts as in distortions inherent in the mechanism). I tend to explain any ‘universality of descriptions of subjective experience’ at least partially with ‘there may be something about the way our brains work that causes that’. Since you haven’t claimed meditation is about anything other than thinking/feeling in ordinary ways, I’m not making any other point.
Honesty without limit is ridiculous, of course (unless it really is the predominant terminal value). I was thinking, specifically, of noticing when something would be painful to admit, and then experimenting provisionally with admitting it. Usually it’s a relief.
Honesty without limit is unhelpful, but in many contexts, the value of honesty at the margin tends to be high, which is why I’d say it’s great advice.
Are there times where there is something that would be painful to admit, but you don’t realize until later that it was weighing on you? I wonder whether you would find doing an active search for such things beneficial (in the right social contexts).
Yes, of course. Sometimes I’m too focused to notice in the moment.
Focus (actually trying to perform well at a given task) has its advantages. Maybe it’s possible to train (or cue with some external trick) brief moments of global or introspective thinking, but quickly returning to the flow if adjustment isn’t needed. Probably there’s both a trade-off and a happy medium.
I haven’t tried it much in real time; mostly post-mortem. I guess I could experiment with low-stakes cases (nearly anything with strangers in the city).