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Insight and Wisdom

RE: What actually happens in the brain at Stream Entry?

Basically my question is in the title. This momentary blip...clearly there is some fundamental rewiring in the brain, but what exactly is it, in a neurological sense? Would outsiders have reason to consider it a form of brain damage or self induced retardation? 

RE: What actually happens in the brain at Stream Entry?
Answer
5/26/14 11:23 PM as a reply to Jason Snyder.
Ha!

I don't know that anyone knows. I could speculate, but it would be pure pseudoscience, something I generally dislike.

I don't know how you would measure it, and even if you were, say, wired to an EEG when it happened or in an fMRI, I still doubt that would tell you much.

I don't think we have the technology at this point to sort it out. Current brain imaging is like trying to learn about human psychology by satellite, like trying to study the workings of a computer with a hand-held magnifying glass and volt-meter.

As to dain bramage, etc. It generally enhances function rather than diminishing it, but that is funny.

RE: What actually happens in the brain at Stream Entry?
Answer
5/26/14 11:50 PM as a reply to Jason Snyder.
Check out the book "Zen and the Brain". It's a classic.

RE: What actually happens in the brain at Stream Entry?
Answer
5/26/14 11:55 PM as a reply to Jason Snyder.
Jason Snyder:
Basically my question is in the title. This momentary blip...clearly there is some fundamental rewiring in the brain, but what exactly is it, in a neurological sense? Would outsiders have reason to consider it a form of brain damage or self induced retardation? 

This study was always kind of interesting:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1361002/

As far as I know no one has recorded a path moment with scientific tools. 

As to what happens I only have speculations, viewing the brain in a holistic sense, one could speculate that consciousness resembles nature , as electrons jump from one energy level to another, so too would consciousness jump from one consciousness level to another.  And, this hypothesis would stand to reason why one wouldn't "fall" back from the stream entered point.

Brain damage or brain change?  Neuroplasticity, yes.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neuroplasticity 

Happy Memorial Day!

Psi

RE: What actually happens in the brain at Stream Entry?
Answer
5/27/14 12:33 AM as a reply to Daniel M. Ingram.
Daniel M. Ingram:
I don't know that anyone knows. I could speculate, but it would be pure pseudoscience, something I generally dislike.

From a actual neurological brain rewiring theory I really don't know if anyone really understands the brain enough to tell you exactly how most of anything real happens for sure....there are theories but I don't know how much of it is really outside destructive inference(we know the results of breaking parts of it) but how much do we know about the operation of a single thought?
Now speculating from a psychological point of view I find quite comfortable since most of psychology is pseudoscience. (or soft science if you prefer)
Here is my speculation - There are multiple selfing processes running in the sub/pre-conscious that add up to a cohesive impression of a self. Any information that gets to the threshold that it pops up to the conscious level has these extra selfing layers added to it. These selfing processes are attached to the defensive center of the brain like the Fight or Flight center. From wiki-"This response is recognized as the first stage of a general adaptation syndrome that regulates stress responses among vertebrates and other organisms." Therefore stress is part and parcel to the selfing processes.
So when stream entry is achieved what happens is that one of the selfing processes shuts down permanently, the sense of self related to this goes away and the stress caused by it is gone. You experience for the first time what it is like to perceive reality without that extra layer and this also tends to free up the brains overall running load to it's benefit. The exact selfing process that shuts down at stream entry seems to me to be the process of possessiveness of the five senses.
This is of course a no-self model and uses terminology outside the Buddhist tradition.
Read the book "The Ego Tunnel" to get a firm grasp of the layers that make up this "illusionary" self. It goes into psychology and neuroscience of this concept and is written by an analytical philosopher. I enjoyed it immensely and it confirmed my concepts to me.
Good luck,
~D

RE: What actually happens in the brain at Stream Entry?
Answer
5/27/14 12:47 AM as a reply to Dream Walker.
Here is a diagram I've been working on.  Still working on it  It is a continuation of my earlier work.

RE: What actually happens in the brain at Stream Entry?
Answer
5/27/14 12:55 AM as a reply to Jason Snyder.
Jason Snyder:
Would outsiders have reason to consider it a form of brain damage or self induced retardation? 
I look at it in the same category as overcoming an extreme phobia...the phobia of letting go of  what you consider as self. As well as overcoming an extreme addition to seeing reality with a self. Those who have done so seem to like it a lot and recommend it highly. Those with the phobia and addiction might tell you something completely different.
~D

RE: What actually happens in the brain at Stream Entry?
Answer
5/27/14 1:29 AM as a reply to Jason Snyder.
Here is another interesting take on what happens from Shinzen Young. Take a look at pages 40 - 45. http://www.shinzen.org/Articles/WhatIsMindfulness_SY_Public.pdf
Sorry if this is getting too far off track from your initial questions.
~D

RE: What actually happens in the brain at Stream Entry?
Answer
5/27/14 2:41 AM as a reply to Jason Snyder.
Can I ask why you want to know? Are you worried about giving yourself brain damage?

DI, I don't see a great harm in speculating on an internet forum (if you don't mind being wrong about stuff?)...I wouldn't call that pseudoscience, just speculation, which could vary on a continuum of scientific informedness. I think we know enough to make some rough speculations. So, for example, if your path moment was followed by feelings of bliss, it would seem likely that you triggered the release of a bunch of neurotransmitters (e.g. dopamine, opiods) into your brain. 

My current speculation is that if the "blip" part of it - a cesssation - involves a loss of consciousness, then it might have some similarity to absence seizures seen in epilepsy. And I think deliberately inducing a temporary loss of consciousness may be harmful (i.e. be neurotoxic). While everyone's experience is different, I have heard reports from some that the "dark night" following stream entry was worse than what became before, so potentially any gain in functioning also has to be weighed in with potentially destabilising effects.  

It might be an easier question to answer if we had a better understanding of what a path moment is - and if "Stream Entry" described a class of experiences that have a similar neurological underpinning. My speculation now is that people use the term Stream Entry to describe a variety of experiences which might actually be quite different at the brain level. 

DW, Most of psychology is psuedoscience? A bit harsh! We actually do know quite a bit about the brain works, particularly in the case where we have good animal models - in visual cognitive neuroscience for example. 

So not being a stream enterer, I am just spitballing, but my way of thinking about it is like seeing an optical illusion - there is a point where you don't see the old woman, but then when you see it, you can't help but see it - so you have altered your perception permanently in seeing something in a new light. "Shutting down" a selfing process entirely seems a little extreme - rather than shutting it down, you spend more time seeing the old woman and gain increased power into downregulating the seeing of the girl. 



RE: What actually happens in the brain at Stream Entry?
Answer
5/27/14 7:07 AM as a reply to Jason Snyder.
dharma wheel starts to run or paddle after the stream entry. Dharma is reality in other words.
So you will start to become randomly aware during the day. (ups offtopic)

RE: What actually happens in the brain at Stream Entry?
Answer
5/27/14 8:45 PM as a reply to Dream Walker.
Dream Walker:
Here is a diagram I've been working on.  Still working on it  It is a continuation of my earlier work.

Interesting diagram. I guess the question I am struggling with is, why did we evolve the selfing process in the first place, and what are we giving up (unintented consequences) by willfully deactivating it. Is it that at an earlier stage of evolution (biological or social) it was a much more critical function then it is in todays world, and so now it just gets in the way?

RE: What actually happens in the brain at Stream Entry?
Answer
5/27/14 8:51 PM as a reply to sawfoot _.
sawfoot _:
Can I ask why you want to know? Are you worried about giving yourself brain damage?

DI, I don't see a great harm in speculating on an internet forum (if you don't mind being wrong about stuff?)...I wouldn't call that pseudoscience, just speculation, which could vary on a continuum of scientific informedness. I think we know enough to make some rough speculations. So, for example, if your path moment was followed by feelings of bliss, it would seem likely that you triggered the release of a bunch of neurotransmitters (e.g. dopamine, opiods) into your brain. 

My current speculation is that if the "blip" part of it - a cesssation - involves a loss of consciousness, then it might have some similarity to absence seizures seen in epilepsy. And I think deliberately inducing a temporary loss of consciousness may be harmful (i.e. be neurotoxic). While everyone's experience is different, I have heard reports from some that the "dark night" following stream entry was worse than what became before, so potentially any gain in functioning also has to be weighed in with potentially destabilising effects.  

It might be an easier question to answer if we had a better understanding of what a path moment is - and if "Stream Entry" described a class of experiences that have a similar neurological underpinning. My speculation now is that people use the term Stream Entry to describe a variety of experiences which might actually be quite different at the brain level. 

DW, Most of psychology is psuedoscience? A bit harsh! We actually do know quite a bit about the brain works, particularly in the case where we have good animal models - in visual cognitive neuroscience for example. 

So not being a stream enterer, I am just spitballing, but my way of thinking about it is like seeing an optical illusion - there is a point where you don't see the old woman, but then when you see it, you can't help but see it - so you have altered your perception permanently in seeing something in a new light. "Shutting down" a selfing process entirely seems a little extreme - rather than shutting it down, you spend more time seeing the old woman and gain increased power into downregulating the seeing of the girl. 


Yes I am a little bit worried about brain damage, although not worried enough to stop from doing it anyway...the thought of continuing life via normal consciousnesss is unsatisfactory. I diagnose myself to be in Equanimity stage and feel like I am close to Stream Entry. There is the fear that I will lose something that I can't get back, and it will be detrimental in the long run. I know this fear is probably irrational, a lot of it comes from fear of letting go of control, and so is just ego. 

RE: What actually happens in the brain at Stream Entry?
Answer
5/27/14 8:53 PM as a reply to Dream Walker.
Dream Walker, thanks for the book recommendation, I just ordered it. 

RE: What actually happens in the brain at Stream Entry?
Answer
5/28/14 12:28 AM as a reply to sawfoot _.
Alright, pure speculation, just so everyone know this is totally made up on the fly and not science at all:

There are various awareness centers in the brain, and when we wire the most conscious of them to brain area after brain area as they tour through during the stages of insight, which, during their progress bring up issue after issue corresponding to brain center after brain center, pathway after pathway, process after process, eventually we have wired them all sufficiently to this awareness center, and this has some sort of synchronizing effect, such that when the attentional centers all synchronize for one great burst of 3-4 pulses of total mental synchrony, as occurs in Conformity knowledge and the few pulses afterwards, this causes the brain centers all to converge totally and without remainder on the end of that last pulse and take themselves all the way down to whatever happens between the frames, typically referred to as Nibbana in the Abhidhamma,  and these synchronized centers converge on that, and in that convergence somehow something shifts, a switch is thrown, and a new set of pathways come on line, such that the benefits of stream entry are switched on.

Daniel

RE: What actually happens in the brain at Stream Entry?
Answer
5/28/14 6:24 AM as a reply to Daniel M. Ingram.
few months ago I had similar idea, though its main thing was not fruition but generally various consciousnesses generated by various pulse times at the same time. They are generated probably by different brain centers so our ideas might be compatible.

The thing with pulse rates which generate brain waves is that they can change their frequency and be with different phase to each other. Fruition here might be having faster consciousness be exactly 3-4 times as short cycle time (or as high frequency) and the same phase so they would exact exactly at the same time. Insight stages that come one after another here would be whatever made this possible which is syncing up to other pulses(conformity) then first beat truly together (change of lineage), whole cycle made together in sync (knowledge of the path - which signify what have to be done by enlightened person all the time) and then end exactly at the same time which is fruition.

goal here would be to operate with that synchronized configuration as often as possible with as least ruckus as possible. Mind should be in this loop all the time and instead of trying to find 'itself' to check own state which is what constitute fruition afterglow it should default to practicing 8-fold-path no matter what. Obviously at that time mind is not yet concerned at such things and because of that dukkha does not leave it until mind learns its lesson and live by... no, until it IS 8-fold-path itself =)

RE: What actually happens in the brain at Stream Entry?
Answer
5/28/14 1:11 PM as a reply to Jason Snyder.
Jason Snyder:
Dream Walker:
Here is a diagram I've been working on.  Still working on it  It is a continuation of my earlier work.

Interesting diagram. I guess the question I am struggling with is, why did we evolve the selfing process in the first place, and what are we giving up (unintented consequences) by willfully deactivating it. Is it that at an earlier stage of evolution (biological or social) it was a much more critical function then it is in todays world, and so now it just gets in the way?

Remember, traits (like the selfing process, or a physical trait) don't have intrinsic 'survival value'. They only facilitate or inhibit reproduction depending on circumstances. So it's fallacious to assume that all traits that current organisms have now, once had survival value. I'm sure many traits we have we have survived despite having. So it's totally possible that the 'selfing' process is just something a brain of sufficient complexity-- or perhaps any brain at all-- generates for technical reasons having to do with reflexivity in neural nets in general but that the selfing process adds nothing to survival value, it's just there because that's how brains tend to work until they become sufficiently complex to debug themselves.

RE: What actually happens in the brain at Stream Entry?
Answer
5/28/14 1:19 PM as a reply to . Jake ..
. Jake .:

Remember, traits (like the selfing process, or a physical trait) don't have intrinsic 'survival value'. They only facilitate or inhibit reproduction depending on circumstances. So it's fallacious to assume that all traits that current organisms have now, once had survival value. I'm sure many traits we have we have survived despite having. So it's totally possible that the 'selfing' process is just something a brain of sufficient complexity-- or perhaps any brain at all-- generates for technical reasons having to do with reflexivity in neural nets in general but that the selfing process adds nothing to survival value, it's just there because that's how brains tend to work until they become sufficiently complex to debug themselves.

Discussed in "The Ego Tunnel" THE EVOLUTION PROBLEM: COULDN’T ALL OF THIS HAVE HAPPENED IN THE DARK?
"First, let’s not forget that evolution is driven by chance, does not pursue a goal, and achieved what we now consider the continuous optimization of nervous systems in a blind process of hereditary variation and selection. It is incorrect to assume that evolution had to invent consciousness—in principle it could have been a useless by-product. No necessity was involved. Not everything is an adaptation, and even adaptations are not optimally designed, because natural selection can act only on what is already there. Other routes and solutions were and remain possible. Nevertheless, a lot of what happened in our brains and in those of our ancestors clearly was adaptive and had survival value."
Chock full o good stuff...
~D

RE: What actually happens in the brain at Stream Entry?
Answer
5/28/14 1:46 PM as a reply to Daniel M. Ingram.
Daniel M. Ingram:
Alright, pure speculation, just so everyone know this is totally made up on the fly and not science at all:

There are various awareness centers in the brain, and when we wire the most conscious of them to brain area after brain area as they tour through during the stages of insight, which, during their progress bring up issue after issue corresponding to brain center after brain center, pathway after pathway, process after process, eventually we have wired them all sufficiently to this awareness center, and this has some sort of synchronizing effect, such that when the attentional centers all synchronize for one great burst of 3-4 pulses of total mental synchrony, as occurs in Conformity knowledge and the few pulses afterwards, this causes the brain centers all to converge totally and without remainder on the end of that last pulse and take themselves all the way down to whatever happens between the frames, typically referred to as Nibbana in the Abhidhamma,  and these synchronized centers converge on that, and in that convergence somehow something shifts, a switch is thrown, and a new set of pathways come on line, such that the benefits of stream entry are switched on.

Daniel


Hmm, interesting. It makes sense in light of the theory that conscious mind is composed of "modules" that get triggered in different situations. It seems to me that by being un-synchronized the sense of a self is allowed to persist because there is always this module in relation to that...but in Stream Entry, as they are synchronized, there is no longer any duality. 

There is an interesting discussion of mind modularity in relation to the sense of self here.

RE: What actually happens in the brain at Stream Entry?
Answer
5/28/14 1:32 PM as a reply to Daniel M. Ingram.
Daniel M. Ingram:
Alright, pure speculation, just so everyone know this is totally made up on the fly and not science at all:

There are various awareness centers in the brain, and when we wire the most conscious of them to brain area after brain area as they tour through during the stages of insight, which, during their progress bring up issue after issue corresponding to brain center after brain center, pathway after pathway, process after process, eventually we have wired them all sufficiently to this awareness center, and this has some sort of synchronizing effect, such that when the attentional centers all synchronize for one great burst of 3-4 pulses of total mental synchrony, as occurs in Conformity knowledge and the few pulses afterwards, this causes the brain centers all to converge totally and without remainder on the end of that last pulse and take themselves all the way down to whatever happens between the frames, typically referred to as Nibbana in the Abhidhamma,  and these synchronized centers converge on that, and in that convergence somehow something shifts, a switch is thrown, and a new set of pathways come on line, such that the benefits of stream entry are switched on.

Daniel


From "The Ego Tunnel" -CHAPTER TWO APPENDIX THE UNITY OF CONSCIOUSNESS: A CONVERSATION WITH WOLF SINGER
"Singer: A unique property of consciousness is its coherence. The contents of consciousness change continuously, at the pace of the experienced present, but at any one moment all the contents of phenomenal awareness are related to one another, unless there is a pathological condition causing a disintegration of conscious experience. This suggests a close relation between consciousness and binding. It seems that only those results of the numerous computational processes that have been bound successfully will enter consciousness simultaneously. This notion also establishes a close link among consciousness, short-term memory, and attention. Evidence indicates that stimuli need to be attended to in order to be perceived consciously, and only then will they have access to short-term memory.
The binding problem results from two distinct features of the brain: First, the brain is a highly distributed system, in which a very large number of operations are carried out in parallel; second, it lacks a single convergence center, in which the results of these parallel computations could be evaluated in a coherent way. The various processing modules are interconnected, in an exceedingly dense and complex network of reciprocal connections, and these appear to be generating globally ordered states, by means of powerful self-organizing mechanisms. It follows that representations of complex cognitive contents—perceptual objects, thoughts, action plans, reactivated memories—must have a distributed structure as well. This requires that neurons participating in a distributed representation of a particular type of content convey two messages in parallel: First, they have to signal whether the feature they’re tuned to is present; second, they have to indicate which of the many other neurons they’re cooperating with in forming a distributed representation. It is widely accepted that neurons signal the presence of the feature they encode by increasing their discharge frequency; however, there’s less consensus about how neurons signal with which other neurons they cooperate.
achieved if neurons engage in rhythmic, oscillatory discharges, because oscillatory processes can be synchronized more easily than temporally unstructured activation sequences.

Metzinger: Then this isn’t just a hypothesis—there’s supportive experimental evidence.

Singer: Since the discovery of synchronized oscillatory discharges in the visual cortex more than a decade ago, more and more evidence has supported the hypothesis that synchronization of oscillatory activity may be the mechanism for the binding of distributed brain processes—whereas the relevant oscillation frequencies differ for different structures and in the cerebral cortex typically cover the range of beta- and gamma-oscillations: 20 to 80 Hz. What makes the synchronization phenomena particularly interesting in the present context is that they occur in association with a number of functions relevant for conscious experience."

Buy the book already...you know you want to emoticon
~D

RE: What actually happens in the brain at Stream Entry?
Answer
5/29/14 3:09 AM as a reply to Daniel M. Ingram.
DI, perhaps they are complementary to a large extent, but I tend to see the stages of insight in terms of a skill development in the context of changing "mood" (hypomania, depression, equanimity) rather than acquiring knowledge or insight. This explains, for example, why you can go through all the stages and not reach "path", and then if you stop meditating for a while, you might have to go through them all again, as you lose out on the brain environment and plasticity necessary to allow certain "tricks" to occur.
y).

Jake, just because something is possible, doesn't mean it is likely. Fairies are possible...

DI, Pawel, everyone - Total brain synchrony sounds romantic - but generally too much synchrony is a bad (e.g. see epilepsy). Some meditation states though seem likely to involve more sychrony than normal, for example, in jhanas. And this probably occurs in high frequency bands (e.g. gamma), though as Pawel notes, you have phase locking with synchrony with lower frequency ranges. If you look into absence seizures, models seem to suggest that increased cortical excitability (with high synchrony) can switch the thalamus to a generalised low frequency oscillation, around 3hz, which is associated with absence of consiousness. So profound changes in consciousness (e.g. blips) are probably associated with a manipulation of the thalamocortical frequency coupling.