One of the reasons I'm so attracted to modern neuroscience and ancient Buddhism is that each discipline agrees that the unchanging Self most people believe they have is an illusion — the reality being that we have multiple selves popping into existence all the time.
Cognitive neuropsychologist Chris Niebauer speaks about this in his book, No Self, No Problem: How Neuropsychology is Catching Up to Buddhism, which I wrote about a few days ago. Here's a compelling passage from his "Pattern Perception and the Missing Self" chapter.
Noting just how many "yous" appear in a day works to dismantle the illusion of a singular "you" behind it all. A sense of freedom can emerge from the realization that you are under no obligation to be consistent. You need not try to glue the continuous change in the world into one single thing.
Anger may appear with one "you," but that is only one page of the flip-book, which will soon be replaced with another emotion, another perception, another thought. Like the sun rising and setting, these "yous" will come and go. There is no need to cling to some and avoid others.
There need be no conflict between these selves — so you can abandon the wrestling match between "sinner you" and "saint you." This frees up an enormous amount of mental energy and fundamentally changes how we can experience the world.
Lastly, you can try to notice that in between the yous there are moments when you are so engaged in some activity that the self isn't even noticeably around. This points to a central question of this book: where is the self when no one is thinking about it?
In his next chapter, "The Basics of Right-Brain Consciousness," Niebauer starts off with the fascinating story of Jill Bolte Taylor, a neuroanatomist who had a stroke that took much of her left brain off-line. I wrote about Taylor in "Brain Damage = Enlightenment?"
The stroke caused her inner voice to fall silent, as it affected the side of her brain that deals with language. But as pleasant as this may seem to those of us (which is virtually everybody) afflicted with monkey mind, Taylor had to undergo years of therapy before she could return to her scholarly work. I shared some quotes from her in my blog post. Taylor said:
I believe that the more time we spend choosing to run the deep inner peace circuitry of our right hemispheres, the more peace we will project into the world and the more peaceful our planet will be. And I thought that was an idea worth spreading.
…So who are we? We are the life force power of the universe, with manual dexterity and two cognitive minds. And we have the power to choose, moment by moment, who and how we want to be in the world.
Right here right now, I can step into the consciousness of my right hemisphere where we are — I am — the life force power of the universe, and the life force power of the 50 trillion beautiful molecular geniuses that make up my form. At one with all that is.
Or I can choose to step into the consciousness of my left hemisphere. where I become a single individual, a solid, separate from the flow, separate from you. I am Dr. Jill Bolte Taylor, intellectual, neuroanatomist. These are the "we" inside of me.
This is entirely consistent with Niebauer's perspective. He correctly observes that because the left brain is the primary handler of words, language, and concepts, it has the upper hand in determining how most people view the world. Namely, through the lens of words, language, and concepts.
But there obviously are other ways of experiencing reality. When we walk, ride a bicycle, dance, reach for a glass of water, and such, we Just Do It. We don't think about doing it. We don't talk about doing it. We just do it. Sure, we can also think and talk about those actions, but our doing is distinct from the speaking.
Evolution has brought us a brain divided into left and right hemispheres. So clearly both the left and right brain have important functions. Niebauer summarizes some of them.
In many ways the right brain is the yin to the yang of the left brain. For instance, in the same way that the left brain is categorical, the right brain takes a more global approach to what it perceives. Rather than dividing things into categories and making judgments that separate the world, the right brain gives attention to the whole scene and processes the world as a continuum.
Whereas the attention of the left brain is focused and narrow, the right brain is broad, vigilant, and attends to the big picture. Whereas the left brain focuses on the local elements, the right brain processes the global form that the elements create. The left brain is sequential, separating time into "before that" or "after this," while the right brain is focused on the immediacy of the present moment.
…Another way to summarize the differences between the left and right brain is that the left brain is the language center and the right brain is the spatial center. While admittedly this is reductive, it is a helpful way to summarize decades of research.
Language is categorical; it looks at one word at a time with a narrow focus either as you read or as you speak. When we process the space around us, we deal with the whole at once, not individual parts but how the parts are all connected as they are in any picture.
Niebauer recommends some right-brain activities: yoga, meditation, mindfulness, tai chi, qigong, Since I've been practicing tai chi for twenty years, I resonated with his observation about moving forms of meditation.
When done well, one is conscious of movement within space without verbal labels.
Well, based on my experience, it is possible to do both: be in the right brain flow while still engaging in some left brain verbiage. In my 2008 post about Taylor, I shared this anecdote.
There are lots of ways to get more in touch with our right brain – meditation, dancing, athletics, drugs, sex, to name a few. Getting into "the zone" is a good thing. But for sure, it's not the only thing.
Yesterday I felt great in my Tai Chi class. At the end of it we did the long form, 108 moves that should take around 20 minutes to perform (or "play," in Tai Chi parlance).
About a third a way into the form I thought, "I'm flowing today." About halfway through I thought, "There's no way I'm going to stumble or make a wrong move."
As soon as I said that to myself, my analytical side responded with, "Oh no, you shouldn't be thinking that way. You're going to jinx yourself. You're going to talk yourself out of the zone you're in."
But I didn't.
I kept on feeling in the flow. Part of me was in the zone, and part of me could say "You're in the zone." The two parts weren't interfering with each other, as they sometimes do. I didn't have to shut off half of my brain to play the long form proficiently.
Balance. Not going to extremes. The middle way. Accepting what is. Flowing flexibly. This is the way to approach the left brain/right brain thing. Here's another tip from Niebauer that appeals to me.
Once a day, do something for no reason at all. As one cannot plan to be spontaneous no matter what your left brain tells you, allow for moments of opportunity to arise. If at some point you feel like getting up and taking a walk, do so — not because you want the fresh air or because work is boring but because you had the inclination and now are acting upon it "for no reason."
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“As neuroscientist Anil Seth concludes, ‘We’re all hallucinating all the time, including right now. It’s just that when we agree about our hallucinations, we call it reality.'” (pg. 44)
Interesting post!
My immediate reaction is, I find the science fascinating, but disagree with the philosophical argument presented as following from the science.
But that’s off of a super quick browse, off of my phone, and no thought put into it. Later when I have time, and am on my computer, then I’m looking forward to rereading this, and maybe more coherently thinking through this, and maybe presenting those thoughts.
But cool discussion generally, loving it! 👍
Wither ancient Buddhism? You’re cherry picking one concept from ancient Buddhism — no-self — while ignoring the rest: The 8-fold path (including meditation), karma, rebirth, and metta, compassion, dana (service to others).
Someone who is solely attracted to the no-self (anatta) concept in Buddhism but ignores other teachings is missing the broader context that gives anatta its depth. Anatta, the idea that there’s no permanent, unchanging self, is a core insight, but it’s interdependent with other teachings like the Four Noble Truths, karma, and the Eightfold Path. Focusing only on anatta risks misunderstanding it as a standalone philosophy rather than part of a holistic system aimed at ending suffering.
Cherry picking anatta has problems. The anatta concept is meant to reduce attachment and ego. Still, without practices like compassion (metta) or ethical conduct (sila), it might be intellectualized or misused to justify detachment from responsibility.
Ancient Buddhism emphasizes practice over theory. Ignoring meditation, mindfulness, or generosity (dana) limits the transformative potential of anatta, reducing it to a concept rather than a lived experience. Also, without balancing anatta with teachings like karma or compassion, one might misinterpret it as nihilistic (nothing matters) rather than liberating, which the Buddha warned against in texts like the Alagaddupama Sutta.
Brian Lowery (Selfless) talks of the ‘self’ as being: – “…a complex and dynamic construct influenced by personal experiences, cultural background, and beliefs about oneself and others.
This is how I understand the self; an accumulation of experiences accrued from birth which goes to define our identities – who/what we think we are. Lowery goes further and states: – “The concept of self is not static, but rather constantly evolving through social interactions and the ongoing construction of our identity.”
Our identities are formed in the first few years of life though our basic sense of self constructed from our gender, culture, beliefs, values, language, traditions, family, friends, customs etc., defines our core selves. Yet, as Lowery points out, our views of ourselves may be modified according to the situations we experience such as when we marry, perhaps have children; we then become someone’s partner, a parent, maybe a householder and so on – but our core identities remain.
I feel that what Chris Niebauer is referring to with his ‘many you’s’, is emotions and feelings, emotions that can arise and are reacted upon depending upon one’s core identity or self. His basic premise titled by his book ‘No self – no Problem’, seems to me to be much more easily understood by inquiring into and being aware of the self-phenomenon as it arises – including emotions, thoughts and feelings.
Taylor may well be correct when she says: – “I believe that the more time we spend choosing to run the deep inner peace circuitry of our right hemispheres, the more peace we will project into the world and the more peaceful our planet will be. And I thought that was an idea worth spreading.”
As a science-based hypotheses okay as far as it goes, though I reckon that the brain is more unified than this and perhaps it is not necessary to attribute peace to one side of the brain but more to do with recognising (without referring to anatomy) when the mind is engaged in its various vexations and watching these continually arise and dissolve.
Hey folks.
Are you, like me, starving?
Why that’s great!
Because today, I’ll be sharing some words written by Doctor Gatekeeper who tells us eating from the right side of the plate is healthier than eating from the left!
There…now won’t that be a fun read, dear fellow starved folks, let’s read it together whilst we both starve to death!
😍
Loved this post of yours, Brian!
Mind, I see what argument you’re trying to present here. And I’m afraid I continue to disagree, completely. With the philosophical argument that’s apparently emerging from the science — except, it isn’t! …But I’m completely loving this discussion!
Let me just put down my thoughts on this. I’ll use the truncated-pieces-post-reply format, if I may. I think that’ll let me best address this.
———-
But first, I have to say: The specific objections I’d voiced, at length, in comments to your posts on Sapolsky, in just as much detail as I intend to address this post of yours. I’d have loved it if you could’ve addressed *those* head-on. Because there’s a great deal of overlap here between the ideas presented in those Sapolsky posts, and the ones here.
(On the other hand, to play Devil’s Advocate, and to steelman your argument: I have to say, that yet another neuroscientist weaving towards the same POV that Sapolsky holds — not as far as the science, that’s beyond argument from the likes of me, but as far as the ethico-philosiphical and practical applications of it — that, to me, is a big point in favor of Sapolsky’s position. Because it shows that it is not just one man’s idiosyncratic conclusion, but one apparently fairly widely held by neuroscientists. …Not that this is conclusive, not by a long shot, only the argument itself can actually be conclusive, not a count of how many people think that way. But even so: absolutely, it’s very cool that Sapolsky’s not the sole prominent neuroscientist voicing this opinion. It makes me that much more inclined to think that maybe, just maybe, there’s something in what he says after all.)
(That said, what I said in the first paragraph of this section. About my objections to Sapolsky, presented earlier on.)
———-
“Noting just how many “yous” appear in a day works to dismantle the illusion of a singular “you” behind it all.”
Not sure that holds up! It’s not that there’s many “you”s behind it all — it’s that there’s none at all, NONE!
Yes, there’s this apparent sense of “you” that we experience, despite knowing in the abstract that there’s no such. But that “you” is generally one apparent single, largely consistent entity. (Yes, there’s no such, I know that. But here we’re talking about how it seems, right? Well, it seems we have a self, and it seems it is the same self. No one experiences different selves at different times, unless they’re psychotic.)
I’m saying, this works neither at the level of perception, nor at the level of abstraction. At the level of perception, we perceive one fairly consistent self, not many discrete selves. And at the level of abstraction, it is not that we have many different selves, but that we have none at all!
———-
“A sense of freedom can emerge from the realization that you are under no obligation to be consistent.”
But wherefore this realization, that you are under no obligation to be consistent??! That last, that one is under no obligation to be consistent, was simply presented here, made up out of whole cloth.
It is not a scientific conclusion, but a philosophical, specifically ethico-moral would-be argument, following from the science. And nor does it hold up to scrutiny: and that it doesn’t, can best be shown via an argumentum ad absurdum, I think:
If you — generic you, always, echoing usage above, is all! — I was saying, if you are under no obligation to think of your apparent self at one moment as essentially consistent with your apparent self at an earlier or future time, well then, nor are others, then, under any obligation to treat “you” as one single, consistent self.
So then, you may have risked, maybe lost, life and limb in defense of your homeland as a soldier, but that’s not the same self as the self apparently inhabiting you now: so no reason to pay you veteran’s benefits and pensions and the rest of it. …It doesn’t even have to be life-threatening, simply your having worked at whatever job you worked at — generic “you” throughout, here! — all of your life, why then would the wholly separate “you” be treated, by others, as consistent with that previous “you”, and be given a pension for that past you’s labor? …For that matter, why would the the work put in by the past you over the week, or month, earn a salary for the future, inconsistent, different you at the end of the week or month? …Why should the present you be held liable for contracts signed by the past you?
Nah, this is just cuckoo, this argument!
It is essentially claiming, without actually showing how that claim/conclusion follows from the premises-based-in-science, that we are ourselves free to think of ourselves as separate at every moment, but others are obligated to treat us as just the same, for all practical purposes — but yet, as has been further argued here, we are not to expect, demand sameness/consistency from others. …That’s just incoherent, sorry.
So no, this doesn’t work. For both those reasons I’ve discussed: one, because the philosophical conclusion does not follow from the scientific premises; and two, because the argumentum ad absurdum also shows up the argument as …well, absurd.
———-
That said, I have to agree, it would indeed be extremely “freeing” to see this, I agree! I’d be happy enough if that made sense.
But it doesn’t make sense. And the fact that it would be cool if it did make sense, is no valid reason to accept this conclusion. No more than the fact it would be cool to have an omnipotent God watching your back would be extremely comforting, does not go one whit towards making it true. That’s simply a fallacious argumentum ad consequentiam, the “freeing” bit.
(But like I said: agreed, should the conclusion itself hold — which it doesn’t — then it would, indeed, be very freeing, very cool.)
———-
“Anger may appear with one “you,” but that is only one page of the flip-book, which will soon be replaced with another emotion, another perception, another thought. Like the sun rising and setting, these “yous” will come and go. There is no need to cling to some and avoid others.”
Sure, emotions arise and pass, as sitting in Vipassana meditation directly shows you, at first hand. No need to cling to past emotions, sure.
But again, that’s a non sequitur, that does not lead to the conclusion you’re trying to argue.
If there’s some thing that consistently angers you, then sure, while there’s no need to hold to the anger itself, naturally, but it’s wise, surely, to hold to the message that that anger is sending you? (For instance, if you find yourself consistently angered by Bibi’s murderous, Hitleresque barbarism in the ME — or if you find yourself consistently outraged and angered by the transparently crooked and hypocritical and now murderous ways of Trump — then, if at some given moment you do not feel anger, then naturally, there’s not need to try to simulate that anger: but, on the other hand, it is probably wise to hold on to the message that the anger is sending you.)
It’s silly to argue that there’s no consistency at all. No one can be completely outraged by the Israel genocide on one day, and, without anything new having transpired, wake up the next day feeling completely elated by it. Likewise, no one can be completely outraged by Trump one day, and, without anything new having happened, next day end up completely indifferent. (That is, the anger itself may come and go, and there’s no need to hold on to such. But what that anger signifies to you about your “self”, you’d be foolish to forget if at some moment there’s no anger felt.)
(And of course, if something different actually transpires, then it’s not apples to applies at all. Like if Bibi were to do a mea culpa tomorrow and get his IDF killers out of Gaza, and hold the settler looters to account — or if Trump were to start behaving like a human being instead of a vile, psychopathic, murderous troll — then sure, you change your reaction to Bibi and/or Trump, absolutely. That’s a whole separate matter, not apples to apples at all. …And yes, if the past ends up lending unreasonable bias to your present reactions (with a great deal of emphasis on the “unreasonable” part!), then sure, that you can and should let go, certainly.
———-
“So who are we? We are the life force power of the universe”
What nonsense. Flowery incoherent claptrap, is all that “life force powering the universe” bit is.
———-
“, with manual dexterity and two cognitive minds. And we have the power to choose, moment by moment, who and how we want to be in the world.”
Sure, agreed. That’s a great message. But it is NOT a coherent message that agrees against continuity of our (apparent) selves — if “selves” is what we’re talking about here.
It’s like this. We change. It’s good to be cognizant of such, and to be accepting of such. But it’s silly to go the other extreme that there’s no connection and no similarity and no consistency, moment to moment to moment, in what we experience as our apparent self.
———-
“Balance. Not going to extremes. The middle way.”
Sure, the balance (also) lies in rejecting the extreme of a single immutable self, as well as the opposite extreme of imagining there’s no consistency amongst one’s different (apparent) selves.
So yeah, the Fool-Me-Once rule still applies. Fool me once, shame on you: fool me twice, shame on me.
None of this amounts to a valid argument against expecting consistency, within reason, either in oneself or in others.
———-
Okay, I’ll stop now, with one last observation about this:
“Once a day, do something for no reason at all.”
Taking a walk because you want to take a walk is not “doing something for no reason at all”. It is taking a walk because you want to.
And it is psychotic to yourself either act randomly moment to moment, and completely mistaken to give in to some else’s gaslighting you into condoning *their* doing such on those terms. (Like some self-proclaimed enlightened beings do, like Osho Rajneesh famously — infamously — was given to doing and saying.)
Pardon my French, but I can’t just go and fuck on a whim the hot girl that’s into me, just because I want to, completely ignoring the fact that I’ve got a steady girlfriend. I can’t just go and pick up that uber expensive car parked there, just because I have a mind to, completely ignoring the fact that it isn’t mine.
Nor is this nitpicking, no Sir! My point is, sure you can take a walk at random if you feel like it. But it isn’t really “at random” at all, because your “consistency” is precisely what is guiding you to choose the act of taking a walk, rather than choosing the act of fornicating with an available woman who isn’t your wife or girlfriend, or choosing the act of driving away with a car you like but that you do no own — or, for that matter, ensuring that you don’t have a broken ankle, and that further stress on it at this point in time, by walking, won’t damage it badly and maybe for good, before taking that walk “at random”.
You see what I’m saying? Even that “random” act of taking a walk, isn’t “random” at all. Not one little bit. It is very much predicated on consistency. All it amounts to is, basically, a reminder to yourself not to be bound unthinkingly by past routines. And, like I said in my comment to your last post, in the last thread: this left-brain-right-brain business in a non sequitur, that is completely irrelevant to reminding ourselves not to be bound unthinkingly by past routines, and to sometimes doing things without an overt agenda.
Woof, looooooong comment!
But I enjoyed thinking that through. And the subject, it’s an important one, very. I’m loving this discussion! (Hope you are too, Brian! My opposite take on this, I mean to say!)