<!DOCTYPE html><html><head><title></title><style type="text/css">p.MsoNormal,p.MsoNoSpacing{margin:0}</style></head><body><div style="font-family:Arial;">This is very interesting, and timely. I am completing an autobiography/essay/monograph for which this will be quite relevant. The opening lines of the work:<br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;"><br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;"><i>"An act of frottage triggered the self-recognition that I was a psychopath. I did not, of course, know either term or their meanings.</i><br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;"><i><br></i></div><div style="font-family:Arial;"><i>I was six." </i><br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;"><br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">davew<br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;"><br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">On Thu, Aug 1, 2024, at 11:03 AM, glen wrote:<br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> Progress or Pathology? Differential Diagnosis and Intervention Criteria <br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> for Meditation-Related Challenges: Perspectives From Buddhist <br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> Meditation Teachers and Practitioners<br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7403193/">https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7403193/</a><br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">><br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> Based on our conversation attempting to identify behavioral markers for <br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> consciousness, I thought this paper might give some insight into Dave's <br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> straddling of mystical and materialistic descriptions of experiences he <br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> marks as conscious. In the paper, they lay out 11 levers for making the <br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> distinction:<br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">><br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> • Circumstances of Onset<br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> • Control<br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> • Critical Attitude<br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> • Cultural Compatibility<br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> • Distress<br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> • Duration<br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> • Functional Impairment<br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> • Health History or Condition<br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> • Impact<br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> • Phenomenological Qualities<br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> • Teachers’ Skills or Resources<br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">><br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> From my perspective that consciousness is a kind of fusion function, <br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> Control, Critical Attitude, Distress, and Functional Impairment are <br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> primary and the rest are secondary. The ability to (change one's) focus <br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> of attention is a hallmark of consciousness, and those 4 levers <br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> direclty target one's ability to focus. Duration may well be secondary <br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> and the rest tertiary, I guess. Because there's something like a <br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> half-life of controllability. If, say, you're a conspiracy theorist, <br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> and you *entertain*, say, flat earth for long enough, maybe you'll lack <br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> the ability to re-focus and don a critical attitude. Similarly, if you <br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> embed into, say, procedural programming long enough, maybe you'll lose <br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> the ability to re-focus and think functionally ... a kind of Functional <br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> Impairment (sorry for the polysemy of "functional", there).<br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">><br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> -- <br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> ꙮ Mɥǝu ǝlǝdɥɐuʇs ɟᴉƃɥʇ' ʇɥǝ ƃɹɐss snɟɟǝɹs˙ ꙮ<br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">><br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> -. --- - / ...- .- .-.. .. -.. / -- --- .-. ... . / -.-. --- -.. .<br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv<br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> Fridays 9a-12p Friday St. Johns Cafe / Thursdays 9a-12p Zoom <br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> <a href="https://bit.ly/virtualfriam">https://bit.ly/virtualfriam</a><br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> to (un)subscribe <a href="http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com">http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com</a><br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> FRIAM-COMIC <a href="http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/">http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/</a><br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> archives: 5/2017 thru present <br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> <a href="https://redfish.com/pipermail/friam_redfish.com/">https://redfish.com/pipermail/friam_redfish.com/</a><br></div><div style="font-family:Arial;">> 1/2003 thru 6/2021 <a href="http://friam.383.s1.nabble.com/">http://friam.383.s1.nabble.com/</a><br></div></body></html>