From many to (n)one: Meditation and the plasticity of the predictive mind
PsyArXiv November 17, 2020 Ruben Eero Laukkonen, Heleen A Slagter 17 citations preprint
A unifying account of deconstructive meditation under the predictive processing view is offered. The brain makes predictions based on past experience, and deconstructive meditation disengages anticipatory processes, gradually reducing counterfactual temporally deep cognition until all conceptual processing falls away, unveiling a state of pure awareness. Three main styles of meditation (focused attention, open monitoring, and non-dual) are placed on a single continuum, where each technique relinquishes increasingly engrained habits of prediction, including the predicted self. This deconstruction can permit certain insights by making these processes available to introspection. The framework is consistent with empirical and (neuro)phenomenological evidence and illuminates the top-down plasticity of the predictive mind.