THE PHENOMENOLOGY OF MEDITATION

Western philosophers and scholars have long maintained the assumption that there is a gulf of difference between " Western rational thinking " and " Eastern irrational, mystical-metaphysical brooding " (cf. Beinorius 2005; Carrette & King 2005; Halbfass 1990; Tart 1969). Among those that are reasonably familiar with both traditions, however, it is well understood that neither Chinese nor Indian thinking, for example, is in any way inferior to that which can be found in the West (cf. Fung 1966; Dasgupta (1922-1955; Radhakrisnan (1929-1931)). However, it is not the aim of this paper to make a general comparison of Eastern and Western thought relative to such criteria as level of achievement, rationality, scientific-mindedness and so forth. Rather, it's more modest and specific aim is to compare Edmund Husserl's (1859-1938) methods for achieving knowledge/truth (i.e., the phenomenological reduction(s)) with those often propounded by the Indian darśana 1 or system of thought (i.e., yogic/jñānic) meditation); 2 as to the latter of these, my primary source will be Patañjali's Yoga Sūtras. 3 More specifically, it

Horizon. Studies in Phenomenology, Vol. 7 No. 2, 2018

[Abstract: Unlike most other philosophical systems of India, Buddhism, though it gives a central place to 'consciousness' in its philosophical enquiry, does not raise its status to a transcendental metaphysical level. Buddhism, in this way, has a special affinity with Phenomenological approach. The present paper focuses on the points of contact between Phenomenology and Mindfulness meditation, the Buddhist spiritual practice. The paper is divided into three parts. The first part gives an account of the four kinds of Mindfulness meditation based on the Buddha's sermons on Mindfulness. Then it focuses on their core features namely 'objectivity', 'impermanence and other essential features' and 'dynamic, yet passive awareness'. These features bring the two approaches close to each other. The second part brings out similarities and differences between the two approaches. Like the phenomenological approach, Mindfulness meditation approach regards consciousness as having intensional and propositional character. It also emphasizes what is immanent to consciousness and brackets the transcendent. Both the approaches exhibit a scientific temperament and both tend to be presupposition-less approaches. In spite of these close similarities, there are glaring differences between the two approaches. The goal of the phenomenological inquiry is intellectual, whereas that of the Buddhist approach is spiritual. Phenomenology attributes reality to essences whereas there is a tendency to deny ontological status to essences in Buddhism. Husserl's acceptance of transcendental or pure ego is in contrast with the no-self theory of Buddhism. Intensionality attributed to consciousness is also not common to all forms of Buddhism. The third part of the paper asserts that similarities and differences between the two approaches open the possibility of varied forms of phenomenological exercise. The paper further suggests that different models of phenomenology are possible within Buddhism.] 1

Oxford Scholarship Online

One of the fundamental distinctions in the modern academy is the difference between studying human life as people experience it and studying it in terms of impersonal causal processes—the so-called first- and third-person approaches. This dichotomy is reflected in the study of meditation, in which neuroscientists attempt to correlate their “objective” findings with the “subjective” reports of meditators. This very distinction, though, invites two extremes: either these discourses are ultimately incommensurable or one discourse—the subjective—should be reduced to the “true,” objective discourse. This chapter criticizes putatively pure subjectivity or objectivity from Buddhist philosophical perspectives, especially the non-duality of subject and object, and seeks to articulate a middle ground between reductionism and incommensurability.

2011

2014

The burgeoning field of cognitive studies in the West is motivated by a renewed interest in conscious experience, which arose in the postmodern zeitgeist in response to the positivist, scientific ideal of objectivity. This work presents a historical overview of Western philosophy from its dawn, focusing on the evolution of key concepts in metaphysics, ontology and epistemology, to arrive at the examination of modern theories on consciousness. The monist systems of pre-Socratic philosophers, the empiricism and rationalism of the Humanism, Kant's critique and the post-Kantian split of traditions in the analytic and continental branches are surveyed. A summary of the key historical concepts of consciousness in the continental tradition, and especially in German idealism and phenomenology is presented. Modern physicalist theories of mind based on epistemological realism, in the analytic tradition are sketched, and critical aspects of the realist viewpoint discussed. The reintroduction of the phenomenal perspective in philosophy of mind, is argued, represents an important turning point in analytic philosophy. In the second part, the philosophic-religious traditions of Advaita Vedanta and Mahayana Buddhism, in its Madhyamaka branch, are presented, and their respective notions of self, mind and reality confronted. The concept of consciousness as an ontological substance is, in Buddhism, deconstructed through the analysis of impermanence and interdependent origination of phenomena. In Advaita philosophy consciousness is equated with the universal Brahman, although no duality is admitted between Brahman and the world. The phenomenological analysis of self in this tradition differs from the Western notion of "transcendental ego" through an understanding of intentionality as a superimposition of subject-object duality on pure consciousness. A core theory of nonduality between the conscious principle and the world is then extracted from the apparently opposite ontological stances of Mahayana and Advaita. This theory is finally compared with the Western idealist and realist conceptions of consciousness, intentionality and subject-object duality. The nondualism of the Indian systems, is argued, represents a possible resolution of the ontological and epistemological problems of Western philosophy.

Our aim in this article is to argue against the claim that phenomenology in the classical sense of the term is a kind of meditative technique or practice involving the careful observation of present moment experience for the purposes of description. In sections 1. and 2. we give an overview of the contemporary presentation of mindfulness, as well as pointing to some ambiguities that will be relevant to our subsequent discussion. Section 3. offers a brief survey of the various comparisons people have made between phenomenology and mindfulness. As will become clear, the majority have based their comparison on a specific interpretation of Husserl’s key methodological tools, the epoché and reduction. In section 4. we argue that said interpretation is mistaken, and that Husserl’s enterprise is very different from the practice of mindfulness, and then in section 5., we examine two examples of the claim we are criticizing, namely recent articles by Natalie Depraz and Michel Bitbol.

Journal of Consciousness Studies, 2019

Are there universal structures or stages of experience, socalled contemplative landmarks, that unfold during meditative practice? As commonly described in contemplative manuals or handbooks, there is a transition from a form of meditation where the subject must exert continual effort in order for consciousness to remain focused. As Kenneth Rose has recently shown, these manuals, stemming from the Buddhist, Hindu, and Christian traditions, agree that a transition will take place from effortful meditation into a state where attention is fixed or locked in on the meditation object. This article describes the micro-phenomenology of this phenomenon, sometimes called dhyana or access concentration, from the first-person perspective. This study both confirms and refines the traditional account, engaging with certain difficulties involved in establishing a correspondence between traditional, clear-cut, and sometimes contradictory concepts and actual experiences, which can be hard to conceptualize precisely

Wading into the Stream of Wisdom. Essays in Honor of Leslie Kawamura. Ed. Sarah F. Haynes and Michelle J. Sorensen. Contemporary Issues in Buddhist Studies. Berkeley: BDK America., 2013

T he term bhāvanā/sgom is usually translated as "meditation," but from a philological standpoint it is more rigorously rendered as "cultivation" or "familiarization." It may indeed be that rendering the term bhāvanā as "meditation" is only an approximation and may even be in some ways misleading. That said, we'll stay with this rendering as it is more or less conventionally adopted in Buddhist circles. We'll discuss some of the translational issues below in more detail. The principal question taken up in this paper is what modern non-Asian Buddhists understand meditation to be. Two types of answers interest us here: (1) Many non-Asian Buddhists will maintain that "meditation" refers to a practical activity of sitting calmly, with concentrated nonconceptual, non-analytic awareness. They will also hold that this activity is what most Tibetan monks and other Buddhists do as their fundamental spiritual practice. Being a readily identifiable practical skill, its nature is not considered to be an important subject of philosophical speculation. (2) Others at some point will treat "meditation" as a normative term. Thus for them not everything called "meditation" is equal, as some practices are more effective, faster, more beneficial, deeper, etc., and some are potentially quite antithetical to what meditation should be. What meditation should be and what it achieves thus become a philosophical issue of some urgency. The resolution of these issues may even be seen as necessary precondition for the success of the practice. In the first half of this paper, Andreas Doctor examines some aspects of the first type of response. Based on his experience with Westerners and Tibetans in Ka-Nying Shedrub Ling (bka' rnying shes grub gling) monastery in Nepal, he contrasts how the term "meditation" is in fact used very differently by these two groups, and how in Tibetan usage

2016

The philosophical investigation of consciousness has a long-standing history in both Indian and Western thought. The conceptual models and analyses that have emerged in one cultural framework may be profitably reviewed in the light of another. In this context, a study of the notion of consciousness in the transcendental phenomenology of Edmund Husserl is not only important as a focus on a remarkable achievement in the context of Western thought, but is also useful for an appreciation of the concern with this question in the Indian philosophical tradition, and especially in the tradition of Advaita Vedānta of Ādi Śamkara. The starting point for this paper is the belief that phenomenology has a recognizably common face for both these traditions. This paper investigates the possibility of a parallel notion of consciousness in the transcendental phenomenology of Husserl and the Advaita Vedānta of Śamkara, with particular emphasis on Husserl’s ‘Transcendental I ’ and Śamkara’s ‘Witness C...

Philosophy East and West, 2011