Home > JOURNALSANDNEWSLETTERS > INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF TRANSPERSONAL STUDIES > Vol. 30 (2011) > Iss. 1
DOI
https://doi.org/10.24972/ijts.2011.30.1-2.11
Abstract
The greatest contemporary challenge in the arena of cognitive neuroscience concerns the
relation between consciousness and the brain. Over recent years the focus of work in this
area has switched from the analysis of diverse spatial regions of the brain to that of the
timing of neural events. It appears that two conditions are necessary in order for neural
events to become correlated with conscious experience. First, the firing of assemblies of
neurones must achieve a degree of coherence, and, second, reflexive (i.e. top-down, or reentrant)
neural pathways must be activated. It does not, of course, follow that such neural
activity causes consciousness; it may be, for example, that the neural activity formats the
brain to interact with consciousness. The latter possibility is suggested by analysis of mystical
texts suggesting that coherence and reflexivity constitute the conditions for the influx of
“spirit.” Kabbalistic sources, for example, describe a hierarchy of “brains” in the human and
divine realms through which the principles of coherence and reflexivity operate. Whilst the
ontological assumptions of such a scheme place it beyond the realm of psychology, parallels
with the picture deriving from the contemporary cognitive neuroscience of consciousness
are striking.
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Recommended Citation
Lancaster, L. (2011). Lancaster, L. (2011). The cognitive neuroscience of consciousness, mysticism and psi. International Journal of Transpersonal Studies, 30(1-2), 11–22.. International Journal of Transpersonal Studies, 30 (1). https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.24972/ijts.2011.30.1-2.11