Tibetan and Himalayan Library - THL

Description:

Consciousness at the Crossroads is a record of the Dalai Lama's meeting with Western psychiatrists, neuroscientists, and philosophers in October of 1989. This was the second formal conference between the Dalai Lama and Western scientists organized by the Mind and Life Institute--the purpose of which was to investigate Buddhist and scientific perspectives on consciousness and the brain.

A particularly pronounced theme is a discussion of the methodological and metaphysical presuppositions of science. Scientists present to the Dalai Lama experimental evidence for how the brain is related mental processes of memory, sleeping, dreaming, language, perception, as well as mental disorders such as amnesia, autism, depression, schizophrenia, and manic-depression (bipolar disorder).

In turn, the Dalai Lama discusses Buddhist perspectives on the relation between the mind and body, including the Buddhist theory of reincarnation and the body's subtle energies as they are found in Buddhist tantric literature.

Buddhists will have to accept, the Dalai Lama says, any scientific discoveries which incontrovertibly show Buddhist views to be wrong. In turn, the Dalai Lama asked that scientists share in this spirit of intellectual honesty regarding their own unquestioned biases.

Editor B. Alan Wallace augments the book's dialogue with additional chapters further elaborating upon basic Buddhist concepts touched upon only briefly during the conference (Zach Rowinski 2006-02-13)

Table of Contents: Opening remarks: brain science as a path to world peace -- Toward a natural science of the mind -- A Buddhist response -- The spectrum of consciousness: from gross to subtle -- Mapping brain functions: the evidence of damage to specific brain regions -- Subliminal awareness and memory from previous lives -- Steps toward an anatomy of memory -- Brain control of sleeping and dreaming states -- Manifestations of subtle consciousness -- What constitutes scientific evidence? -- Psychiatric illnesses and psychopharmacology -- The limits of intervention -- A Buddhist deconstruction of the mind's self -- In conclusion: building bridges -- Afterword: Buddhist reflections by B. Alan Wallace -- Appendix: about the Mind and Life Institute -- Notes

Associated Information: For more information on this conference, see the Mind and Life Institute's conference website: 1989: Dialogues between Buddhism & the Neurosciences.