The Science of Consciousness w/ Dr. Bala Subramaniam, Harvard Consciousness Researcher

The Nugget

Dr. Bala Subramaniam, a Harvard anesthesiologist and consciousness researcher, discusses the nature of consciousness from both scientific and spiritual perspectives. The key insight is that consciousness may be a fundamental energy that the brain perceives, rather than something generated by the brain itself.

Make it stick

🧠 The brain may be an organ that perceives consciousness, rather than generates it, similar to how the eyes perceive light but don't create it.
🔍 Science focuses on studying the "footprints" of consciousness through neural correlates. The actual subjective experience is harder to measure objectively.
🧘‍♂️ Spiritual practices like meditation allow one to experientially understand consciousness in ways that go beyond the current scientific paradigm.
🆓 True "free will" may arise when one can act from a place of conscious choice rather than being driven by memories, impulses and external motivations.

In Western science, consciousness is often seen as an emergent property of neural activity in the brain. Eastern spiritual traditions view consciousness as a more fundamental "energy" out of which matter, including the brain, arises.
Dr. Subramaniam's research looks at the "footprints" of consciousness - neural correlates of various states as measured by fMRI, EEG, etc. But the actual subjective experience remains elusive to current scientific methods.
Through his own meditation practice, he has come to see consciousness as something the brain perceives and experiences, rather than generates. Similar to how our eyes perceive light but don't create it.

Higher order theories propose the prefrontal cortex creates conscious experience by computing information from lower brain regions.
Global workspace theory likens consciousness to a stage with attentional spotlights that illuminate different sensory experiences.
Integrated information theory proposes consciousness arises from the integration of information across brain regions, similar to a complex musical performance.

True free will may arise when one acts from conscious choice rather than being driven by impulses, desires, memories or external motivations. This requires gaining some distance and detachment from these driving forces.
Much of human behavior is driven by underlying motivations outside our awareness. Greater self-awareness through practices like meditation can help dissolve these automatic motivations and allow more conscious, free choice.
Life's circumstances can't be fully controlled, but we have a choice in how we respond to them. Tranquility and effectiveness come from conscious engagement without entanglement in outcomes.

Hard problem of consciousness - the subjective experience remains elusive to objective scientific measurement focused on neural correlates.
We have no direct scientific proof for the existence of thoughts, feelings, or subjective experience. Only inference from brain activity.
Science has focused on 3rd person objective study of the brain. Spiritual traditions have developed rigorous 1st person methods for exploring consciousness experientially. An integration of the two approaches is needed.

"Consciousness is there in everybody, just the content, the richness of the experience, is going to vary...as we keep evolving, we have become very complex and our ability to experience this has become much richer."
"We all play the game of life but no one teaches us the rules, no one teaches us the scientific principles underlying it. The source of suffering in life is this ignorance (avidya)."
"The problem is that we don't think about how today's actions impact tomorrow. The more you give into your motivations, the worse they become, the more grooved those neural pathways get. That's what we need to understand to gain control of our minds."

This summary contains AI-generated information and may have important inaccuracies or omissions.