[Buddha-l] neuroscience: neural plasticity

[S.A. Feite]

On May 29, 2007, at 10:05 PM, Vera, Pedro L. wrote:

> Steve wrote:
>
>> This is a fascinating new topic for meditation researchers interested
>> in "hardware". But really, that's also the problem: drug companies
>> love to sponsor "hard" research if it leads to the latest and
>> greatest multi-spectrum SSRI and gazillions for them. They'd love to
>> know how meditators are getting blissed out so they can sell it back
>> to others. That's why I always question the ultimate sponsors in
>> these sorts of things.
>
> This seems like an overly simplified and sinister view of the  
> research enterprise. Yes, obviously drug companies sponsor research  
> in the hope that their products fare well in the trials and they  
> can then proceed to market them and make "gazillions".
>
> However, most scientific research in this country (USA), and, in  
> particular, neuroscience research dealing with issues like  
> plasticity, is funded through the National Institutes of Health  
> (NIH). At the risk of stating something that might be known to most  
> of the readers of this list (or perhaps not), the NIH is composed  
> of several more or less autonomous institutes specializing in  
> particular areas (e.g. cancer, National Cancer Institute). The  
> institute that is most likely to fund "brain research" would be the  
> National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS;  
> http://www.ninds.nih.gov/). These institutes fund research from  
> money allocated by congress for the NIH and they use the much  
> maligned "peer-review process" to apportion their funds.

 From what I'm seeing in research, some research does get NIH or  
"other" funding but much Buddhist meditation research is being  
privately funded. The only reason I mention the downside is because  
of the recent writings of people like Alan Wallace which go into some  
detail into the "idolization of the brain" in consciousness research.  
This effects all meditation research directly or indirectly because  
of the materialistic bias inherent in the scientific-materialistic  
paradigm which forces researchers looking for grants to kowtow to the  
monies that drive this market. In this case we're talking about the  
pharmceutical industrial complex. The tack that meditation  
researchers are forced to take is often couterpoised to materialistic  
points of view, and thus the discussion among people like Wallace  
about the taboo against subjectivity, the basic POV of a meditator or  
yogin/i.

Would research get funded if it was trying to emphasize a new,  
subjective science? Accepting drug compay monies would essentially  
force researchers to take a scientific materialistic POV and this may  
be in direct contradiction to the style of thinking necessary for  
advanced meditation research. What it boils down to is two opposing  
ways of looking at reality: one which says that consciousness is an  
artifact of the physical brain and another which says that  
consciousness itself is primary and the brain secondary. One relies  
on materialism, the other on the "taboo" of subjective inquiry.

-Steve