The Default Mode Network (DMN) has been increasingly important in understanding awakening, self-referential thoughts, tasking, meditation, and psychedelics since it was identified by Marcus Raichle et al. in "A Default Mode of Brain Function" (2001). The DMN has been in 28 bloposts from "Folk Who Meditate Decrease Mind Wandering" and "What Is the Default Mode Network?" to "magic mushrooms work like meditation? the latest science".
The most useful paper has been Jessica Andrews-Hanna et al.'s "Functional-Anatomic Fractionation of the Brain's Default Network" in Neuron (2010).
It defined three main components of the 11-element DMN; a two-element core (yellow), and two sub-networks which give a sense of "self and other" (blue) and "self through time" (green).
The blogpost ""nondual awakening and autism...the battle of the "blah, blah" and "tasking" networks" showed the interaction between the DMN ("blah, blah") and its anti-correlated task positive network, (TPN) for "tasking". When folk were concentrating fully on performing tasks, the TPN was active/the DMN was inactive; when not tasking, the DMN was active with virtually continuous self-referential internal narrative (SRIN) - "blah, blah".
Many questions remained: a) "What controls which network is operating?", b) "How does the brain switch between the TPN and DMN?", c) "Do self-related, but non-emotional, non-sticky, tasking thoughts manifest in the DMN?" and d) "How does the brain maintain the DMN de-activated for long periods?".
Andrews-Hanna answered some of these in her recent "meta/overview paper", "The default network and self-generated thought: component processes, dynamic control and clinical relevance". This was sent in by Richard Miller, friend, fellow yogi and nondualist traveler (Blogpost "Lying-down meditation for nondual, self-inquiry...really?".)
The DMN is now renamed the Default Network (DN) to highlight its "role as a large-scale brain system whose functions may extend beyond the resting state".
The DN is actually active in both the very predominant non-tasking "blah, blah", and in some self-related tasking. No longer just an anti-network to the TPN (now called the Dorsal Attention Network (DAN)), the DN is characterized by "the type of self-generated mental content it supports". The strong anti-correlation between the DN and the DAN is covered in Buckner, Kreinen and Yeo (2013).
Why do we even have self-generated thoughts? They must have been somehow Darwinianly, evolutionarily adaptive. The post "How old is the "I"? How/why did it come into existence?...new science", described how the "I" evolved about 75,000 or so years ago when our numbers were growing and we needed to coordinate, plan and work in larger organizational structures. However, as we can all attest, this SRIN generates many problems in today's massively complex world.
As Andrew-Hanna (2014) acknowledges, "Processing negative information increases the frequency of negative and retrospective thoughts, and task-unrelated thoughts can also lead to subsequent unhappiness." Thinking about the self offsets the information value of self-referential, episodic, memory. Self-generated thoughts may cause mental health disorders and neurodegenerative diseases.
This well-written, technically-complex and heavily researched "meta paper" provides a comprehensive review of the state-of-the art wrt the DN/DMN, including the effects of different centers and subsystems in the DN, along w/a discussion of the DN in macaques.
It also extends and modifies Andrews-Hanna (2010) w/the inclusion of Yeo, et al. "The organization of the human cerebral cortex estimated by intrinsic functional connectivity" (2011) done @ Harvard, Mass General and MIT.
Compare the size of the areas at the right in Yeo, et al. to those above; more areas and many are enlarged. (The color scheme is retained.)
There is also a meta-analysis (at left) on 526 meta-analyses on terms/concepts relating to memory, attention, emotion, etc. This gives some idea of what the areas of the DN relate to.
(Letter size indicates importance and arrow size the strength of the correlations. Colors are consistent.)
The DN and DAN work closely w/, and are situated physically around, a control network. Vincent, et al., in "Evidence for A Frontoparietal Control System Revealed by Intrinsic Functional Connectivity" (2008) demonstrated that the frontoparietal control system (FPCS/FPCN), (shown at right) does the cognitive control and decision making processes for focusing attention. Originally comprised of the lateral prefrontal cortex and the inferior parietal lobe, it now includes six other centers.
Andrews-Hanna combined these works w/Spreng, et al. "Default network activity, coupled with frontoparietal control network, supports goal-directed cognition". (2010) and Buckner (2013) to create a complex, multi-network intercommunication scheme, shown below.
An important improvement is that many centers that were treated as one, are now broken out into their own component parts - front, back, right, left, top, bottom, side - and the relationships of those components is distinguished.
The FPCN's physical location between the DN and the DAN indicates that it is the executive control network that moves the action back and forth between them, integrating their opposing operations as required.
An FPCN subnetwork, the "salience" network, switches between "internal" and "external" modes of attention and suppresses DN activity; it is also connected to the DAN. The DN suppression network was shown in Brewer, et al. (2011), discussed in "Folk who meditate decrease mind wandering".
To demonstrate how this works with semantic problem solving, if there is a visuospatial planning, or motor sequence task, like the "Tower of London", the DAN is engaged and is coupled with the FPCN during the task.
If there is an autobiographical planning task, like devising personal plans to get out of debt to meet specific goals, (but not to imagine events associated with the achieved outcome) do mental simulations and evaluate creative ideas towards a goal, the DN is engaged along w/the FPCN.
"Content regulation" focuses on which topics generate self-referential thoughts and is a critical element in adaptively useful functioning of the DN. As Andrews-Hanna (2014) states, "...harnessing the beneficial aspects of self-generated thought and associated DN activity requires the ability to adaptively regulate the content underlying this internal experience."
The consequences, of course, vary as the content varies. Approaches like "mindfulness and/or acceptance interventions that alter an individual's relationship w/his/her internal thoughts" are recommended.
Some psychopathological disorders involve linking DN elements with other networks. OCD has been tied to connections of the DN's mPFC w/the ventral striatum; chronic pain is linked to connections between the mPFC and the insula; schizophrenia in linked to increased PCC and decreased vmPFC activation in the DN and connections to the insula.
Similarly, "context regulation", focused on when such thoughts occur, is critical. "A final form of psychopathology could be a failure to regulate self-generated thought to a context when it does not interfere with ongoing tasks."
"Many disorders including ADHD, depression, rumination and OCD (occur when folk) have difficulty regulating the occurrence of self-generated thoughts." This is manifested as "increased distractibility or elevated levels of mind-wandering, as well as hyperactivity of the DN..."
"By contrast, individuals with improved executive control are able to limit their self-generated thought to nondemanding or unimportant contexts." "Sticky thoughts", a term we have used, were highlighted as particularly problematic.
So what are the "takeaways"?
a) A "control"/FPCN network does the operational switching between the autobiographical/"blah, blah" and the semantic/"tasking" networks. Better management of this switching system requires a better development of the FPCN through meditation, self-inquiry, mindfulness, acceptance, etc.
b) Semantic problem solving and planning is done by the "tasking"/DAN network.
c) Autobiographical problem solving and planning is done by the "default"/DN network. As the DN is almost always in "blah, blah" mode, these "autobiographical" functions w/o emotional "blah, blah" were overlooked.
d) Regulation of the DN's "sticky"/"blah, blah" self-referential internal narrative (SRIN) is done largely by the salience subnetwork of the FPCN.
BTW, i was recently interviewed by C(onsciousness)-Realm's Kayemmo Kmo O' Khan (KMO) in a podcast "I/me/my". KMO invites controversy; the first 8:25 are from Thomas Legate's "The Conspiracy Against the Human Race" that advises us to "just stop breeding" as our consciousness is a hopeless cause of suffering.
When my segment ends @ 54:00, KMO reads a comment from Cloudwalking Owl on his belief that spiritual practice can be harmful, as folk are diverted from working on social/environmental issues. A lengthy discussion between us followed in the C-Realm comments.
BTW2. The blog has > 500,000 page views and there are almost 1300 subscribers on youTube. There are new vids up from "my" presos @ Science and NonDuality Conference in Doorn, Netherlands last year: "Meditation Works Like Magic Mushrooms" and "Living in NonDuality - The Hard Questions". Not viral, but tks to you, and to Her who does it all.
The most useful paper has been Jessica Andrews-Hanna et al.'s "Functional-Anatomic Fractionation of the Brain's Default Network" in Neuron (2010).
 |
| Andrews-Hanna, et al., 2010 |
The blogpost ""nondual awakening and autism...the battle of the "blah, blah" and "tasking" networks" showed the interaction between the DMN ("blah, blah") and its anti-correlated task positive network, (TPN) for "tasking". When folk were concentrating fully on performing tasks, the TPN was active/the DMN was inactive; when not tasking, the DMN was active with virtually continuous self-referential internal narrative (SRIN) - "blah, blah".
Many questions remained: a) "What controls which network is operating?", b) "How does the brain switch between the TPN and DMN?", c) "Do self-related, but non-emotional, non-sticky, tasking thoughts manifest in the DMN?" and d) "How does the brain maintain the DMN de-activated for long periods?".
 |
| Jessica Andrews-Hanna U of CO Boulder |
The DMN is now renamed the Default Network (DN) to highlight its "role as a large-scale brain system whose functions may extend beyond the resting state".
The DN is actually active in both the very predominant non-tasking "blah, blah", and in some self-related tasking. No longer just an anti-network to the TPN (now called the Dorsal Attention Network (DAN)), the DN is characterized by "the type of self-generated mental content it supports". The strong anti-correlation between the DN and the DAN is covered in Buckner, Kreinen and Yeo (2013).
 |
| First demonstration of symbolic logic - 75,000 yrs ago |
As Andrew-Hanna (2014) acknowledges, "Processing negative information increases the frequency of negative and retrospective thoughts, and task-unrelated thoughts can also lead to subsequent unhappiness." Thinking about the self offsets the information value of self-referential, episodic, memory. Self-generated thoughts may cause mental health disorders and neurodegenerative diseases.
This well-written, technically-complex and heavily researched "meta paper" provides a comprehensive review of the state-of-the art wrt the DN/DMN, including the effects of different centers and subsystems in the DN, along w/a discussion of the DN in macaques.
 |
| Yeo, et al. 2011 Color scheme as in A-H 2010 above |
It also extends and modifies Andrews-Hanna (2010) w/the inclusion of Yeo, et al. "The organization of the human cerebral cortex estimated by intrinsic functional connectivity" (2011) done @ Harvard, Mass General and MIT.
Compare the size of the areas at the right in Yeo, et al. to those above; more areas and many are enlarged. (The color scheme is retained.)
There is also a meta-analysis (at left) on 526 meta-analyses on terms/concepts relating to memory, attention, emotion, etc. This gives some idea of what the areas of the DN relate to.
(Letter size indicates importance and arrow size the strength of the correlations. Colors are consistent.)
 |
| DAS = DAN HCMS = DN FPCS = FPCN Vincent, et al. 2008 |
Andrews-Hanna combined these works w/Spreng, et al. "Default network activity, coupled with frontoparietal control network, supports goal-directed cognition". (2010) and Buckner (2013) to create a complex, multi-network intercommunication scheme, shown below.
An important improvement is that many centers that were treated as one, are now broken out into their own component parts - front, back, right, left, top, bottom, side - and the relationships of those components is distinguished.
 |
| DN/DMN - default - blue FPCN/FPCS - control- green DAN - tasking - red Node size - interconnector hub import Line thickness - correlation |
The FPCN's physical location between the DN and the DAN indicates that it is the executive control network that moves the action back and forth between them, integrating their opposing operations as required.
An FPCN subnetwork, the "salience" network, switches between "internal" and "external" modes of attention and suppresses DN activity; it is also connected to the DAN. The DN suppression network was shown in Brewer, et al. (2011), discussed in "Folk who meditate decrease mind wandering".
 |
| Tower of London task DAN + FPCN |
To demonstrate how this works with semantic problem solving, if there is a visuospatial planning, or motor sequence task, like the "Tower of London", the DAN is engaged and is coupled with the FPCN during the task.
 |
| Get out of debt task DN + FPCN |
If there is an autobiographical planning task, like devising personal plans to get out of debt to meet specific goals, (but not to imagine events associated with the achieved outcome) do mental simulations and evaluate creative ideas towards a goal, the DN is engaged along w/the FPCN.
"Content regulation" focuses on which topics generate self-referential thoughts and is a critical element in adaptively useful functioning of the DN. As Andrews-Hanna (2014) states, "...harnessing the beneficial aspects of self-generated thought and associated DN activity requires the ability to adaptively regulate the content underlying this internal experience."
The consequences, of course, vary as the content varies. Approaches like "mindfulness and/or acceptance interventions that alter an individual's relationship w/his/her internal thoughts" are recommended.
Some psychopathological disorders involve linking DN elements with other networks. OCD has been tied to connections of the DN's mPFC w/the ventral striatum; chronic pain is linked to connections between the mPFC and the insula; schizophrenia in linked to increased PCC and decreased vmPFC activation in the DN and connections to the insula.
Similarly, "context regulation", focused on when such thoughts occur, is critical. "A final form of psychopathology could be a failure to regulate self-generated thought to a context when it does not interfere with ongoing tasks."
"Many disorders including ADHD, depression, rumination and OCD (occur when folk) have difficulty regulating the occurrence of self-generated thoughts." This is manifested as "increased distractibility or elevated levels of mind-wandering, as well as hyperactivity of the DN..."
"By contrast, individuals with improved executive control are able to limit their self-generated thought to nondemanding or unimportant contexts." "Sticky thoughts", a term we have used, were highlighted as particularly problematic.
So what are the "takeaways"?
a) A "control"/FPCN network does the operational switching between the autobiographical/"blah, blah" and the semantic/"tasking" networks. Better management of this switching system requires a better development of the FPCN through meditation, self-inquiry, mindfulness, acceptance, etc.
b) Semantic problem solving and planning is done by the "tasking"/DAN network.
c) Autobiographical problem solving and planning is done by the "default"/DN network. As the DN is almost always in "blah, blah" mode, these "autobiographical" functions w/o emotional "blah, blah" were overlooked.
d) Regulation of the DN's "sticky"/"blah, blah" self-referential internal narrative (SRIN) is done largely by the salience subnetwork of the FPCN.
 |
| KMO C-Realm |
BTW, i was recently interviewed by C(onsciousness)-Realm's Kayemmo Kmo O' Khan (KMO) in a podcast "I/me/my". KMO invites controversy; the first 8:25 are from Thomas Legate's "The Conspiracy Against the Human Race" that advises us to "just stop breeding" as our consciousness is a hopeless cause of suffering.
When my segment ends @ 54:00, KMO reads a comment from Cloudwalking Owl on his belief that spiritual practice can be harmful, as folk are diverted from working on social/environmental issues. A lengthy discussion between us followed in the C-Realm comments.
BTW2. The blog has > 500,000 page views and there are almost 1300 subscribers on youTube. There are new vids up from "my" presos @ Science and NonDuality Conference in Doorn, Netherlands last year: "Meditation Works Like Magic Mushrooms" and "Living in NonDuality - The Hard Questions". Not viral, but tks to you, and to Her who does it all.
Hi Gary,
ReplyDeleteCould you please tell us if/how you've experienced Nirodha Samapatti - which I understand is the complete cessation of perception (things vanish and come back some time later). If yes, for how long ? Has it been captured in a lab setup ?
It seems really fascinating in regards to correlating awareness with specific brain regions.
Regards,
Mark
Hi Mark,
Deletei am the wrong person to ask about Theravadan scriptures or practices. i went directly to Rinzai Zen which was created for "special transmission outside scriptures" and "did not stand upon words", and Ramana Maharshi’s analogous self-inquiry approach, which focused on awakening.
i did not even know that Theravada existed until i was invited into the long-term meditator research program @ Yale which focused on Theravadans and their meditative practices – I was the first non-Theravadan scanned.
The Theravadans generally place importance on specific experiences, often in order. Because of the difference in practices, many of the experiences that they describe are not ones that i have ever heard of in Zen or nonduality, including the one you mention. In general, the Zen/self-inquiry traditions place no importance on experiences as they are so variable, fade, and becoming attached to them can be an obstacle to further awakening.
Differences between the two traditions were exhaustively discussed in the blogpost and comments in “letting go/self-inquiry/Direct path or Kenneth Folk’s/Daniel Ingram’s hardcore dharma”.
As far as comparisons between self-inquiry and Theravada in fMRI scanning, the philanthropist who actively co-sponsored the meditation research @ Yale announced in sending an interview of me to his friends that “…he lives in the present more than anyone else we have yet scanned (we have scanned 100 or so experienced meditators). He is highly functional…”. This research is covered in the blogpost “Folk who meditate decrease mind wandering” and the differences between our scans in “The neuroscience of suffering…and its end…no thoughts”.
To answer your question on the 8th jhana directly, contact Ron Serrano, a widely-acknowledged jhana master, deeply steeped in Theravada and probably the most scanned Theravadan on the East Coast, perhaps in the US. Ron is also straightforward, scientific, and honest. He worked for years in engineering and is heavily involved in his community, family and Buddhist Geeks. We have communicated a great deal and met several times; he has provided material for posts in the past. You can reach him at rons erra noa tgm aild otc om (take out the spaces).
Trust this is useful.