A Penny For Your Thoughts
Meditation teachers will often refer to scientific studies on the effects of meditation, such as the Dalai Lama’s well-publicized cooperation with western neuroscientists, which goes back more than 30 years.
As a garden-variety practitioner, I never imagined my brainwaves would be of interest to the scientific community.
However, when our Wednesday evening meditation group leader forwarded an email from the CMU Brain-Computer Interaction lab recruiting experienced meditators as subjects, I decided to sign up. After all, I had the requisite background, ample free time, a modicum of curiosity, and willingness to pocket some easy cash.
The experiment’s primary question: “Does meditation help you learn how to control a computer with just your mind?”
This is part of their larger investigation into decoding a user’s mental intent solely through neural signals, to enable patients with a variety of neurological dysfunctions, such as stroke, ALS, and spinal cord injuries to control devices such as robotic arms, quadcopters, and so forth. There are explanatory videos on the lab’s web page.
And we won’t mention the obvious military and espionage applications of this technology, except perhaps to highlight its applicability for control of huge Gundam-style mecha-robots!
Over the past month, I went to the lab for five identical two-hour sessions. Each session began with the lengthy task of fitting and wiring up an EEG cap with about six dozen electrodes. Then the actual experiment, followed by calibrating the cap and washing gobs of electro-conductive gel out of my hair.
The experiment comprised a series of tasks wherein I controlled the movement of a dot on a computer screen on one axis (left/right), then another axis (up/down), and then both dimensions at once. To move the dot required only that I think about moving my left hand, my right hand, both hands, or neither.
That “neither” is a “gotcha” for most people, because how do you go from concentrating on your hands to not thinking about them? It’s a direct example of psychology’s “ironic rebound”, whereby deliberate attempts to suppress a thought actually makes it more likely (e.g. don’t think about a pink elephant).
It was wondrous seeing such thought processes play out on screen. I’d move my attention from right hand to left, but if the subtlest attempt to not think about the right hand crept into my mind, the cursor would stubbornly swerve in that direction.
However, an experienced meditator knows that we have only crude control over our minds, and quickly recognizes that “gotcha” because they've experienced it thousands of times. They’ve learned strategies for sidestepping it, such as dropping all thought by focusing on other sense input, or redirection (e.g. mentally reciting the list of prime numbers). So a meditative background was very beneficial for me.
After starting at a modest level, over time my accuracy and performance improved. And importantly for me, the amount of mental strain and fatigue I experienced fell away, too.
The experiments also confirmed my perceived pattern of learning and proficiency. In nearly any new field (with a few well-known exceptions), I’ll display remarkable initial aptitude, then gain basic proficiency steadily and quickly. However, not long after, I become complacent and my skill level plateaus, while others who started at a lower level of proficiency catch up and potentially surpass me. That was my experience in graphic design school, and it was confirmed by the lead researcher in these brain-computer interface experiments.
The CMU study called for six visits doing the same experiment, followed by a seventh that would feature a different set of tasks. Unfortunately, this was taking place while the COVID-19 pandemic was spreading into the US, causing universities like CMU to send students home; so out of an abundance of caution I regretfully cancelled the final two experiments. I was kinda looking forward to that final session, and the extra $160 that I forwent.
But now I can officially say that my brain was the subject of scientific inquiry and experimentation, and that I’ve contributed to the growing body of scientific knowledge about the effectiveness of meditation. And having done a proof-of-concept that I can control a computer with my mind, the next step will be total world domination!
Although due to concern over the spread of COVID-19, right now I’m focusing all my efforts on opening doorknobs using my mind, rather than my hands...