12 ms·

The Long Marriage of Mindfulness and Money

39 points by nether 12y ago

verytrivial 12y ago
Deepak Chopra. First sentence. Next!
- vanderZwan 12y ago
  The article neither about him, nor is mindfullness a quack method unverified by science. And even if it was, a report on how this method is embraced by Wall Street can still be worthy of your time.
  - sago 12y ago
    > nor is mindfullness a quack method unverified by science What specific benefits had mindfulness been verified to provide, in comparison to placebo meditation? I'd be very grateful for any references to peer-reviewed study.
    - vanderZwan 12y ago
      That's a very specific question, and I'm no expert on the matter. Although I think that comparing it to "placebo meditation" is like comparing two types of exercise to each other, within the larger debate of whether exercising in general is useful or not. Here's a visualisation by Information Is Beautiful, along with the list of sources used: http://www.informationisbeautiful.net/visualizations/what-is-meditation-mindfulness-good-for/ http://www.informationisbeautiful.net/visualizations/what-is... https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1m_tiYlDIyNpp6WGUgKd5nTu6r7MySFqIc5MDS0JJSoM/edit#gid=7 https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1m_tiYlDIyNpp6WGUgKd5...
      - sago 12y ago
        Excellent. The list of articles is interesting. More has been done than I thought had been done, and it is interesting stuff. The visualisation I find a problem, because it masks the nuances of thed studies and verges on the misrepresentation. But the underlying studies definitely feed my concern. There is the issue of whether mindfulness meditation is anything more than a coincidental piggyback on meditation. But there are several studies in the list that, while not directly controlling for that, certainly provide strong circumstantial evidence (most of the linked research is not about mindfulness at all). So I definitely take back the more extreme tone of my skepticism, (for whatever that is worth!)
    - pvnick 12y ago
      How would you define "placebo meditation"?
      - sago 12y ago
        To verify a method scientifically, one must compare it to something with the same structure but different content. To verify a tablet, one compares it to another tablet without the purported active ingredient, to verify traditional acupressure, you would compare it to pressure applied in arbitrary places, to verify mindfulness meditation, you would have to compare it against things with a meditative form, but without the mindfulness content. I think that hasn't been done. At best investigations are general and barely scientific. It is very dubious to claim that science has demonstrated this is not a quack technique.
        Sacho 12y ago
        I don't know why you're getting downvoted without anyone challenging your argument. I completely agree that the parent comment about being "unverified by science" is bogus(is it? where? citations, links?). However, I wouldn't dismiss this meditation effect outright - after all, even placebo medication can have effects compared to no medication. As long as it doesn't try to wear the trappings of "scientifically tested", it might be a neat "works for me" trick.
        sago 12y ago
        I agree, in fact, my intuition is that meditation is probably beneficial. And I suspect that might be demonstrable scientifically, though it would be tough, and probably quite vague at best. I was only reacting to the over-hyped claims about this modality. The downvotes I think are because the people who are reading are more likely to be invested in it enough to trawl through the comments, and anything that suggests disbelief, even if not read properly, is automatically anathema.
        vanderZwan 12y ago
        > (is it? where? citations, links?) I posted an excel sheet full of links, which you apparently didn't bother to check out. And before someone tries to pull an ad-hominem of me being a floaty alternative person: I studied physics and am the son of two doctors of the mainstream I-hate-alternative-medicine bullshit kind. The only reason I know anything about mindfulness is because I have a sister (with a master degree in biology, so natural sciences again), who is currently doing her PhD on mindfulness as a stress reduction method at the University of Amsterdam.
    - rikibro 12y ago
      There are no studies like that since there is no such thing as placebo meditation. Meditation, in general, for the usual western mind, can be seen as mental hygiene. I could guess you never read a study about the benefits of oral hygiene but you probably never doubt its benefits - because of culture (parents/school). "Our" culture is very advance in many "sciences" but is a child in others. Give it some decades - your grandchildren will teach their children about meditation, in the same manner any parent, nowadays, teach their kids to brush their teeth before bed. Answering your question, even though I don't know (and care) about peer-reviewed studies about this, I can tell you that mindfulness has many benefits (verified by myself) and I've experienced most benefits given by the first link of [vanderZwan] reply. By the way, one can reach a state of "being in the zone" with much more ease (which is a requirement to excel at any sports): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flow_(psychology) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flow_(psychology)
      - sago 12y ago
        Quite a diferrent claim from "it works for me" to "it is verified by science". Google scholar shows over 2 million results for published articles on oral health. Pubmed has several thousand of them. You really want to pretend that's a cultural thing? It is quite clear you don't care about peer-reviewed science. That's your prerogative. I wouldn't have commented if the OP hadn't implied that mindfulness specifically (not meditation generally) had scientific verification. > Give it some decades - your grandchildren will teach their children about meditation That is an easy claim "in a few years, you'll all be scientologists" is just as simple. And, even if true, would have no bearing on whether mindfulness meditation is verified or not. > flow Can you show scientific evidence that meditation improves the achievement of flow? That's a new claim I've not seen before. Again, easy to say. I don't think it impossible, but I'd like to see that it is more than something you're making up.
        goldfeld 12y ago
        If science is your only and absolute god, you're as fundamentalist, blind and prone to being deceived as a diehard religious person.
    - DennisP 12y ago
      A simple google for "mindfulness study" brings up some interesting material. At the top is this review of a couple dozen studies: http://marc.ucla.edu/workfiles/pdfs/MARC-mindfulness-research-summary.pdf http://marc.ucla.edu/workfiles/pdfs/MARC-mindfulness-researc... I haven't attempted to look at the studies in detail, but it should be pretty easy to pull up peer-reviewed work if you're really interested.
    - mtalantikite 12y ago
      The body of research might still be small, but it's growing. Here is one researcher at Mass General/Harvard that has published on it: https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=Y0qQluMAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=sra https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=Y0qQluMAAAAJ&hl=en... There is a group at UMass medical that has been doing work in the area for a few decades: http://www.umassmed.edu/cfm/ http://www.umassmed.edu/cfm/ Of course more research needs to be done. Maybe a limiting factor in the past was the technology available to investigate neurobiology. As we understand the brain more I'm sure we'll see an increase in data on meditation.
dasil003 12y ago
> Brendel’s fear is that meditation might make executives too mellow and compassionate Won't someone please think of the shareholders!
- afarrell 12y ago
  Both of these things lead to indecision "I don't know right from wrong all the time, I wish I did, but one thing I cannot be is indecisive." - Frank Underwood to an Arab in a wheelchair, justifying his choice to blow that man's legs off via drone strike.
pvnick 12y ago
Interesting that they mention mindfulness as we know it today is been gutted of theological meaning. I would say that is largely true of modern mindfulness, but it doesn't have to be the case. Christianity, for example, has a form of prayer called "centering prayer," in which one mindfully meditates on God while letting distracting thoughts flow away [1]. The parallels between westernized mindfulness and centering prayer are notable, and I find it encourages an opportunity for deeper spirituality than the more ubiquitous conversant prayer ("God, please forgive me for lying and oh can you please let the Patriots win the Super Bowl"). I have been practicing both for a couple weeks now and I find I am much better able to concentrate on focus-driven tasks like reading literature, something I have always struggled with due to a history of ADHD. [1] http://cct.biola.edu/blog/2014/aug/04/when-strivings-cease/ http://cct.biola.edu/blog/2014/aug/04/when-strivings-cease/
kylek 12y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fugio_Cent https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fugio_Cent
westoncb 12y ago
A funny error in the article: "The Varieties of Religious Experience" was written by William James, not Henry James—it'd be a very different book if his brother had written it. The article tries to give the impression that mindfulness meditation as it appears in the U.S. is more of a money making gimmick than an effectively distilled version of the Eastern tradition. Undoubtedly people will try to make money off of it and you'll have plenty of books/teachers who present it in a disconnected fashion whose only efficacy derives from the placebo effect (which will probably be enough for it to spread with good reputation through corporate culture). That said, there's a pretty long tradition of smart people who've been trying in earnest to interpret meditation practice and Eastern philosophical concepts in a Western framework. There's a lot of variety in the results, sure—but at the same time there's a core set of ideas and practices that have an internal consistency, and—in my opinion—which fill an important gap in the typical U.S. life philosophy. In particular, it offers a solution to the problem of, "what greater ultimate goal can I have for life than obtaining positive experiences and avoiding negative ones, if I'm basically an experience machine who will cease to exist after X years?"—without asking people to have faith in some positive metaphysical system. Additionally, meditation can be powerfully instructive in letting people see/remember certain aspects of being human that it's easy to lose after spending years feeling driven to accomplish some goals.

39 points by nether 12y ago

verytrivial 12y ago

Deepak Chopra. First sentence. Next!

vanderZwan 12y ago
The article neither about him, nor is mindfullness a quack method unverified by science. And even if it was, a report on how this method is embraced by Wall Street can still be worthy of your time.
- sago 12y ago
  > nor is mindfullness a quack method unverified by science What specific benefits had mindfulness been verified to provide, in comparison to placebo meditation? I'd be very grateful for any references to peer-reviewed study.
  - vanderZwan 12y ago
    That's a very specific question, and I'm no expert on the matter. Although I think that comparing it to "placebo meditation" is like comparing two types of exercise to each other, within the larger debate of whether exercising in general is useful or not. Here's a visualisation by Information Is Beautiful, along with the list of sources used: http://www.informationisbeautiful.net/visualizations/what-is-meditation-mindfulness-good-for/ http://www.informationisbeautiful.net/visualizations/what-is... https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1m_tiYlDIyNpp6WGUgKd5nTu6r7MySFqIc5MDS0JJSoM/edit#gid=7 https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1m_tiYlDIyNpp6WGUgKd5...
    - sago 12y ago
      Excellent. The list of articles is interesting. More has been done than I thought had been done, and it is interesting stuff. The visualisation I find a problem, because it masks the nuances of thed studies and verges on the misrepresentation. But the underlying studies definitely feed my concern. There is the issue of whether mindfulness meditation is anything more than a coincidental piggyback on meditation. But there are several studies in the list that, while not directly controlling for that, certainly provide strong circumstantial evidence (most of the linked research is not about mindfulness at all). So I definitely take back the more extreme tone of my skepticism, (for whatever that is worth!)
  - pvnick 12y ago
    How would you define "placebo meditation"?
    - sago 12y ago
      To verify a method scientifically, one must compare it to something with the same structure but different content. To verify a tablet, one compares it to another tablet without the purported active ingredient, to verify traditional acupressure, you would compare it to pressure applied in arbitrary places, to verify mindfulness meditation, you would have to compare it against things with a meditative form, but without the mindfulness content. I think that hasn't been done. At best investigations are general and barely scientific. It is very dubious to claim that science has demonstrated this is not a quack technique.
      - Sacho 12y ago
        I don't know why you're getting downvoted without anyone challenging your argument. I completely agree that the parent comment about being "unverified by science" is bogus(is it? where? citations, links?). However, I wouldn't dismiss this meditation effect outright - after all, even placebo medication can have effects compared to no medication. As long as it doesn't try to wear the trappings of "scientifically tested", it might be a neat "works for me" trick.
        sago 12y ago
        I agree, in fact, my intuition is that meditation is probably beneficial. And I suspect that might be demonstrable scientifically, though it would be tough, and probably quite vague at best. I was only reacting to the over-hyped claims about this modality. The downvotes I think are because the people who are reading are more likely to be invested in it enough to trawl through the comments, and anything that suggests disbelief, even if not read properly, is automatically anathema.
        vanderZwan 12y ago
        > (is it? where? citations, links?) I posted an excel sheet full of links, which you apparently didn't bother to check out. And before someone tries to pull an ad-hominem of me being a floaty alternative person: I studied physics and am the son of two doctors of the mainstream I-hate-alternative-medicine bullshit kind. The only reason I know anything about mindfulness is because I have a sister (with a master degree in biology, so natural sciences again), who is currently doing her PhD on mindfulness as a stress reduction method at the University of Amsterdam.
  - rikibro 12y ago
    There are no studies like that since there is no such thing as placebo meditation. Meditation, in general, for the usual western mind, can be seen as mental hygiene. I could guess you never read a study about the benefits of oral hygiene but you probably never doubt its benefits - because of culture (parents/school). "Our" culture is very advance in many "sciences" but is a child in others. Give it some decades - your grandchildren will teach their children about meditation, in the same manner any parent, nowadays, teach their kids to brush their teeth before bed. Answering your question, even though I don't know (and care) about peer-reviewed studies about this, I can tell you that mindfulness has many benefits (verified by myself) and I've experienced most benefits given by the first link of [vanderZwan] reply. By the way, one can reach a state of "being in the zone" with much more ease (which is a requirement to excel at any sports): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flow_(psychology) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flow_(psychology)
    - sago 12y ago
      Quite a diferrent claim from "it works for me" to "it is verified by science". Google scholar shows over 2 million results for published articles on oral health. Pubmed has several thousand of them. You really want to pretend that's a cultural thing? It is quite clear you don't care about peer-reviewed science. That's your prerogative. I wouldn't have commented if the OP hadn't implied that mindfulness specifically (not meditation generally) had scientific verification. > Give it some decades - your grandchildren will teach their children about meditation That is an easy claim "in a few years, you'll all be scientologists" is just as simple. And, even if true, would have no bearing on whether mindfulness meditation is verified or not. > flow Can you show scientific evidence that meditation improves the achievement of flow? That's a new claim I've not seen before. Again, easy to say. I don't think it impossible, but I'd like to see that it is more than something you're making up.
      - goldfeld 12y ago
        If science is your only and absolute god, you're as fundamentalist, blind and prone to being deceived as a diehard religious person.
  - DennisP 12y ago
    A simple google for "mindfulness study" brings up some interesting material. At the top is this review of a couple dozen studies: http://marc.ucla.edu/workfiles/pdfs/MARC-mindfulness-research-summary.pdf http://marc.ucla.edu/workfiles/pdfs/MARC-mindfulness-researc... I haven't attempted to look at the studies in detail, but it should be pretty easy to pull up peer-reviewed work if you're really interested.
  - mtalantikite 12y ago
    The body of research might still be small, but it's growing. Here is one researcher at Mass General/Harvard that has published on it: https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=Y0qQluMAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=sra https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=Y0qQluMAAAAJ&hl=en... There is a group at UMass medical that has been doing work in the area for a few decades: http://www.umassmed.edu/cfm/ http://www.umassmed.edu/cfm/ Of course more research needs to be done. Maybe a limiting factor in the past was the technology available to investigate neurobiology. As we understand the brain more I'm sure we'll see an increase in data on meditation.

dasil003 12y ago

> Brendel’s fear is that meditation might make executives too mellow and compassionate Won't someone please think of the shareholders!

afarrell 12y ago
Both of these things lead to indecision "I don't know right from wrong all the time, I wish I did, but one thing I cannot be is indecisive." - Frank Underwood to an Arab in a wheelchair, justifying his choice to blow that man's legs off via drone strike.

pvnick 12y ago

Interesting that they mention mindfulness as we know it today is been gutted of theological meaning. I would say that is largely true of modern mindfulness, but it doesn't have to be the case. Christianity, for example, has a form of prayer called "centering prayer," in which one mindfully meditates on God while letting distracting thoughts flow away [1]. The parallels between westernized mindfulness and centering prayer are notable, and I find it encourages an opportunity for deeper spirituality than the more ubiquitous conversant prayer ("God, please forgive me for lying and oh can you please let the Patriots win the Super Bowl"). I have been practicing both for a couple weeks now and I find I am much better able to concentrate on focus-driven tasks like reading literature, something I have always struggled with due to a history of ADHD. [1] http://cct.biola.edu/blog/2014/aug/04/when-strivings-cease/ http://cct.biola.edu/blog/2014/aug/04/when-strivings-cease/

kylek 12y ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fugio_Cent https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fugio_Cent

westoncb 12y ago

A funny error in the article: "The Varieties of Religious Experience" was written by William James, not Henry James—it'd be a very different book if his brother had written it. The article tries to give the impression that mindfulness meditation as it appears in the U.S. is more of a money making gimmick than an effectively distilled version of the Eastern tradition. Undoubtedly people will try to make money off of it and you'll have plenty of books/teachers who present it in a disconnected fashion whose only efficacy derives from the placebo effect (which will probably be enough for it to spread with good reputation through corporate culture). That said, there's a pretty long tradition of smart people who've been trying in earnest to interpret meditation practice and Eastern philosophical concepts in a Western framework. There's a lot of variety in the results, sure—but at the same time there's a core set of ideas and practices that have an internal consistency, and—in my opinion—which fill an important gap in the typical U.S. life philosophy. In particular, it offers a solution to the problem of, "what greater ultimate goal can I have for life than obtaining positive experiences and avoiding negative ones, if I'm basically an experience machine who will cease to exist after X years?"—without asking people to have faith in some positive metaphysical system. Additionally, meditation can be powerfully instructive in letting people see/remember certain aspects of being human that it's easy to lose after spending years feeling driven to accomplish some goals.