Spectral signatures of increased entropy and coherence during different meditative traditions

TAGLIZUCCHI, ENZO; MARTINEZ VIVOT, ROCIO

Garrison, Nueva York

Conferencia; Interconnection, Inclusivity and Transdisciplinary Collaboration in Contemplative Research; 2018

Mind and Life Institute

It has been recently hypothesized that states of consciousness can be ordered along a continuum indexed by the entropy of the associated brain dynamics1. Empirical evidence supports the association of states of reduced consciousness (e.g. anesthesia, sleep) with reduced entropy, and states of expanded consciousness (e.g. psychedelic state) with increased entropy.Given the phenomenological commonalities between certain meditative or contemplative practices and aspects of the psychedelic experience (e.g. sense of unity, loss of ego boundaries, ego dissolution, dissociation, etc) we hypothesized that the meditative state could be characterized by an increased level of entropy as measured with EEG.