6. Spatial perception

The most basic assumption we have about objective reality is our own spatially derived presence, whereby our surroundings provide the context for our own presence. Neurologists point to the posterior superior parietal lobe-the portion of the brain Newberg and D’Aquili have dubbed the orientation association area, or OAA:

“The primary job of the OAA is to orient the individual in physical space-it keeps track of which end is up, helps us judge angles and distances, and allows us to negotiate safely the dangerous physical landscape around us. To perform this crucial function, it must first generate a clear, consistent cognition of the physical limits of the self. In simpler terms, it must draw a sharp distinction between the individual and everything else, to sort out the you from the infinite not-you that makes up the rest of the universe.”

In their best-seller, Why God Won’t Go Away, they suggest that reduced neural activity in the OAA during transcendence indicates a deficit condition resulting from a lack of information processing:

“Would the orientation area interpret its failure to find the borderline between the self and the outside world to mean that such a distinction doesn’t exist? In that case, the brain would have no choice but to perceive that the self is endless and intimately interwoven with everyone and everything the mind senses. And this perception would feel utterly and unquestionably real.”

However, by assuming that the spatial limits of the self are the absolute limits of the self, they overlook the key attribute of transcendence, which is the heightened sense of immediacy. They fail to acknowledge that the brain has to first generate a perspective from which to interpret the spatial boundary of the self.

One’s perspective emerges from optic flow; those movements in the scenery that are attributed to one’s own movement. In essence, the mind uses these movements for the sake of determining one’s moving perspective. Since the correlation between these movements and one’s own motion is immediate, the relationship between them contributes to one’s sense of immediacy. However, while our perspective resides in the present moment, the interpretation of space suppresses our experience of the present moment by harnessing our perspective to navigate space. The mechanism that renders the world as spatial does so at the expense of our own immediacy.

We use a variety of cues to perceive depth; motion is only one of many. One of the most powerful cues to depth, especially at short distances, is binocular disparity, the difference in the images received by each eye. Additionally, we make use of accommodation, the thickening and thinning of the lens of the eye to better focus on near and far objects respectively. Additionally, we use a number of pictorial cues to depth, such as the fact that nearer objects occlude further objects (occlusion), nearer objects are larger than further objects (relative size) and are further from the horizon (relative position).

Although motion is not the only means by which depth is interpreted, it distinguishes itself from all other depth cues by virtue of its temporality. Depth variations revealed by motion are determined across time. The mind determines the shape of an object, or an empty space, based on how its appearance changes over time. These changes in appearance only make sense to the extent that they are relative to the observer’s perspective. So, the process of determining depth through motion effectively harnesses the observer’s perspective, with the result that our sense of immediacy is dulled.

Space seems like a solid foundation for presence, however, it is not as fundamental as it seems. As far as perception is concerned, it is a façade that masks the fluidity of one’s perspective. Paradoxically, this fluidity is more resilient than space, because it is the foundation for spatial perception. Through meditation it is possible to retract one’s awareness from the world, and in so doing dissolve the division between one’s perspective and the object of one’s attention, such that one’s very perspective becomes the object. Then, one does not see the surroundings so much as the movements in the surroundings that indicate one’s own motion. Subject and object merge and the here-and-now becomes palpable.

The “sharp distinction between the individual and everything else” only applies to our spatial presence. Our immediacy extends beyond this boundary. The so-called inner and outer worlds are intertwined within our consciousness. One’s perspective emerges from the changing appearance of one’s surroundings and the so-called “outer” reality only gains its spatial character from the projection of one’s own presence. What emerges from this discussion, however, is the distinction between spatial and temporal relations, where space is in fact ‘imagined’ and the nature of transcendence extends beyond our physical boundary.

While it is perfectly sensible to treat the world as objectively present, the spatial paradigm is by definition divisive. By contrast, the temporal paradigm is inclusive. However, the nature of this connection is not to be understood in spatial terms. It sounds absurd to say that: “the self is endless and intimately interwoven with everyone and everything the mind senses” without first dissolving the spatial paradigm. It infers that the mind is misinterpreting its relationship to the world. On the contrary, during transcendence, the mind perceives the foundation of its own presence. The extraordinary connection felt during meditation doesn’t just feel real it is real. But it is a connection to the present moment, rather than the physical world as such.

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Surfism : Emergence : Articulation : Synaesthesia : Semiosis :
Spatial perception : Dimensions : Evolution : Conclusion