03/16/2023 “How Perception and Memory Shape Experience” with Rick Maddock

How Perception and Memory Shape Experience – converging views from neuroscience and early Buddhist teachings

Many of the Buddha’s teachings have close parallels in modern neuroscience. This talk will explore these parallels, with a particular focus on how perception and memory shape experience. Early Buddhist teachings on perception and emptiness point to insights that can be valuable supports for dharma practice. Similar insights emerge from modern studies of the perceptual circuits of the brain. Neuroplasticity, or how the brain is changed by experience, is viewed by neuroscientists as the basis of all forms of memory. Early Buddhist and Yogacara teachings on karma and the “storehouse” (alaya) emphasize how this principle affects our practice and well-being. A similar perspective underlies the effectiveness of many modern psychotherapies.