In Defence of Bare Attention: A Phenomenological Interpretation of Mindfulness

0508092 - FLÚ 2020 RIV GB eng J - Článek v odborném periodiku
Puc, Jan
In Defence of Bare Attention: A Phenomenological Interpretation of Mindfulness.
Journal of Consciousness Studies. Roč. 26, 5/6 (2019), s. 170-190. ISSN 1355-8250
Grant CEP: GA ČR(CZ) GJ16-00994Y
Institucionální podpora: RVO:67985955
Klíčová slova: Mindfulness * mindfulness meditation * attention * phenomenology
Obor OECD: Philosophy, History and Philosophy of science and technology
Impakt faktor: 0.859, rok: 2019
Způsob publikování: Omezený přístup
https://www.ingentaconnect.com/contentone/imp/jcs/2019/00000026/f0020005/art00007

Mindfulness is arguably the most important concept to have transplanted from Buddhist thought to contemporary Western psychology. However, whilst mindfulness was already an ambiguous term in the original context, specified more by a set of practices than by a clear definition, its cross-cultural transmission has blurred its content even further. In this paper, I assess the recent criticism of the widespread definition of mindfulness as non-elaborative, purely receptive ‘bare attention’. According to the critics of bare attention, what can be characterized as purely receptive is the automatic turning of attention toward an object. But should mindfulness be a quality of consciousness that is to be established and developed by the reflexive practice of meditation, it must be something more than this automatic turning of attention. This paper shows how the definition of mindfulness as bare attention can be defended by explicating it in terms of the phenomenological model of attention.
Trvalý link: http://hdl.handle.net/11104/0299083