Not that I object to meditation by a long shot--it's just such rich world of alternatives and people deserve to know about that.
Is it though? We can at least all agree on the definition of exercise, not so with meditation. Without a common definition, I'm not sure what kind of empirical claims can be made about meditation.
Oh really.
How many miles do you run on a flat treadmill? How high of Heart BPM? How much does the individual weigh? What movement is done, for how many reps and what weight?
Now how does one parameterize the intensity/duration of a meditation session? And does it, like exercise, depend on the existing adaptations of the individual?
Kinds of distractions (subtle vs gross)
How much detail is perceived of the meditation object
Is the mind one-pointed
Are there gross physical sensations, or only subtle (like your body is a point cloud)
Are there intense, or subtle, pleasant sensations through the body
Are there constrictions in the body
What is the nature, frequency and intensity of thoughts
Is there a sensation of being a knower/subject
Stage in the Progress of Insight ( https://www.mctb.org/mctb2/table-of-contents/part-iv-insight... )
Which Jhana ( https://www.mctb.org/mctb2/table-of-contents/part-iii-the-sa... )
etc, etc.
Different traditions would be interested in different aspects of your experience, though.
IMO the best things are the brain imaging technologies, but I suppose that's far too expensive to research right now?
(Of course walking won't raise it as much as pumping iron will, but they both will, and they're both exercise.)
To me, that's the range of definitions that meditation has. I have heard that meditation should be thinking of nothing, I have heard that meditation should be reflection on the past, I have heard that meditation should be free-form thinking, or focused on the present.
This range is, to me, roughly equivalent to "meditation is basically anything, usually (but not always) involving some quite though process".
Meditation is completely nebulous, ranging from sitting down indian-style for 15 minutes to pseudoscience chakra bullshit that induces euphoria and cures diseases.
When people say they are going to exercise, you know what they are going to do. When they say they're going to meditate, it really could be anything. It is a real suitcase word.
I think you might be confusing lack of visibility, or difficulty of measurement, with indefinability.
...and a lot of people would include slow, gentle stretching in the category
> Meditation is completely nebulous
It can be nebulous to you. To other people sport can be nebulous and meditation a well understood domain.
There are lots of forms of exercise that are not done specifically to raise heart rate. I'd say most.
Is it something that increases your heart rate? Surely playing video games or watching a scary movie is not exercise.
Does it require one to walk or run around, i.e. ambulation of the lower limbs? Sit-ups and push-ups are probably exercise but don't require this.
Can you make empirical claims about exercise when one person is deadlifting 350lbs and the other is running 10 miles a day?
bodily exertion for the sake of developing and maintaining physical fitness
So video games and scary movies wouldn't count whereas sit-ups and push-ups would. Science can tell us the types of "bodily exertion" that contribute to "developing and maintaining physical fitness", that's how we can know what counts and what doesn't.
> Can you make empirical claims about exercise when one person is deadlifting 350lbs and the other is running 10 miles a day?
If you control for diet you absolutely can.
I don't think I agree with that definition of exercise.
Bodily exertion for any other sake (running from a wild animal, from a threatening person, towards an individual in need of help etc) is still exercise. There is not a requirement that it must be for the sake of developing fitness.
>If you control for diet you absolutely can.
Well, no, that's not quite true.
From my examples above, distance running is a form of cardiovascular exercise which has benefits such as stimulating the release of chemicals like BDNF, which tend have positive neurological effects. There are, obviously, also significant cardiovascular benefits - increased VO2 max, lower resting heartrate, etc.
On the other hand, deadlifting heavy weights results in major growth of the musculoskeletal system, bone density, and other benefits, but causes little benefit to cardiovasculr or neurological function.
Cardio and strength training are two entirely different beasts in the types of empirical claims you can make about the benefits they bring.
I don't see a compelling reason to dispense with a dictionary definition
> There is not a requirement that it must be for the sake of developing fitness.
It's not an exhaustive definition, but it is practical one, it's also unambiguous in its meaning, and applies to discussions about medical outcomes. Escaping from a wild animal is technically exercise but it's not really what the word is meant to convey. If you spent a day in the woods escaping from a wild bear, when you arrived home and someone asked you "what did you do today", you wouldn't say "I was out exercising" because that's just not how the word is used.
> Well, no, that's not quite true.
Yes it is true. We could make predictions about weight and muscle mass over time.
If both, we're discussing this in a context that prefers practicality and meaningful discourse. If neither, we're discussing in a context that prefers pedantry and academic hogwash. Otherwise, if one but not the other, maybe we're getting the worst of both worlds ️
It's a turn of phrase, I don't mean that literally all people will always agree on the definition of the word, I mean, practically speaking, outside of "pedantry" and "academic hogwash". I mean the scientific definition with empirical outcomes.
edit: Me being one of them. I have a hazy understanding of focal meditation (whether breath, clock ticking, whatever) and what it's supposed to accomplish. Other types of meditation are absolutely confusing to me. E.g. "visualization" - visualize what, for how long, how clear is it supposed to be, what are the benefits?
edit2: You are focusing on "push back", I am focusing on what the original poster said - meditation needs to be better defined.
If I'm absolutely wrong you then hope meditation gets unfavourable reactions or responses? Curious why you think what most would consider a positive and healthy thing as worthy of pushback? What does meditation do to deserve this pushback?
I really liked the way one Zen Buddhist put it: just sit. Don't think about something else, don't focus on passing thoughts, and don't push away passing thoughts, but you may observe them. The point of having a focal point (breath, a fixed point in front of you, an unfixed point) is mostly to give you something that's not distracting to focus on when you get distracted by a passing thought. That same master gave very specific guidelines on posture and whatnot, but at the same time he said to not worry about doing things wrong, they're just there to help you stay comfortable during a meditation session.
If you really want to give it a try, find a comfy position (not laying down, you might fall asleep), focus on something (feeling of your breath, an uninteresting point in front of you, etc), and try to avoid focusing on anything else, returning to the point you picked when you inevitably fail. It's surprisingly difficult, and you immediately get goals (sit for X minutes without distractions). If you like, pick up a book (I liked Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind), or better yet, go to a class, but that's really not necessary to just get started.
If there is one thing I have seen meditation teachers agree on, it is that meditation is not about clearing your mind. Your description of a Zen sitting practice does accommodate passing thoughts, so perhaps you mean something other than a no-thought state by a 'clear mind'?
It is sometimes possible to reach a state in which no thoughts arise for a long time (e.g. second and subsequent Jhana states) but that is quite rare for most meditators.
That's not stopping you from doing whatever you want.
That seems to be the crux of the problem though... how do we know?
There are three primary or classical types of meditation and most kinds of meditation bridge off of that, all with different experiences, goals, and results.
1) Concentration meditation, like breath meditation. This increases concentration and mindfulness increasing awareness so one can notice subtle details they could not before, most notably the causal relationship within mental states.
2) Insight meditation, like noting meditation. These kinds of meditation are used with the teachings to get enlightened, but ones mindfulness and awareness must be high before being able to yield any fruit.
3) Metta meditation. It's where you wish for good things to yourself and others. This can help cultivate positive psychological states like metta (loving kindness) and compassion.
4) Zazen, which is technically a kind of concentration meditation, is a kind of meditation where you copy the posture of the teacher in front of you mirroring their movements rounding out breathing patterns and what not. It's often a do for nothing good for nothings meditation.
And more...
Most people don't meditate correctly or go deeply enough to enter the breathless state. A lot of the popular teachers of mindfulness meditation (Kabat-Zinn, etc) never mention what happens when you allow your body to become totally still and ignore sensory input (or even that you should). Yet this leads to the Taoist's Original Breath, or Patanjali's spontaneous Kumbhaka, where the breath naturally suspends for long periods of time, and is really the doorway to deep meditation.
Sorry for people wanting medical science here - materialistic science has inherent limitations when trying to deal with subjective experiences such as the nature of consciousness itself. You'd have to convince yourself if you were interested that the states reached by e.g. intent concentration on the breath is experientially very similar to those arrived at by other methods.
BTW: I can see from your comment you've either never practiced Zazen, have no experience of it or have had a charlatan teacher.
> Fundamental awareness: A framework for integrating science, philosophy and metaphysics [1]
Satguru Bodhinatha Veylanswami recently quoted it and said it very much lines up with the Saiva Siddhanta perspective.