Other names for the lost-in-thought state
This is the third article in the series on the lost-in-thought state. Before I go on, I should mention that this state has been described in various traditions and fields under other names.
The reason I prefer “lost-in-thought state” is because this name emphasizes its most important attribute for my purposes: diminished consciousness. None of the other common names refer to this crucial fact.
Here’s a list of terms prepared by Claude Sonnet 3.5. I haven’t checked it for accuracy so it may contain some mistakes.
Default Mode Activity (DMA): Neuroscience term for the brain's "idle" or wandering state
Mind-wandering: Psychology/cognitive science
Discursive thinking: Buddhist terminology
Monkey mind: Buddhist terminology
Vibbhanta-citta; Buddhist terminology
Scattered mind/scattered thinking: General usage
Rumination: Psychology/clinical context
Stream of consciousness: Psychology/literature
Mental chatter: Colloquial/meditation contexts
Cognitive noise: Psychology
Spontaneous thought: Cognitive science
Self-generated thought: Neuroscience/psychology
Stimulus-independent thought: Scientific literature
Woolgathering: Traditional English term
Daydreaming: Common usage
These terms emphasize various important aspects of this state—its involuntary nature, its role as the brain's default mode, its separation from immediate experience, its typical content—but none highlights the fact that is most relevant for this blog: consciousness is diminished or absent in this state. While lost in thought, we don't know what we're thinking or even that we're thinking.
I would say when we’re in the lost-in-thought state, consciousness isn’t lost, but the awareness of consciousness is lost.
Absence of consciousness must imply the state of a computer for example. It can still process or produce information but it is not aware of any of this. But we humans are almost always aware of the contents of the consciousness, the information, unless we get a concussion etc. and get unconscious or are in deep sleep.
So from that point of view there are three levels, not two and we are in the second by default:
1- No consciousness
2- Consciousness
3- Awareness (or consciousness) of consciousness
The third one may also be called awareness of the Self, with or without the knowing that it’s the Self. If it is with this knowing, then it is the awakened (enlightened, Self-Realized) state.
What do you think?