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• Unconvincing claims in this article
  Josef Mattes
  Published on: 4 April 2018

• Published on: 4 April 2018

  Unconvincing claims in this article

  • Josef Mattes, Researcher Universität Wien

  On p.5 the authors comment on the use of mindfulness exercises as "a tool to relieve suffering
  and increase functioning". They claim that "This goes against common epistemic values" where these epistemic values are described as "the sort of values that lead one to accept uncomfortable truths, and to be honest, even brutally honest, with oneself."
  As far as I can see there is no argument given for that claim, and what is more, it seems to go precisely contrary to the purpose of mindfulness exercises in that these are intended to enable one to be honest with oneself and face uncomfortable truths (e.g.: "... we cultivate acceptance by taking each moment as it comes and being with it fully, as it is [...] receptive and open to whatever we are feeling, thinking, or seeing". [Kabat-Zinn, Full catastrophe living, p.28f: https://books.google.at/books?id=fIuNDtnb2ZkC]). Mindfulness is to a large extent a tool to enable one be "honest, even brutally honest, with oneself".

  There is a number of other strange claims in this article, I will mention only one: "Suppose an atheist was having trouble coping emotionally with a natural disaster in which there were many casualties. They might object to imagining the people who died in the disaster frolicking in heaven, even if doing so would help them cope. They do not believe in heaven, thus the imaginati...

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  On p.5 the authors comment on the use of mindfulness exercises as "a tool to relieve suffering
  and increase functioning". They claim that "This goes against common epistemic values" where these epistemic values are described as "the sort of values that lead one to accept uncomfortable truths, and to be honest, even brutally honest, with oneself."
  As far as I can see there is no argument given for that claim, and what is more, it seems to go precisely contrary to the purpose of mindfulness exercises in that these are intended to enable one to be honest with oneself and face uncomfortable truths (e.g.: "... we cultivate acceptance by taking each moment as it comes and being with it fully, as it is [...] receptive and open to whatever we are feeling, thinking, or seeing". [Kabat-Zinn, Full catastrophe living, p.28f: https://books.google.at/books?id=fIuNDtnb2ZkC]). Mindfulness is to a large extent a tool to enable one be "honest, even brutally honest, with oneself".

  There is a number of other strange claims in this article, I will mention only one: "Suppose an atheist was having trouble coping emotionally with a natural disaster in which there were many casualties. They might object to imagining the people who died in the disaster frolicking in heaven, even if doing so would help them cope. They do not believe in heaven, thus the imaginative exercise is in tension with their core beliefs. Mindfulness exercises involve a similar tension with the core beliefs." Well, I am an atheist, and I would have no qualms whatsoever about such an imaginative exercise - after all, it is just imagination (of course, I would find it a bit surreal, but so what if it helps).

  Discussing the alleged "metaphysical loadedness" of mindfulness exercises would need more space and time than I have here, but that claim seems no more convincing to me than the ones above, despite the constant repetition of this claim in the article.

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  Conflict of Interest:
  None declared.

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