The Second Apocalypse
Miscellaneous Chatter => Philosophy & Science => Topic started by: sciborg2 on September 13, 2013, 04:20:10 am
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I mentioned in the Hungry Ghosts thread that I'd make a new thread to talk about the actual therapeutic value of psychedelics.
I wanted to step away from the paranormal aspects, though I'll try to find some stuff about the life review process that occurs in some (many?) ayahuasca and ibogaine cases. People seem to be guided in these reviews by entities, but discussion about the nature of said entities is better left to the ghost thread.
Knowledge from all spheres welcome, as well as any contrary evidence that these drugs are bad. Just note that we aren't talking about recreational use here, though a discussion about self-medicating does fit.
Why Doctors Can't Give You LSD (But Maybe They Should) (http://www.popsci.com/science/article/2013-04/new-science-lsd-therapy)
Part of the problem with studying psychedelics--and other illicit drugs, such as marijuana--for medical use, is simply that they're not high-tech, and no pharmaceutical company needs or wants to get involved. There's no money in it for them. Though drugs like LSD and psilocybin are relatively easy to make in the lab, as MAPS founder Rick Doblin pointed out in a 2012 interview, "psychedelics are off-patent, can’t be monopolized, and compete with other psychiatric medications that people take daily."
"My colleagues say to me, in these days of nanotechology and targeted therapy, what are you doing?" says Donald Abrams, a professor of medicine at the University of California, San Francisco who has done research on medical marijuana. "We live in the 21st century. Studying plants as medicine is not where most investigators are putting their money."
And without the outside funding to continue researching, a scientist's career goes nowhere, so even fewer scientists want to get involved.
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Common drug fallacies:
A drug is what it is called or what you have been told it is: Unless you have a testing kit, you don't know. Anyone who has ever bought ecstacy knows this one. We can smell, touch, taste and see the substance, but we can't automatically identify what it is composed of.
Prohibition fallacy: It is commonly assumed that because drugs are prohibited, they must therefore actually be safe/good/a radical posture of defiant individualist heroics. Just because their harms are routinely exaggerated or theatricised does not therefore mean they are safe.
Creativity fallacy: Drugs do not enhance creative ability, only alter neuro physiology. This may or may not enhance ability in a favourable way.
Feeling fallacy: what little effects of drug use we are able to consciously notice are not trustworthy markers of the total affects the drug is having. Cokeheads don't consciously intend to become hyper sexual gibbering creeps but it happens. The positive effects of a drug are usually temporary and override our rationality with cravings that make us neglect to consider long term consequences. If brain damage is the loss of neurological capabilities, then it stands to reason it would feel fun as hell. Being stupider is probably a welcome relief to everyone.
Control fallacy: we are not able to consciously control the effects drugs have on us. We can only notice their affects after the fact, and usually we have very poor insight even then.
Dopamine bias: I am too scientifically ignorant to speak on this, but would I be correct in saying most drugs release a short burst of pleasure chemicals which cause us to crave them in spite of other more detrimental affects?
Erowid bias: the tendency to attribute mystical or religious insight to a conscious state brought about by narcotics while remaining in total ignorance of the physical state of ones brain. It is not controversial to say that certain neurological states are responsible for our feelings of religious insight. A sounder method would be to scientifically deduce these rather than shovelling dubious plants into our stomachs and hoping for the best.
You may sense a slight bitterness to my post. I'm just suffering from Junkie bias: being surrounded by dim witted hedonists and new age hippies for so long one becomes desensitised to the correlation between stupid enthusiasm for narcotics and the rate of psych ward institutionalizations and wrecked lives.
Having said all that I hope to see the day when a sound understanding of the possible therapeutic effects of certain drugs becomes uncontroversial.
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Every time I try to discuss this with people,they tend to dismiss it because of its legality issues.There is just no way that the government would keep these substances illegal if they were of great value.Especially if they would be beneficial in therapy or medicine,it would be almost a crime against humanity to keep these substances illegal.So the question is why are they illegal? Where I live(Norway) people put these substances in the same category as crack,speed and heroine,so called heavy and dangerous drugs.That is simply not true,if you have had any experience with psychedelics,you just know that is bullshit.
Part of the problem with studying psychedelics--and other illicit drugs, such as marijuana--for medical use, is simply that they're not high-tech, and no pharmaceutical company needs or wants to get involved. There's no money in it for them. Though drugs like LSD and psilocybin are relatively easy to make in the lab, as MAPS founder Rick Doblin pointed out in a 2012 interview, "psychedelics are off-patent, can’t be monopolized, and compete with other psychiatric medications that people take daily."
It seems plausible that this is a political/business issue.If anyone have read "The emperor wears no clothes" by Jack Herer,you will see that there are hundreds of areas where you can use hemp.Even the hemp plants that you can`t get high on are illegal.
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A drug is what it is called or what you have been told it is: Unless you have a testing kit, you don't know. Anyone who has ever bought ecstacy knows this one. We can smell, touch, taste and see the substance, but we can't automatically identify what it is composed of.
I agree,lots of dirty drugs out there.On the other hand,if you pick your own mushroom in the woods,you know what it is right? nobody fucked around with that mushroom,it is pure.
Prohibition fallacy: It is commonly assumed that because drugs are prohibited, they must therefore actually be safe/good/a radical posture of defiant individualist heroics. Just because their harms are routinely exaggerated or theatricised does not therefore mean they are safe.
I agree about the safety part.No drug is safe,you take a risk.I am not promoting the use of psychedelics,you should treat it with respect and use it only if you feel you can gain something from it.You can easily provoke a bad trip just out of fear(my own experience),and doing it a "wrong" setting with the "wrong" people.
I think that when evidence shows that these substances can be helpful in therapy,we should look into it more.
Erowid bias: the tendency to attribute mystical or religious insight to a conscious state brought about by narcotics while remaining in total ignorance of the physical state of ones brain. It is not controversial to say that certain neurological states are responsible for our feelings of religious insight. A sounder method would be to scientifically deduce these rather than shovelling dubious plants into our stomachs and hoping for the best.
Well,you just slammed many cultures who have used these substances for thousands of years :) I think we need to show some humility toward this,because this seem to work in these various cultures.To throw science in their faces would not do any good.
You may sense a slight bitterness to my post. I'm just suffering from Junkie bias: being surrounded by dim witted hedonists and new age hippies for so long one becomes desensitised to the correlation between stupid enthusiasm for narcotics and the rate of psych ward institutionalizations and wrecked lives.
We are all biased one way or the other James ;) I spent a year working with heavy addicts of all sorts,so I know perfectly well what you mean.I hardly do any drugs anymore,just some caffeine and the very rarely occasional trip
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You may sense a slight bitterness to my post. I'm just suffering from Junkie bias: being surrounded by dim witted hedonists and new age hippies for so long one becomes desensitised to the correlation between stupid enthusiasm for narcotics and the rate of psych ward institutionalizations and wrecked lives.
Having said all that I hope to see the day when a sound understanding of the possible therapeutic effects of certain drugs becomes uncontroversial.
Actually, I'm glad to have you in this thread. It's easy to become so optimistic about a treatment you miss the other side. I've a friend who strongly feels people should be able to self-medicate with psychedelics and I'm very much against that.
I also lack personal experience because I've not done any recreational drug save alcohol, and even then I've never been drunk. I'm just looking at the potential for treatment.
For example:
Mind-altering drug could offer life free of heroin (http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg21929313.900-mindaltering-drug-could-offer-life-free-of-heroin.html?full=true#.UjMhIbyE5w9)
Several clinical trials have shown that low doses of ibogaine taken over the course of a few weeks can greatly reduce cravings for heroin and other drugs. There was extensive research on it in the 1990s, with good evidence of safety in animals and a handful of studies in humans. The US National Institute on Drug Abuse invested over $1 million, but then abandoned the project in 1995. A study had shown that at high doses, ibogaine caused some brain cell degeneration in rats. Lower doses similar to those used in human addiction trials showed no such effect, however....
But anecdotal accounts suggest that a single treatment is just as effective as multiple low doses. The dose is much higher, although still nowhere near the levels found to cause harm in rats. A single treatment is less expensive than standard addiction therapies, and the intensity of the experience is not a recreational high that users seem to want to repeat....
"There have been claims by the government that there's a high potential for abuse and no medical use, and claims from ibogaine advocates that one dose is a miracle cure. We're trying to gather some scientific evidence to better evaluate it," says Rick Doblin, executive director of MAPS. A similar study is also being carried out in New Zealand.
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Creativity fallacy: Drugs do not enhance creative ability, only alter neuro physiology. This may or may not enhance ability in a favourable way.
I'll repeat - it seems helpful to adopt a perspective whereby to your brain, everything is a drug.
Dopamine bias: I am too scientifically ignorant to speak on this, but would I be correct in saying most drugs release a short burst of pleasure chemicals which cause us to crave them in spite of other more detrimental affects?
I'm not sure what you are trying to communicate so I'll throw some description at it.
Some drugs seem to manipulate/hijack the release of specific neurotransmitters in areas of the brain that are usually densely populated with those specific neurotransmitters to begin with. It is extremely misleading to think of any one specific neurotransmitter as being exclusively active in any one specific area. For instance, a dopaminergic neuron is simply an area of the brain, which utilizes more of the neurotransmitter dopamine than other neurotransmitters that are also present in dopaminergic neuron. It's a concert, not a solo.
There are number of competing perspectives but essentially those drugs, which manifest the most destructive behaviors of addiction, seem to all co-opt the same dopaminergic structures and their normal release of a number of neurotransmitters, including dopamine.
You can imagine how that science, as it disseminates, becomes "my dopamine made me do it" ;).
Erowid bias: the tendency to attribute mystical or religious insight to a conscious state brought about by narcotics while remaining in total ignorance of the physical state of ones brain. It is not controversial to say that certain neurological states are responsible for our feelings of religious insight. A sounder method would be to scientifically deduce these rather than shovelling dubious plants into our stomachs and hoping for the best.
Well,you just slammed many cultures who have used these substances for thousands of years :) I think we need to show some humility toward this,because this seem to work in these various cultures.To throw science in their faces would not do any good.
I actually think its helpful to imagine the mundane results of culture and society as conceived by drugs users with fanatical followers - it's historically prevalent. A certain number of sages, wise-men, kings, emperors, etc, regularly consulted with drugs in various forms for insight.
Yesterday's visionary is today's junkie.
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I actually think its helpful to imagine the mundane results of culture and society as conceived by drugs users with fanatical followers - it's historically prevalent. A certain number of sages, wise-men, kings, emperors, etc, regularly consulted with drugs in various forms for insight.
Yes,and the Aztecs is a very good example of how you can misuse psychedelics and provide horrific results.
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Yes,and the Aztecs is a very good example of how you can misuse psychedelics and provide horrific results.
Can you elaborate? - thanks!
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They had child offerings during psilocybin rituals,and after consuming the substance they communicated with deities(war god),and these deities told them to kill people in the most horrible ways you can imagine.It does not matter if they imagined this contact with deities or not,the substance was used to commit horrible acts of violence.
Graham Hancock wrote a book about this called "war god",and he also features on a podcast with Joe Rogan,where he talks about the history and use/misuse of various psychedelics.
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It's not the morphine, it's the size of the cage: Rat Park experiment upturns conventional wisdom about addiction (http://sub.garrytan.com/its-not-the-morphine-its-the-size-of-the-cage-rat-park-experiment-upturns-conventional-wisdom-about-addiction)
So, if Rat Park is to be believed, drug addiction is a situation that arises from poor socioeconomic conditions. From literally being a rat in a cage. If you're a rat in a park, you'd rather hang out with your friends and explore the world around you.
Perhaps it's time the war on drugs becomes a war on the existence of poverty? (edit: Poverty of our relationships to family, community, and nation too, not merely monetary. As commenters have pointed out, there are plenty of people who have plenty of money who may well be the most poverty-ridden in other respects.)
It's not about the drugs. It's about the social environment in which we live.
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So, if Rat Park is to be believed, drug addiction is a situation that arises from poor socioeconomic conditions. From literally being a rat in a cage. If you're a rat in a park, you'd rather hang out with your friends and explore the world around you.
This is most likely a stupid question,but can you really compare rats to humans in this way? Surely it is much more complicated to handle this issue with humans.In my experience with working with heroine addicts,the wounds are sometimes very deep and complicated.Especially with long time addicts,the thought of a life without the comfort of drugs is unbearable.Of course,in a utopian world where everyone has their dream life fulfilled and everyone is socially/economically adept,there will be no drug addicts.That is certainly not the case though.
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Socioeconomics seem to play an important role in drug abuse, neh, Royce?
It's not a be all, end all solution. It's part of what should be a multifaceted approach to drug abuse and, ultimately, what we call people problems.
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Socioeconomics seem to play an important role in drug abuse, neh, Royce?
Yeah it does,but the issue of addiction is a very tricky one.If I can use Norway as an example,you will see that we are one of the wealthiest countries on the planet,we have a system that takes care of everyone socially and economically(in theory).If you don`t have a job,the government provides all you need and more,they even help you out getting a job.Health care is basically free,crime is not a big issue at all.Nevertheless we have among the highest amount of heroine addicts in the world,and it really makes no sense,since socially/economically we are on top.
As you said,ultimately these are people problems.Can society fix that? Maybe to certain degree I guess.
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The phenomenon speaks towards a dysfunctional organization in some specific aspect?
Clearly, the heroin is getting into the country or being produced there, someone or group has vested interests in the black market sale, vested interests in distributing the heroin to addicts, who become users in the first place for a plethora of reasons, availability included.
Are there a higher number of social dependents? Are people generally unsatisfied with Norway's zeitgeist (the feel of the times)? Are options unavailable that might fulfill people otherwise?
Just freestylin', obviously.
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I wrote a long rambling post that turned into an essay about how narco capital works. It was far too long so here's a condensed version:
Basically, in a commercial society, the only thing going on is making money. Instead of accepting the pointlessness of existence, in recent years we've tried to organize an entire ideology around enjoyment. Enjoyment is supposed to be the purpose of life, and in many quarters, its the only permissible value and questioning gets you viciously attacked by aggressively passive sneering idiots.
You read something like Vice magazine, they are desperately trying to push this kind of consumer existentialism based around drug taking. There's a constant drive to hype the intense heights of hedonism (instead of comfort). Like its heroic. It's as if we have a religious duty to mask our despair with hedonism, I think this works because we are all fascinated by our own degradation. Most drug users are feeling thought, but they can never truly escape it.
It's a consumerist religion. It functions by this weird kind of disavowed nihilism, like, consuming commodities is the true purpose of life, because enjoying them saves us from nihilism. I think the idea is we don't have to face nihilism if we keep consuming and perform our selves as consumers who have this supernatural power to change their reality through positive thinking. Who can attain this sense of self through hyper consumption and become celebrities. I'm theory wanking a bit here, it's probably just all appetite driven chaos.
The last society that made enjoyment its core value was the Roman Empire, right on the way to their pinnacle of decadence and before they got invaded and blood poured down the aqueducts. I guess because we have drones it won't happen to us, although I live in hope.
Enjoyment is a very stupid principle to try and organize a society around, because its basically covering over the harvesting of human brains, particularly proletarian ones, to turn them into rats moving coins around. They are exhausted and used up in over consumption. Recovery and work become moral issues, and the recovery industry is itself massive. The ideal citizen is one who is smoking and trying to quit at the same time. The managers of these addictions make a decent living, and of course the cash ultimately flows upwards.
For an organism addicted to oxygen, death is the only sobriety. So we are all being harvested by SOME commodity just to survive, things like food, the need for transportation and energy to live and clean yourself and get to work. If you've ever eaten a bag of crisps, you've consumed a slightly psychoactive substance.
Drugs are a commodity that literally implants itself like a software code into our brains and has an extreme influence on our behavior. No matter what hobby you have or what you love in life, no one will put the sheer effort and work into getting their rocks off as much as a drug addict. No matter how much it destroys you, you will still do it, at all hours of the day and night with all resources available to you.
I could go into a long detailed ramble about how narco capital functions, suffice to say that no one who has the power to stop the influx of drugs has any interest in doing so. The funds all get scrubbed and recycled into 'legitimate' assets, and become untraceable. In the 08 crash an analyst claimed to have discovered that 70% of the global economies assets were criminal - either tax avoidance or crime - which is basically code for drugs.
Drug dealers are like popstars, there's a new one every month and everyone loves them and claims to be their friend, then they get busted and a new one comes along. Cops mainly go after low level dealers, who are replaceable. Once you start going up the chain, you will eventually run into dock workers, transport workers, and eventually government officials and high capital. Without aiming to be condescending, obviously the law has to be imposed by a specific group of people with limited time and resources. Court rooms don't magically appear over night. A rookie cop is not going to be any match for the higher levels of narco capital, who have the funds and lawyers to make pursuing a case a shortcut to a lost career and being counter sued for defamation or whatever. Also, many cop evidence lockers are like candy stores for cops who come in and grab a bottle of seized vodka or a bootleg carton of cigs or a 9 bar of hash for their own personal pleasure. Cops need justifications for their budgets, they make their careers out of getting tax money to 'stop' (usually people on welfare) spending the tax money they were given on drugs. All they are really doing is keeping a lid on it when it threatens the smooth functioning of commerce and maybe helping the middle classes to stay a bit safer. In America the laws basically created an entire industry that sucks up massive budget slices to fight the war on drugs, which they neither win or do much good against.
The cops will periodically take down a supplier and do a photo op with a nice big table of drugs. But all seizure does is ramp up the price by destroying stock and making new gaps in the market. This is what maintains the high profit margins.
The suppliers, who are one level above the dealers, just pay off the tax man. Without wanting to get myself shot, come take a drive around the countryside near here and you might just come across a few mansions and sports cars. The law is like that for the rich, you just pay off whoever. It almost functions as an industry in itself. At best it puts away a few scumbags for a while.
I think because drugs alter human neural functioning so much, we have an incredibly difficult time rationally dealing with them. They derange and addict us. We don't have the kind of control we think we have over them. However, it is necessary to wage some sort of prohibitory battle against them for the sake of society, even if this battle is never ultimately winnable.
IMO its possible the reason we don't have holocausts anymore is narcotics. It's far more economically advantageous to sell the consumer to the substance itself. This is why any kind of materialist, technical or scientific understanding of drugs and other commodities has to be obfuscated by the hedonic culture and the constant repetition that there is an almost supernatural illicit mystique of this stuff. The technical, rational and scientific knowledge of how the brain and these substances function does exist within the society but it is only permissible to mention it as a way to explain the power of the hedonism. You don't want to be nerd now do you! Smoke crack! Authority figures don't want you to so it must be good! There's been more than a few destroyed lives because of this shit.
If anyone wants to try and verify my hypothesis, go see how many people you can find that don't get unconsciously hysterical and/or angry when you question the concept of enjoyment too much.
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Lol I intended that to be a short post.
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Many good questions Madness,and I can freestyle a bit myself,since I don`t know for sure what is the cause of this problem.About the drugs coming into the country,I guess it is a mix of corruption and also just people doing a bad job in catching the smugglers.I would not know about heroine being produced here,but many of the substitutes are(methadon,subotex).
In the area of rehabilitation I know there are many methods that simply do not work.First they have to ask for help,and then they have to wait until one of the institutions have room for them(sometimes several months).They stay in rehab for about 3 months,and they are just sent "home".It is easy to figure out what happens next.With no chance of getting a job or a decent place to stay,they end up contacting their old "friends" and they are back in hell.They wait awhile and then they go through the same shit again.This is mostly a problem for the senior junkies,who have absolutely no chance of building a new life,because they know nothing else I guess.Many of the younger ones only need rehab and they are fine.
I can`t speak for anyone but myself,but you do see certain attitudes among Norwegians that are not very flattering.A huge distrust to people not from here,and we enjoy this wealth so much that we are terrified of losing it.What to do then? The oil has spoiled our nation since the seventees,and that has led to a extreme focus on stuff(cars,big houses,boats) People without an education can get jobs that pay very well.So do think that this meaningless pursuit of material goods make many people feel totally empty,and if you add that the climate is very harsh for almost 8 months out of 12,people spend a lot of time inside drinking.People from warmer countries tend to describe Norwegians as cold and isolated,and they are correct to a certain degree.So I guess people are getting frustrated with the feel of the times yes.
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That was a lovely rant James :) I actually got a picture in my head of Bill Hicks yelling this at some dumbfounded crowd ;D
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Interesting stuff James and Royce.
Will have more to say, ideally after a night's rest.
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Speaking of Vice:
Kicking Heroin with an Ibogaine Ceremony (http://www.vice.com/vice-on-hbo-outtakes/kicking-heroin-with-an-ibogaine-ceremony)
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Round three. I wrote an hour long response to james and Royce yesterday morning and now I'm stuck attempting to cheaply recreate the initial reaction. Forgive me if the following seems curt but I've written it almost three times now and am, obviously, rewriting and condensing the same statements over and again.
Basically, in a commercial society, the only thing going on is making money. Instead of accepting the pointlessness of existence, in recent years we've tried to organize an entire ideology around enjoyment. Enjoyment is supposed to be the purpose of life, and in many quarters, its the only permissible value and questioning gets you viciously attacked by aggressively passive sneering idiots.
Two propositions; three, really, but one is not so relevant.
Why should I accept the pointless of existence? Is enjoyment the only raison d'etre following the acceptance of this premise, as you write? Is it not permissible to offer embodying alternative reactions to life, the universe, and everything?
It's a consumerist religion. It functions by this weird kind of disavowed nihilism, like, consuming commodities is the true purpose of life, because enjoying them saves us from nihilism. I think the idea is we don't have to face nihilism if we keep consuming and perform our selves as consumers who have this supernatural power to change their reality through positive thinking. Who can attain this sense of self through hyper consumption and become celebrities. I'm theory wanking a bit here, it's probably just all appetite driven chaos.
Consumerism is a distraction. I don't even necessarily think people have to develop a nihilist perspective to desire to be distracted from the intimacy of being alive. Most people don't even get past thinking on mortality or eternity before immersing themselves in consumer culture. Is drug abuse a consequence of consumerism? Are they separate?
Enjoyment is a very stupid principle to try and organize a society around, because its basically covering over the harvesting of human brains, particularly proletarian ones, to turn them into rats moving coins around. They are exhausted and used up in over consumption. Recovery and work become moral issues, and the recovery industry is itself massive. The ideal citizen is one who is smoking and trying to quit at the same time. The managers of these addictions make a decent living, and of course the cash ultimately flows upwards.
There will always be vested interests. It's not an excuse to me. We should still seek to embody alternatives.
For an organism addicted to oxygen, death is the only sobriety. So we are all being harvested by SOME commodity just to survive, things like food, the need for transportation and energy to live and clean yourself and get to work. If you've ever eaten a bag of crisps, you've consumed a slightly psychoactive substance.
Probably in full-on rant mode at this point but I wonder at the initial sentence. Can you clarify? I had previously highlighted that I see dividends in adopting an "everything ingested is a drug to your brain" perspective.
Drugs are a commodity that literally implants itself like a software code into our brains and has an extreme influence on our behavior. No matter what hobby you have or what you love in life, no one will put the sheer effort and work into getting their rocks off as much as a drug addict. No matter how much it destroys you, you will still do it, at all hours of the day and night with all resources available to you.
The addiction of drugs seems more a matter of spectrum. And certainly a matter of distinction. Perspectives like "alcohol isn't a drug" statistically account for a number of eventual addicts. Stereotypes about coffee or sugar aren't much better.
Also, what about obsession? They can satisfy the same criteria but sometimes result in positives (while potentially still killing those afflicted).
Drug dealers are like popstars, there's a new one every month and everyone loves them and claims to be their friend, then they get busted and a new one comes along. Cops mainly go after low level dealers, who are replaceable. Once you start going up the chain, you will eventually run into dock workers, transport workers, and eventually government officials and high capital. Without aiming to be condescending, obviously the law has to be imposed by a specific group of people with limited time and resources. Court rooms don't magically appear over night. A rookie cop is not going to be any match for the higher levels of narco capital, who have the funds and lawyers to make pursuing a case a shortcut to a lost career and being counter sued for defamation or whatever. Also, many cop evidence lockers are like candy stores for cops who come in and grab a bottle of seized vodka or a bootleg carton of cigs or a 9 bar of hash for their own personal pleasure. Cops need justifications for their budgets, they make their careers out of getting tax money to 'stop' (usually people on welfare) spending the tax money they were given on drugs. All they are really doing is keeping a lid on it when it threatens the smooth functioning of commerce and maybe helping the middle classes to stay a bit safer. In America the laws basically created an entire industry that sucks up massive budget slices to fight the war on drugs, which they neither win or do much good against.
+1 for descriptives. So there seems an almost symbiotic relationship? Is it an issue of conceptual organization, how we structure our education and social services rather than availability?
I think because drugs alter human neural functioning so much, we have an incredibly difficult time rationally dealing with them. They derange and addict us. We don't have the kind of control we think we have over them. However, it is necessary to wage some sort of prohibitory battle against them for the sake of society, even if this battle is never ultimately winnable.
There is a relationship between willpower and addiction but some drugs seem to negate that to different degrees - it isn't all or nothing, like you're describing.
If anyone wants to try and verify my hypothesis, go see how many people you can find that don't get unconsciously hysterical and/or angry when you question the concept of enjoyment too much.
Lol - upsetting people isn't a reason not to strive for difference.
Many good questions Madness,and I can freestyle a bit myself,since I don`t know for sure what is the cause of this problem.About the drugs coming into the country,I guess it is a mix of corruption and also just people doing a bad job in catching the smugglers.I would not know about heroine being produced here,but many of the substitutes are(methadon,subotex).
james has pretty decent descriptions of the status quo above. But I think the conversation should move towards the socioeconomic framework, which manifests these circumstances.
In the area of rehabilitation I know there are many methods that simply do not work.First they have to ask for help,and then they have to wait until one of the institutions have room for them(sometimes several months).They stay in rehab for about 3 months,and they are just sent "home".It is easy to figure out what happens next.With no chance of getting a job or a decent place to stay,they end up contacting their old "friends" and they are back in hell.They wait awhile and then they go through the same shit again.This is mostly a problem for the senior junkies,who have absolutely no chance of building a new life,because they know nothing else I guess.Many of the younger ones only need rehab and they are fine.
Well, I'm not one to refine Norway's social services ;)... but you've highlighted an at risk demographic and the need for mandatory out-patient counseling, at the very least.
I can`t speak for anyone but myself,but you do see certain attitudes among Norwegians that are not very flattering.A huge distrust to people not from here,and we enjoy this wealth so much that we are terrified of losing it.What to do then? The oil has spoiled our nation since the seventees,and that has led to a extreme focus on stuff(cars,big houses,boats) People without an education can get jobs that pay very well.So do think that this meaningless pursuit of material goods make many people feel totally empty,and if you add that the climate is very harsh for almost 8 months out of 12,people spend a lot of time inside drinking.People from warmer countries tend to describe Norwegians as cold and isolated,and they are correct to a certain degree.So I guess people are getting frustrated with the feel of the times yes.
The bold seems to reflect the consumerist outcry that james' has nicely articulated. But is it the only response?
Hrm. Sorry, good people, the first rendition of this post was on it. This is a weak substitute but I was compelled to respond as I would like to keep participating in this discussion.
Cheers.
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Madness, it's clear I need to take a breath and better consider my ramblings, because I am not making myself very clear.
I meant to say that enjoyment is pushed on us as the raison d'etre for existence but that it shouldn't be. I think that there's a kind of weird mystification going on, in which the culture tries to fool itself that it can stave off the threat of nihilism through adopting this attitude that consumerism saves us because it allows us to enjoy in spite of, and deny or defeat nihilism. IMO nihilism is part of the path we must embark on to liberate ourselves from being harvested as human commodities for the profit of the managers of our addictions and needs.
When I said "for an organism addicted to oxygen, death is the only form of sobriety possible" what I meant was that while we are alive we will always be addicted to something, and always be slightly intoxicated by the world. Death IMO is a preferable state of being, and it is the only absolute in our lives and the only permanent liberation. Much suffering has been caused by the refusal to accept this fact. But if we accept it, then we can develop both compassion and an armour of knowledge that allows us to resist the madness and much of the pointless suffering and violence in the world.
In the UK reporting negative, frustrated or generally nihilistic emotional states is grounds for psychiatric incarceration. Once there, you will eventually report the positive mental attitude the authorities want, or you won't leave.
The emotional realities of life, particularly for the proles, are too offensive to the dominant ideology of positive thinking for its own sake and absolute denial of the nihilistic implications of existence. We all have a duty to censor any expression of negativity with hope and a kind of wistful 'oh well it will all be ok if i just believe' type attitude.
This is demanded by a psychiatric establishment that over medicates people with SSRI's, drugs that have been proven to not work and were proven to involve faked or suppressed testing results, because such results would interfere with the profitability of the commodity. Therefore we can recognize the truth of our society, a commodity has more value than a human. Human life must be subservient to commodities, only the latter is permitted technical understanding, the former must perform an ideologically mandated personality. This personality is designed to obfuscate the pointlessness of existence, the zero sum nature of the economy, and the failure of positive thinking and consumer existentialism to liberate anyone. The non existent phantom of the self is imposed as an ideological reality that cannot be deviated from in order for the prole machine to falsely claim agency with no reference to his neuro-physical determinants. Therefore consumption becomes a moral issue, when it is bad for us we must blame ourselves, and we must always believe that we need only believe in goodness and we can do it right in the future.
We are forced to believe in a maladaptive enlightenment fallacy that stretches individual autonomy into the realms of the supernatural. We are supposed to be subjects that only encounter reality after causally deliberating over it. "Should I smoke or not, well, I know smoking is bad, so I will chose not to and resist it by my will power. I will exercise this resolve not to smoke at all times and nothing can overpower it." This is the same scam that makes people starve themselves because they think thats how a diet works. All they do is push the body into starvation mode, and they usually binge on sugar and fat once the brain has resorted to using up its own reserves in lieu of a sufficient fat intake. It's dangerous and damaging, but finding the truth is almost impossible in the noisey media deluge of junk science and hypo manic idiots advertising scams and faking positive consumer feedback on their websites.
Instead of understanding the mechanical processes causing our diet and sobriety fails, we think of it in terms of guilt and discipline! That to me is evil. We think we can conjure attitudes out of thin air that will override reality itself.
Of course, this arises because we don't have conscious access to such processes, our introspection and consciousness only provides the faintest data about what is going into our bodies and what the brain is doing. The brain produces thoughts, but we are never permitted to understand these thoughts as emanating from anything other than a supernatural construct - the self, which doesn't really exist!
Only a techno scientific understanding of ourselves as machines can help us. We must understand the truth of what we input into our bodies, and realize that this creates data which online communities can help us interpret. Only science can save us from becoming rats moving coins around the urban cage to get a cheap and dangerous dopamine hit.
Your friendly neighbourhood crack dealer is a neuro hacker. He pushes a product that installs code that prompts the brain to replicate the code by inputting more of the source material. We are all being factory farmed for profit, as and by commodities.
I think you understand that we can't simply resist this with prohibition. The only way out is through. Smarter drugs - an end to the mystical hedonistic attitude that dominates drug culture - a sub culture of neuro modification, health, healing, performance and expansion. We can dream of a future in which we develop new hardware for the brain and body. We can use it to meditate, for security, to play the financial markets, for performativity, or just to experience novel neurophysiologies. But we must resist the demand to use it to exhaust and damage ourselves in addiction.
Someone who has been made obese by junk food, or given diabetes and massive weight gain by SSRI's they don't need, someone who smokes themselves until disease and death, who becomes alcoholic, all are victims of their brains being hacked. Their suffering can at least show us the necessity to take control of our own neuro chemistry. To tend to our brains like a garden or a machine. To monitor and control what is inputted and record and compare the data of the effects. To develop a sub culture of technical modifcation, through software (memes, substances, experiences) and hardware (implants, tcds machines, new types of jewellry/accessories etc.)
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I will just add one more thing, I personally have only the faintest scientific understanding. But I at least realize that only it can truly help me. Hopefully we are moving towards a culture where this is generally understood and new and cool scientific sub cultures can replace some of the very boring and dangerous ones we currently have.
I'm somewhat pleased by the fact I recognize that no amount of philosophy, hipsterism, mysticism, art or whatever is going to really do all that much for me, even though those were my main concerns in the earlier parts of my life. So I've made some sort of progress I guess.
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James posted while I was writing mine,and I was in a lazy mood,so I just posted mine without reading his first :).I feel that this is not a discussion anymore,it is more a question of how can we cope with the so called meaningless existence of ours.This has turned into rants which are extremely subjective in nature.Although I agree with much of what James is saying,it is also just a subjective understanding of the nature of reality.There are tons of those out there.Which of those are true?Either none or everyone.No objective understanding exists,so we are left with sharing our subjective ones I guess.
The bold seems to reflect the consumerist outcry that james' has nicely articulated. But is it the only response?
No it is not the only response,but it is the one that is most visible,and because it is so visible,it makes sense to use that as a reason.
Who knows what is going on inside billions of brains? IMO I think this goes much deeper than consumerism.
One way to look at it is that we have distanced ourselves more and more from what we know we are,namely nature.Maybe that makes us sick,and we behave irrationally and create this unsane civilization because we have to destroy,violate and consume the planet the keep the machine going.To me,getting out of the city worked for me.Surrounded by wilderness and animals,I have again found the peace I need to cope with existence.Am I running away? Maybe,but I needed to do something,or else I would literally loose my mind.To be part of a society is like taking part in a game.You choose to participate.There are people who chose not to participate(ascetics),and they exist just as much people who play the game does.Maybe there are ways the western civilization can be "saved" but I am not hopeful.
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Sorry for the ranting, you should see how bad I get IRL.
Although, in my defence, walls of text are at least a slightly healthier release than getting stoned everyday!
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Don`t be sorry James ;) You have a genuine passion for this,and that is very healthy :)
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One way to look at it is that we have distanced ourselves more and more from what we know we are,namely nature.Maybe that makes us sick,and we behave irrationally and create this unsane civilization because we have to destroy,violate and consume the planet the keep the machine going.To me,getting out of the city worked for me.Surrounded by wilderness and animals,I have again found the peace I need to cope with existence.Am I running away? Maybe,but I needed to do something,or else I would literally loose my mind.To be part of a society is like taking part in a game.You choose to participate.There are people who chose not to participate(ascetics),and they exist just as much people who play the game does.Maybe there are ways the western civilization can be "saved" but I am not hopeful.
Royce, I've seen the attitude you have articulated quite a lot recently and I've always been somewhat skeptical of it.
However, I'd agree with you that getting out of the city, getting 'back to nature' etc. is not only an extremely healthy and therapeutic thing to do, it's probably one of the easiest ways to heal someones nerves and psyche and prevent a breakdown.
But I still find this idea quite regressive. Ecologists like Timothy Morton would criticize this because they say there is no such thing as nature. I agree with that. I also don't think there is anyway to 'go back' to a simpler way of living, or that there is any merit in doing so beyond a temporary release from modern pressures.
As I said in my last post, the only way out is through. Slowing down, simplifying, trying to reconnect with nature - these are not options available to the majority of people. I actually think the drive to reconnect with nature is a terrible mistake. There is no organic, wholesome relationship between nature and humanity. Nature wants us dead and it wins 100% of the time. The idea of stripping back modern, artificial technological implements can only provide a temporary relief.
I think that only we moderns could dream of a benevolent and maternal nature, precisely because we have been so severed from it. Precisely because we have been extricated from the 'nature red in tooth and claw' scenario for so long.
My vision is a little different. I'd rather live in a city - i'd rather aspire for the money to install soundproofing or use white noise from headphones. I'd rather wait and see what audial implants and devices will be developed to help spare us the ceaseless noise of modern life. I'd rather make Soylent or set up some sort of lab in my apartment to produce my own food. 3d printers and some sort of system that can grow ingredients from bacteria or base materials? That is more promising than tilling the fields. A city run on sustainable energy, or one of the fusion reactors that are currently being developed - for poor people, city life maximizes opportunity (as well as risk).
I fully expect that in decades to come, solar panels, with their constant performance breakthroughs, will be cheap and powerful enough for many individuals to create decades worth of energy for themselves. I think I have a better chance, economically and socially, at plunging head first into all technology has to offer, rather than trying to find some distance from it. Yes, it causes serious nervous illnesses, exhaustion etc. but rather than retreating from that, we should see all these things as engineering problems.
You don't need nature because we are already so close to technically replicating all the functions nature provides - free heat, energy from the sun, soil and space to grow crops etc. with small scale personal technology. Certainly, the life you speak of has tremendous merits, however I worry about the regressive tendencies that sometimes manifest within it.
What does it mean to go back to nature other than to seek free but rapidly obsolescing sources of sustenance and energy?
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But I still find this idea quite regressive. Ecologists like Timothy Morton would criticize this because they say there is no such thing as nature. I agree with that. I also don't think there is anyway to 'go back' to a simpler way of living, or that there is any merit in doing so beyond a temporary release from modern pressures.
I am not sure what he means by nature being nonexistent,but I will check this guy out.I do not feel that I am "going back" to nature,more that I am moving away from fake people,noise,polluted air,aggressive tendencies,temptations on every corner and so on.I still have connections in the nearest city,and I am there quite a lot.I just enjoy leaving when I am done :).
I agree that nature is not all fairytale beauty and all,it is indeed dangerous and hostile.You find that everywhere,there is no escape from that.Again I must point out that this is something that works for me,it is not a global solution to anything.
My vision is a little different. I'd rather live in a city - i'd rather aspire for the money to install soundproofing or use white noise from headphones. I'd rather wait and see what audial implants and devices will be developed to help spare us the ceaseless noise of modern life. I'd rather make Soylent or set up some sort of lab in my apartment to produce my own food. 3d printers and some sort of system that can grow ingredients from bacteria or base materials? That is more promising than tilling the fields. A city run on sustainable energy, or one of the fusion reactors that are currently being developed - for poor people, city life maximizes opportunity (as well as risk).
This sounds very good,but I guess we will have to try and fail for many years before we can replace nature with technology.The kind of society you so brilliantly describes in earlier posts,is a society I gladly leave behind.Maybe I will move back when these technologies you speak of turn out to improve the life of humans in cities.
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I forgot to mention that I am not at all against technological inventions that improve aspects of existence,and make us less dependent on destroying the planet.I am not at all saying that everyone should start walking backwards,but are things better as they are now?
The fundamental core of your previous posts suggest that our civilization is heading in a wrong direction(consumerism/enjoyment).Do you see that changing anytime soon?We now have enjoyment right in front of our noses 24/7 with gadgets in numerable forms.I can`t really see there is going to arrive any kind of global awakening where everyone realizes that this hunger for enjoyment is wrong.The reason for that is that most people do not agree with you.They love this lifestyle more than anything else.Comfort is the new drug.
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Apologies in advance for the quote/response ratio. I like to be clear as I can manage.
I meant to say that enjoyment is pushed on us as the raison d'etre for existence but that it shouldn't be. I think that there's a kind of weird mystification going on, in which the culture tries to fool itself that it can stave off the threat of nihilism through adopting this attitude that consumerism saves us because it allows us to enjoy in spite of, and deny or defeat nihilism. IMO nihilism is part of the path we must embark on to liberate ourselves from being harvested as human commodities for the profit of the managers of our addictions and needs.
Are the people constituting culture, by whatever distinct divisions we want to draw, aware of this? Is nihilism even a natural progression? I'm something of an agnostic myself, though I try to resist classification. And, in the case of consumerism, existing participation doesn't strike me as a particularly convincing argument not to attempt difference.
When I said "for an organism addicted to oxygen, death is the only form of sobriety possible" what I meant was that while we are alive we will always be addicted to something, and always be slightly intoxicated by the world. Death IMO is a preferable state of being, and it is the only absolute in our lives and the only permanent liberation. Much suffering has been caused by the refusal to accept this fact. But if we accept it, then we can develop both compassion and an armour of knowledge that allows us to resist the madness and much of the pointless suffering and violence in the world.
There is a thread (http://second-apocalypse.com/index.php?topic=734.0) ;).
Death being the only absolute, I want to live - despite being adamant about denying immortality beyond a couple centuries.
The only other consensus I hear on this planet is that people live... lives were lived before us and lives will be lived after and so, for me, every effort must be made to make living better. And I'm not suggesting an ineffable better at some point in the future, I'm talking better than now cause everyone can agree that now has become truly ridiculous. We waste an incredible amount of our only real bartering chip (our brain) as a species to maintain this degree of apathy.
Which, brings us back to point and task. You've qualified 'intoxication' as a natural state (which reflects a minority literature suggesting that intoxication is a 'drive' like thirst or hunger). I've responded that at a certain level of description all interaction between the brain and the environment enacts chemical and electrical transmission like any other conscious state, including taking drugs (the argument continues that drugs add or detract something but so does sustenance, fear, sleep - if the state of the brain is chemical and electrical, changing it by those mechanisms is still a state of the brain?)
A detriment to a single human is a loss to us all. As a culture and society we embody and enact the reactions to the reality of living.
In the UK reporting negative, frustrated or generally nihilistic emotional states is grounds for psychiatric incarceration. Once there, you will eventually report the positive mental attitude the authorities want, or you won't leave.
The emotional realities of life, particularly for the proles, are too offensive to the dominant ideology of positive thinking for its own sake and absolute denial of the nihilistic implications of existence. We all have a duty to censor any expression of negativity with hope and a kind of wistful 'oh well it will all be ok if i just believe' type attitude.
That sounds particularly difficult in the UK but I feel that "censoring" attitude is prevalent in the Western Empire. But there are plenty of immediate cultural distinctions that quickly transcend that attitude in communication as well.
This is demanded by a psychiatric establishment that over medicates people with SSRI's ... Therefore consumption becomes a moral issue, when it is bad for us we must blame ourselves, and we must always believe that we need only believe in goodness and we can do it right in the future.
Vested interests and polarizing propoganda. It's not easy to do right by ourselves and it takes effortful practice. But it is on us to be informed and participate. There definitely should be a involved society, which constantly re-prioritizes how it wants to facilitate its constituents.
We are forced to believe in a maladaptive enlightenment fallacy that stretches individual autonomy into the realms of the supernatural. We are supposed to be subjects that only encounter reality after causally deliberating over it ... It's dangerous and damaging, but finding the truth is almost impossible in the noisey media deluge of junk science and hypo manic idiots advertising scams and faking positive consumer feedback on their websites.
We're definitely fed a certain perception - but we can fight for change, neh? I'm perfectly capable of believing that I'm back to black when my mortal form passes and still wanting to make a difference in the living realm while I'm here.
Instead of understanding the mechanical processes causing our diet and sobriety fails, we think of it in terms of guilt and discipline! That to me is evil. We think we can conjure attitudes out of thin air that will override reality itself.
Distinctions, nothing more. Disseminate clearer communication.
Of course, this arises because we don't have conscious access to such processes, our introspection and consciousness only provides the faintest data about what is going into our bodies and what the brain is doing. The brain produces thoughts, but we are never permitted to understand these thoughts as emanating from anything other than a supernatural construct - the self, which doesn't really exist!
I apologize as I strive to respond practically. I feel you're asking deeper questions...
Only a techno scientific understanding of ourselves as machines can help us. We must understand the truth of what we input into our bodies, and realize that this creates data which online communities can help us interpret. Only science can save us from becoming rats moving coins around the urban cage to get a cheap and dangerous dopamine hit.
Hrm. Science is constituted of real people with vested interests. And it's on the wrong side of a socioeconomic class distinction for most of us.
I think you understand that we can't simply resist this with prohibition. The only way out is through. Smarter drugs - an end to the mystical hedonistic attitude that dominates drug culture - a sub culture of neuro modification, health, healing, performance and expansion. We can dream of a future in which we develop new hardware for the brain and body. We can use it to meditate, for security, to play the financial markets, for performativity, or just to experience novel neurophysiologies. But we must resist the demand to use it to exhaust and damage ourselves in addiction.
I think you might fixated on a single dimension of the problem. It just isn't this simply.
Someone who has been made obese by junk food, or given diabetes and massive weight gain by SSRI's they don't need, someone who smokes themselves until disease and death, who becomes alcoholic, all are victims of their brains being hacked. Their suffering can at least show us the necessity to take control of our own neuro chemistry. To tend to our brains like a garden or a machine. To monitor and control what is inputted and record and compare the data of the effects. To develop a sub culture of technical modifcation, through software (memes, substances, experiences) and hardware (implants, tcds machines, new types of jewellry/accessories etc.)
Again, are you railing against the plebletariot's ignorance, the complacency of experts (family doctors, Lay's Chips, the Breweries, Starbucks, Kollisch/Hofmann), the legislation that makes them all possible, or Hammurabi's Code in the first place (by which I just meant codified laws of civilization and their philosophic necessity to keep us from the worst of us?)
This has turned into rants which are extremely subjective in nature.
While I don't think we've strayed all that much, I do think that the subjective straying keeps the conversation rich in profited wisdom. Greater chance of revelation ;). Plus, is this not how all societies affect change, by a handful of individuals on the intraweb ::)?
Although I agree with much of what James is saying,it is also just a subjective understanding of the nature of reality.There are tons of those out there.Which of those are true?Either none or everyone.No objective understanding exists,so we are left with sharing our subjective ones I guess.
The bold seems to reflect the consumerist outcry that james' has nicely articulated. But is it the only response?
No it is not the only response,but it is the one that is most visible,and because it is so visible,it makes sense to use that as a reason.
Who knows what is going on inside billions of brains? IMO I think this goes much deeper than consumerism.
We're all aspects of the phenomenon in question. james is, in fact, offering a sample perspective of the kind of mind that turns towards satiation in unadvised dietary choices or medicating chemically. To approach this specific crux from a different angle, what are other alternative explanations as to why people turn to drugs in the first place - if not wrestling with some kind of existential angst that james describes (whether it's an actually embodied mindset is a completely different story - few can adopt the sincerity of Peter Stormare in The Big Lebowski: "We’re Nihilists. We believe in nothing, Lebowski. Nothing.")
One way to look at it is that we have distanced ourselves more and more from what we know we are,namely nature.Maybe that makes us sick,and we behave irrationally and create this unsane civilization because we have to destroy,violate and consume the planet the keep the machine going.To me,getting out of the city worked for me.Surrounded by wilderness and animals,I have again found the peace I need to cope with existence.Am I running away? Maybe,but I needed to do something,or else I would literally loose my mind.To be part of a society is like taking part in a game.You choose to participate.There are people who chose not to participate(ascetics),and they exist just as much people who play the game does.Maybe there are ways the western civilization can be "saved" but I am not hopeful.
I applaud you, Royce, and many in my country adopt the same perspective towards the same end. But not participating isn't an option for me. The game is everywhere now. You can flee to the mountains but damn sure the world is going to come knocking before long.
Royce, I've seen the attitude you have articulated quite a lot recently and I've always been somewhat skeptical of it.
However, I'd agree with you that getting out of the city, getting 'back to nature' etc. is not only an extremely healthy and therapeutic thing to do, it's probably one of the easiest ways to heal someones nerves and psyche and prevent a breakdown.
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we should see all these things as engineering problems.
You don't need nature because we are already so close to technically replicating all the functions nature provides - free heat, energy from the sun, soil and space to grow crops etc. with small scale personal technology. Certainly, the life you speak of has tremendous merits, however I worry about the regressive tendencies that sometimes manifest within it.
What does it mean to go back to nature other than to seek free but rapidly obsolescing sources of sustenance and energy?
I forgot to mention that I am not at all against technological inventions that improve aspects of existence,and make us less dependent on destroying the planet.I am not at all saying that everyone should start walking backwards,but are things better as they are now?
Aren't you discussing aspects of the same proposal? It is rare that someone in a self-sufficient living condition relies on a balance of technology and nature - harvesting solar energy seems the exemplar of what you are describing, james, that technologies should work to be displace relatively little that exists already?
Anyone check out Earthships (http://earthship.com/)? Great documentary to go along with it.
We now have enjoyment right in front of our noses 24/7 with gadgets in numerable forms.I can`t really see there is going to arrive any kind of global awakening where everyone realizes that this hunger for enjoyment is wrong.The reason for that is that most people do not agree with you.They love this lifestyle more than anything else.Comfort is the new drug.
Isn't it satisfying to freestyle alternatives, though? The world can be different. And, in my opinion, practically identifying the whys and the wherefores of the way things are is one of a number of places to being seeking the way things could be.
I have to cut this a little short, though there wasn't much else in the final posts by either of you, which compelled me to respond.
I have no issue with continue the discussion as trends but, though it is inextricably intwined in the conversation for qualify why people turn to drugs, I might make a separate topic.
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We're all aspects of the phenomenon in question. james is, in fact, offering a sample perspective of the kind of mind that turns towards satiation in unadvised dietary choices or medicating chemically. To approach this specific crux from a different angle, what are other alternative explanations as to why people turn to drugs in the first place - if not wrestling with some kind of existential angst that james describes (whether it's an actually embodied mindset is a completely different story - few can adopt the sincerity of Peter Stormare in The Big Lebowski: "We’re Nihilists. We believe in nothing, Lebowski. Nothing.")
I think there can be many reasons why people turn to drugs,and not all of them are destructive.It can easily end up being destructive of course,depending on the drug of choice.
Maybe a healthy and curious attitude toward altered states? It does not have to end up being something destructive.I know people who have learned much about themselves through various drugs,and ended up being a better person because of it.Many people just want to experience as much as possible in their rather short lifespan,and various drugs provide plenty of interesting experiences.
I applaud you, Royce, and many in my country adopt the same perspective towards the same end. But not participating isn't an option for me. The game is everywhere now. You can flee to the mountains but damn sure the world is going to come knocking before long.
Yes,the game is everywhere,but I did not move because I did not want to participate.Maybe just reduce the level of involvement a bit :)
You have to isolate yourself on grand scale if you are to escape the tentacles of the system :) And that is not really the point either.My head just works better when I am surrounded by the beauty of nature,instead of the worst that man can offer.
Aren't you discussing aspects of the same proposal? It is rare that someone in a self-sufficient living condition relies on a balance of technology and nature - harvesting solar energy seems the exemplar of what you are describing, james, that technologies should work to be displace relatively little that exists already
I guess I must sound like a hypocrite in certain aspects,and I think I might be a bit hypocritical,because I do want that balance of technology and nature.
I also feel I have to point out that I am not self-sufficient at all.I am planning to set up a little greenhouse to grow vegetables in.Although ascetics fascinate me,I am not quite there yet :) It is the surroundings that are key for me.Being out here,and still be able to talk to you guys is the perfect balance I need at the moment ;)
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Instead of another long post I'll just ask you a question Madness, what do you propose as the solution or the idea that is going to change things? I don't have any faith in fighting for change or altered perspectives. There is too much profit in drugs for anything to change. In fact what will happen is a massive intensification of the range and quantity of substances available. There will be many casualties and much psychosis, but also a lot of hard data gathered.
Also - the NoGod speaks:
Life: Chore that regularly convinces you to smoke dope instead.
I remember the bad old days when I planned a cannabis farm in my flat but pulled out at the last minute. I knew it was a dodgy set up, my roommate had this friend who was smart, he would go pitch a cannabis farm to people. He'd provide the equipment and stop by to help them grow it, and of course it wouldn't be in his house so he wouldn't have broken any laws. Crucially, he had the connect to sell large crops too. I could see his angle and realized that my roommate was too stupid and high to pull this off, so I declined.
I kicked out my roommate and he went on to start one in his new flat. He got too drunk one night and his 'mates' came in and robbed it all! Pulled off the buds and leaves and left him with a bunch of stalks.
Now when I smoke weed - I don't get high. I seriously just get a kind of dark dull depression. I smoked so much weed I went beyond cannabis psychosis to just total burn out of all THC synapses. The last time I smoked I just wandered around pissed off in a dark mood, absolutely no high off it whatsoever.
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http://youtu.be/CVULjnfBPCY (http://youtu.be/CVULjnfBPCY)
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I think there can be many reasons why people turn to drugs,and not all of them are destructive.It can easily end up being destructive of course,depending on the drug of choice.
Maybe a healthy and curious attitude toward altered states? It does not have to end up being something destructive.I know people who have learned much about themselves through various drugs,and ended up being a better person because of it.Many people just want to experience as much as possible in their rather short lifespan,and various drugs provide plenty of interesting experiences.
I think you're talking about information dissemination - the most popularized rendition, to me, seems to be the organized campaign against ecstasy. Statistics don't speak highly of this and james and you have both mentioned that new, stranger drugs have been created.
We definitely need more dialogue between parents and children, educators and parents, police and students, etc.
I guess I must sound like a hypocrite in certain aspects,and I think I might be a bit hypocritical,because I do want that balance of technology and nature.
I also feel I have to point out that I am not self-sufficient at all.I am planning to set up a little greenhouse to grow vegetables in.Although ascetics fascinate me,I am not quite there yet :) It is the surroundings that are key for me.Being out here,and still be able to talk to you guys is the perfect balance I need at the moment ;)
Lol, regardless, you're on a journey. The point remains that self-sufficient individuals still can't truly escape interaction with the current global civilization.
Think of Fukushima. Everyday it become more and more obvious that we need the best human minds available, regardless of nationality, race, gender, etc., working on safely containing and disposing the mess. Japan finally accepted international aid today but it's been almost two and half years.
It doesn't matter then that we are ignorant as hermits, isolated cultures, and the uninformed plebletariot (all of us) - what we don't know about the behaviors of society can hurt us.
Instead of another long post I'll just ask you a question Madness, what do you propose as the solution or the idea that is going to change things? I don't have any faith in fighting for change or altered perspectives. There is too much profit in drugs for anything to change. In fact what will happen is a massive intensification of the range and quantity of substances available. There will be many casualties and much psychosis, but also a lot of hard data gathered.
I'm not really sure but I definitely was trying to get the group of us freestyling on the topic.
I agree with your prediction but at the same time, the consequences of drug use often arise as a result of psychosocial dynamics other than usage - production, dissemination (purchase & sale), legislation proportional to black market value, social distinctions (alcohol vs. drugs).
Life: Chore that regularly convinces you to smoke dope instead.
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I'm glad you didn't get caught in anything. I'm wondering at what you wanted to communicate with your anecdote though.
I wanted to take the time to watch the documentary on Mexico before I posted but I couldn't tonight.
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I'm glad you didn't get caught in anything. I'm wondering at what you wanted to communicate with your anecdote though.
I wanted to take the time to watch the documentary on Mexico before I posted but I couldn't tonight.
I just wanted to let everyone know that I turned down the thug life to become a depressed neckbeard. I could have been Scarface, but it was unfair to pursue that path since the world would be denied the gift of my intellect. ;)
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Lol. Meh, I've been there - modern thug life loses its alluring romantic edge ;).
Intellect is. No matter where.
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Sorry to link spam, I have more to say but just feel like I need to read/think more to offer anything of value. I am enjoying the discussion though.
The Science of Choice in Addiction: Research has shown that beating addiction is ultimately about regarding addicts as people who can rationally choose. (http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2013/09/the-science-of-choice-in-addiction/280080/)
The basic experiment goes like this. Hart recruits addicts who have no interest in quitting but who are willing to stay in a hospital research ward for two weeks for testing. Each day, Hart offers them a sample dose of either crack cocaine or methamphetamine, depending upon the drug they use regularly. Later in the day, they are given a choice between the same amount of drugs, a voucher for $5 of store merchandise, or $5 cash. They collect their reward when they’re discharged two weeks later.
More often than not, subjects choose the $5 voucher or cash over the drug, except that, when offered a higher dose, they go for the drug. But when Hart ups the value of the reward to $20, addicts chose the money every time.
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I was reading this on Westeros, Sci. I have my academic differences with the quality of research but feel free to "spam" as you like :).
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http://www.thelocal.no/20130822/no-link-between-lsd-and-mental-problems-say-norway-researchers
LSD is good for you :) At least that is what these researchers imply.It is weird though that it takes researchers like this 50 years to catch up on what they discovered during experiments in the sixtees.
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Thanks for that Royce. Looks like the ability to self-medicate just took a big hit:
Feds Seize Silk Road, Everybody's Favorite Illegal Drug Website (http://gizmodo.com/feds-seize-silk-road-everybodys-favorite-illegal-drug-1440172693?utm_campaign=socialflow_gizmodo_facebook&utm_source=gizmodo_facebook&utm_medium=socialflow)
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Here is something which is actually related to the tread :)
The NYU Training Program for Psychedelic Psychotherapy- Jeffrey Guss
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=LhL-jTg8KoY#t=15
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Good stuff Royce. I've been on a mini vacation chilling with my cousin who does a lot of work with medicine plants.
Some great conversations related to this topic, will try to distill and [at] some point.
I think one of the pertinent things we discussed was separating the recreational and medicinal, and how to take this understanding in older cultures and bring it into a modern, legalistic + healthcare framework.
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There are lots of great videos regarding this on the tube.There is a channel called "maps",where you get many interesting talks about the therapeutic value of various drugs.
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http://www.consciousentities.com/?p=1516 (http://www.consciousentities.com/?p=1516)
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That your brain is making you believe you have gained some "inner truth" might be true. Does it matter though? If we are all deceived anyway, why not pick a delusion that hurts no one, and can make you less aggressive and hostile towards others.
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That your brain is making you believe you have gained some "inner truth" might be true. Does it matter though? If we are all deceived anyway, why not pick a delusion that hurts no one, and can make you less aggressive and hostile towards others.
I think Bakker gets into this very question with the Dunyain. If all is deception, why does one deception matter more than another? Why does truth matter...is there meaning in a deluding life?
Well, what if meaning itself is an illusion?
I look at people finding grand truths in drug use the same way I look at people still working on philosophical justifications for dualism - if nothing is true then Truth itself is a questionable goal so let these people indulge themselves.
Not to mention the possibility that people do find Truth via drugs or dualism.
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Does it matter though? If we are all deceived anyway, why not pick a delusion that hurts no one, and can make you less aggressive and hostile towards others.
+1. Or the one that facilitates the most 'good' (which is a powder-keg of an argument).
That your brain is making you believe you have gained some "inner truth" might be true. Does it matter though? If we are all deceived anyway, why not pick a delusion that hurts no one, and can make you less aggressive and hostile towards others.
I think Bakker gets into this very question with the Dunyain. If all is deception, why does one deception matter more than another? Why does truth matter...is there meaning in a deluding life?
Well, what if meaning itself is an illusion?
I look at people finding grand truths in drug use the same way I look at people still working on philosophical justifications for dualism - if nothing is true then Truth itself is a questionable goal so let these people indulge themselves.
Not to mention the possibility that people do find Truth via drugs or dualism.
What does 'Truth' even mean in this context, sci? How do you establish 'objective' existent outside ourselves 'truth,' if the only meaning humans are capable of apprehending is utilitarian and subjective?
EDIT: In this context, the only thing drug cocktails (o'natural or otherwise) might establish is a more 'functional' perspective that creates less 'subjective-obstacles' when interacting with the social and physical realities.
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That your brain is making you believe you have gained some "inner truth" might be true. Does it matter though? If we are all deceived anyway, why not pick a delusion that hurts no one, and can make you less aggressive and hostile towards others.
I think Bakker gets into this very question with the Dunyain. If all is deception, why does one deception matter more than another? Why does truth matter...is there meaning in a deluding life?
Well, what if meaning itself is an illusion?
I look at people finding grand truths in drug use the same way I look at people still working on philosophical justifications for dualism - if nothing is true then Truth itself is a questionable goal so let these people indulge themselves.
Not to mention the possibility that people do find Truth via drugs or dualism.
What does 'Truth' even mean in this context, sci? How do you establish 'objective' existent outside ourselves 'truth,' if the only meaning humans are capable of apprehending is utilitarian and subjective?
EDIT: In this context, the only thing drug cocktails (o'natural or otherwise) might establish is a more 'functional' perspective that creates less 'subjective-obstacles' when interacting with the social and physical realities.
Yeah, that's part of the challenge facing skeptics clamoring for increasing acceptance of materialism. It offers objective truths but what can if bring to the discussion of subjective first person experience...the qualia of "Truth"?
I guess what I was getting at is I don't see the problem with someone being "deceived" into thinking there are DMT elves so long as they aren't harming others. Just pushing back against the, IMO silly, notion that increased numbers of skeptical materialists will make the world better somehow.
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I'm not straight on the specifics of 'skeptical materialists' or the 'qualia of Truth' but I was asking after "the possibility of finding Truth via drugs" as well (you somewhat addressed the "one deception over the other").
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I'm not straight on the specifics of 'skeptical materialists' or the 'qualia of Truth' but I was asking after "the possibility of finding Truth via drugs" as well (you somewhat addressed the "one deception over the other").
I guess in simplified form I don't see how drugs can fake subjective feelings of Truth if all feelings are ultimately illusory from the third person objective framework of science.
It's also problematic, to me anyway, to deny someone their personal feeling of gnosis if they aren't harming anyone. I have a friend who shed his depression after an ayuhuasca trip wherein he contacted the goddess Sophia.
Now, I don't believe in Sophia (or Zeus/Allah/Shiva/etc) but I don't know if there's a huge problem with someone else believing in what I and science consider an illusion.
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I think you are trying to say that all Truth is relative but that all relative Truth has the potential to be 'good' for an individual - like your friend?
The original discrepancy arose here:
I look at people finding grand truths in drug use the same way I look at people still working on philosophical justifications for dualism - if nothing is true then Truth itself is a questionable goal so let these people indulge themselves.
Not to mention the possibility that people do find Truth via drugs or dualism.
Those two sentences seemed somehow incompatible to me.
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Yeah, that pretty much captures what I was getting at.
Sorry for the confusion. Lack of sleep, long hours.
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No apologies necessary, Sci, it is a non-issue.
Take care of yourself, brethren.
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Now, I don't believe in Sophia (or Zeus/Allah/Shiva/etc) but I don't know if there's a huge problem with someone else believing in what I and science consider an illusion.
Again, if we are all deceived anyway, this should not be a problem. Many people use psychedelics to have a mystical experience(as you describe with your friend). This experience may give individuals a renewed sense of meaning in their lives. Like religion does for others actually.
I do not care what people believe, as long as it does not harm others. I think the difference between having a mystical experience through psychedelics VS religion, is that it is not written down in a book, it does not have strict rules you have to follow. In other words it is not organized and based on profit and lies.
I am glad that it now seems to be more acceptance for the use of psychedelics in therapy and otherwise. That the state should tell us what is good for our health by spreading lies about psychedelics, and at the same time throwing alcohol,nicotine and caffeine in our faces is just absurd.
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Well, we already have a rudiment understanding of which types of drugs best facilitate 'good' experiences as we've highlighted in the last few posts (and the majority of the thread really) and which types of drug are most likely to cause acute harm or 'bad' experiences - as per the thread title.
However, even despite doing all kinds of terrible and great things to my body and my brain through ignorance growing up, I still don't know how much I condone facilitating these kinds of therapies over non-chemical alternatives.
Though, of course, if there was a collection of research done, the popular conceptions would be overturned, we'd be selling ourselves packages of modernized cocktail version shrooms and LSD.
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However, even despite doing all kinds of terrible and great things to my body and my brain through ignorance growing up, I still don't know how much I condone facilitating these kinds of therapies over non-chemical alternatives.
Well, you should not take (at least not high doses) when your young. You have no idea what you are getting into. It seems we have both experienced what certain drugs can do to a undeveloped mind.
It is something else when you are an adult. I know people who would rather spend a little money on a "heroic dose" of psilocybin, instead of spending a lot of time and money with a psychiatrist or psychologist.
For me it was an amazing experience. It changed me in many ways, all of them good. Made me more humble, less cocksure, much more
caring to everything.
Either way I do not know if I recommend it, because it was also extremely unpleasant during the start of the trip, and people react very
differently to these kinds of drugs. Psychedelics is also just one of many ways to achieve these goals. Since I am lazy, it was natural for
me to do it, instead of spending years to learn yoga or meditation at very high levels. You must go deep to compete with a high dose of psychedelics.
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Since I am lazy, it was natural for
me to do it, instead of spending years to learn yoga or meditation at very high levels. You must go deep to compete with a high dose of psychedelics.
Lol - this was really where I ended my last post, Royce. There is no reason to assume that every generation, or even all peoples, need to see sustained practice as a dichotomy of laziness. I'd much rather see us review our perspectives of meditation and 'trips' and clothe the latter in the supposed ritual of the first (cause honestly, breathing: you're doing it anyways ;) - attention makes meditation).
It's the ignorance that gets me. Luckily, there were three of us at each other's backs and there were no instances of innate biology and exogenous chemicals interacting with damage. But we ranged in our drug use and did really dangerous, ill-informed things to ourselves.
Plus arguing between the level of specificity, intensity, duration, of drugs now (then) and drugs to come is still just offering people two versions of roulette and probably the natural occurrences are less safe (I realize you were only "soft-advocating" the point).
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It's the ignorance that gets me. Luckily, there were three of us at each other's backs and there were no instances of innate biology and exogenous chemicals interacting with damage. But we ranged in our drug use and did really dangerous, ill-informed things to ourselves.
Yes, and this is why I am for drug education instead of war on drugs. Kids will explore drugs no matter what, so why not take that
seriously, and educate them instead of screaming NO to their faces.
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Haha. Did you know that there were statistical analyses done of the "success" of Reagan's "Just Say No" campaign?
More people ended up trying drugs because of being introduced to the concept of drugs, who otherwise would not have been exposed to them; this outweighed the negligible (small) number of people who actually said "no" because of seeing the advertisements.
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Yeah, I have seen him promoting crack on TV, it is ridiculous.
Say "just say know" instead of "just say no":)
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Yeah, I have seen him promoting crack on TV, it is ridiculous.
Say "just say know" instead of "just say no":)
Lmao. I will assume you are thinking of Joe Rogan?
I was referring to Nancy Reagan ;).
But I agree with your slogan. If arming yourself with more information doesn't help, I'm not sure what will.
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Lol, no it was in one of Kevin Booths documentaries, either "American drug war" or "How weed won the west".
There is a clip where Ronald Reagan was talking about this "new epidemic" of dangerous drugs. What was weird was that it sounded
like a commercial. "This is crack cocaine, it is cheap, easy to get your hands on and highly addictive".
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Haha.
Yeah... ridiculous. Reagan is such an obvious puppet, it really bothers me that he's one of the most respected Presidents.
I shall look into these Kevin Booth documentaries. I've heard the name before.
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He was a friend of Bill Hicks, and he has been on the Alex Jones show a few times.
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Ah yes, course.
I always thought Bill Hicks and Alex Jones kind of looked like each other.
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Haha, there are certain similarities yes :)
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Saw the Spirit Molecule, the documentary on DMT. At 70 or so minutes, I'd say it's definitely worth a watch for anyone wanting an introduction to the subject.
There's some good stuff about using shrooms to decrease anxiety of terminal cancer patients.
Also, as a personal note, was cool to see Neal Goldsmith (http://www.nealgoldsmith.com/index.html) interviewed as I've actually attended his Poetry Science talks which I recommend to anyone who lives near NYC.
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Cosmic creativity -- how art evolves consciousness: Alex Grey at TEDxMaui 2013
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0_YJToyOp_4
Great talk by Alex Grey, the extraordinary artist whose paintings are incredible depictions of [purported] higher realms.
I love how he met his wife. :)
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This is a dense thread I've been meaning to hop into, though I'm not sure where to start. Background I suppose.
I've done a substantial amount of psychedelics. Several (dozens) of trips of often heroic doses of mushrooms and acid, dabbling with MDMA (I hesitate to call that a proper trip, but whatever), and a few 2C-E/I trips, few mescaline, and a DMT dose. Not really a 'party' tripper, I treat them with respect and go in with the intention of coming out with something new.
I think most people should have some experience with psychedelics, because I think it's valuable to have your fundamental belief systems altered frequently. You're not the same person you were 10 years ago, and if you compared those two people, you can obtain some insight into yourself, your life, your path, etc. Tripping is often like doing that immediately, several times in rapid succession. Plus, they're fascinating as all hell.
I know many, many people start finding the 'magic' of them, talking about alternate/transcendent realities, profound and externally-generated insights, so on. This bothers the shit out of me. Physically ingesting a physical drug as it works physical effects on your physical brain creating alterations to your subjective experience, to me has always been superb evidence of the physical basis of said subjective experience. That this is not obvious to most is frankly depressing. I've lost good friends to that sort of lunacy. But! So it goes.
Before psylocibin, lsd, and mdma were criminalized, there was much effort in studying their therapeutic effects. MDMA was used (in carefully controlled dosages with great preperation) with children from abusive, awful homes who developed severe antisocial behavior to very positive effects (from raging and fighting other children for their toys to actively sharing and hugging others). LSD can be used to treat migraines (non-psychoactive doses), Bill whatshisface who helped found AA promoted it for treatment of alcoholics. Sci mentions above psylocibin being used for anxiety of terminal patients. There's plenty of bits here and there in the 50's-70's, and it's an absolute shame that we haven't been able to spend the past decades building on that research (don't even get me started on the state of pharmaceuticals).
Saddest of all is how these get lumped in with 'drugs' in general. It's a lazy thing to do, completely detracting from their function.
Annnd I've run out of steam and work is calling.
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I think most people should have some experience with psychedelics, because I think it's valuable to have your fundamental belief systems altered frequently. You're not the same person you were 10 years ago, and if you compared those two people, you can obtain some insight into yourself, your life, your path, etc. Tripping is often like doing that immediately, several times in rapid succession. Plus, they're fascinating as all hell.
I agree with this. People I have talked to regarding these substances do admit that having your belief system altered is
something that causes doubt and fear. You do not want to realize that you might be fundamentally wrong about how you view reality. Personally I found it very helpful in how I look at things, and how people use language and rhetoric to portray
reality in a certain way.
And sadly I have not tried DMT yet, which is pretty hard to come by where I live.
I know many, many people start finding the 'magic' of them, talking about alternate/transcendent realities, profound and externally-generated insights, so on. This bothers the shit out of me. Physically ingesting a physical drug as it works physical effects on your physical brain creating alterations to your subjective experience, to me has always been superb evidence of the physical basis of said subjective experience. That this is not obvious to most is frankly depressing. I've lost good friends to that sort of lunacy.
This one is a little tricky, though I agree with your reasoning. The question of why these substances provides a genuine mystical experience for certain people is fascinating. It is not something you read in a book, or something people tell you is the truth. You experience it first hand, and I can see that people get so awestruck by the experience that they end up explaining it using religious terminology. It has the potential of becoming a religion(and some people claim that it was the "true" religion back in the day, with mushroom cults etc.)
Personally(and I think I have said this before, either here or in another tread) I do not think that we visit other dimensions and so on, but rather take a deep dive into "ourselves" or our unconsciousness where we encounter lost memories, supressed emotions, hopes and fears. This can be a thrilling ride if you have experienced much in your life.
Saddest of all is how these get lumped in with 'drugs' in general. It's a lazy thing to do, completely detracting from their function.
Yes, it is sad , but I do think those days are over. The evidence and conclusions from recent research are just to positive to ignore in the long run. I also believe that if we could study these substances freely without prejudice we would learn more of what the experience really is, and maybe prevent another religious cult from springing to life:)
Great talk by Alex Grey, the extraordinary artist whose paintings are incredible depictions of [purported] higher realms
Yes he is quite amazing:) I think he made the cover art for some of the Tool albums too.
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Great talk by Alex Grey, the extraordinary artist whose paintings are incredible depictions of [purported] higher realms.
Anything Alex Grey is awesome. But it's interesting, I don't think people need trips necessarily as "therapy" when his art was enough to grip me as a teenager and push me against the glass. In fact, in many ways, I became exploratory of drugs because I couldn't handle real life (and those aspects of it you glimpse in AG's art) and was looking for a more mundane mundane.
This is a dense thread I've been meaning to hop into, though I'm not sure where to start. Background I suppose.
I'm glad you dove in, Wic. The middle... three pages seem to have strayed towards different aspects of drugs in relation to X, anyways (not necessarily therapy related).
I've done a substantial amount of psychedelics. Several (dozens) of trips of often heroic doses of mushrooms and acid, dabbling with MDMA (I hesitate to call that a proper trip, but whatever), and a few 2C-E/I trips, few mescaline, and a DMT dose. Not really a 'party' tripper, I treat them with respect and go in with the intention of coming out with something new.
That's really cool. How did you learn of the respect-frame? Just asking as it was many years after I'd already abused drugs that I learned from smarter, calmer people that intentions could be made whetstones (thankfully, I had a general predisposition for treating all moments as being interpretable to provide a lesson for me contextually).
I think most people should have some experience with psychedelics, because I think it's valuable to have your fundamental belief systems altered frequently. You're not the same person you were 10 years ago, and if you compared those two people, you can obtain some insight into yourself, your life, your path, etc. Tripping is often like doing that immediately, several times in rapid succession. Plus, they're fascinating as all hell.
Truth - but people can do these things elsewise also. Drugs aren't the only experiences that mediate changes of this magnitude.
I know many, many people start finding the 'magic' of them, talking about alternate/transcendent realities, profound and externally-generated insights, so on. This bothers the shit out of me. Physically ingesting a physical drug as it works physical effects on your physical brain creating alterations to your subjective experience, to me has always been superb evidence of the physical basis of said subjective experience. That this is not obvious to most is frankly depressing. I've lost good friends to that sort of lunacy. But! So it goes.
I think these thoughts in people around me primarily made me go from some subset of Christian to Agnostic (I may still have been still thinking in terms of soul rather than self at 15-16). Everything is possible. Reality is completely and utterly more than we individual humans here on Earth bound to our biohusk can possible comprehend. I'm going to focus on saving our little corner from ourselves (which is the only real obstacle) and maybe working towards getting us out of this perilous planet-bound existence. Go a Scattering like the Ousters ;).
Before psylocibin, lsd, and mdma were criminalized, there was much effort in studying their therapeutic effects. MDMA was used (in carefully controlled dosages with great preperation) with children from abusive, awful homes who developed severe antisocial behavior to very positive effects (from raging and fighting other children for their toys to actively sharing and hugging others). LSD can be used to treat migraines (non-psychoactive doses), Bill whatshisface who helped found AA promoted it for treatment of alcoholics. Sci mentions above psylocibin being used for anxiety of terminal patients. There's plenty of bits here and there in the 50's-70's, and it's an absolute shame that we haven't been able to spend the past decades building on that research (don't even get me started on the state of pharmaceuticals).
Ah, the seventies. The glory days of research with drugs.
You know, there are a handful of labs worldwide studying psylocibin. And I know I've seen some fMRI studies of brains on mushrooms and marijuana. I can probably dig some stuff up for you, Wic.
Oh yes, what's that about the coordinated effort toward medicalizing the world? We should probably make another thread ;).
Saddest of all is how these get lumped in with 'drugs' in general. It's a lazy thing to do, completely detracting from their function.
Annnd I've run out of steam and work is calling.
My favorite is to tell people that everyone I've ever worked with thinks nothing of abusing over the counter medication to affect their subjective experience but pooh, pooh, the arbitrary category of 'drugs,' which for some reason... doesn't include alcohol, nicotine, caffeine, refined sugar. Or that people in power are just people with power and all the evidence that they snort a bunch of codeine and do their job just like the rest of the pillheads out here.
I love the work posts that are contributed around here.
EDIT:
I agree with this. People I have talked to regarding these substances do admit that having your belief system altered is
something that causes doubt and fear. You do not want to realize that you might be fundamentally wrong about how you view reality. Personally I found it very helpful in how I look at things, and how people use language and rhetoric to portray
reality in a certain way.
Honestly, these threads of thought describe some aspects of why the Western Empire has a history of substance abuse, and pretty much why all other society have retained extensive histories, at least, if not practices of intensive ritual use. Guiding elders, ceremony, you know, constructing something of a necessary pedestal to divide the journey from the mundane - it's explicit in their actions: "this is not for regular consumption."
This one is a little tricky, though I agree with your reasoning. The question of why these substances provides a genuine mystical experience for certain people is fascinating. It is not something you read in a book, or something people tell you is the truth. You experience it first hand, and I can see that people get so awestruck by the experience that they end up explaining it using religious terminology. It has the potential of becoming a religion(and some people claim that it was the "true" religion back in the day, with mushroom cults etc.)
Narrative serves as a major component of regular function. So in achieving altered state, narrative might be likely to remain proportionately present in experience of that state.
Personally(and I think I have said this before, either here or in another tread) I do not think that we visit other dimensions and so on, but rather take a deep dive into "ourselves" or our unconsciousness where we encounter lost memories, supressed emotions, hopes and fears. This can be a thrilling ride if you have experienced much in your life.
Unfortunately, there hasn't been as much research into how the experiences might correspond to what happens. Is it like my perspective of dreams and tarot where the benefit is explicitly from getting a random narrative to correspond with your life? (in the same sense Wic highlighted that different drugs provide semi-random patterns of excitation and inhibition, tuning up and down different aspects of experience to provide with a definitively altered frame for viewing reality)
Yes, it is sad , but I do think those days are over. The evidence and conclusions from recent research are just to positive to ignore in the long run. I also believe that if we could study these substances freely without prejudice we would learn more of what the experience really is, and maybe prevent another religious cult from springing to life:)
Hmm... hmm... but more importantly, prejudice in our world, Royce, is also profitable. See Wic's impending rant on pharmaceuticals ;).
Great talk by Alex Grey, the extraordinary artist whose paintings are incredible depictions of [purported] higher realms
Yes he is quite amazing:) I think he made the cover art for some of the Tool albums too.
Yeap! From Lateralus on AG has worked with Tool, even on their Show Art and Videos. It's a beautiful coordination of attempting to raise the bar of consciousness a little.
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I know many, many people start finding the 'magic' of them, talking about alternate/transcendent realities, profound and externally-generated insights, so on. This bothers the shit out of me. Physically ingesting a physical drug as it works physical effects on your physical brain creating alterations to your subjective experience, to me has always been superb evidence of the physical basis of said subjective experience. That this is not obvious to most is frankly depressing. I've lost good friends to that sort of lunacy. But! So it goes.
I posted way too much on this board and in this thread in particular, and ended up with too many people calling me out to respond to them all. But this quote right here is basically the point I wanted to make.
Wic - it may bother the shit out of you, but for me it's an even more intense mix of frustration, rage, anxiety fear etc. I've lost too many friends just like you have, and also probably lost far too much of my own mind too.
I got really frustrated trying to explain what you've said in social contexts, because living in a really desolate and culturally and economically deprived place, there's very few spaces I can go to avoid the aforementioned lunacy.
And what's even more pathetic/disgusting is how utterly PROUD so many people are now of their macho hedonist/nihilist individualism. How scandalized they are when you dare suggest they aren't in god like control of it all, that there's any cultural and social programming involved, that they aren't just enthralled in a kind of dipshitted consumer existentialist ideology that works to create profit for others at the expense of their lives... and of course the lives of others who suffer from the fall out of their behaviours.
I don't want to sound like some hypocritical conservative moralist, but I do have a certain hatred for what passes as leisure time these days. Drink till you puke, then let the social services/pharmaceutical industries clean up the mess. If you follow your pleasures, you can't be questioned or made fun of.
It doesn't HAVE to be this way. The horrible banality of it all is really grating.
All of this is not to say I didn't party HARD, because I did, and am a bitter burn out whose stuck with the dullness of sobriety. It's sad that I prefer this to anything else that's going on.
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Don't like linking to the UKs equivalent of Fox News, but has anyone else come across this theory? http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2527074/Did-BEER-create-modern-society-Ancient-man-developed-agriculture-brew-alcohol-not-bake-bread-claims-scientist.html (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2527074/Did-BEER-create-modern-society-Ancient-man-developed-agriculture-brew-alcohol-not-bake-bread-claims-scientist.html)
Makes such a terrible amount of sense...
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This one is a little tricky, though I agree with your reasoning. The question of why these substances provides a genuine mystical experience for certain people is fascinating. It is not something you read in a book, or something people tell you is the truth. You experience it first hand, and I can see that people get so awestruck by the experience that they end up explaining it using religious terminology. It has the potential of becoming a religion(and some people claim that it was the "true" religion back in the day, with mushroom cults etc.)
Personally(and I think I have said this before, either here or in another tread) I do not think that we visit other dimensions and so on, but rather take a deep dive into "ourselves" or our unconsciousness where we encounter lost memories, supressed emotions, hopes and fears. This can be a thrilling ride if you have experienced much in your life.
Indeed. I would certainly consider them more valid spiritual experiences than anything that involves the interjection of another person between you and [insert transcendent entity here]. If someone was going to develop a relationship with a god, they should be digging inward.
That's really cool. How did you learn of the respect-frame? Just asking as it was many years after I'd already abused drugs that I learned from smarter, calmer people that intentions could be made whetstones (thankfully, I had a general predisposition for treating all moments as being interpretable to provide a lesson for me contextually).
Before I ever took any, I fortunately spent years reading about them from a solid group of educated trippers (many in their 30's/40's) discussing them on a forum (forum wasn't all about psychedelics, but the topic came up frequently). I didn't realize the magnitude of it at the time, but they thoroughly equipped me for just about anything.
And I know I've seen some fMRI studies of brains on mushrooms and marijuana.
Yeah, I remember one recently about the surprising - to some - of the decreased activity in the brain on psylocibin. I think it was presumed to be, in part, a decreased activity of inhibitors (which, if I remember my Oliver Sacks readings right, is associated with other, internally-generated hallucinations). I agree there seems to be a slowly growing comeback, which is great.
Wic - it may bother the shit out of you, but for me it's an even more intense mix of frustration, rage, anxiety fear etc. I've lost too many friends just like you have, and also probably lost far too much of my own mind too.
I think you misinterpreted me there - I was talking about losing them to the goofy mysticism. If a generally rational, irreligious friend started attending church and yakking about the light of the lord spilling out of every pore, I'd consider that a loss too. :P
I like seeing deviance in the world, just as a personal opinion. I agree that there can be very perturbing aspects of indulgent nihilism, shallowness and arrogance, but these just things people carry them around, we see it all over. People who don't observe themselves, don't read books, etc. At least they throw decent parties.
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Hmm... hmm... but more importantly, prejudice in our world, Royce, is also profitable. See Wic's impending rant on pharmaceuticals ;).
Yeah, I actually got hold of "Bad Pharma" by Ben Goldacre, and that is surely going to be a depressing read for sure. It is rather absurd that this industry can alter consciousness of kids so they will fit the societal state of consciousness, which some people might call the slave mentality. Those other mind altering drugs that may teach you to think for yourself, those are not recommended. Of course the western empire works much better if the people in it ask as few vital questions as possible.
I might also add that some kids who have been medicated have probably gotten a better life because of it, so it is not necessarily 100% evil:)
Before I ever took any, I fortunately spent years reading about them from a solid group of educated trippers (many in their 30's/40's) discussing them on a forum (forum wasn't all about psychedelics, but the topic came up frequently). I didn't realize the magnitude of it at the time, but they thoroughly equipped me for just about anything.
Now this is a brilliant advice, I wish I had done it the same way.
I had a few semi-bad experiences with psychedelics, like taking shrooms and going to nightclubs. That was a terrible experience for me. My older brother said that this is not the way you should take these substances, started talking about Timothy Leary and "set and setting" and so on, and I have to say that it is not bullshit at all. It made all the difference in the world for my experience of psychedelics.
Yeah, I remember one recently about the surprising - to some - of the decreased activity in the brain on psylocibin. I think it was presumed to be, in part, a decreased activity of inhibitors (which, if I remember my Oliver Sacks readings right, is associated with other, internally-generated hallucinations). I agree there seems to be a slowly growing comeback, which is great.
If the various effects of psilocybin interests you, I highly recommend the youtube channel called "maps". Lots of interesting talks on the subject.
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I think you misinterpreted me there - I was talking about losing them to the goofy mysticism. If a generally rational, irreligious friend started attending church and yakking about the light of the lord spilling out of every pore, I'd consider that a loss too. :P
I like seeing deviance in the world, just as a personal opinion. I agree that there can be very perturbing aspects of indulgent nihilism, shallowness and arrogance, but these just things people carry them around, we see it all over. People who don't observe themselves, don't read books, etc. At least they throw decent parties.
Ah I see! I've been to (and hosted) far too many of those parties. After a while the only doors of perception being opened are your own being kicked through by psychotic speed freaks.
I agree with you about the mysticism. Funny enough, my experience of it has shown it to be often MORE corrupt than any organized, conservative religion. There's something about telling people fluoride and heart medicine are poison and what you really need is to take dodgy shrooms in the forest with a gropey "druid" that makes me long for the dullness of sunday worship.
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I think you should also check this guy out: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanis%C5%82aw_Ignacy_Witkiewicz (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanis%C5%82aw_Ignacy_Witkiewicz). He was a Polish writer, poet and painter of the pre-WWII period, who experimented with mind-altering substances of various kinds. And he would sign his paintings with symbols that show what substance was he using while painting (or not - some are signed something like "two days without cigarettes", too). He also wrote a book about his experiences.
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I think you should also check this guy out: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanis%C5%82aw_Ignacy_Witkiewicz. He was a Polish writer, poet and painter of the pre-WWII period, who experimented with mind-altering substances of various kinds. And he would sign his paintings with symbols that show what substance was he using while painting (or not - some are signed something like "two days without cigarettes", too). He also wrote a book about his experiences.
Nice input Alia:) Could be interesting to read his take on this, compared with Huxley who wrote "the Doors of Perception" about 20 years later.
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Psychedelics and drugs are for depressed people.
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Psychedelics and drugs are for depressed people.
Lol. You could have added curious, which I think is the reason many try these substances out.
I do agree that it can lead to depression if not treated with respect, but some substances tend to sort out depression too.
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I know many, many people start finding the 'magic' of them, talking about alternate/transcendent realities, profound and externally-generated insights, so on. This bothers the shit out of me. Physically ingesting a physical drug as it works physical effects on your physical brain creating alterations to your subjective experience, to me has always been superb evidence of the physical basis of said subjective experience. That this is not obvious to most is frankly depressing. I've lost good friends to that sort of lunacy. But! So it goes.
I posted way too much on this board and in this thread in particular, and ended up with too many people calling me out to respond to them all. But this quote right here is basically the point I wanted to make.
I hope that those of us participating weren't terrible about it?
I will reiterate that this doesn't invalidate the possibility of drugs making the short of "multidimensional connections" as I think may have been suggested up-thread.
Wic - it may bother the shit out of you, but for me it's an even more intense mix of frustration, rage, anxiety fear etc. I've lost too many friends just like you have, and also probably lost far too much of my own mind too.
The issue I think Past Madness had upthread with simply attributing these lost souls to chemical imbalance is that that wide eyed tendency to wax religiously about experience is a product of experience. "Sober" people sound worse to my subjectivity than any of the worst druggies that I sat there nodding my head with to avoid the torsion of contradiction.
"How can you not see that which is obvious to be true?"
Stoned, sober, it's all the same deluded creature. I mean, I'm not even hard-delusion a la Bakker, I think there are degrees of awareness to be had within BB (though, ultimately, I agree with his worse conclusions about asymptotic limits and that they are probably impassible without perceptual augmentation).
I still want to find a way to communicate.
I got really frustrated trying to explain what you've said in social contexts, because living in a really desolate and culturally and economically deprived place, there's very few spaces I can go to avoid the aforementioned lunacy.
And what's even more pathetic/disgusting is how utterly PROUD so many people are now of their macho hedonist/nihilist individualism. How scandalized they are when you dare suggest they aren't in god like control of it all, that there's any cultural and social programming involved, that they aren't just enthralled in a kind of dipshitted consumer existentialist ideology that works to create profit for others at the expense of their lives... and of course the lives of others who suffer from the fall out of their behaviours.
Lol. Application. I can't see a mind like yours be lost to the frustration. I think we can affect change, and while maybe we should curtail our rampant reproduction - with some restraint even - I think that we should even harness the seven billion brains available. It kills me that another Einstein, Newton, Darwin, whoever are working and dying because of, rather than being facilitated by, circumstance of the dominant culture's making (at this point in globalization anyhow) - which is me, buying my bullshit; basically just food and books.
It doesn't HAVE to be this way. The horrible banality of it all is really grating.
+1. But you have to find some personal solace somewhere. Dwelling on the suck, sucks. I'm lucky in that I get warped about just being alive and experiencing (it used to be a negative experience and I had to reach an understanding to harness it as positive) and that I'm deluded into think I can affect change and do that by honing myself to do so ;).
All of this is not to say I didn't party HARD, because I did, and am a bitter burn out whose stuck with the dullness of sobriety. It's sad that I prefer this to anything else that's going on.
Lol - I think sobriety gets a bad rap. What's wrong with functioning normally?
I hope by this you mean the forum. It's already gotten me through tough shit in two years. Not to mention, that I saw a dramatic sharpening of my debating skills :).
Don't like linking to the UKs equivalent of Fox News, but has anyone else come across this theory? http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2527074/Did-BEER-create-modern-society-Ancient-man-developed-agriculture-brew-alcohol-not-bake-bread-claims-scientist.html (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2527074/Did-BEER-create-modern-society-Ancient-man-developed-agriculture-brew-alcohol-not-bake-bread-claims-scientist.html)
Makes such a terrible amount of sense...
I know it has come up elsewhere but have you read Food of the Gods?
Indeed. I would certainly consider them more valid spiritual experiences than anything that involves the interjection of another person between you and [insert transcendent entity here]. If someone was going to develop a relationship with a god, they should be digging inward.
+1 - I'm all about positing human first.
Before I ever took any, I fortunately spent years reading about them from a solid group of educated trippers (many in their 30's/40's) discussing them on a forum (forum wasn't all about psychedelics, but the topic came up frequently). I didn't realize the magnitude of it at the time, but they thoroughly equipped me for just about anything.
Awesome. If only society enabled more of that discussion... but, of course, informed people don't make money perpetuating as is. We wouldn't see so many lost.
And I know I've seen some fMRI studies of brains on mushrooms and marijuana.
Yeah, I remember one recently about the surprising - to some - of the decreased activity in the brain on psylocibin. I think it was presumed to be, in part, a decreased activity of inhibitors (which, if I remember my Oliver Sacks readings right, is associated with other, internally-generated hallucinations). I agree there seems to be a slowly growing comeback, which is great.
Give me time to find the others - this is one of the more foundational pieces of new research: Neural correlates of the psychedelic state as determined by fMRI studies with psilocybin (http://www.pnas.org/content/109/6/2138.full).
In reading a bit of that again, I remembered it as a type of communicative inhibition. So structures that are normally communicate with each other cognate alone (?).
I think you misinterpreted me there - I was talking about losing them to the goofy mysticism. If a generally rational, irreligious friend started attending church and yakking about the light of the lord spilling out of every pore, I'd consider that a loss too. :P
I like seeing deviance in the world, just as a personal opinion. I agree that there can be very perturbing aspects of indulgent nihilism, shallowness and arrogance, but these just things people carry them around, we see it all over. People who don't observe themselves, don't read books, etc. At least they throw decent parties.
Lol. I actually have to say I've probably landed closer to james' perspective more than once at those "decent parties." Sometimes there were just no mutually curious people around and intoxication becomes plastic.
Yeah, I actually got hold of "Bad Pharma" by Ben Goldacre, and that is surely going to be a depressing read for sure. It is rather absurd that this industry can alter consciousness of kids so they will fit the societal state of consciousness, which some people might call the slave mentality. Those other mind altering drugs that may teach you to think for yourself, those are not recommended. Of course the western empire works much better if the people in it ask as few vital questions as possible.
To read it how McKenna puts it in Food of the Gods, those were the same dividends of distributing coffee and sugar worldwide in the past couple hundred years. It's always an interesting perspective. Goldacre works hard.
I might also add that some kids who have been medicated have probably gotten a better life because of it, so it is not necessarily 100% evil:)
In some cases. But we could be working harder to eliminate bias that sees a number of kids dosed to make money.
Sometimes, indulging a child's innate curiousity really is the best tactic.
I had a few semi-bad experiences with psychedelics, like taking shrooms and going to nightclubs. That was a terrible experience for me. My older brother said that this is not the way you should take these substances, started talking about Timothy Leary and "set and setting" and so on, and I have to say that it is not bullshit at all. It made all the difference in the world for my experience of psychedelics.
"Set and setting" is pulled right from the drugs and behavior textbook I've been exposed to.
If the various effects of psilocybin interests you, I highly recommend the youtube channel called "maps". Lots of interesting talks on the subject.
Never really got a handle on how I felt about MAPS (http://www.maps.org/).
I agree with you about the mysticism. Funny enough, my experience of it has shown it to be often MORE corrupt than any organized, conservative religion. There's something about telling people fluoride and heart medicine are poison and what you really need is to take dodgy shrooms in the forest with a gropey "druid" that makes me long for the dullness of sunday worship.
Lol.
I think you should also check this guy out: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanis%C5%82aw_Ignacy_Witkiewicz (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanis%C5%82aw_Ignacy_Witkiewicz). He was a Polish writer, poet and painter of the pre-WWII period, who experimented with mind-altering substances of various kinds. And he would sign his paintings with symbols that show what substance was he using while painting (or not - some are signed something like "two days without cigarettes", too). He also wrote a book about his experiences.
"In the late 1920s he turned to the novel, writing two works, Farewell to Autumn and Insatiability."
I love when scientists do works of fiction to encompass their theories - though this isn't really that. I want to both read those books and find out if he marked portions of writing like his paintings.
Did anyone know that BF Skinner wrote a piece of fiction (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walden_Two)?
Nice input Alia:) Could be interesting to read his take on this, compared with Huxley who wrote "the Doors of Perception" about 20 years later.
Have you read other Huxley, Royce?
Psychedelics and drugs are for depressed people.
... I just don't know how to take you.
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I read some Witkiewicz at school, he's even part of set books over here ;-) and no, he did not mark his books as written under influence. But I much prefer his visual works, I could just sit and stare at his paintings.
I also read Huxley and "Brave New World" always seemed to me rather anti-drug. After all, the ubiquitous soma is used to keep people happy, stop them from thinking and protect the social order.
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I've always thought that certain drugs were illegal because it keeps the money off the books. Allowing others to sell and distribute off-record.
We found out in Iran-contra that the CIA were quite happy to run drugs and sell them to replace the cash that congress were denying them.
The CIA also helped Chiang kai-shek sell opium so he could fund his fight .
Plus many other allegations.
In the book "the untouchables" which is mainly about the scandals of the met(metropolitan police) for the last 40 years, drug running investigations were spiked. Drugs and guns in northern ireland as well during the height of the troubles.
I've taken several psychedelic drugs before, but not in years.
I've taken Psilocybe semilanceata (liberty caps) which grow in a field 10 minute walk from me. Plus a few other strains as well as LSD, and heavy amounts of ingested cannabis which gave a trippy effect.
It's an interesting experience and amongst my friends we all agree you get a sense of the connectiveness of everything, which might very well be how the thing work, it also disolves the ego somewhat, and had some great conversations about fears and worries without any sort of social hang-up.
I shall now go read the thread :P
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Psilocybe semilanceata (liberty caps)
Not really relevant, but are you from Northern Europe? This is the same shroom that grows everywhere in Norway:)
just food and books
I had to laugh when I saw this:) This is exactly what my wife told me a couple of days ago. "The only thing you need is books and some food":)
Do I get myself a college degree with all this reading? No, though I have tried college a couple of times, but I never quite managed to just keep my head down and accept that I had to read what they told me to read. The cognitive dissonance stressed me a bit:) A bit childish maybe, but an important point is that I have a "job" which suits me perfectly. I help out a couple of friends of mine who happen to be in wheelchairs. A loooooot of freetime at work, where I can write a lot and read some more. So if I did`t not have this sweet deal in regards to work, I most certainly would have gotten through college. So basically I read what I want, when I want at work. And as long as I have the greatest teacher so far(the internet) I can learn to understand more on my own.
Sorry about this exremely off topic post, but I have been thinking of starting an education thread soon ;)
Have you read other Huxley, Royce?
Only the you know what, that almost everyone I know has read:) I have islands and Moksha on my to read list.
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Yes i do :)
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I read some Witkiewicz at school, he's even part of set books over here ;-) and no, he did not mark his books as written under influence. But I much prefer his visual works, I could just sit and stare at his paintings.
I also read Huxley and "Brave New World" always seemed to me rather anti-drug. After all, the ubiquitous soma is used to keep people happy, stop them from thinking and protect the social order.
Lol - it really depends on the moral quality of Huxley's personality?
I've always thought that certain drugs were illegal because it keeps the money off the books. Allowing others to sell and distribute off-record.
It depends - we can't know but either drugs were "morally" outlawed first or someone decided to do so to explicitly make money.
See marijuana.
But I think that in all cases people will work to profit from how things are. At a certain point, these people perceive that they would lose or make less money if things change. And enforcement.
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I also read Huxley and "Brave New World" always seemed to me rather anti-drug. After all, the ubiquitous soma is used to keep people happy, stop them from thinking and protect the social order.
Lol - it really depends on the moral quality of Huxley's personality?
Sorry, I don't understand your point. Perhaps my writing again wasn't as clear as I wanted it to be. "Brave New World" is a dystopia showing a society where masses are kept happy with the help of drugs (soma). So it seemed to me that the overall message was "drugs can be bad, as they make people complacent and comfortable with their lives, even though objectivelly it is a tyranny". (BTW, Russian tsars used alcohol to much the same end.)
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You were clear, Alia.
I meant that there is another way of perceiving his story, in that Huxley was providing a model for actual social use - like your example of the Russians.
While it's possible (and commonly thought) that he might be a black sheep, Aldous is part of a dynastic family of wealthy and affluent scientists.
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Oh, right. I was not aware of this other interpretation of "Brave New World". But then again, personal lives of authors do not really interest me. Which means that I may sometimes miss something.
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Just letting you know that the Aldous, in particular, may have been trying to design a blueprint to enslave the masses ;).
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OK. I think over here especially the only "canonic" interpretation was that what he wrote was a dystopia which criticised capitalist society.
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Did anyone know that BF Skinner wrote a piece of fiction?
I missed this. Have you read it?
Just letting you know that the Aldous, in particular, may have been trying to design a blueprint to enslave the masses ;).
I think I have heard about this. A drug that is actually good for people, maybe that would be a "blessing" rather than an enslavement. The question is, would the drug liberate people from enslavement, or would it just make you accept the ongoing enslavement that is ever present? Will a drug cause enslavement no matter how it works?
Did he talk about this in other books?
OK. I think over here especially the only "canonic" interpretation was that what he wrote was a dystopia which criticised capitalist society
I think this is the general opinion of what he portrayed. It is a very broad generalization I think, because the book touches on many aspects of being human, not only capitalist vs primitive.
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I think I have heard about this. A drug that is actually good for people, maybe that would be a "blessing" rather than an enslavement. The question is, would the drug liberate people from enslavement, or would it just make you accept the ongoing enslavement that is ever present? Will a drug cause enslavement no matter how it works?
I think that if we had a drug that was easily available, socially accepted, cheap (not to mention, distributed freely by the government) and free of immediate negative effects (like hangover in case of alcohol, which to a great extent fulfils the first three points), it would be very hard for anyone to stop taking it. Our brains' reward system is very powerful. And I don't think it would liberate people from enslavement, especially if the government was the only source. It would be more like this - you spend the whole day doing your tasks, even if you hate them, because you know that in the evening, before going to bed, you would get your fix and everything would be wonderful.
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You describe more or less the status quo today. Alcohol, caffeine, nicotine etc make enslavement more bearable to the general public, so they are legal. I was thinking more of if we could create a drug that would take away anxiety and fear, and not make you indifferent/apathetic but rather more focused on fulfilling your human potential. If it were distributed by a government, it would be a completely different kind of government(since they too take the drug). Now that could be a brave new world:)
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Well, alcohol, for one, has nasty and immediate side effects and in addition getting drunk is not socially acceptable in certain circles, so it's not the perfect drug I was describing.
The one that you are describing - I suppose some of prescription anti-psychotics and anxiolytics could have that potential, but they are also addictive and their list of side effects is very long. Although in some cases they work miracles (I've seen that myself). So perhaps if you could create something on that basis but not addictive and easily tolerated, this would change the world and society.
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OK. I think over here especially the only "canonic" interpretation was that what he wrote was a dystopia which criticised capitalist society.
It's the way I like to see it too.
Did anyone know that BF Skinner wrote a piece of fiction?
I missed this. Have you read it?
No, I only recently just learned about it - actually, it's been a few quick realizations that led me to conceive that many scientists I've been interested in write fiction to assert their theoretical considerations.
Just letting you know that the Aldous, in particular, may have been trying to design a blueprint to enslave the masses ;).
I think I have heard about this. A drug that is actually good for people, maybe that would be a "blessing" rather than an enslavement. The question is, would the drug liberate people from enslavement, or would it just make you accept the ongoing enslavement that is ever present? Will a drug cause enslavement no matter how it works?
Hmm... in this perspective, I'm offering that Aldous is telling the "elites" that they may be able to dose the masses into compliance. Though, I prefer Alia's view where he's making commentary about the "cultural daze."
Did he talk about this in other books?
I think that Island is a must read. But he's chemically-interested in many of his books. Doors of Perception, Heaven and Hell.
I think I have heard about this. A drug that is actually good for people, maybe that would be a "blessing" rather than an enslavement. The question is, would the drug liberate people from enslavement, or would it just make you accept the ongoing enslavement that is ever present? Will a drug cause enslavement no matter how it works?
I think that if we had a drug that was easily available, socially accepted, cheap (not to mention, distributed freely by the government) and free of immediate negative effects (like hangover in case of alcohol, which to a great extent fulfils the first three points), it would be very hard for anyone to stop taking it. Our brains' reward system is very powerful. And I don't think it would liberate people from enslavement, especially if the government was the only source. It would be more like this - you spend the whole day doing your tasks, even if you hate them, because you know that in the evening, before going to bed, you would get your fix and everything would be wonderful.
This is the, let's say, "negative" conception of Brave New World.
Reminds me of Equilibrium.
You describe more or less the status quo today. Alcohol, caffeine, nicotine etc make enslavement more bearable to the general public, so they are legal. I was thinking more of if we could create a drug that would take away anxiety and fear, and not make you indifferent/apathetic but rather more focused on fulfilling your human potential. If it were distributed by a government, it would be a completely different kind of government(since they too take the drug). Now that could be a brave new world:)
Again, this comes up in Food of the Gods. Have you read it yet, Royce?
The bold is likely to happen. As we continue to learn about the brain and the efficacy of nootropics increases, I expect to see the rise of a society where certain jobs, government positions, etc - to the dangerous edge - require you to amend some cognitive augmentation specific to increase your social/cultural functionality...
It's scary because the status quo shouldn't be a static thing, in my opinion. When you have powerful chemical or surgical tools to enforce the intentional ritual of things as before you affected such changed, we can only expect to see a strange ingrown situation unfold.
Well, alcohol, for one, has nasty and immediate side effects and in addition getting drunk is not socially acceptable in certain circles, so it's not the perfect drug I was describing.
The one that you are describing - I suppose some of prescription anti-psychotics and anxiolytics could have that potential, but they are also addictive and their list of side effects is very long. Although in some cases they work miracles (I've seen that myself). So perhaps if you could create something on that basis but not addictive and easily tolerated, this would change the world and society.
I think, Royce is onto something in suggesting that certain drugs, in certain circles, both slip notice as drugs, and work to orient group-think... coffee addicts, smokers, alcoholics - we all recognize our own and they shift us into particular patterns of behavior.
But I would really hope that we can affect change for the better without needing wholesale sociocultural dosing...
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I think that Island is a must read. But he's chemically-interested in many of his books. Doors of Perception, Heaven and Hell.
Yeah I am going to read Island in the near future, and I have read Doors, which was fascinating.
Again, this comes up in Food of the Gods. Have you read it yet, Royce?
I started on that one many years ago, but I did not get through it, since I lacked the language skills and it was in my pre- internet days. I have it on my kindle now, and will read it. I have listened to many of his talks, and read other stuff of him, so I guess I have read some parts of that book already:)
I think, Royce is onto something in suggesting that certain drugs, in certain circles, both slip notice as drugs, and work to orient group-think... coffee addicts, smokers, alcoholics - we all recognize our own and they shift us into particular patterns of behavior.
But I would really hope that we can affect change for the better without needing wholesale sociocultural dosing...
Yes, certain drugs are not considered drugs because they are legal. How can something that is legal be harmful, right? WRONG:)
I guess I am hinting at an experience that will take away addictive behaviour, and see through the madness that is accepted as a kind of sick socially accepted practice. One example is in my country where you are considered a freak if you do not drink yourself into oblivion twice a week. It seems like people are so bitter and unsatisfied with how they live that they have to get completely wasted to make up for it. We have a very weird drug culture here, but I guess it is the same story everywhere where alcohol is the only accepted "party drug". Everyone is of course biased when it comes to what substances they like, and that is why I seriously believe that everything should be legal, and there should be honest and thorough information available about every single drug out there, and maybe then people would think more carefully about what they put into their bodies. I can not see any other way I`m afraid. The only real difference from how it is today is that people would know more about what the drug is. The funny thing is that we have factual evidence of how decriminalization of drugs have positive effects in regards to drug abuse, namely Portugal. Read this link.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/erikkain/2011/07/05/ten-years-after-decriminalization-drug-abuse-down-by-half-in-portugal/
A good drug(IMO) is a drug that leaves you with an insight that you should not do drugs on a regular basis. That sounds weird I know, but for me that is actually what happened.
Back to what you said Madness, I agree that sociocultural dosing seems like a bad idea, since we in some absurd way are totally dependent of the ever changing flow of difference and conflict to learn more about ourselves and society. Rigidity leads to indifference and apathy, and how can we strive for something better if there is nothing "evil" to point your finger at? Light/dark, thick/thin, up/down etc, it seems these poles are dependent of each other to have any meaning at all.
I see I often tend to throw myself of topic now and again, but I found out recently that just writing by your stream of consciousness can be fun and rewarding(for me atleast:))
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Again, this comes up in Food of the Gods. Have you read it yet, Royce?
I started on that one many years ago, but I did not get through it, since I lacked the language skills and it was in my pre- internet days. I have it on my kindle now, and will read it. I have listened to many of his talks, and read other stuff of him, so I guess I have read some parts of that book already:)
Do it :).
One example is in my country where you are considered a freak if you do not drink yourself into oblivion twice a week. It seems like people are so bitter and unsatisfied with how they live that they have to get completely wasted to make up for it. We have a very weird drug culture here, but I guess it is the same story everywhere where alcohol is the only accepted "party drug". Everyone is of course biased when it comes to what substances they like, and that is why I seriously believe that everything should be legal, and there should be honest and thorough information available about every single drug out there, and maybe then people would think more carefully about what they put into their bodies.
I think that the drinking culture exists everywhere, as does the smoking culture, the sugar culture, the coffee culture. But this hits upon more social cruxes than it does chemical ones.
I exist as I do because my environment finds it impossible to digest me and I resist dissolution in conformity. This can be uncomfortable for myself and those around me when those conflicting worldviews clash.
Whatever the dominant ritual protocols are, Royce, our not partaking in them is why people find us strange. And the chemical interaction also plays it's game; where alcoholics, for instance, are more likely to experience the same types of thinking as other alcoholics - they have both have a fluency with the ritual terms and the similar mediated experience.
Now drinking a bunch to bridge the gap isn't the answer. Neither would I argue for abstinence because of its historical pedigree (though, I might suggest we stop drinking the mostly crap we do now and start getting our alcohol intake from heavy meads and gruels again). But people cannot be abandoned as beyond recognition and communication... those divisions are only going to get dystopian worse.
A good drug(IMO) is a drug that leaves you with an insight that you should not do drugs on a regular basis. That sounds weird I know, but for me that is actually what happened.
I can grok it. It goes back to what I mentioned about ritual separation in actions from drugs.
Back to what you said Madness, I agree that sociocultural dosing seems like a bad idea, since we in some absurd way are totally dependent of the ever changing flow of difference and conflict to learn more about ourselves and society. Rigidity leads to indifference and apathy, and how can we strive for something better if there is nothing "evil" to point your finger at? Light/dark, thick/thin, up/down etc, it seems these poles are dependent of each other to have any meaning at all.
I don't think we need "evil" to strive. I don't think war is progress.
We have 7 billion brains... how many braids might we possibly create with our individual strands? If I had to word it (and qualify it with a thousandfold justifications) I would say that we strive for art in everything we do.
I see I often tend to throw myself of topic now and again, but I found out recently that just writing by your stream of consciousness can be fun and rewarding(for me atleast:))
I been on this stream of consciousness kick for years ever since I broke my thumb... I was looking for ways to rehabilitate my hand so I decided to become ambidextrous (it was a long time coming but the event spurred me to action) and a friend of mine recommended that I write stream of consciousness. I have done so. Almost a page a day for fiveish years.
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Well, my culture is also one in which it is socially acceptable and expected to get totally drunk at the weekend. But I am lucky - I have worst hangovers ever, which taught me moderation very early on. And the trick is to find your own social niche - I am a nerd, my friends are nerds, we meet regularly, some people get drunk, some don't, some talk, some sit in the corner and read a book, it's ok. Now that I look back, meeting them probably saved my life or at least my sanity.
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And the trick is to find your own social niche - I am a nerd, my friends are nerds, we meet regularly, some people get drunk, some don't, some talk, some sit in the corner and read a book, it's ok. Now that I look back, meeting them probably saved my life or at least my sanity.
+1 for support. However, I think Bakker is right that secluding ourselves in these comforting bubbles is not going to help the human race any. I do think we still need to figure out how to communicate across disparate gaps in recognition.
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I don't think we need "evil" to strive. I don't think war is progress.
This is another tread, because the problem of "evil" is tricky. Many people do think that war is progress in a way, progress to rid the world of evildoers, progress for certain industries etc. So it is a matter of perspective, although I do think that it is insanity to have that perspective. Don`t you think that evil can play a role in making us better humans? I think that by observing its presence you may pay more attention to your own actions, so that you behave better. Is it all bullshit the whole deal about balance? That you need the bad to even know what good is? I have a hard time with this problem, and it is fascinating that "evil" has always been around, but maybe we can somehow evolve past the evil/good problem and strive to join hands and eventually make the planet into a spaceship and explore space as one united race of humans!:)
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Rick Strassman, M.D. - “Old Testament Prophecy – A Western Model of the Psychedelic Experience”
http://vimeo.com/16298958
Our clinical research with the naturally-occurring human psychedelic, DMT (N,N-dimethyltryptamine) sought to understand the relationship between the psychopharmacology of DMT and spiritual experience. Eastern religious systems, particularly Buddhist, provided the spiritual model which I, and previous investigators, believed would be most relevant to our research. However, unitive experiences of ego dissolution typical of enlightenment experiences were quite rare. Rather, volunteers actively related to what appeared to be autonomous, external alternative realties, while firmly maintaining a sense of personal identity. Old Testament descriptions of prophetic experience are replete with psychedelic content, and comport more closely with the DMT volunteers’ reports than a Buddhist model of enlightenment. This finding provides support for utilizing Old Testament prophetic literature as an alternative, Western model by which to understand and integrate contemporary psychedelic experience. It also suggests a means by which students of the Old Testament may access the state of consciousness out of which emerged prophetic Old Testament text.
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This is the "spirit molecule" guy right?
Many people do suggest that "true" religion do have their roots in psychedelics(mushroom cults etc). It may even explain why religion today makes less and less sense. They tell you to read one book. That is it. I am going to be a bit rude here and suggest that you most likely are a very simpleminded person if you read one book, and end up convinced. I can understand more people who feel they connect with something "higher" then themselves through direct experience, whether it is meditation, yoga or substances. Although I do not personally think that there is anything "higher" at all, only that humanness is overwhelmingly more complex than our narrow perception leads us to believe. These techniques and substances will crack your head wide open.
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Missed this before, Royce.
I don't think we need "evil" to strive. I don't think war is progress.
This is another tread, because the problem of "evil" is tricky. Many people do think that war is progress in a way, progress to rid the world of evildoers, progress for certain industries etc. So it is a matter of perspective, although I do think that it is insanity to have that perspective. Don`t you think that evil can play a role in making us better humans? I think that by observing its presence you may pay more attention to your own actions, so that you behave better. Is it all bullshit the whole deal about balance? That you need the bad to even know what good is? I have a hard time with this problem, and it is fascinating that "evil" has always been around, but maybe we can somehow evolve past the evil/good problem and strive to join hands and eventually make the planet into a spaceship and explore space as one united race of humans!:)
Lol - well, I think something has always been around that some people have qualified as "evil." And I don't think the Lifeboat Earth is going to change our perspectives in this situation. Perhaps, greed is "evils" root because "evil" is often committed to achieve some perceived gain over another (I often make mention that this happens at the cost of greater gains that might be achieved through cooperation).
But yes, even though I think some people would still seek to be greedy in committing to any endeavour, as a speciest (I guess) and as a member of species that knows it thrives on cycles of life and suffers under cycles of death (diverse vs. collapsing ecosystems, evolutionary adaptions in as little as generation, etc), I would say we need to work to distribute ourselves away from Earth as soon as "humanly" possible (but especially in the sense that portions of the planet needing immediate and possibly permanent human absence to recover). Enter the Solar-System Age.
Work on a coordinated human effort towards that and the second problem naturally becomes should the worst happen, "Earth Inhabitable," how do we ensure that our colonies can survive without support from Gaia?
Completely aside, but did you know that private companies are already working on how to legislate "owning property" on the moon because otherwise it's unfeasible to work on gathering resources from the moon unless you are assured propriety...
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Work on a coordinated human effort towards that and the second problem naturally becomes should the worst happen, "Earth Inhabitable," how do we ensure that our colonies can survive without support from Gaia?
Good question. Probably someone from the future has to come back and answer that one :)
Maybe we strike lucky and find something that is exactly the same.
Completely aside, but did you know that private companies are already working on how to legislate "owning property" on the moon because otherwise it's unfeasible to work on gathering resources from the moon unless you are assured propriety...
I am not sure how to respond to this. There is just no end to the lunacy is there? So it won`t be long till we read in the paper: "WEED WILL BE ILLEGAL ON THE MOON WHEN WE GET THERE". People are just so obsessed with moneymaking and control. Bring on the dragon of chaos!:) I Seriously want to vipe dust of some Bakunin books and dabble with anarchism again(not really serious:))
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There is just no end to the lunacy is there?
Tell me this was intentional, as it's just so delicious to see that word when talking about moon colonization. ;D
Yeah, my hatred of corporations is making me think we need to pump government funds into making sure the U.N. claims the moon as an international venture.
Also, going back to Pinchbeck's Breaking Open the Head. Have a friend who's going to try to use successive hits of DMT to get to those alien landscapes and I need to get him to let me monitor.
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Tell me this was intentional, as it's just so delicious to see that word when talking about moon colonization. ;D
Lol, I wish I could say it was ;D
Also, going back to Pinchbeck's Breaking Open the Head. Have a friend who's going to try to use successive hits of DMT to get to those alien landscapes and I need to get him to let me monitor.
Wow, you must write it down if you are going to monitor, and share it with us if that is ok with him/her. I would love to try that myself sometime.
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Wow, you must write it down if you are going to monitor, and share it with us if that is ok with him/her. I would love to try that myself sometime.
Definitely. I'm not sure if I'll be allowed to monitor, especially at the beginning b/c dude wants to focus on a personal sigil then take the DMT at the moment of orgasm. ???
I don't think he'll mind sharing the experience anonymously with more people, as he plans to make a site about the various issues and experiences relating to varied drugs. All of it will be anecdotal, but I also know a woman who works with NORML (National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws) who is gathering accounts about how weed helped people. I personally know of people who found weed assisted to a greater/lesser extent in managing eating disorders.
Also, here's an article with Rick Strassman about DMT (https://realitysandwich.com/5697/voyaging_dmt_space_with_dr_rick_strassman_md/). He actually contributed a chapter to Inner/Outer space about preparing for a psychedelic trip to get the most out of it.
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In 1962 Alan Watts was asked to do the same thing as Aldous Huxley did with his "doors of perception" book, namely to write down his experience with psychedelics. He has a beautiful way with words(as does Huxley) and his book "The joyous cosmology" is deeply fascinating. I will share a little bit with you, enjoy the words :)
"Listen, there is something I must tell. I have never, never seen it so clearly. But it does not matter a bit if you do not understand, because each one of you is quite perfect as you are, even if you do not know it. Life is basically a gesture, but no one, no thing, is making it. There is no necessity for it to happen, and none for it to go on happening. For it is not being driven by anything; it just happens freely of itself. It is a gesture of motion, of sound, of color, and just as no one is making it, it is not happening to anyone. There is simply no problem of life; it is completely purposeless play- exuberance which is its own end. Basically there is the gesture. Time, space, and multiplicity are complications of it. There is no reason whatever to explain it, for explanations are just another form of complexity, a new manifestation of life on top of life, of gestures gesturing. Pain and suffering are simply extreme forms of play, and there is not anything in the whole universe to be afraid of because it does not happen to anyone! There is not any substantial ego at all. The ego is a kind of flip, a knowing of knowing, a fearing of fearing. It is a curlicue, an extra jazz to experience, a sort of double-take or reverberation, a dithering of consciousness which is the same as anxiety.
Sorry about the wall of text, but it is basically one long sentence.
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I'm not one to really support Reality Sandwich anymore but...
Beyond the Machine Elves: On DMT Culture, Visionary Plants and Entheodelic Storytelling (http://realitysandwich.com/216190/beyond-the-machine-elves-on-dmt-culture-visionary-plants-and-entheodelic-storytelling/)
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I'm not one to really support Reality Sandwich anymore but...
Beyond the Machine Elves: On DMT Culture, Visionary Plants and Entheodelic Storytelling (http://realitysandwich.com/216190/beyond-the-machine-elves-on-dmt-culture-visionary-plants-and-entheodelic-storytelling/)
Thanks for that Madness. Out of curiosity did you just drift away from Reality Sandwich or did it get too far out for you?
I like some of the articles, even the metaphysical ones, but sometimes it's all speculation without grounding. And while I enjoy the concept behind Gnosticism the conspiracy theory aspect of it gets a bit weird over there.
All that said, I'm reading The Second Psychedelic Revolution Part One: The End of Acid (http://realitysandwich.com/216613/the-second-psychedelic-revolution-part-one-the-end-of-acid/).
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I'm not one to really support Reality Sandwich anymore but...
Beyond the Machine Elves: On DMT Culture, Visionary Plants and Entheodelic Storytelling (http://realitysandwich.com/216190/beyond-the-machine-elves-on-dmt-culture-visionary-plants-and-entheodelic-storytelling/)
Thanks for that Madness. Out of curiosity did you just drift away from Reality Sandwich or did it get too far out for you?
I was involved with the Evolver Blogs for awhile. Apparently belonged to a group of dissenters. There was a rift in vision between Evolver and Reality Sandwich. I was eventually made a commentator moderator at RS (possibly still am) when I signed up to help clean up spam on Evolver... It got weird. Though, the people who volunteered for modding couldn't access Evolver and were tricked into cleaning RS, Pinchbeck and his team actively pruned blogs that didn't adhere to their particular vision of Evolver's "evolution."
So eventually I stopped partaking.
I like some of the articles, even the metaphysical ones, but sometimes it's all speculation without grounding.
I stop by every once in awhile and read if something tickles. But I don't actively promote the whole thing as I used to.
And to be clear, I think that Pinchbeck is fucking genius for having affected the Evolver spores. An invaluable tool of real-world dissemination.
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I stop by every once in awhile and read if something tickles. But I don't actively promote the whole thing as I used to.
And to be clear, I think that Pinchbeck is fucking genius for having affected the Evolver spores. An invaluable tool of real-world dissemination.
Will have to check out the Evolver side of this. Reality Sandwich is great, but I think the mix of grounded concerns might be better separated from the spiritual stuff. Which is not to deny expression of the latter, but I think the piece on psychedelic fiction could've been written without insisting the deities residing in the hologram or whatever are real.
Sometimes the articles read like the person writing them was high while typing.
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but I think the piece on psychedelic fiction could've been written without insisting the deities residing in the hologram or whatever are real.
This is my biggest turn-off with that area of "theorizing" (books, articles, research, whatever)... the primary sources don't do much to put on a legitimate front on their investigation.
This is just a metaphor for science, really though. Too many people are prone to editorialize.
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but I think the piece on psychedelic fiction could've been written without insisting the deities residing in the hologram or whatever are real.
Dennis Mckenna said something interesting about this. When he was younger, more optimistic and full of life, DMT trips was incredibly intense, and propped with "meaning". I do not remember him mentioning deities, but probably he met them to. He had an experience with DMT, after not having done it in several years, and the experience was very different. It was more bleak, and the "carnival of life" that he experienced when he was younger, was almost absent. He said that it might be because he was old, and he did not view life in such an optimistic manner anymore.(He is rather pessimistic about the status quo changing for the better).
What this tells me is that your attitude going into a trip sort of shapes the experience, which means that "deities" might be real if you want them to be. It seems to me that trips are like clay which you can mold into whatever you want. So real, or not real, is really pretty irrelevant. It is real to the person experiencing it, but when that person says to someone else that it is real, he is falling into a trap IMO.
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This could just as easily be explained by a great abundance of neurotransmitters that the "trips" have to work with in youth versus in aging?
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Dont destroy my mold and clay metaphor please ;D You are most likely correct in your assumtion
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:-X ;)
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Just thought I should share a story which IMO reflect maybe the most important aspect of the therapeutic value of psychedelics. I am talking about coping with fear. Not little fears or anxiety, but the fear with a capitol F, namely the fear of death.
My brother knows a guy who works in a team of psychologists/therapists who mainly work with terminally ill patients.
There was this guy who was terrified of dying, and my brother and his friend arranged for this guy to try out psilocybin mushrooms. There was medical personnel present, so it was safe to go through with it(either way, he was terminally ill, so nothing could really happen to make things worse).
So, it was(according to my brother) heartbreaking to see this frightening individual turn into a big smile :). He did not say much, but he did not really have to. The fear was completely gone, and he had found peace with his situation.
All this is of course totally illegal, and everyone involved took a risk, but it was in the end totally worth it. The nurse who was present was totally shocked by this mental transformation that occurred.
It is a shame that the general public does not know of the value and difference these medicines can provide for a shattered human mind.
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As Breathe - Pink Floyd comes on the radio, I must note the synchronicity.
But +1, Royce, and I feel that all euthanasia advocates should also support appropriate instances like the above.
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As Breathe - Pink Floyd comes on the radio, I must note the synchronicity.
Oh yes, it does not get much better than that ;)
Found this blog by Ben Cain to be very interesting :)
http://rantswithintheundeadgod.blogspot.ca/2012/12/the-psychedelic-basis-of-theism.html
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Found this blog by Ben Cain to be very interesting :)
http://rantswithintheundeadgod.blogspot.ca/2012/12/the-psychedelic-basis-of-theism.html
Interesting rant - I'm glad he's honest about trying to sell us his particular, supposedly fact based opinion. It does come off as kinda preachy though.
That said I'm not sure Nagel or Hancock would agree with Cain about the nature of reality.
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I feel like playing the preacher is part of the Rants/schtick (: a component, part of the essence, of what something is), Sci.
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I feel like playing the preacher is part of the Rants/schtick (: a component, part of the essence, of what something is), Sci.
It is interesting that so many people who talk about psychedelics have a "reality tunnel" to sell whether it's gods beyond the hologram or a materialist challenge to antinatalism.
I just think people would be better off with the creative agnosticism of Robert Anton Wilson. Would avoid the preachy feeling, though some people who've committed to Cain's own faith in what reality is might find his words comforting.
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It is interesting that so many people who talk about psychedelics have a "reality tunnel" to sell whether it's gods beyond the hologram or a materialist challenge to antinatalism.
Well, as I am sure I have mentioned before, psychedelics bring forth certain insights that are unexplainable. Literally.
So whatever "reality tunnel" they are selling, is only a vague understanding of something unbelievably complex.
To listen to someone talk about psychedelics when you have not experienced it yourself, is really like talking about driving a car when you actually never have driven a car before. It is two completely different things.
This is why I rarely discuss this with people, because it is not something you need to do. If you want do do it, because you think you can learn something, or you are curious about altered states in general, go ahead. If not, then dont.
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This is why I rarely discuss this with people, because it is not something you need to do. If you want do do it, because you think you can learn something, or you are curious about altered states in general, go ahead. If not, then dont.
I actually feel the same way about the Divine...or perhaps better stated the "Numinous". Too few have really known God in any meaningful way but want to explain away what that feeling is.
As a soft materialist, as Robert Anton Wilson would classify me (http://www.cognitiveliberty.org/4jcl/4JCL61.htm), I'm okay with resigning myself to materialism until something better comes along. But I see no reason to evangelize the paradigm's supposed virtues, and any attempt to justify skeptical missionary work via appeals to the idea people ought to live with the Truth are IMO self-defeating as there is no "ought" written into the world nor is there Platonic Truth.
Too many materialists seem so desperate to spread conformity to their ideas that they get hypercritical about anyone else's interpretations of mystical/gnostic experiences whether that is religious ecstasy or the psychedelic experience.
Really goes back to the possibility that a lot of intellectual bitterness is self-inflicted.
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Leaving aside the vital but off topic criticism of materialist evangelism and the personalities behind it, which admittedly is best left for another thread, I'll correct my derailing by getting back to the topic at hand:
Joe Rogan Experience #417 - Graham Hancock (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1cbnCrHwVSg)
Some interesting discussion about psychedelics and how they relate to the wider availability of drugs out there.
The Psychedelic Reader (http://www.techgnosis.com/chunkshow-single.php?chunk=chunkfrom-2008-01-26-1201-0.txt&printable=1)
Eric Davis's intro to the collection of 60's articles on psychedelics.
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As a soft materialist, as Robert Anton Wilson would classify me, I'm okay with resigning myself to materialism until something better comes along. But I see no reason to evangelize the paradigm's supposed virtues, and any attempt to justify skeptical missionary work via appeals to the idea people ought to live with the Truth are IMO self-defeating as there is no "ought" written into the world nor is there Platonic Truth.
I like this ;)
I have a couple of books by Hancock, but have not read them yet. I try not to read books about psychedelics(have read a few), but I feel I have to get through Terence Mckennas Food of the Gods before I try anything else. He is the master you know :)
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I have a couple of books by Hancock, but have not read them yet. I try not to read books about psychedelics(have read a few), but I feel I have to get through Terence Mckennas Food of the Gods before I try anything else. He is the master you know :)
Hancock is interesting. I've admittedly dismissed all his Atlantis type stuff, or at least classified it as so improbable as to not be important to my life.
I like Supernatural [the book] as ethnography, there are so many accounts of shamanism in the book and the comparison to UFO abductions is interesting. But I don't think there's any smoking gun in the book that proves psychedelics transport us to another dimension.
Also, I still think his TED talk was terrible and an utter waste of an opportunity.
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MDMA and Autistic Adults: A New Research Study [Psychedelic Salon #392] (http://realitysandwich.com/217810/mdma-and-autistic-adults-a-new-research-study-psychedelic-salon-392/)
The latest episode of the Psychedelic Salon podcast features a talk from the 2013 Palenque Norte Burning Man series. In it, Alicia Danforth discusses the results of a 2013 research study she conducted into the various effects of MDMA on individuals with Autism Spectrum disorders.
Criminals and Researchers: Perspectives on the Necessity of Underground Research (http://realitysandwich.com/217791/criminals-and-researchers-perspectives-on-the-necessity-of-underground-research/)
I do not deny that there is sanctioned research being done on psychedelics, nor do I deny that there are groundbreaking results coming out of sanctioned psychedelic research. However, the fact of the matter is that there is not “enough” psychedelic research being done, nor do I believe it is possible to ever pursue “enough” psychedelic research within the confines of sanctioned institutions set within a prohibitionist paradigm.
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Psychedelic Science 2013 Mini-Documentary
http://the-nexian.me/home/external-news/74-psychedelic-science-2013-mini-documentary
Transforming Medicine is a mini-documentary showcasing the exciting, multidisciplinary field of psychedelic science through interviews with attendees of Psychedelic Science 2013, an unprecedented event that gathered more than 100 of the world's leading researchers and over 1,900 international attendees to share knowledge about the risks and benefits of psychedelic substances.
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Effects of psilocybin on hippocampal neurogenesis and extinction of trace fear conditioning (http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00221-013-3579-0)
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Effects of psilocybin on hippocampal neurogenesis and extinction of trace fear conditioning (http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00221-013-3579-0)
Good stuff - thanks for that Madness!
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NeuroSoup:
http://www.neurosoup.com/about-us/
"NeuroSoup is based upon principles of harm reduction and strives to educate people around the world on responsible drug use. We hope to educate people about the positive and negative aspects of all drugs, whether they are legal, available by prescription, or illegal. Moreover, NeuroSoup aids in addicted individuals’ recovery by providing online self help drug and alcohol rehab resources. As well, NeuroSoup contends that through the use of the many consciousness expansion tools currently in existence (including spirituality, entheogens, lucid dreaming, meditation, yoga, and sensory deprivation, among others), people can grow spiritually to realize their full potential. We strive to provide resources for people as they walk down this path of consciousness exploration"
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LSD, Reconsidered for Therapy
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/04/health/lsd-reconsidered-for-therapy.html
...On Tuesday, The Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease is posting online results from the first controlled trial of LSD in more than 40 years. The study, conducted in the office of a Swiss psychiatrist near Bern, tested the effects of the drug as a complement to talk therapy for 12 people nearing the end of life, including Peter.
Most of the subjects had terminal cancer, and several died within a year after the trial — but not before having a mental adventure that appeared to have eased the existential gloom of their last days.
“Their anxiety went down and stayed down,” said Dr. Peter Gasser, who conducted the therapy and followed up with his patients a year after the trial concluded.
The new publication marks the latest in a series of baby steps by a loose coalition of researchers and fund-raisers who are working to bring hallucinogens back into the fold of mainstream psychiatry. Before research was effectively banned in 1966 in the United States, doctors tested LSD’s effect for a variety of conditions, including end-of-life anxiety.
But in the past few years, psychiatrists in the United States and abroad — working with state regulators as well as ethics boards — have tested Ecstasy-assisted therapy for post-traumatic stress; and other trials with hallucinogens are in the works....
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Return trip: A new generation of researchers is heading into the weird world of psychedelic drugs. (http://aeon.co/magazine/oceanic-feeling/erik-davis-psychedelics/)
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Return trip: A new generation of researchers is heading into the weird world of psychedelic drugs. (http://aeon.co/magazine/oceanic-feeling/erik-davis-psychedelics/)
Great stuff. Love Erik Davis.
Mystical Experiences Occasioned by the Hallucinogen Psilocybin Lead to Increases in the Personality Domain of Openness (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3537171/)
Talk: Katherine MacLean, Psilocybin and Personality Change (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s3CG_wyxn6o)
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I am going to try to read this book at some point.
http://www.amazon.com/Psychedelic-Information-Theory-Shamanism-Reason/dp/1453760172/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1397327052&sr=8-1&keyword
It will be refreshing (for me at least) to get a scientific view on this matter.
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Paying a high price for the war on drugs:
https://www.apa.org/monitor/2014/03/war-drugs.aspx
"In a new memoir, neuroscientist Carl Hart discusses how his research on drugs like cocaine and methamphetamine has led him to decide that all drugs should be decriminalized."
"As a child growing up in one of Miami's roughest neighborhoods during the 1970s, Carl Hart saw first-hand the toll that poverty, drugs, guns and domestic violence took on his close family and friends. When he was 6, his mother separated from his abusive father. At age 12, he saw his sister injured in a drive-by shooting. Many of his childhood friends ended up dead or in prison. As a teen he used drugs, shoplifted and occasionally carried a gun himself. But eventually — through hard work, mentors, the military and education — he launched himself to the highest rungs of academia.
Hart, who earned his PhD in 1996 from the University of Wyoming, is now Columbia University's first tenured African-American professor in the sciences, where he studies the neuroscience of drug use. Some of his work undercuts widespread assumptions about drug users, such as the idea that most will become addicted. In laboratory studies with cocaine and methamphetamine users, he's found that rather than being held hostage to their drug use, most people can make a rational decision to give up a dose in exchange for a reasonable reward — even as little as $5.
Recently, Hart has become involved in drug policy advocacy as well. In his book "High Price: A Neuroscientist's Journey of Self-Discovery That Challenges Everything You Know About Drugs and Society," he interweaves personal memoir and scientific research to conclude that drug abuse is a symptom rather than a cause of societal ills — and that America's drug laws, not drugs themselves, have wreaked the greatest havoc on the country's poorest and most vulnerable citizens."
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Looks interesting, sci.
I am going to try to read this book at some point.
http://www.amazon.com/Psychedelic-Information-Theory-Shamanism-Reason/dp/1453760172/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1397327052&sr=8-1&keyword
It will be refreshing (for me at least) to get a scientific view on this matter.
You might want to check out The Subtle Body (http://www.amazon.com/The-Subtle-Body-Encyclopedia-Energetic/dp/1591796717/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1398260304&sr=8-1&keywords=the+subtle+body) - Cyndi Dale, Royce. It's an interesting read to say the least.
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Thanks for that Madness. I will check that out instead, since it seems more broad in content
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‘Angels and Demons’: the Politics of Psychoactive Drugs (http://www.madinamerica.com/2014/04/angels-demons-politics-psychoactive-drugs/)
We are now paying people to take drugs they don’t like and don’t want, while we continue to invest vast sums of public money in efforts to curb the use of drugs that people do like and do want. Prescription drugs like antidepressants, antipsychotics and so-called ‘mood stabilisers’ are widely promoted as good for your health. But the history of prescription and recreational drug use is more intimately intertwined than most people recognise. Attempts to disentangle the two have created a false dichotomy – with prescription drugs, at least some of them, set up as the ‘angels’ that can do no wrong, and recreational drugs cast as the ‘demons’(3).
Distinguishing drugs in this way makes no sense pharmacologically, and does not help us to understand what effects they actually have. The regulation of drugs is driven by political imperatives to produce a population that remains productive, diverted and obedient. The masses must have their opium, but must not be allowed to be so free with their drug use that they infringe public order or undermine the efficient operation of the economy.
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EkF9NZjrSIE
Bill Hicks on the value of psychedelics:)
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Politically Incorrect on LSD with guest Robert Anton Wilson:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zYzfSzYbmAE
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RAW is such an interesting dude. I have "quantum psychology" and "prometheus rising" on my shelf.