there's also the new 5HT2a inhibitor, pimavanzserin...as a thought experiment, what would scans w/ this medicine AND LSD onboard show?
Brain scans reveal how LSD affects consciousness
81–90 of 208 posts
Re: Brain scans reveal how LSD affects consciousness
#82Pretty cool. I'd like to point out that meditation might have a similar dampening effect on the default mode network as well. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25904238 The question arises again, can psychedelics have lasting effects or is meditation the only way to create permanent positive change in that direction? Finally, a quote from a letter to Osho: "Many people are experimenting with the drug ecstasy. I hear…
Modern science hasn't even started to appreciate the existence of consciousness let alone validating which is the better method. The Himalayan yogic and tantrik traditions have gone to the depth of consciousness, dimensions, multiverse ETC, and literally have thousands of books written on the subjects (both practical and theoretical). There aren't only drugs but better mechanisms like mantras, rituals etc to actually…
> Modern science hasn't even started to appreciate the existence of consciousness let alone validating which is the better method.
Wow, you sure don't know what you're talking about.
David Nutt, Albert Hoffman, Jon Kabat-Zinn, Albert Einstein, Richard Feynman, Charles Darwin... every single one of these scientists has both made statements about the nature of consciousness and done research which has significantly furthered our understanding of consciousness. And I'm not even bringing up the field of psychology in that list because arguably the entire field of psychology is about consciousness, so I wouldn't know what scientists to pick from that field.
What you said was both ignorant and insulting to a lot of people's hard work.
Re: Brain scans reveal how LSD affects consciousness
#83Earlier quoted context omitted.
Religion is what the unconverted soul does in order to do right by God. To "make it to heaven", so to speak, by doing good things and avoiding doing bad or downright ugly things. All attempts at pleasing God - i.e. religion - are doomed because you inevitably will fail to meet the standard, because it is an impossible one - i.e. don't lust for women in your heart. Just as I wrote that...probably a thought or an image…
Without going too far off topic into a boring argument that won't go anywhere - I should say my religion comment includes the idea of a god/faith or supernatural creator etc.
I experienced a similar (but non-drug related) shock to you several years ago and it changed how I think. I came to the conclusion that religion is just an old fashioned, and highly specialised, way of treating mental health. Without going into details, it gives people an ultimate dose of peace of mind.
Re: Brain scans reveal how LSD affects consciousness
#84Earlier quoted context omitted.
I did ecstasy and i did LSD. Ecstasy is like a lie in this quote comparison. You get high in the beginning and it brings you down at the end, really awful feeling at the end. LSD is different, i experienced world differently even for couple of days after i took LSD. World seemed different. I knew what was important in life and what not, very clear. I can't describe how you feel on LSD, and people that didn't took LSD…
For a counterpoint to this - I decided to do 150 micrograms of LSD after reading a lot about it on HN, talking with many friends that had tried it or do it fairly regularly and reading as much as I could find (Sam Harris, Huxley, What the Dormouse said etc.). Nothing can really prepare you for it - the dream like state, the visuals and just the capacity of how different things can be. When looking at things I saw the…
I had a similar experience with dmt, but it was horrible at the time of the trip also. But I do look back on the new perspective I got from it, though difficult to adjust to at the time, as ultimately positive.
I also attribute some of that difficulty to the stage I was in I'm my life, young adult.
Re: Brain scans reveal how LSD affects consciousness
#85Pretty cool. I'd like to point out that meditation might have a similar dampening effect on the default mode network as well. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25904238 The question arises again, can psychedelics have lasting effects or is meditation the only way to create permanent positive change in that direction? Finally, a quote from a letter to Osho: "Many people are experimenting with the drug ecstasy. I hear…
If you meditate for emotional stillness and spiritual depth, then there is no reason you can't seek happiness and awareness from a girlfriend or a psychedelic drug experience. Or from both at the same time. You could meditate alone for a thousand lifetimes and not experience love. Saying you can endogenously experience psychedelic states by meditation or Kundalini yoga sounds nice and ideal, but it is only partially…
> Saying you can endogenously experience psychedelic states by meditation or Kundalini yoga sounds nice and ideal, but it is only partially true.
Even if some people can experience psychedelic states through extensive meditation, that doesn't make their experience intrinsically better. They're chasing the same experience as someone who experiments with psychedelic drugs, but there always seems to be an irritating sense of smug superiority from people who do meditate.
Re: Brain scans reveal how LSD affects consciousness
#86Earlier quoted context omitted.
*Ecstasy is an undefined product.. it's easy to critique the black market, but even products on Amazon or ebay are known to be counterfeits. It could be caffeine, meth, research chemicals, MDA, MDMA, bath salts... who knows? Who can verify these things? One can only hope even a claim of 'pure' MDMA is what someone says it is. The same issue applies to LSD. How can you be certain it's not DOB or a research chemical? h…
You can buy chemical reagent tests that will give you reasonable certainty that what you're taking isn't meth/something else, but you're right that there's always a risk when taking an unknown substance that it could be a as yet unknown research chemical or cut with something else.
[0] dancesafe.org
Re: Brain scans reveal how LSD affects consciousness
#87Pretty cool. I'd like to point out that meditation might have a similar dampening effect on the default mode network as well. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25904238 The question arises again, can psychedelics have lasting effects or is meditation the only way to create permanent positive change in that direction? Finally, a quote from a letter to Osho: "Many people are experimenting with the drug ecstasy. I hear…
I suspect LSD and meditation might approach the same thing from different angles. LSD itself can force you to deal with thoughts in your brain you can normally filter or suppress—potentially similar to how meditation can reveal unconscious biases, fears, desires, etc. I don't think that meditation is CONTRARY to drugs. Ecstasy is pretty stupid as far as mind-drugs go. You experience intense happiness, pleasure, indee…
Let me firmly disagree.
LSD is exciting, fascinating, marvellous, yes indeed! It makes that whole armor of everyday consciousness drop away. Maybe it's like becoming a child, a very aware and sensitive child, in an adult's mind? Everything is fresh like it's the first day of the world, yet everything around you is ancient and significant, too...
It's also unsettling. The LSD mindset for me is like being an alien visiting Earth. And in a way I think we all are like aliens (hey, Heidegger was all about this idea, and many religions too). These experiences cast a strange and eerie light over my life. I'm grateful!
But I disagree that ecstasy—let's say MDMA—is stupid! For me, and several people I know, it's very much an eye-opener, too. I think we, especially some of us, live in a time of much anxiety, loneliness, remoteness, some kind of rigidity, emotional distance. And MDMA makes all of that drop away for an evening at least.
So LSD brings out this kaleidoscopic perspective of cosmic and microcosmic beauty. MDMA makes it possible, for someone who has difficulty, to sit up with someone for eight hours talking about everything, life, family, desires, interests, fears, anxieties, appreciation... These conversations have been enormously beneficial for me.
I think it would be wonderful if both drugs were made available for adults.
Re: Brain scans reveal how LSD affects consciousness
#88Earlier quoted context omitted.
Religion is what the unconverted soul does in order to do right by God. To "make it to heaven", so to speak, by doing good things and avoiding doing bad or downright ugly things. All attempts at pleasing God - i.e. religion - are doomed because you inevitably will fail to meet the standard, because it is an impossible one - i.e. don't lust for women in your heart. Just as I wrote that...probably a thought or an image…
Without going too far off topic into a boring argument that won't go anywhere - I should say my religion comment includes the idea of a god/faith or supernatural creator etc.
You sir, at least have an inquiring mind. That's a lot more I can say for many people who I've known years and years.
Re: Brain scans reveal how LSD affects consciousness
#89Earlier quoted context omitted.
If you meditate for emotional stillness and spiritual depth, then there is no reason you can't seek happiness and awareness from a girlfriend or a psychedelic drug experience. Or from both at the same time. You could meditate alone for a thousand lifetimes and not experience love. Saying you can endogenously experience psychedelic states by meditation or Kundalini yoga sounds nice and ideal, but it is only partially…
> Saying you can endogenously experience psychedelic states by meditation or Kundalini yoga sounds nice and ideal, but it is only partially true. Even if some people can experience psychedelic states through extensive meditation, that doesn't make their experience intrinsically better. They're chasing the same experience as someone who experiments with psychedelic drugs, but there always seems to be an irritating sen…
Meditation is a virtue signal, like jogging or being vegetarian.
It also tends to go along with a sense of being on a cosmic path toward truth, beauty, and enlightenment...
Re: Brain scans reveal how LSD affects consciousness
#90Earlier quoted context omitted.
> So you're saying the parent commenter was made aware of the Tao? No, he's saying, "Some things are ineffable." — in exactly so many words. There are experiences we can have that simply can not be articulated in something as clumsy and imprecise as language. The same word can mean subtly different things to the parties of a single conversation, and this kind of thing is pretty much all subtlety. The experiences you…
But we're humans and our foremost means of communication is language. Who cares if it's clumsy and imprecise? Try us, it's the best we've got. Saying it's ineffable is lazy. Unless you're talking about the centerpiece of your religion, I suppose, so I thought parent was suggesting that this person had stumbled upon the Tao. Edit: My comments are getting hammered into oblivion, forbid somebody should try to hold somet…
Saying it's ineffable is being accurate. The human language is clumsy, and I'd argue our normal consciousness and ego lack the mechanisms to convey this experience in any tangible way to a person who hasn't also been affected by it.
LSD is quite possibly the most powerful thing I've ever experienced. It really is like describing color to a blind person.
You're going to be frustrated if you try to understand it without actually trying it. I just wouldn't recommend it for anyone who doesn't respect it appropriately.