Bit of a meta comment, but I wonder why none of the ~30 posts here seem to actually be discussing the article. Something about the subject that motivates people to state personal opinions/experiences?
Can psychedelics make you a better person?
41–50 of 115 posts
Re: Can psychedelics make you a better person?
#42Psychedelics (LSD, shrooms) made me a better person. I don’t know anyone who became less caring, less respectfull, more violent or more greedy after doing those drugs. I would argue that psychedelics make you more human, in the good sense of the word.
Same here - I don't know anyone who became a worse person after psychedelics - and I know a LOT of people. It seems like the other responses you're getting are the exception and not the rule.
I always expect the exceptions to come out on HN because the denizens here are always quite contentious about whatever subject comes up.
Re: Can psychedelics make you a better person?
#43I’ve never used them, but everyone I’ve met who has, has spoken along similar lines that dropping acid opens up another part of your mind. So I think if it does unlock another part of your mind, then absolutely it could make you a better person.
“Doing LSD was one of the two or three most important things I have done in my life." -Steve Jobs
Re: Can psychedelics make you a better person?
#44Bit of a meta comment, but I wonder why none of the ~30 posts here seem to actually be discussing the article. Something about the subject that motivates people to state personal opinions/experiences?
because the article spends the first half taking a cynical stance of "but can we reeealy believe what people say about their experiences" and spends the latter half first talking about the authors experiences and then more or less stating that those experiences were wrong, or at least not the original intent of the indigenous culture.
part of the PR problem with psychedelics is its easy status for cynical evaluation: "everything we hear is anecodotal, and furthermore the subject of discussion was tripping anyway, how can it be believable." it is probably hoped by those sharing experiences to provide reasonable sounding arguments to break through the cynicism.
Re: Can psychedelics make you a better person?
#45For anybody interested in experimenting I recommend reading about LSD microdosing as an alternative to high doses that make you trip. Look for James Fadiman's research.
Re: Can psychedelics make you a better person?
#46Earlier quoted context omitted.
Can YouTube videos be considered research? Are they build on empirical data and peer reviewed? Don’t get me wrong, go right a head and drink the funky tea, just don’t call monetized experiences of random content producers “research”. If you do that, then you’ll be telling me weed cures broken bones next, or warn me not to vaccinate my children.
Yes, YouTube videos can be considered research, because that word itself does not imply peer review. You may have misunderstood how the word research is being used in this thread. https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/research Definitions 1 "careful or dilligent search" and 3 "the collecting of information about a particular subject" are the forms that were being used in this thread. When @acetoxy suggested doin…
I don’t think watching YouTube videos qualifify as gathering information, even if it fits within the definition of the word research.
Feel free to do it though, and I take no offense if you disagree with me, but I’d be careful trusting strangers on the internet, especially if you’re considering going to South America to do drugs.
Re: Can psychedelics make you a better person?
#47Is you need drugs to become more open minded and empathetic, the source of the problem is your upbringing, and by proxy the culture. The contemporary liberal western culture actively works towards shaping us into selfish materialistic consumerist narrow minded soulless beings. Half a trillion dollars per year go towards this effort, and the solution is start drugging ourselves with LSD? Bet, if that ever became commo…
you're painting "drugs" with a broad brush psychedelics are not like cocaine, despite what the 'gubbmunt' would like you to believe - rather they are like a window into your 'self' - if you think of psychedelics in terms of frequency, you might better understand the tremendous potential they hold with regard to a laundry list of ailments, including depression, PTSD, etc.
Your comment doesn't address what he wrote. The answer to anything as far as the modern consumer is concerned seems to always be "Buy more stuff!" In this case, what's being pedaled is the cure to consumerism. And the irony that the proposed solution is to buy yet another product seems lost on most people here.
Enough is enough. I agree with the original poster. Our solutions to every problem shouldn't be to buy yet another thing.
Re: Can psychedelics make you a better person?
#48ctrl+f ego... no hits? I've never done a psychedelic other than a very spiritual moment with salvia divinorum, but I have read up on them extensively, (they are often touted to help with ptsd), and the one major common factor is their ego-busting nature. Ego is a good thing in many ways, but due to societal and cultural strangeness, it is sometimes warped into overdrive (arrogance, etc) and sometimes too puny (low se…
From my completely inexpert perspective, and keeping in mind I've never taken any psychedelics, I'd guess that 'ego-busting' as you call it is almost certainly the component of value here. Our traditional notions of self are ridiculously naive and very poorly model reality, and I think working from poor models of reality is part of why we suffer like we do, which leads us to being worse people. Psychedelics allow peo…
Psychedelic chemicals don't speak narrative; the answer is far more boring of a story than "ego-busting". In my non-expert opinion, it's something roughly like this:
People have a surprising amount of path-dependence to their personality and behavior. That's like, the entire point of childhood - to figure out what kind of person you are, what kind of society you're in, and how to live up to expectation. These experiences will crystallize people's patterns of thought.
How psychedelics broadly work is they shake up people's typical thought patterns and make them experience new ones. Not better ones, not necessarily "ego-busting", just new. This lets people shake things up and clear out some over-adaptation. As a bonus model prediction: since the average thought pattern is adaptive, "too much" is bad for people as it makes them under-adapted for the world they inhabit.
Re: Can psychedelics make you a better person?
#49Is you need drugs to become more open minded and empathetic, the source of the problem is your upbringing, and by proxy the culture. The contemporary liberal western culture actively works towards shaping us into selfish materialistic consumerist narrow minded soulless beings. Half a trillion dollars per year go towards this effort, and the solution is start drugging ourselves with LSD? Bet, if that ever became commo…
I just hope you realize in part your comment is being
down-voted to hell not because of your opinion, but due to a lack of critical thinking and good faith arguments.
Consider even your first sentence “If you need drugs to become more open minded and empathetic...”, is a misstatement of the subject.
The only question asked by the article and any commenter from what I can see is can you become a better person?
I don’t know your religious leanings, but just probability tells us that they likely disagree with your premise that having a good “upbringing” is all it takes to become a person with no room for improvement. Likely your belief system encourages a lifetime of effort to improve these qualities.
The question here is not about needing drugs. The point is most people would be interested in bettering themselves if possible. For thousands of years humans have pondered ways to do so, and they will naturally continue to consider possibilities to do so within a sea of possibilities. This article simply continues that tradition.
Re: Can psychedelics make you a better person?
#50ctrl+f ego... no hits? I've never done a psychedelic other than a very spiritual moment with salvia divinorum, but I have read up on them extensively, (they are often touted to help with ptsd), and the one major common factor is their ego-busting nature. Ego is a good thing in many ways, but due to societal and cultural strangeness, it is sometimes warped into overdrive (arrogance, etc) and sometimes too puny (low se…
From my completely inexpert perspective, and keeping in mind I've never taken any psychedelics, I'd guess that 'ego-busting' as you call it is almost certainly the component of value here. Our traditional notions of self are ridiculously naive and very poorly model reality, and I think working from poor models of reality is part of why we suffer like we do, which leads us to being worse people. Psychedelics allow peo…
> Psychedelics allow people to more easily shift their perspective
This is a fairly accurate summary, from my personal experience.
Psychedelics help to partially peel back the immense layers of mental models and perspectives that we slowly build up over the many years of our life. These layers are usually fairly inscrutable -- most people don't think about them much. As the mental model of one's self is perhaps the most deeply rooted of them all, this process is how "ego death" occurs.
It is possible to gain some insight into our deeply rooted mental structures through years of careful self-observation and/or meditation, but psychedelics are an incredibly powerful tool for getting a different view of your own mind in single day (integrating the experience takes much longer).
I should say, though, due to the sheer power and novelty of the experience, it can feel as if the most simple thought is deeply profund -- so this is something one has to watch out for, if they care about genuine insight.
Warning: Psychedelics should be used with great caution -- they are not toys, and can cause significant harm if used improperly or under the wrong conditions.