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Unifying Theories of Psychedelic Drug Effects

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

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Re: Unifying Theories of Psychedelic Drug Effects

#51

Post by collyw »

bfuller wrote: post #44
collyw wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It isn't listed here. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychedelic_drug That's what I mean by its not generally considered a psychedelic. I am aware some people class it as one. Personally I have never experienced psychedelic effects from it.

it is absolutely generally considered a psychedelic. like I said eat a few grams of hash and tell me it's not. it has been used that way in world religions for thousands of years.

Post me some edibles over and 'll be happy to oblige. Never had that effect when I tried them before. Usually larger doses just made me giggly and put me to sleep.

Re: Unifying Theories of Psychedelic Drug Effects

#52

Post by dleslie »

munchhausen wrote: post #43
dlwdlw wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also may explain why they can be damaging to younger people. Like disturbing plants before their root system (filtration system) takes root tends to kill or damage the plants entire lifespan.

That is a really, really poor and flawed metaphor. It is completely arbitrary and there's no logic or reasoning behind it. The "filtration system" that is talked about here is not comparable to a root system, or, in other words, any life-sustaining or life-promoting system. Rather, a malignantly overgrown filtration system is the root cause of feelings of disconnectedness, deprivation, and subsequent depression, that…

I mostly agree, save for the aside about VR; social VR, when done well, is a connecting and expressive experience and not an isolating one.

Re: Unifying Theories of Psychedelic Drug Effects

#53

Post by Asooka »

dleslie wrote: post #52
munchhausen wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is a really, really poor and flawed metaphor. It is completely arbitrary and there's no logic or reasoning behind it. The "filtration system" that is talked about here is not comparable to a root system, or, in other words, any life-sustaining or life-promoting system. Rather, a malignantly overgrown filtration system is the root cause of feelings of disconnectedness, deprivation, and subsequent depression, that…

I mostly agree, save for the aside about VR; social VR, when done well, is a connecting and expressive experience and not an isolating one.

As someone who has spent close to 40 hours in VRChat so far (not to mention how many tweaking avatars in Blender and Unity), I wholeheartedly agree with this statement. Of all the VR experiences out there nothing beats the ability to just make whatever skin you want for yourself and go around roleplaying in virtual worlds with other people. Or show off your creativity with shaders. You can be a walking shadertoy of your own design and awe people with raytraced fractals or whatever you wish. And it's free! It honestly feels like an early internet forum.

Re: Unifying Theories of Psychedelic Drug Effects

#54

Post by grawprog »

GordonS wrote: post #45
bfuller wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

marijuana is definitely a psychedelic. eat a few grams of hash and tell me it's not.

Not sure why you're getting downvoted - when eaten, THC is metabolised into 11-OH-THC, which is much more potent that THC. If you eat too much, cannabis has psychedelic effects that are not present when smoking/vaping, and some people compare the 'trippy' effects to those of LSD or mushrooms.

I keep hearing this....I have yet to consume enough marijuana to have this happen...I've injested at least 2000mg of thc worth of candies made from shatter at once while smoking copious amounts of doobies and shatter no hallucinations....i've taken ten 100mg THC oil pills at once...zero hallucinations....smoked several grams of shatter in one sitting...nope....made a batch of cookies out of about 3 ounces of bud and a few grams of hash...ate most of the cookies in one sitting...again...no hallucinations...the only time i've ever even come close was the very first time...as I walked around whatever part of my body I couldn't see just didn't exist.

Also...smoking weed or ingesting it is fairly incomparable to either LSD or mushrooms....like in the slightest...mushrooms will strip your brain away piece by piece and let you meet the mushroom people....and LSD is like going to a magical land of wonder....smoking weed does neither of these things...I really wish it did...i've tried really hard to get that to happen...

Re: Unifying Theories of Psychedelic Drug Effects

#55

Post by cjslep »

c22 wrote: post #50
cjslep wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This comment seems to me to be incredibly condescending and implies that a professional artist (whatever that definition is) cannot have fun making new discoveries for themselves in the world of art. I am sorry that you are only interested in the professional artists on psychedelics; I think looking at its effect on all artists novice or otherwise is interesting.

Yours is not a very charitable reading. I think gp is just pointing out that a lot of people "give up" on art at a young age, so a regression to childish tendencies when it comes to art and psychedelics may not imply such a regression generally. It would be interesting if the subject was a professional artist with many years of training and technique, because then to throw this all away to "do art as a three year old…

Yes I suppose it wasn't. I am sorry. I can see now this argument, which seems reasonable. I had mistakenly read the previous message as complete belittlement.

Re: Unifying Theories of Psychedelic Drug Effects

#56

Post by cjslep »

yesenadam wrote: post #48
cjslep wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This comment seems to me to be incredibly condescending and implies that a professional artist (whatever that definition is) cannot have fun making new discoveries for themselves in the world of art. I am sorry that you are only interested in the professional artists on psychedelics; I think looking at its effect on all artists novice or otherwise is interesting.

Well, this comment seems incredibly condescending to me. You're not 'sorry', and I can't see the implication you suggest at all. Please allow people to freely be interested in what they're interested in.

I am fine with people being interested in whatever pleases them, so long as they aren't being mean to others about it.

Granted, a sibling comment to yours made me see how the person I responded to could formulate a reasonable argument. Whereas previously I could only see bourgeois academic snobbery. So, like you, I thought there was only one way to interpret it. But now, I have been enlightened.

I am indeed sorry.

Re: Unifying Theories of Psychedelic Drug Effects

#57

Post by xamuel »

MikkoFinell wrote: post #42
stinos wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Note I'm not claiming the filtration theory is true or false - I also have doubts about it - I'm just saying your rejection of it based on 'we don't see such effects because of brain damage ergo the theory doesn't hold' isn't exactly sound. Actually I'm not sure you can use brain damage to prove anything here. It's also too general of a term for me. As far as I'm concerned a serious head trauma where part of the brai…

I'm not saying that filtration theory is false, I'm saying it seems less likely to me than the following alternative: The chemical composition of a sober persons brain causes us to have the usual experience, but taking a substance like psilocybin alters the chemical balance and therefore makes us have unusual experiences. It seems like I have to suppose more assumptions under filtration theory, and that those new ass…

The brain damage caused by psychedelics is extremely specific. By your logic, tonsillitis shouldn't be curable by removing the tonsils, because if it were, then shooting someone in the mouth with a shotgun ought to produce similar effects to performing a tonsillectomy.

Re: Unifying Theories of Psychedelic Drug Effects

#58

Post by alexandercrohde »

I haven't tried any of the drugs described in this piece, and intend to keep it thus.

That said, overall, I think this is a fascinating approach to reverse-engineering the most impressive machine in existence: the human brain.

This particular article though feels hand-waivy by the end. Until we can validate these theories of mechanics [e.g. entropic brain theory] (e.g. by stimulating certain brain networks directly), they seem beyond speculative.

Re: Unifying Theories of Psychedelic Drug Effects

#59

Post by stinos »

MikkoFinell wrote: post #42
stinos wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Note I'm not claiming the filtration theory is true or false - I also have doubts about it - I'm just saying your rejection of it based on 'we don't see such effects because of brain damage ergo the theory doesn't hold' isn't exactly sound. Actually I'm not sure you can use brain damage to prove anything here. It's also too general of a term for me. As far as I'm concerned a serious head trauma where part of the brai…

I'm not saying that filtration theory is false, I'm saying it seems less likely to me than the following alternative: The chemical composition of a sober persons brain causes us to have the usual experience, but taking a substance like psilocybin alters the chemical balance and therefore makes us have unusual experiences. It seems like I have to suppose more assumptions under filtration theory, and that those new ass…

enough people suffer similar brain damage

Problem is that is quite hard to assess if it is sufficiently similar. That alone warrants an entire range of experiments. Also I don't know the literature enough to figure out if certain types of trauma reliably lead to similar experiences but I do think that is the case. For example electrical stimulation (not 'damage' per se but definitely altering the normal brain operation in subjects) has been repeatedly used to treat a myriad of problems like tinitus, tremors, ... And I know for a fact that during surgery, when attempting to find the right position for the electorde, it is not uncommon for patients to experience hallucinations/strong feelings of disgust/... because stimulating in the 'wrong' area instead of the proper target area. Also look at lobotomy for instance: quite a lot of similar symptoms in the unlucky subjects. Again: doesn't really prove filtration, but does indicate what you think doesn't happen (ie.strategical damage causing similar experiences) does in fact happen so it's imo not a good measure to reject the hypothesis.

Re: Unifying Theories of Psychedelic Drug Effects

#60

Post by collyw »

alexandercrohde wrote: post #58

I haven't tried any of the drugs described in this piece, and intend to keep it thus. That said, overall, I think this is a fascinating approach to reverse-engineering the most impressive machine in existence: the human brain. This particular article though feels hand-waivy by the end. Until we can validate these theories of mechanics [e.g. entropic brain theory] (e.g. by stimulating certain brain networks directly),…

You should try.
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