81–90 of 92 posts
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Plenty of people manage to be conscious without taking mushrooms.
The idea is, culture teaches those people how to be conscious, and mushrooms bootstrapped the culture. Not saying it’s correct, but that’s the hypothesis.
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In much the same way jumping counts as air travel.
I thought being in a plane in the air counted as air travel and being in a spacecraft in space counted as a space travel?
The role of fungi in earth's ecology is endlessly fascinating. In addition to laying the groundwork for complex life, there's evidence they helped in the emergence of intelligence and consciousness[1] as well as helping save honeybees[2] [1] https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/pdf/10.1098/rsif.2014... (pdf link) [2] https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2015/10/09/446928755/co...
I acknowledge that this comment is probably low quality, but if you have ever taken magic mushrooms you realise that fungi are definitely linked to the emergence of consciousness.
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> There is another well known corollary -- if we consume the bulk of fossil fuels this time around, it's unlikely that recovery after a major civilisation collapse would be possible. There will still be coal. Coal reserves are unbelievable. Even if we consume that too, we should be fine so as long as there is wood. You can power cars and tanks with wood. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wood_gas If we have no trees left…
Hence I said 'bulk of fossil fuels', not 'some, but leave plenty of coal behind'. In either case, the fossil fuels that are increasingly difficult / expensive to obtain now, in an era with comparatively abundant free energy, would be even more difficult / expensive to obtain in an energy-scarce world. And yes, I'm aware that things can burn. As a species we've known how to burn things for a very long time, but the in…
This is tangentially related: I've had a pet theory for a while (which may not be original, idk) that a possible explanation for the Fermi Paradox Great Filter is literally the existence of huge amounts of Fossil Fuels. It took millions of years of dead biological life on our planet to build up the supplies we have, and the big ol' meteor that hit us some 60 million years ago helped not only kill off a bunch of that…
I don't think this is true. The industrial age was, to begin with, powered by solid fuel; charcoal and coke. The abundance of coal accelerated the industrial revolution, but is essentially fungible with charcoal derived from wood. Oil came somewhat later, and rather than enabling new applications, mostly just replaced the use of solid fuels. Rocketry was pioneered with non-fossil fuels such as alcohol, as oil refinement wasn't initially good enough to enable their use. Particularly, the sulphur content made it too corrosive.
More than anything industrialization seems to be predicated by innovation; particularly the revolutionary invention of machine tools, which allowed accurate machinery to be made. Early mills were powered by water and wind, later moving to solid fuelled steam engines.
> the big ol' meteor [...] set the stage for actual intelligent life
I'm not convinced by this. Although this freed up evolutionary niches and enabled the dominance of mammals over reptiles, and the mammalian neocortex is regarded as providing higher intelligent functioning, we have observed conventionally neocortical activities in reptiles and birds. The meteor may have actually delayed the development of high intelligence, as it wiped out the animals large enough to support the brain metabolism we expect to be necessary.
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There is another well known corollary -- if we consume the bulk of fossil fuels this time around, it's unlikely that recovery after a major civilisation collapse would be possible. Naturally the kind of leadership that declines to consider what will happen over the next 20-30 years is even less likely to be concerned about the subsequent 200-300.
> There is another well known corollary -- if we consume the bulk of fossil fuels this time around, it's unlikely that recovery after a major civilisation collapse would be possible. There will still be coal. Coal reserves are unbelievable. Even if we consume that too, we should be fine so as long as there is wood. You can power cars and tanks with wood. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wood_gas If we have no trees left…
I’m afraid we’re the only game in town.
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The idea is, culture teaches those people how to be conscious, and mushrooms bootstrapped the culture. Not saying it’s correct, but that’s the hypothesis.
That's bullshit, people (and other animals) are conscious even without culture.
I also think comparing human level of consciousness to animal level of consciousness is a hard position to defend.
Anyway I guess you're missing the original point. What it theorizes is that some mushroom compounds might have had effect on our ancestors brains and helped them develop to what we are now, over long periods of time. A bit like agriculture or writing had a huge impact on our societies, but it's not a on/off switch, it's a very long gradual process.
I don't know if there is a lot of evidence supporting it, but it's not news that some drugs can temporarily or permanently reshape parts of our brains.
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The idea is, culture teaches those people how to be conscious, and mushrooms bootstrapped the culture. Not saying it’s correct, but that’s the hypothesis.
That's bullshit, people (and other animals) are conscious even without culture.
I’m not sure if that person would be more conscious than a dolphin, or a bear.
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That's bullshit, people (and other animals) are conscious even without culture.
People without culture? I don't think that's a thing. I also think comparing human level of consciousness to animal level of consciousness is a hard position to defend. Anyway I guess you're missing the original point. What it theorizes is that some mushroom compounds might have had effect on our ancestors brains and helped them develop to what we are now, over long periods of time. A bit like agriculture or writing…
It happens sometimes—feral children who are neglected or abandoned in various ways.
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This is like claiming that dripping drops of water on a circuit board, and observing that the electronics misbehave, somehow links it to the emergence of circuit design.
It surely is in some ways. But in other ways, it sure seems like they have some sort of a special "relationship" (for utter lack of a better term) with consciousness. Out of curiosity, have you tried them before?
Yes, I agree.
I'm not convinced, from a system perspective, that disturbing a system by poking its most intimate internal parts, and in an unusual way, means that the disturbance was directly required or a part of the emergence of the system.
I will admit that this perspective is mostly logically pedantic and, perhaps naive, disregards the universal usage of psychedelics throughout human history.
I suppose the question would be, what's the evolutionary advantage to temporarily modifying your brains behavior? Any raw structural changes from the use wouldn't be passed to your offspring, leaving mostly social advantages. One could argue that sensitivity to these compounds could promote these advantages, leading to a natural selection of those with more sensitive, and perhaps necessarily more complicated, brains.
What's that social, or perhaps functional, advantage? Maybe epigenetics could have played a role, along with the occasional tribe saving, trip induced, insight?
I would very much enjoy any facts or ramblings on this topic, it's very interesting.
> have you tried them before?
No, just LSD.