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Psychedelics alter metaphysical beliefs

nature.com

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Re: Psychedelics alter metaphysical beliefs

#241

Post by tayo42 »

leadingthenet wrote: post #136
tayo42 wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

During my first lsd trip, I was sitting on a rock in the park, and I'm not sure what happened or why, but suddenly my entire reality fell apart, disintegrated into a bright light and small pieces, and I became intensely aware of how we are seemingly are just built up from particles that came together. I think those pieces were the atoms and molecules that came together to create my experience of the world. Less about…

I think my psychedelic experiences mirror yours quite well, and it has led to me reaching much the same conclusion, though you've put it into words much better than I've ever been able to. Have you ever experienced your sense of time becoming immaterial? I've had one such trip where I genuinely believed that time stopped, and I was present in some eternal plane, though my ego no longer was present. I can definitely s…

Thanks! And no I actually haven't, the only time changes I experienced was those moments where your like wow it's only been 20 minutes

Re: Psychedelics alter metaphysical beliefs

#242

Post by mostertoaster »

dang wrote: post #229
mostertoaster wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Personal attacks, flamebait, snark, and ideological battle—which I think this manages to be all 4 of!—are not allowed on HN. If you'd please review the rules and not post like that, we'd appreciate it. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

I apologize. I will try not to let myself get carried away next time.

Re: Psychedelics alter metaphysical beliefs

#243

Post by EricDeb »

jklinger410 wrote: post #212
Der_Einzige wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh really? So you mean things like the no-cloning theorem, no-copying theorem, the whole idea of quantum indeterminacy, and the fact that actual randomness exists gives you evidence for objective reality? Actually, it's exactly the opposite. A =/= A. Even if there was objective reality, it's not available to us. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/No-cloning_theorem https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_indeterminacy h…

You've got mounds and mounds of evidence for an objective and constant reality, and a few conundrums to unravel, and you then say "we don't know anything!" That's completely irrational. It sounds to me like you are looking to find data to fit your theory, you are HOPING we are in a simulation, and throwing out the baby with the bathwater. I find this whole conversation so incredibly funny. Go tell a person serving a…

There's undoubtedly shared aspects of reality and I don't think anyone seriously thinks psychedelics can produce water in a desert. I think the main benefit is psychedelics show you a different mental perspective on objective/shared reality and can shift your ego/identity in a radical way temporarily. Reality is "subjective" in the sense that your beliefs/identity/ego/brain-chemistry make up a huge part of your experience and those aspects can be altered dramatically. Telling someone serving a life sentence that could actually be useful to them. You see a lot of them turn to religion. That being said I eyeroll as well when someone says we're probably living in a simulation, but there is a lot we still don't know lol

Re: Psychedelics alter metaphysical beliefs

#244

Post by GoblinSlayer »

toomanydoubts wrote: post #221
GoblinSlayer wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I can tell you: "I'm conscious and aware", but there's no way I can prove to you I'm not a philosophical zombie(someone that acts like it's conscious, but isn't). You can't prove that to yourself either, because a zombie has the same thoughts as you. You can't differentiate even subjectively whether you're a zombie or not.

Interesting idea, but I'm not sure I follow completely. Philosophical zombies may have the same "thoughts", but they do not have qualia, they act like they do, but they don't. As for me, I'm pretty sure I have qualia. I've been watching this movie called "my life" ever since I was born. If I were to be a philosophical zombie, it all would have passed in the dark. I think the phrase "I think, therefore I am" is the es…

If a zombie could detect it doesn't have thoughts, it would report about it. This can be done with reflection. If a zombie can't do reflection, that would be an observable functional difference from human, which is not allowed by definition. Therefore a zombie knows it has thoughts the same way a human knows it. A zombie only doesn't have qualia based on the assumption that it's possible to think without qualia.

Re: Psychedelics alter metaphysical beliefs

#245

Post by GoblinSlayer »

malermeister wrote: post #199
GoblinSlayer wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We established the magnitude of the avogadro number, objects so complex have no chance to fully fit in imagination.

So you're saying the fact that your imagination is limited is proof? I believe in myself more than that, sorry. [also again, how do you know the Avogadro constant is real?]

Beliefs have no effect on reality, sorry.

Not sure what you mean by real there, the Avogadro number expresses precision at which you need to simulate reality to get something believable and a brain simply isn't big enough for this in purely quantitative terms.

Re: Psychedelics alter metaphysical beliefs

#246

Post by GoblinSlayer »

Elof wrote: post #235
GoblinSlayer wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cognitive bias doesn't exist in perception, it's interpretation, and attributions are even thoretization. Difficulty of classification is not a problem of perception, it's a problem of classification. If we can't name the color, it doesn't mean we don't see the color as it is.

Interpretation informs perception and perception isn't some constant in the human experience. A difficulty of classification can absolutely be a problem of perception because none of these things exist in a vacuum. Literally every human interpretation of reality is at best an approximate summary of what we experience of reality because it's impossible to remove bias and, believe it or not, we still don't know everyth…

We don't know everything, but we discern reality just fine. Those are two different claims.

Re: Psychedelics alter metaphysical beliefs

#247

Post by GoblinSlayer »

TheCoelacanth wrote: post #232
GoblinSlayer wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's just FUD. If reality was difficult to discern, we would long be extinct.

I don't think that's at all accurate. We have evolved to perceive some aspects of reality (the ones where perceiving them improves survival/reproduction) and to not perceive many other aspects of reality because those aspects of reality do not affect survival/reproduction success enough to make up for the cost of having the more accurate perception.

The aspects that improve survival are pretty big and their perception is accurate and that's how we study nature - by augmenting our perception with tools.

Re: Psychedelics alter metaphysical beliefs

#248

Post by jklinger410 »

pmichaud wrote: post #237
jklinger410 wrote: post #209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are positing a that all reality is unknowable because our senses can be fooled, and our brain is an unreliable narrator (if you will). No matter what evidence I bring to the table, they will simply say "but what if you are being fooled?"

Yeah I'm not them, but I think that's close. What I would say is that our sensory data + mental models of that data are abstractions over whatever reality actually is, which I am guessing you agree with. On top of that I think something else that I am guessing you don't agree with: I think those abstractions are pretty arbitrary and hide important "implementation details" of reality that could turn out to have a big…

Thank you for digesting the argument and identifying the key points where we differ.

Re: Psychedelics alter metaphysical beliefs

#249

Post by Elof »

GoblinSlayer wrote: post #246
Elof wrote: post #235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interpretation informs perception and perception isn't some constant in the human experience. A difficulty of classification can absolutely be a problem of perception because none of these things exist in a vacuum. Literally every human interpretation of reality is at best an approximate summary of what we experience of reality because it's impossible to remove bias and, believe it or not, we still don't know everyth…

We don't know everything, but we discern reality just fine. Those are two different claims.

Sure, we discern reality, but that doesn't mean our perception isn't biased or correct.

Re: Psychedelics alter metaphysical beliefs

#250

Post by BizarroLand »

srcreigh wrote: post #205

I know of three spiritual teachers who describe psychedelics as a door to the spiritual world. Ram Dass the Jewish Psychology Professor at Harvard/Hippie/Hindu. See his famous book Be Here Now. [1] He passed away last year Fr. Stephen De Young and Fr. Stephen Damick (PhD), Eastern Orthodox Christian priests. Psychedelics are mentioned near the end of episode 2 of their podcast. [2] [1]: https://www.goodreads.com/book…

I found a copy of Be Here Now for sale at a thrift store and bought it as a curio.

A few days later I opened it to read it and a dried, pressed cannabis leaf (not the flower) fell out.

The book did not disappoint, but it was definitely odd.

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