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The life-changing effects of hallucinations

bbc.com

41–50 of 123 posts

Re: The life-changing effects of hallucinations

#41

I can't speak for myself, but I can offer a piece of anecdata. I had this buddy, who, at the time we became friends, was writing stuff in assembler that I had trouble putting in pascal. To my kid mind, he was an absolute genius. Eventually, he told was he was talking acid and disclosed how he could tell his mind was not as sharp as it used to be as a result. I have no knowledge if it was laced with anything or he sim…

Pretty obvious that it's not good for your brain to make it malfunction.

Re: The life-changing effects of hallucinations

#42
post #10

I wouldn't call myself a psychonaut yet, but I do love hallucinations. One thing I think the article didn't touch on that I found profoundly interesting is depersonalization. I had a trip recently where I entirely left my conscious reality behind, temporarily, except by a very thin thread. Some context for those that don't follow the fractals, depersonalization isn't super common on things like mushrooms or LSD, but…

After you take the CBD to stop things, what happens?

Re: The life-changing effects of hallucinations

#43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As far as I understand the science, that clarity is in part the perceived experience of reduced inflammation in the central nervous system. Psychedelics are anti-inflammatory. (Profoundly so. The anti-inflammatory effect is orders of magnitude stronger than the effects on the mind, i.e. a dose orders of magnitude smaller than we can directly perceive has a strong anti-inflammatory effect. Which is fascinating as thes…

This is interesting when combined with this study which showed that ketamine therapy with rapamycin was more effective (both are very strong anti-inflammatory drugs), despite the hypothesis being that rapamycin would inhibit the effects of ketamine due to MTORC suppression. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41386-020-0644-9

If anyone is interested in some listening on this topic, Tim Ferris interviewed a guy recently who talked a lot about rapamycin on his podcast.

https://tim.blog/2022/07/27/matt-kaeberlein-life-extension/

There's a transcript linked if you'd rather read/skim it.

Re: The life-changing effects of hallucinations

#44
post #10

I wouldn't call myself a psychonaut yet, but I do love hallucinations. One thing I think the article didn't touch on that I found profoundly interesting is depersonalization. I had a trip recently where I entirely left my conscious reality behind, temporarily, except by a very thin thread. Some context for those that don't follow the fractals, depersonalization isn't super common on things like mushrooms or LSD, but…

Now that you have been through it, do you think you would be able to reasonably emulate the cognitive aspect of the experience, leaving aside all of the ~emotional/experiential aspects of it?

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EDIT: I've exceeded my three posts per day limit but am keenly interested in this topic, so will reply here hoping you will see it (if not, I will re-post as a reply tomorrow):

> Like, can I observe myself more readily without judgement and emotion? Yeah, I think these experiences teach me to do that in new and fascinating ways over time, but it is absolutely iterative. If you're asking if I can make the same discoveries without LSD now that I've done it once, maybe - but I doubt it. Many of the chains LSD relieves you of you are so accustomed to having that you may not even know they're present.

I'm aiming for much more nuanced detail (a trick: think of what we are discussing as a project that you are being paid to implement, which can facilitate the application of the full horsepower of your mind to the idea).

I think the key word here is "emulate" - you experienced an alternative but genuinely real & "true" mode of operation of your mind, one that is superior in some ways:

- I entered a state of mind where I got to visualize all the paths a thought could branch to

- and what ark that would carry on my thinking in the long term

- once I accepted my circumstances I was able to observe without fear

- I learned a tool for observing without expectation or controls

If you break your experience down into discrete bullet points like this, and you conceptualize them as services or implementations, and then you apply some of your standard computing analysis skills to the whole thing, do you believe it may possible (for you, or someone) to achieve a (crude or otherwise) reproduction/emulation of these abilities?

Re: The life-changing effects of hallucinations

#46
post #31

I’ve had two hallucinagenic experiences (acid and 2c-I) and I never got any life changing experiences. Is it like hypnosis where you have to believe in it to have it work? I know someone cured of an addiction from her hypnosis so I know these things happen. I would say I absolutely had hallucinations and the experiences were powerful and long lasting, but I’m still aware it’s a trip.

Yeah I've never understood why people say that hallucinations are real, and even "more real" and the "actual reality". The very definition of a hallucination is that it's not real, it's false. What am I missing here?

You may be assuming that your ("the") normal conscious experience is base reality, as opposed to simply a much more common hallucination, which is what it can be revealed to be with a relatively small amount of investigation.

Also, there is a distinction between the words that we use to conceptualize and communicate about reality, but consciousness (presumably due to evolution) tends to filter such things out.

Re: The life-changing effects of hallucinations

#47

How come these articles never mention the profound effects and aftereffects of bad trips?

As someone who came down with visual snow syndrome (permanent HPPD) after an anxiety attack, why anyone would roll the dice on joining this hell is beyond me.

Also LSD has been linked to speeding up early onset schizophrenia in individuals who are susceptible: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4813425/

Re: The life-changing effects of hallucinations

#48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I read the whole article and yes the dream machine is interesting. I'm just commenting because there have been multiple articles on front page today about hallucinogens and the standard thought on HN is that these things are beneficial to society. I simply disagree.

Fortunately, we don't have to rely on opinions for things. We have science!

Be careful in presuming that science is capable of revealing the entirety of reality though. Technically, it doesn't even explicitly make that claim, but it seems that its reputation has kind of morphed into something much more than it is.

Re: The life-changing effects of hallucinations

#49
post #42
post #10

I wouldn't call myself a psychonaut yet, but I do love hallucinations. One thing I think the article didn't touch on that I found profoundly interesting is depersonalization. I had a trip recently where I entirely left my conscious reality behind, temporarily, except by a very thin thread. Some context for those that don't follow the fractals, depersonalization isn't super common on things like mushrooms or LSD, but…

After you take the CBD to stop things, what happens?

Along these lines, does CBD stop things?
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