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Messages that can only be understood under the influence of psychedelics

qri.org

71–80 of 302 posts

Re: Messages that can only be understood under the influence of psychedelics

#71

This is a very cool post. It’s a bit funny to see the HN crowd polarized with how best to view the messages but doesn’t seem anyone has viewed yet under psychedelics

Yeah let me drop acid in my morning cereal right before the daily scrum. This day's gonna be a fun if unproductive one finding patterns across Confluence pages.

Re: Messages that can only be understood under the influence of psychedelics

#72
post #51

All the people in this thread who decoded it used long exposure or faster playback. Using the latter, for me, it starts to become readable at 2.5x and is essentially a clear static image at 4x. (I had to download the video and play it back using VLC.) Which for me, makes this claim a bit absurd: > At a theoretical level, this confirmation is significant because it is the first clear demonstration of a real perceptual…

Is life just about "computation advantage" ?

Re: Messages that can only be understood under the influence of psychedelics

#73

People who haven't used psychedelics don't tend to get or appreciate The Congress as much as those who have. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BPGhw4nACfk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pPAl5GwvdY8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8pqzaZcivh4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IMMI8HWhqEc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QHBl43lMJY0 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Congress_(2013_film)

I've recommended the film previously on HN [0]. It's a movie that only gets more relevant with time.

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30628290

Re: Messages that can only be understood under the influence of psychedelics

#74
>first clear demonstration of a real perceptual computational advantage of psychedelic states of consciousness.

I feel like this is technically true but also misleading towards the belief that there is an overall perceptual computation advantage of psychedelic states. You can maybe get a higher score on certain tests, but it comes at a loss on other tests. I'm willing to bet basic tests like an eye exam will score worse when all the letters are dripping. The reality is psychedelics effect a particular band of brainwave frequencies, and so is not like the blunt general stimulation or inebriation of other drugs. It may be better for your brain to be in a psychedelic state on certain tasks, but if it was better in the general case evolution would have already made it so. Remember, I can rig a system with absolute perfect perception just so long as you don't mind a rate of 100% false positives.

Still congrats to QRI on this research. Very impressive result. Seems like they had some of the same method ideas I've had, or thought my ideas were worth taking last I spoke with them.

Re: Messages that can only be understood under the influence of psychedelics

#76
post #56

Have we all misunderstood the function of drug screening job applicants by the NSA?

This gave me a good chuckle. I remember at school once there was a shadowy entity that I came to understand was NSA recruiters (think big engineering school, big Military budget, not atypical for students to have high clearance). If you signed away a couple years they gave you some cash, I remember that, but what made me laugh was the thought of those bland recruiters surreptitiously whispering, “Now look, the LSD is…

Ive heard a lot of folklore surrounding these topics. I'd just be weary personally. At one point if you admitted you had used psychedelics some number of times you were considered insane and there's no way you could pass a polygraph.

Obviously no one can vouch for this topic, but consider the vulnerability associated with intense psychedelic use. If someone wanted to make you die in real life, black mail you, etc, this would be very good leverage. I've been told that the government likes leverage like this for maintaining control/order of the people who work for it. But who really knows, could all be conspiratorial mumbo jumbo. What is known is that the government invested a lot of time into studying psychedelics for purposes of mind control, IE, something that is not in the interest of the practitioner whatsoever.

Me personally... If I had to choose between being a psychedelic user on my own with my own tribe, or durring a government evaluation of my character, I think it's probably safer to choose the former not the latter.

Re: Messages that can only be understood under the influence of psychedelics

#77
post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You know, according to people who have done buckets of psychedelics, there's an awful lot more to the psychedelic experience than 2.5-4x slower processing speed. I recall reading of numerous people who found they could collectively slow down a wall clock to the point were it didn't move any longer, and people who have experienced what they refer to as "eternity", "multiple life times", "thousands of years", etc. Also…

people who have experienced what they refer to as "eternity", "multiple life times", "thousands of years", etc. They didn't "experience an eternity". They experienced an emotional feeling they likened to an eternity. This is the difference between your computer running a program for a thousand years and you changing the date settings. These people did not go through an eternity of perception, processing, and thought;…

That's a subjective interpretation, and I say that even as someone who believes in objective reality.

There's no telling what time perception is "correct" or "real". It is actually within the realm of possibility that they did experience an eternity-scale (but sub-infinite, natch) amount of experiences.

Re: Messages that can only be understood under the influence of psychedelics

#78
post #51

All the people in this thread who decoded it used long exposure or faster playback. Using the latter, for me, it starts to become readable at 2.5x and is essentially a clear static image at 4x. (I had to download the video and play it back using VLC.) Which for me, makes this claim a bit absurd: > At a theoretical level, this confirmation is significant because it is the first clear demonstration of a real perceptual…

It's opening up a perceptual time domain that is not available in a sober state. That's not 'slower processing speed'.

Re: Messages that can only be understood under the influence of psychedelics

#80

One time I took way too much weed butter and watched Interstellar, and I swear I could tell exactly where the green screen and photoshopping points were.

Cannabis is indeed a psychedelic substance. Many users don't experience it as such, but in the proper dose, and especially ones first usage of it, can be intensely psychedelic. The challenge with the cannabis experience is, it is often deeply clouded in fear and paranoia. I bet someone could read the messages in these videos quite easily under the influence of cannabis, but I doubt most would be comfortable at that l…

> Many users don't experience it as such, but in the proper dose, and especially ones first usage of it, can be intensely psychedelic.

ime/imo the main reason why it's so uncommon is because you have to go _comically_ far over your tolerance to hit the truly-psychedelic effects, and, as you said, it can be deeply uncomfortable. I've only ever managed to hit truly-psychedelic effects by ex. eating 600mg of RSO with a low tolerance, or doing a dab after a t break and way overestimating my tolerance.

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