Altered states of consciousness

[Johnathan Corgan]

On Tue, 2009-03-17 at 19:05 +0100, Bruno Marchal wrote:

> Note that with high concentrated extract of Salvia Divinorum, people
> can "suffer" (or "enjoy") a total amnesia, where you forget not just
> your name and memories of life, but you forget even what is a person,
> what is space, what is time.  Yet you remain conscious. Life appears
> as a dream, that you recall vaguely, and then forget, and then you
> forget you did that dream. Yet "you" come back. (See the reports, I
> don't encourage its consumption, but anyone interested by
> consciousness can be interested by such reports).

Many arguments or lines of reasoning that I have seen that incorporate
consciousness reply upon it's "typical" characteristics, that is, what
we would call "normal" consciousness. Yet, altered states of
consciousness can have dramatically different subjective properties or
qualia.

A review of the vast literature of the subjective effects of
hallucinogens such as salvinorin A, dimethyltryptamine (DMT), and LSD
reveals 1-pov experiences that, while not corresponding to consensus
"1st person plural" reality, are still structured and internally
consistent.

In many cases, their effects go beyond mere sensory distortion, and
provide the experiencer with a direct, entirely novel "replacement" set
of qualia, reported to be like "being transported to a new reality."
And, by all accounts, the experienced qualia appear to "kick back" in
the Deutsch/Johnson sense.

In the terminology of the theories expounded on this discussion list,
what sort of observer moments correspond to these 1-pov experiences?
How are they distinguished from those that correspond to consensus
reality?  Most people would dismiss the subjective experience of
hallucinogens as merely the chaos induced by chemically disrupting the
brain's operation, yet a large fraction of the reports in the literature
are anything but chaotic.

If one adheres to the consciousness-as-computation hypothesis, what sort
of computations are involved in these cases?

Johnathan Corgan




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[Kim Jones-2]

On 20/03/2009, at 6:08 AM, Johnathan Corgan wrote:

> In the terminology of the theories expounded on this discussion list,
> what sort of observer moments correspond to these 1-pov experiences?
> How are they distinguished from those that correspond to consensus
> reality?  Most people would dismiss the subjective experience of
> hallucinogens as merely the chaos induced by chemically disrupting the
> brain's operation, yet a large fraction of the reports in the  
> literature
> are anything but chaotic.




Why would people dismiss the subjective experience of hallucinogens as  
chaos?

That would suggest that millions upon millions of people on the planet  
who daily do drugs are indulging in an experience of chaos. Whoever  
thinks like this lacks an education in drugs and should attempt to do  
something about that. Humans, properly fed, clothed, looked after,  
educated will ALWAYS seek to alter their consciousness somehow by  
using substances. You do it every time you consume an omelette.

Millions of people drink coffee which has a powerful chemical impact  
but nobody ever shows concern for their 1-pov experiences. Why the  
special pleading for drugs? It's all just substance of one kind or  
another. People create an artificial straw-man issue out of drugs  
constantly. It's like the current witch-hunt into pedophilia.  
Pedophiles are lurking under every leaf so watch out kiddies!

I'll be damned if I smoke a joint and sit down to compose music and  
rubbish comes out. Never happened yet. Drugs, properly used are an aid  
to civilisation. They give kiddy winks Ritalin don't they? Ever tried  
it???? You wonder why they make cannabis illegal.

I'm far more worried about my partner who strips butt-naked in the  
shower to clean the bathroom with chlorine bleach with the windows  
closed. Now that is what I call playing with mind-altering substances.

A little salvia, a little dope, a little coffee, a little red wine, a  
little chocolate, a little kiss....


K







>
>
> If one adheres to the consciousness-as-computation hypothesis, what  
> sort
> of computations are involved in these cases?
>
> Johnathan Corgan


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[Stathis Papaioannou-2]

2009/3/20 Johnathan Corgan <jcorgan@...>:

> A review of the vast literature of the subjective effects of
> hallucinogens such as salvinorin A, dimethyltryptamine (DMT), and LSD
> reveals 1-pov experiences that, while not corresponding to consensus
> "1st person plural" reality, are still structured and internally
> consistent.
>
> In many cases, their effects go beyond mere sensory distortion, and
> provide the experiencer with a direct, entirely novel "replacement" set
> of qualia, reported to be like "being transported to a new reality."
> And, by all accounts, the experienced qualia appear to "kick back" in
> the Deutsch/Johnson sense.
>
> In the terminology of the theories expounded on this discussion list,
> what sort of observer moments correspond to these 1-pov experiences?
> How are they distinguished from those that correspond to consensus
> reality?  Most people would dismiss the subjective experience of
> hallucinogens as merely the chaos induced by chemically disrupting the
> brain's operation, yet a large fraction of the reports in the literature
> are anything but chaotic.
>
> If one adheres to the consciousness-as-computation hypothesis, what sort
> of computations are involved in these cases?

I see the idea of the observer moment as extremely general, covering
every possible form of consciousness, from animals with simple nervous
systems to people with hebephrenic schizophrenia to godlike Jupiter
brains. Brains that correspond to "consensus reality" are simply a
special case, adapted to a particular environment. If the behaviour of
a flatworm's nervous system can be emulated on a computer then I see
no reason why the behaviour of a human brain, whether functioning
normally or hallucinating, can't also be so emulated.


--
Stathis Papaioannou

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[Johnathan Corgan]

On Fri, 2009-03-20 at 17:02 +1100, Kim Jones wrote:

> Why would people dismiss the subjective experience of hallucinogens as  
> chaos?

This is simply the observation that the action of hallucinogens on
consciousness is often dismissed as an abberration and the potential
scientific benefits from their objective study are therefore lost.  

Witness the popularity of the term "psychotomimetic" until fairly
recently to automatically classify these effects as something akin to
temporary mental illness, or the determination in the medico-legal
context that all use is "abuse".

What is ignored is that any theory of consciousness, or other theories
that rely on the concept of consciousness as part of a chain of
reasoning, must also be able to explain not only "typical" consciousness
but also the quantitative and qualitative nature of altered states of
consciousness.  These altered states may be arrived at in a variety of
ways (meditation, religious practices, psychoactive substances), but the
use of drugs to achieve them appears to be the way most amenable to
controlled, scientific study.  Yet there is very little of this
happening, and what studies are in progress are aimed at establishing
their potential health benefits (MDMA for PTSD sufferers, for example.)

This is not a bad goal in and of itself, but here we are trying to
understand this enormous mystery of consciousness, and focusing on a
narrow subset of conscious experience as the data to reason from.

> Humans, properly fed, clothed, looked after,  
> educated will ALWAYS seek to alter their consciousness somehow by  
> using substances.

Yes, history bears this out.

> Millions of people drink coffee which has a powerful chemical impact  
> but nobody ever shows concern for their 1-pov experiences. Why the  
> special pleading for drugs? It's all just substance of one kind or  
> another.

Well, my earlier post in particular was singling out a specific class of
substances--hallucinogens potent enough to not just alter or distort
existing qualia, but to replace the user's entire sensorium with novel
qualia, and by some reports, qualia in novel sensory modalities.  People
report experiencing being in completely different locations, witnessing
and participating in complex, detailed events, with a subjective sense
that they are as real or even more real than what they experience in the
absence of the effects of the drug.

Some hallucinogens go even further than this, and introduce an element
of amnesia for semantic and episodic memories, such that users report
the experience of "forgetting that I had taken a drug, that I was human,
or even what being human meant."  Five to twenty minutes later they
return to baseline and report feeling completely "normal" again.

Frankly, what astonishes me, is that these altered states even exist at
all.  It would be reasonable to think that "disrupting" the physical
processes which give rise to consciousness would merely cause it to
fail; i.e., cause a loss of consciousness.  Instead, in some cases, we
have these fully immersive experiences with recurring, consistent
themes, well structured, with content of unknown origin, and a lack of
any relationship to sensory data streaming into the brain from the
"outside."

Yeah, I think their might be something worth investigating here.

Johnathan Corgan



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[Johnathan Corgan]

On Fri, 2009-03-20 at 21:54 +1100, Stathis Papaioannou wrote:

> > If one adheres to the consciousness-as-computation hypothesis, what
> > sort of computations are involved in these cases?
>
> I see the idea of the observer moment as extremely general, covering
> every possible form of consciousness, from animals with simple nervous
> systems to people with hebephrenic schizophrenia to godlike Jupiter
> brains. Brains that correspond to "consensus reality" are simply a
> special case, adapted to a particular environment. If the behaviour of
> a flatworm's nervous system can be emulated on a computer then I see
> no reason why the behaviour of a human brain, whether functioning
> normally or hallucinating, can't also be so emulated.

Sure, I agree.

My poorly articulated question was meant more to address the fact that
fairly small variations in brain chemistry can give rise to vastly
different observer moments (see previous email).  

If our consciousness is a result of an invariant computational process
that may be instantiated on a a variety of substrates, such as brains or
computers, what sorts of computational alterations correspond to the
transition between normal experience and hallucinogenic experiences
brought on by altering brain chemistry?

Johnathan Corgan


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[Bruno Marchal]

Hi Johnathan, Kim, Stathis


I agree with you Johnathan. Scientists learn a lot from extreme cases,  
and altered states of consciousness is worth to study, even to  
understand better what is a "normal" (if that exists) states of  
consciousness.

Now remember that our brain seems to generate already by itself a  
numerous of different "naturally",  or self-altered, consciousness  
states.
The most amazing and well known is the state of the so called  
paradoxical sleep, or REM period, or dream state, or reality  
simulation state. It is a state unknown by the dinosaurs and the  
reptiles. It appears with the birds and then all the homeothermic  
animals. Michel Jouvet called it paradoxical, because it makes the  
animal hallucinated and paralyzed which makes it an easy prey for the  
predator, yet that states has survived 65 millions of years, nobody  
really knows why, but we suspect its importance.

During sleep, with some training you can be "lucid" not just during  
the REM paradoxical state, you can be somehow lucid during the slow  
wave states, and that gives roughly speaking another collection of  
four "natural altered states". Fever, some headache, some stroke could  
lead to variants.

Why altered states? I can find plausible that in situation of stress,  
like for a mouse in the mouth of a cat, your probabilities of  
surviving are made higher if your brain has a system of self calm  
down, if not self lying. It is known that mouse indeed generates  
endogenous morphine like pain killer, and as you know the brain is  
full of enhancers and inhibitors. Most drugs coming from plants are  
molecules looking like our own inhibitors of enhancers, general or  
specific. Which means (but don't repeat) that the first big drugs  
constructor is the brain itself (don't repeat because make they will  
make the brain and computer illegal).
Like anything alive a big part of the work consists in self-repairing  
and all those endogenous drugs, well all, depending the amount, can  
alter *a little bit more* the state of consciousness, than it does in  
normal circumstances, so that, again, a normal state of consciousness  
is a sum of altered states in a equilibrium, belonging to some  
neighborhood of states.

And why does plant constructs altered states of consciousness  
molecules? In my opinion it has all to do with the incredibly complex  
relationships that plant have with animals, in general, and insects in  
particular. Many plants have to detract predator insects. By killing  
them, or by just smelling like, or imitating the smell of, of the  
appearance of  the worst predators of the insect (sort of lies!). But  
they must also to attract insects, feed them, and manipulate them in  
such a way that Mister plant can send its Message to Missis Plant  
which leaves at five miles from Him. You bet that with millions of  
years they knows about manipulating insects and animals, from predator  
and pollinator to consumers.

And which explains perhaps why there are so much medicinal and  
"psychedelic" plants (entheogen).

Now I agree with you Johnathan, that for discussing about  
consciousness, we should distinguish between drugs which alter the  
mood and the perception, like cannabis and alcohol from hallucinogen,  
like some mushrooms and cactus, and dissociators like Ketamine. Salvia  
Divinorum, strictly speaking, is a bit of both a dissociator and an  
hallucinogen. The first alter your "actual" consciousness, the second  
triggers an actual different in nature experience, like an out of body  
experience, or a near death experience, or a dream, or a dream-like  
scenario. Typically and without training you don't remain lucid: you  
forget you are under the product. You can't take Salvia casually, you  
take it to live a particular experience which requires your attention,  
and preparation.

Now, I would not compare the effect of Salvia with anything produced  
by any other entheogen. When smoked, it produces an effect which lasts  
in general between 3 and 6 minutes. Unlike cannabis, alcohol, LSD, and  
many others, the effect is disphoric, meaning not typically pleasant.  
Animals does not push twice on the "button" with salvia, showing in  
particular it is not addictive. Normal, "my thesis" in four minutes,  
the poor animals!

The effect are quite different from people to people, and according to  
the concentration of the salvinorin molecules. You find it  from 1X  
(the leaves), to 5X, 10X, ... 40X (beyond it seems to me only the  
price grows up, not the effect).

Many meet typical archetypes (elves, carnival wheel, clown). Some will  
relive childhood events, or complete life of someone else. Most will  
talk about a strong pulling or pushing rotation, physically felt,  
which can sometimes leads to being cut in billions parts and send to  
as much parallel realities (some can panic here). All talk about  
realities and perception of realities. many% (on about 1000 reports)  
talk explicitly about feeling a "feminine presence", which "teach" you  
something, the last point of it seeming unmemorable. Some lives the  
experience very badly. In my own experiment, with 30 participants (one  
by one), they made rewarding experiences, you just need to be patient  
and to increase the amount of concentration incrementally, and to  
encourage the respect of the plant. Most learns this by experience.

Is it safe? The effect are impressive, but apparently not dangerous.  
If you look at the YouTube Video, you see that used in the worst  
conditions it leads, in the worse case only to bruises and nightmares.  
(With alpinism, a slight error can kill you and others). Like  
cannabis, no overdose level exists. Given big amount of  
"infinityX" (pure salvinorin) to rats makes then "sleep" for 4  
minutes, and then they resume their activities. It is estimated that  
on the last 2 millions of American who smoked salvia, there are zero  
death related to it, nor even emergency calls. There are thousand of  
death related to alcohol consumption, and many more injuries, just to  
compare.

Salvia is above all a medicinal plant. Incredibly enough, I did cure a  
severe migraine recently. The person told me she did try all possible  
medications, without success, she has to just keep calm in the dark  
for 12 hours. A little hit of leave made it disappear in three  
minutes.  It is one of the main use among the Mazatec. It helps for  
nasal congestion too, it helps for sleep (always 1X here).
It is antidepressant, and it is antiaddictive. It is a medication  
against drugs!

And yes Kim, it is easy (far more than cannabis which is already easy)  
to grow your own plant and to multiply it. It is alas less easy to  
find the plant, there are no seeds available, because Salvia Divinorum  
has literally abandon sexual reproduction (I think she did have its  
own predator as pollinator, explaining the subtleties of her message).
You don't need light, she hates light, she loves the dark, heat and  
water a lot. She lives, or at least her ancestors were used to live  
(because since 700 years she has been cultivated by the Mexican  
Mazatec) in dark hot and humid forest, in the nightlight of the day  
within the shadows of trees with many branches. Below 0° (celsius) she  
dies.

I am glad I found my master. A plant!  (grin). But I will continue to  
explain UDA+AUDA for those who prefer the pure third person  
communicable way. Don't worry, (or worry, perhaps :).  It is a  
question of taste. Reality is creative, beyond wonders and surprises.  
People who does not like wonders, surprises should not study computer  
science and logics, neither physics, and should avoid Lewis Carroll  
and Salvia Divinorum. That plant likes joking. Here a video of someone  
very sensible, and a bit unprepared, who seems to appreciate the joke:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a1QavlZe2H8&feature=channel_page

About that plant, I would like to add that I am certainly in favor of  
some regulation. But criminalization of it is no less than criminal.  
The plant becomes really dangerous: it can send you to hell (jail),  
even without smoking it!
We should have laws forbidding defamation about products related to  
health. Against the abuse of systematic well known errors of logic,  
the ignorance of what is a trance states, etc.

Best,

Bruno


http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/




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[John Mikes]

Bruno,

I enjoyed your pretty comprehensive post!

Thanks!

John

PS> one little question: have you ever been 'present' when in REM? JM

On Sun, Mar 22, 2009 at 4:14 PM, Bruno Marchal <marchal@...> wrote:

Hi Johnathan, Kim, Stathis


I agree with you Johnathan. Scientists learn a lot from extreme cases,
and altered states of consciousness is worth to study, even to
understand better what is a "normal" (if that exists) states of
consciousness.

Now remember that our brain seems to generate already by itself a
numerous of different "naturally",  or self-altered, consciousness
states.
The most amazing and well known is the state of the so called
paradoxical sleep, or REM period, or dream state, or reality
simulation state. It is a state unknown by the dinosaurs and the
reptiles. It appears with the birds and then all the homeothermic
animals. Michel Jouvet called it paradoxical, because it makes the
animal hallucinated and paralyzed which makes it an easy prey for the
predator, yet that states has survived 65 millions of years, nobody
really knows why, but we suspect its importance.

During sleep, with some training you can be "lucid" not just during
the REM paradoxical state, you can be somehow lucid during the slow
wave states, and that gives roughly speaking another collection of
four "natural altered states". Fever, some headache, some stroke could
lead to variants.

Why altered states? I can find plausible that in situation of stress,
like for a mouse in the mouth of a cat, your probabilities of
surviving are made higher if your brain has a system of self calm
down, if not self lying. It is known that mouse indeed generates
endogenous morphine like pain killer, and as you know the brain is
full of enhancers and inhibitors. Most drugs coming from plants are
molecules looking like our own inhibitors of enhancers, general or
specific. Which means (but don't repeat) that the first big drugs
constructor is the brain itself (don't repeat because make they will
make the brain and computer illegal).
Like anything alive a big part of the work consists in self-repairing
and all those endogenous drugs, well all, depending the amount, can
alter *a little bit more* the state of consciousness, than it does in
normal circumstances, so that, again, a normal state of consciousness
is a sum of altered states in a equilibrium, belonging to some
neighborhood of states.

And why does plant constructs altered states of consciousness
molecules? In my opinion it has all to do with the incredibly complex
relationships that plant have with animals, in general, and insects in
particular. Many plants have to detract predator insects. By killing
them, or by just smelling like, or imitating the smell of, of the
appearance of  the worst predators of the insect (sort of lies!). But
they must also to attract insects, feed them, and manipulate them in
such a way that Mister plant can send its Message to Missis Plant
which leaves at five miles from Him. You bet that with millions of
years they knows about manipulating insects and animals, from predator
and pollinator to consumers.

And which explains perhaps why there are so much medicinal and
"psychedelic" plants (entheogen).

Now I agree with you Johnathan, that for discussing about
consciousness, we should distinguish between drugs which alter the
mood and the perception, like cannabis and alcohol from hallucinogen,
like some mushrooms and cactus, and dissociators like Ketamine. Salvia
Divinorum, strictly speaking, is a bit of both a dissociator and an
hallucinogen. The first alter your "actual" consciousness, the second
triggers an actual different in nature experience, like an out of body
experience, or a near death experience, or a dream, or a dream-like
scenario. Typically and without training you don't remain lucid: you
forget you are under the product. You can't take Salvia casually, you
take it to live a particular experience which requires your attention,
and preparation.

Now, I would not compare the effect of Salvia with anything produced
by any other entheogen. When smoked, it produces an effect which lasts
in general between 3 and 6 minutes. Unlike cannabis, alcohol, LSD, and
many others, the effect is disphoric, meaning not typically pleasant.
Animals does not push twice on the "button" with salvia, showing in
particular it is not addictive. Normal, "my thesis" in four minutes,
the poor animals!

The effect are quite different from people to people, and according to
the concentration of the salvinorin molecules. You find it  from 1X
(the leaves), to 5X, 10X, ... 40X (beyond it seems to me only the
price grows up, not the effect).

Many meet typical archetypes (elves, carnival wheel, clown). Some will
relive childhood events, or complete life of someone else. Most will
talk about a strong pulling or pushing rotation, physically felt,
which can sometimes leads to being cut in billions parts and send to
as much parallel realities (some can panic here). All talk about
realities and perception of realities. many% (on about 1000 reports)
talk explicitly about feeling a "feminine presence", which "teach" you
something, the last point of it seeming unmemorable. Some lives the
experience very badly. In my own experiment, with 30 participants (one
by one), they made rewarding experiences, you just need to be patient
and to increase the amount of concentration incrementally, and to
encourage the respect of the plant. Most learns this by experience.

Is it safe? The effect are impressive, but apparently not dangerous.
If you look at the YouTube Video, you see that used in the worst
conditions it leads, in the worse case only to bruises and nightmares.
(With alpinism, a slight error can kill you and others). Like
cannabis, no overdose level exists. Given big amount of
"infinityX" (pure salvinorin) to rats makes then "sleep" for 4
minutes, and then they resume their activities. It is estimated that
on the last 2 millions of American who smoked salvia, there are zero
death related to it, nor even emergency calls. There are thousand of
death related to alcohol consumption, and many more injuries, just to
compare.

Salvia is above all a medicinal plant. Incredibly enough, I did cure a
severe migraine recently. The person told me she did try all possible
medications, without success, she has to just keep calm in the dark
for 12 hours. A little hit of leave made it disappear in three
minutes.  It is one of the main use among the Mazatec. It helps for
nasal congestion too, it helps for sleep (always 1X here).
It is antidepressant, and it is antiaddictive. It is a medication
against drugs!

And yes Kim, it is easy (far more than cannabis which is already easy)
to grow your own plant and to multiply it. It is alas less easy to
find the plant, there are no seeds available, because Salvia Divinorum
has literally abandon sexual reproduction (I think she did have its
own predator as pollinator, explaining the subtleties of her message).
You don't need light, she hates light, she loves the dark, heat and
water a lot. She lives, or at least her ancestors were used to live
(because since 700 years she has been cultivated by the Mexican
Mazatec) in dark hot and humid forest, in the nightlight of the day
within the shadows of trees with many branches. Below 0° (celsius) she
dies.

I am glad I found my master. A plant!  (grin). But I will continue to
explain UDA+AUDA for those who prefer the pure third person
communicable way. Don't worry, (or worry, perhaps :).  It is a
question of taste. Reality is creative, beyond wonders and surprises.
People who does not like wonders, surprises should not study computer
science and logics, neither physics, and should avoid Lewis Carroll
and Salvia Divinorum. That plant likes joking. Here a video of someone
very sensible, and a bit unprepared, who seems to appreciate the joke:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a1QavlZe2H8&feature=channel_page

About that plant, I would like to add that I am certainly in favor of
some regulation. But criminalization of it is no less than criminal.
The plant becomes really dangerous: it can send you to hell (jail),
even without smoking it!
We should have laws forbidding defamation about products related to
health. Against the abuse of systematic well known errors of logic,
the ignorance of what is a trance states, etc.

Best,

Bruno


http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/

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[Kim Jones-2]

On 23/03/2009, at 7:14 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote:

> And why does plant constructs altered states of consciousness
> molecules? In my opinion it has all to do with the incredibly complex
> relationships that plant have with animals, in general, and insects in
> particular. Many plants have to detract predator insects. By killing
> them, or by just smelling like, or imitating the smell of, of the
> appearance of  the worst predators of the insect (sort of lies!). But
> they must also to attract insects, feed them, and manipulate them in
> such a way that Mister plant can send its Message to Missis Plant
> which leaves at five miles from Him. You bet that with millions of
> years they knows about manipulating insects and animals, from predator
> and pollinator to consumers.
>

Are you saying that the psycho-active component of Salvia comandeers  
the brain-state of the "predator" and sends it on its mission to find  
Miss Salvia for purposes of pollination?

Would it be possible to examine the brain state of an insect "under  
the influence" to verify this somehow? Brilliant theory....maybe this  
somehow relates to the appearance of the mysterious female in Salvia-
induced dysphoria in humans?


Hmmmmmmmmm



Kim

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[Bruno Marchal]

Hi John,

On 23 Mar 2009, at 23:44, John Mikes wrote:

Bruno,

I enjoyed your pretty comprehensive post!

Thanks!

John

PS> one little question: have you ever been 'present' when in REM?

I feel like I am present in most of the dreams, that is in the rather realist dream of the REM states. But in general I am not lucid, meaning that I am not aware that I am dreaming during the dream. With a lot of training I have been able go up to an average of 4 lucid dreams per month. I have stopped since years to pursue that training, because it is time consuming and ask for a lot of day work. Also, non lucid dreams are more interesting philophically than lucid dreams.  In Conscience et Mecanisme I define a notion of contralucid dream. Dream having narration in which the dreamer concludes explicitly that he/she is NOT dreaming. They produces astonishment when waking up, and help to illustrate to oneself how much our brain can fool ourselves.

Some plant can enhance dream lucidity. The most known with that effect is Calea Zacatechichi. You prepare it as a tea, but it is bitter (*very* bitter!). Salvia Divinorum itself seems to increase the "realistic" nature of dreams, and can help to develop lucidity.

To be sure, I am not sure I completely understand what you mean by "being present" in a dream; I always feel present, in life and dreams. Even with strong salvia amnesia, I still feel present, even if I have no idea who is Bruno or even of what is a person. I guess you mean "lucid". I am not lucid in normal dreams, and usually I remain lucid in most "altered state of consciousness" (natural or medication induced).

Have a good day,

Bruno

On Sun, Mar 22, 2009 at 4:14 PM, Bruno Marchal <marchal@...> wrote:

Hi Johnathan, Kim, Stathis


I agree with you Johnathan. Scientists learn a lot from extreme cases,
and altered states of consciousness is worth to study, even to
understand better what is a "normal" (if that exists) states of
consciousness.

Now remember that our brain seems to generate already by itself a
numerous of different "naturally",  or self-altered, consciousness
states.
The most amazing and well known is the state of the so called
paradoxical sleep, or REM period, or dream state, or reality
simulation state. It is a state unknown by the dinosaurs and the
reptiles. It appears with the birds and then all the homeothermic
animals. Michel Jouvet called it paradoxical, because it makes the
animal hallucinated and paralyzed which makes it an easy prey for the
predator, yet that states has survived 65 millions of years, nobody
really knows why, but we suspect its importance.

During sleep, with some training you can be "lucid" not just during
the REM paradoxical state, you can be somehow lucid during the slow
wave states, and that gives roughly speaking another collection of
four "natural altered states". Fever, some headache, some stroke could
lead to variants.

Why altered states? I can find plausible that in situation of stress,
like for a mouse in the mouth of a cat, your probabilities of
surviving are made higher if your brain has a system of self calm
down, if not self lying. It is known that mouse indeed generates
endogenous morphine like pain killer, and as you know the brain is
full of enhancers and inhibitors. Most drugs coming from plants are
molecules looking like our own inhibitors of enhancers, general or
specific. Which means (but don't repeat) that the first big drugs
constructor is the brain itself (don't repeat because make they will
make the brain and computer illegal).
Like anything alive a big part of the work consists in self-repairing
and all those endogenous drugs, well all, depending the amount, can
alter *a little bit more* the state of consciousness, than it does in
normal circumstances, so that, again, a normal state of consciousness
is a sum of altered states in a equilibrium, belonging to some
neighborhood of states.

And why does plant constructs altered states of consciousness
molecules? In my opinion it has all to do with the incredibly complex
relationships that plant have with animals, in general, and insects in
particular. Many plants have to detract predator insects. By killing
them, or by just smelling like, or imitating the smell of, of the
appearance of  the worst predators of the insect (sort of lies!). But
they must also to attract insects, feed them, and manipulate them in
such a way that Mister plant can send its Message to Missis Plant
which leaves at five miles from Him. You bet that with millions of
years they knows about manipulating insects and animals, from predator
and pollinator to consumers.

And which explains perhaps why there are so much medicinal and
"psychedelic" plants (entheogen).

Now I agree with you Johnathan, that for discussing about
consciousness, we should distinguish between drugs which alter the
mood and the perception, like cannabis and alcohol from hallucinogen,
like some mushrooms and cactus, and dissociators like Ketamine. Salvia
Divinorum, strictly speaking, is a bit of both a dissociator and an
hallucinogen. The first alter your "actual" consciousness, the second
triggers an actual different in nature experience, like an out of body
experience, or a near death experience, or a dream, or a dream-like
scenario. Typically and without training you don't remain lucid: you
forget you are under the product. You can't take Salvia casually, you
take it to live a particular experience which requires your attention,
and preparation.

Now, I would not compare the effect of Salvia with anything produced
by any other entheogen. When smoked, it produces an effect which lasts
in general between 3 and 6 minutes. Unlike cannabis, alcohol, LSD, and
many others, the effect is disphoric, meaning not typically pleasant.
Animals does not push twice on the "button" with salvia, showing in
particular it is not addictive. Normal, "my thesis" in four minutes,
the poor animals!

The effect are quite different from people to people, and according to
the concentration of the salvinorin molecules. You find it  from 1X
(the leaves), to 5X, 10X, ... 40X (beyond it seems to me only the
price grows up, not the effect).

Many meet typical archetypes (elves, carnival wheel, clown). Some will
relive childhood events, or complete life of someone else. Most will
talk about a strong pulling or pushing rotation, physically felt,
which can sometimes leads to being cut in billions parts and send to
as much parallel realities (some can panic here). All talk about
realities and perception of realities. many% (on about 1000 reports)
talk explicitly about feeling a "feminine presence", which "teach" you
something, the last point of it seeming unmemorable. Some lives the
experience very badly. In my own experiment, with 30 participants (one
by one), they made rewarding experiences, you just need to be patient
and to increase the amount of concentration incrementally, and to
encourage the respect of the plant. Most learns this by experience.

Is it safe? The effect are impressive, but apparently not dangerous.
If you look at the YouTube Video, you see that used in the worst
conditions it leads, in the worse case only to bruises and nightmares.
(With alpinism, a slight error can kill you and others). Like
cannabis, no overdose level exists. Given big amount of
"infinityX" (pure salvinorin) to rats makes then "sleep" for 4
minutes, and then they resume their activities. It is estimated that
on the last 2 millions of American who smoked salvia, there are zero
death related to it, nor even emergency calls. There are thousand of
death related to alcohol consumption, and many more injuries, just to
compare.

Salvia is above all a medicinal plant. Incredibly enough, I did cure a
severe migraine recently. The person told me she did try all possible
medications, without success, she has to just keep calm in the dark
for 12 hours. A little hit of leave made it disappear in three
minutes.  It is one of the main use among the Mazatec. It helps for
nasal congestion too, it helps for sleep (always 1X here).
It is antidepressant, and it is antiaddictive. It is a medication
against drugs!

And yes Kim, it is easy (far more than cannabis which is already easy)
to grow your own plant and to multiply it. It is alas less easy to
find the plant, there are no seeds available, because Salvia Divinorum
has literally abandon sexual reproduction (I think she did have its
own predator as pollinator, explaining the subtleties of her message).
You don't need light, she hates light, she loves the dark, heat and
water a lot. She lives, or at least her ancestors were used to live
(because since 700 years she has been cultivated by the Mexican
Mazatec) in dark hot and humid forest, in the nightlight of the day
within the shadows of trees with many branches. Below 0° (celsius) she
dies.

I am glad I found my master. A plant!  (grin). But I will continue to
explain UDA+AUDA for those who prefer the pure third person
communicable way. Don't worry, (or worry, perhaps :).  It is a
question of taste. Reality is creative, beyond wonders and surprises.
People who does not like wonders, surprises should not study computer
science and logics, neither physics, and should avoid Lewis Carroll
and Salvia Divinorum. That plant likes joking. Here a video of someone
very sensible, and a bit unprepared, who seems to appreciate the joke:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a1QavlZe2H8&feature=channel_page

About that plant, I would like to add that I am certainly in favor of
some regulation. But criminalization of it is no less than criminal.
The plant becomes really dangerous: it can send you to hell (jail),
even without smoking it!
We should have laws forbidding defamation about products related to
health. Against the abuse of systematic well known errors of logic,
the ignorance of what is a trance states, etc.

Best,

Bruno


http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/

http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/

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[John Mikes]

Kim,

 

I would not search in Bruno's generalized theoretical scientific write-up answers to ANY/ALL particular question in (and out of) all domain(s).

 

In my worldview (I wish I could compose it in a text callable scientific) the interconnection of the totality (relations of ALL to ALL) brings about all kinds of unrestricted relations (varieties/variants, you might call them structural forms, even interactive contraptions etc.) with characteristics (call them: functional specifics) unlimited. Some of those proove 'useful' for the survival (proliferation) of the species, some useless, or even damaging. Accordingly the characteristics select themselves into the proliferating kinds or get extinct (what evolution calls mutation for the survival of the fittest and natural selection).

During those billions of years (USb) many variations went through the test and the poor scientist has a hard time to even guess, how certain now still observable features got into and stayed in organisms. Consider in this aspect that 'science' takes snapshots only from time to time and the extinct (or limited occurrence) unsuccessful variants don't reven show up in them. The snapshots only include the successful variations in large numbers with accomplished 'mutation' - unexplainable from the timely composite-views' total.  

 

I don't differentiate plants, animals, insects) in the process and "the scientist" calls the changes within a species a "random mutation".

 

I consider it all a result of the big numbers of trials. No design, no goal.

I deny a mathematical deciphering because of functions with unlimited variables in kind, number, interference of unlimited modifications and domains, but mostly: our possible knowledge of merely a portion of them. Like our history teacher wanted to tease in highschool the 'eminent' pupil, who "knew everything" asking: Well, George, which king in what year did what to whom? (he answered precisely 'a case' - ha ha).

 

We are so smart in our partial knowledge.

 

Respectfully

 

John M

 

On Wed, Mar 25, 2009 at 5:42 AM, Kim Jones <kimjones@...> wrote:

On 23/03/2009, at 7:14 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote:

> And why does plant constructs altered states of consciousness
> molecules? In my opinion it has all to do with the incredibly complex
> relationships that plant have with animals, in general, and insects in
> particular. Many plants have to detract predator insects. By killing
> them, or by just smelling like, or imitating the smell of, of the
> appearance of  the worst predators of the insect (sort of lies!). But
> they must also to attract insects, feed them, and manipulate them in
> such a way that Mister plant can send its Message to Missis Plant
> which leaves at five miles from Him. You bet that with millions of
> years they knows about manipulating insects and animals, from predator
> and pollinator to consumers.
>


Are you saying that the psycho-active component of Salvia comandeers
the brain-state of the "predator" and sends it on its mission to find
Miss Salvia for purposes of pollination?

Would it be possible to examine the brain state of an insect "under
the influence" to verify this somehow? Brilliant theory....maybe this
somehow relates to the appearance of the mysterious female in Salvia-
induced dysphoria in humans?


Hmmmmmmmmm



Kim

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[Bruno Marchal]

On 21 Mar 2009, at 19:55, Johnathan Corgan wrote:

>
> On Fri, 2009-03-20 at 17:02 +1100, Kim Jones wrote:
>
>> Why would people dismiss the subjective experience of hallucinogens  
>> as
>> chaos?
>
> This is simply the observation that the action of hallucinogens on
> consciousness is often dismissed as an abberration and the potential
> scientific benefits from their objective study are therefore lost.
>
> Witness the popularity of the term "psychotomimetic" until fairly
> recently to automatically classify these effects as something akin to
> temporary mental illness, or the determination in the medico-legal
> context that all use is "abuse".
>
> What is ignored is that any theory of consciousness, or other theories
> that rely on the concept of consciousness as part of a chain of
> reasoning, must also be able to explain not only "typical"  
> consciousness
> but also the quantitative and qualitative nature of altered states of
> consciousness.  These altered states may be arrived at in a variety of
> ways (meditation, religious practices, psychoactive substances), but  
> the
> use of drugs to achieve them appears to be the way most amenable to
> controlled, scientific study.  Yet there is very little of this
> happening, and what studies are in progress are aimed at establishing
> their potential health benefits (MDMA for PTSD sufferers, for  
> example.)
>
> This is not a bad goal in and of itself, but here we are trying to
> understand this enormous mystery of consciousness, and focusing on a
> narrow subset of conscious experience as the data to reason from.

You may be interested in the work of Walter Norman Pahnke, on the  
relation between drugs an mystical consciousness:
http://www.maps.org/books/pahnke/

A summary can be found here:
http://www.psychedelic-library.org/pahnke.htm

Concerning relations with death, and immortality question, here is  
another paper by the same author:
http://www.psychedelic-library.org/pahnke2.htm

It is a bit old, but still worth it, imo.

I guess you have heard about the more recent experiences, which have  
shown that people can feel the benefits of psychedelic mushroom one  
year after having ingest them:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/25464338/

>
>
>> Humans, properly fed, clothed, looked after,
>> educated will ALWAYS seek to alter their consciousness somehow by
>> using substances.
>
> Yes, history bears this out.
>
>> Millions of people drink coffee which has a powerful chemical impact
>> but nobody ever shows concern for their 1-pov experiences. Why the
>> special pleading for drugs? It's all just substance of one kind or
>> another.
>
> Well, my earlier post in particular was singling out a specific  
> class of
> substances--hallucinogens potent enough to not just alter or distort
> existing qualia, but to replace the user's entire sensorium with novel
> qualia, and by some reports, qualia in novel sensory modalities.  
> People
> report experiencing being in completely different locations,  
> witnessing
> and participating in complex, detailed events, with a subjective sense
> that they are as real or even more real than what they experience in  
> the
> absence of the effects of the drug.
>
> Some hallucinogens go even further than this, and introduce an element
> of amnesia for semantic and episodic memories, such that users report
> the experience of "forgetting that I had taken a drug, that I was  
> human,
> or even what being human meant."  Five to twenty minutes later they
> return to baseline and report feeling completely "normal" again.
>
> Frankly, what astonishes me, is that these altered states even exist  
> at
> all.  It would be reasonable to think that "disrupting" the physical
> processes which give rise to consciousness would merely cause it to
> fail; i.e., cause a loss of consciousness.  Instead, in some cases, we
> have these fully immersive experiences with recurring, consistent
> themes, well structured, with content of unknown origin, and a lack of
> any relationship to sensory data streaming into the brain from the
> "outside."
>
> Yeah, I think their might be something worth investigating here.

I think so. What is really fascinating is the similarity and  
differences between reports by different people, from different  
traditions. This gives some credit to Jung's idea of collective  
unconscious and archetypes (despite a lot of misuses of those ideas in  
the literature).

Of course all this lead to very difficult questions which touch deep  
and alas still rather taboo questions. Not a long time ago, even the  
very notion of consciousness or person was rather badly seen in the  
"scientific" community. Vienna circle influence and behaviorism have  
been attempts to make science abandoning the metaphysical inquiry.  
Fortunately, today, there is a general understanding that we cannot  
dismiss such type of questioning without hiding data, or dehumanizing  
humans. But "altered state of consciousness" is not yet well seen, I  
guess mainly for authoritative religious, or irreligious, reasons (or  
madness).

Best,

Bruno


http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/




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[Kim Jones-2]

On 28/03/2009, at 4:46 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote:

Some hallucinogens go even further than this, and introduce an element

of amnesia for semantic and episodic memories, such that users report

the experience of "forgetting that I had taken a drug, that I was  

human,

or even what being human meant."  Five to twenty minutes later they

return to baseline and report feeling completely "normal" again.

Frankly, what astonishes me, is that these altered states even exist  

at

all.  It would be reasonable to think that "disrupting" the physical

processes which give rise to consciousness would merely cause it to

fail; i.e., cause a loss of consciousness.  Instead, in some cases, we

have these fully immersive experiences with recurring, consistent

themes, well structured, with content of unknown origin, and a lack of

any relationship to sensory data streaming into the brain from the

"outside."

Yeah, I think their might be something worth investigating here.

There is definitely something worth investigating here. I'll volunteer for any consciousness altering experiments you want to run.

I think so. What is really fascinating is the similarity and  
differences between reports by different people, from different  
traditions. This gives some credit to Jung's idea of collective  
unconscious and archetypes (despite a lot of misuses of those ideas in  
the literature).

Ahhhh Jung

Between the age of 16 and 24 I sat in libraries and read his collected works. One of my other intellectual heroes. I don't care if he didn't write it but his autobiography "Memories Dreams and Reflections" is the best place for anyone who wanted to start with Jung. I started with "The Archetypes of the Collective Unconscious" and in my spare time listened to Wagner's Ring Cycle. 

Jung was at his most creative, of course in "Synchronicity: an Acausal Connecting Principle" where he tries to show that the human mind or consciousness is able to register a type of information in random events that is somehow not coincidental. You have to take strongly on board that he was the son of a theologian and was into table turning and the paranormal. He has had profound penetration in the arts, as of course, did Freud. Just the same, Wolfgang Pauli (exclusion principle) helped him crunch the numbers in the Synchronicity study. It got into pop culture and is a word that everybody has heard but few understand was an attempt to scientifically prove the existence of an organising principle in Nature that in later years he felt could only be the "will of God". He never heard of MWI but leapt on the Copenhagen Interpretation as evidence for "the universe knew we were coming" in the wave collapse theory.

Sorry - I just had to throw all that in there...

K

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[John Mikes]

"Present"

I meant as the difference of the (active?) feeleing of consciously being there vs. the afterthought, thinking back "to be there".

It would be amazing to be 'conscious' in a state of dreaming = 'unconsciousness'.

I would cut out instances of Salvia etc., as my deliberate aim for thinking in 'mind etc.' terms is to understand something about the "normally active" mentality of the present level 'human'.

There is lot of lit in neurology and psych based on sick patients, I seem the "unaltered" to understand better the aberrations.

I appreciate the efforts to help the ill, but that is not my domain.

John

On Wed, Mar 25, 2009 at 7:34 AM, Bruno Marchal <marchal@...> wrote:

Hi John,

On 23 Mar 2009, at 23:44, John Mikes wrote:

Bruno,

I enjoyed your pretty comprehensive post!

Thanks!

John

PS> one little question: have you ever been 'present' when in REM?

I feel like I am present in most of the dreams, that is in the rather realist dream of the REM states. But in general I am not lucid, meaning that I am not aware that I am dreaming during the dream. With a lot of training I have been able go up to an average of 4 lucid dreams per month. I have stopped since years to pursue that training, because it is time consuming and ask for a lot of day work. Also, non lucid dreams are more interesting philophically than lucid dreams.  In Conscience et Mecanisme I define a notion of contralucid dream. Dream having narration in which the dreamer concludes explicitly that he/she is NOT dreaming. They produces astonishment when waking up, and help to illustrate to oneself how much our brain can fool ourselves.

Some plant can enhance dream lucidity. The most known with that effect is Calea Zacatechichi. You prepare it as a tea, but it is bitter (*very* bitter!). Salvia Divinorum itself seems to increase the "realistic" nature of dreams, and can help to develop lucidity.

To be sure, I am not sure I completely understand what you mean by "being present" in a dream; I always feel present, in life and dreams. Even with strong salvia amnesia, I still feel present, even if I have no idea who is Bruno or even of what is a person. I guess you mean "lucid". I am not lucid in normal dreams, and usually I remain lucid in most "altered state of consciousness" (natural or medication induced).

Have a good day,

Bruno

On Sun, Mar 22, 2009 at 4:14 PM, Bruno Marchal <marchal@...> wrote:

Hi Johnathan, Kim, Stathis


I agree with you Johnathan. Scientists learn a lot from extreme cases,
and altered states of consciousness is worth to study, even to
understand better what is a "normal" (if that exists) states of
consciousness.

Now remember that our brain seems to generate already by itself a
numerous of different "naturally",  or self-altered, consciousness
states.
The most amazing and well known is the state of the so called
paradoxical sleep, or REM period, or dream state, or reality
simulation state. It is a state unknown by the dinosaurs and the
reptiles. It appears with the birds and then all the homeothermic
animals. Michel Jouvet called it paradoxical, because it makes the
animal hallucinated and paralyzed which makes it an easy prey for the
predator, yet that states has survived 65 millions of years, nobody
really knows why, but we suspect its importance.

During sleep, with some training you can be "lucid" not just during
the REM paradoxical state, you can be somehow lucid during the slow
wave states, and that gives roughly speaking another collection of
four "natural altered states". Fever, some headache, some stroke could
lead to variants.

Why altered states? I can find plausible that in situation of stress,
like for a mouse in the mouth of a cat, your probabilities of
surviving are made higher if your brain has a system of self calm
down, if not self lying. It is known that mouse indeed generates
endogenous morphine like pain killer, and as you know the brain is
full of enhancers and inhibitors. Most drugs coming from plants are
molecules looking like our own inhibitors of enhancers, general or
specific. Which means (but don't repeat) that the first big drugs
constructor is the brain itself (don't repeat because make they will
make the brain and computer illegal).
Like anything alive a big part of the work consists in self-repairing
and all those endogenous drugs, well all, depending the amount, can
alter *a little bit more* the state of consciousness, than it does in
normal circumstances, so that, again, a normal state of consciousness
is a sum of altered states in a equilibrium, belonging to some
neighborhood of states.

And why does plant constructs altered states of consciousness
molecules? In my opinion it has all to do with the incredibly complex
relationships that plant have with animals, in general, and insects in
particular. Many plants have to detract predator insects. By killing
them, or by just smelling like, or imitating the smell of, of the
appearance of  the worst predators of the insect (sort of lies!). But
they must also to attract insects, feed them, and manipulate them in
such a way that Mister plant can send its Message to Missis Plant
which leaves at five miles from Him. You bet that with millions of
years they knows about manipulating insects and animals, from predator
and pollinator to consumers.

And which explains perhaps why there are so much medicinal and
"psychedelic" plants (entheogen).

Now I agree with you Johnathan, that for discussing about
consciousness, we should distinguish between drugs which alter the
mood and the perception, like cannabis and alcohol from hallucinogen,
like some mushrooms and cactus, and dissociators like Ketamine. Salvia
Divinorum, strictly speaking, is a bit of both a dissociator and an
hallucinogen. The first alter your "actual" consciousness, the second
triggers an actual different in nature experience, like an out of body
experience, or a near death experience, or a dream, or a dream-like
scenario. Typically and without training you don't remain lucid: you
forget you are under the product. You can't take Salvia casually, you
take it to live a particular experience which requires your attention,
and preparation.

Now, I would not compare the effect of Salvia with anything produced
by any other entheogen. When smoked, it produces an effect which lasts
in general between 3 and 6 minutes. Unlike cannabis, alcohol, LSD, and
many others, the effect is disphoric, meaning not typically pleasant.
Animals does not push twice on the "button" with salvia, showing in
particular it is not addictive. Normal, "my thesis" in four minutes,
the poor animals!

The effect are quite different from people to people, and according to
the concentration of the salvinorin molecules. You find it  from 1X
(the leaves), to 5X, 10X, ... 40X (beyond it seems to me only the
price grows up, not the effect).

Many meet typical archetypes (elves, carnival wheel, clown). Some will
relive childhood events, or complete life of someone else. Most will
talk about a strong pulling or pushing rotation, physically felt,
which can sometimes leads to being cut in billions parts and send to
as much parallel realities (some can panic here). All talk about
realities and perception of realities. many% (on about 1000 reports)
talk explicitly about feeling a "feminine presence", which "teach" you
something, the last point of it seeming unmemorable. Some lives the
experience very badly. In my own experiment, with 30 participants (one
by one), they made rewarding experiences, you just need to be patient
and to increase the amount of concentration incrementally, and to
encourage the respect of the plant. Most learns this by experience.

Is it safe? The effect are impressive, but apparently not dangerous.
If you look at the YouTube Video, you see that used in the worst
conditions it leads, in the worse case only to bruises and nightmares.
(With alpinism, a slight error can kill you and others). Like
cannabis, no overdose level exists. Given big amount of
"infinityX" (pure salvinorin) to rats makes then "sleep" for 4
minutes, and then they resume their activities. It is estimated that
on the last 2 millions of American who smoked salvia, there are zero
death related to it, nor even emergency calls. There are thousand of
death related to alcohol consumption, and many more injuries, just to
compare.

Salvia is above all a medicinal plant. Incredibly enough, I did cure a
severe migraine recently. The person told me she did try all possible
medications, without success, she has to just keep calm in the dark
for 12 hours. A little hit of leave made it disappear in three
minutes.  It is one of the main use among the Mazatec. It helps for
nasal congestion too, it helps for sleep (always 1X here).
It is antidepressant, and it is antiaddictive. It is a medication
against drugs!

And yes Kim, it is easy (far more than cannabis which is already easy)
to grow your own plant and to multiply it. It is alas less easy to
find the plant, there are no seeds available, because Salvia Divinorum
has literally abandon sexual reproduction (I think she did have its
own predator as pollinator, explaining the subtleties of her message).
You don't need light, she hates light, she loves the dark, heat and
water a lot. She lives, or at least her ancestors were used to live
(because since 700 years she has been cultivated by the Mexican
Mazatec) in dark hot and humid forest, in the nightlight of the day
within the shadows of trees with many branches. Below 0° (celsius) she
dies.

I am glad I found my master. A plant!  (grin). But I will continue to
explain UDA+AUDA for those who prefer the pure third person
communicable way. Don't worry, (or worry, perhaps :).  It is a
question of taste. Reality is creative, beyond wonders and surprises.
People who does not like wonders, surprises should not study computer
science and logics, neither physics, and should avoid Lewis Carroll
and Salvia Divinorum. That plant likes joking. Here a video of someone
very sensible, and a bit unprepared, who seems to appreciate the joke:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a1QavlZe2H8&feature=channel_page

About that plant, I would like to add that I am certainly in favor of
some regulation. But criminalization of it is no less than criminal.
The plant becomes really dangerous: it can send you to hell (jail),
even without smoking it!
We should have laws forbidding defamation about products related to
health. Against the abuse of systematic well known errors of logic,
the ignorance of what is a trance states, etc.

Best,

Bruno


http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/

http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/

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[Kelly Harmon]

I tried Salvia for the first time yesterday.  Very similar to
dreaming, but more intense, with a lot more sounds.

At first I thought, "Nothing's happening".  Then I thought, "I seem to
be about to slide sidewise...I need to stop".

Then, I was sitting somewhere...in a tilled field I think, and I
couldn't remember who I was.  Then I thought, someone's going to be in
trouble...I need to tell my sister.

Then, for the next 30 minutes it was 1978, and I was in Arkansas, and
I was a kid again.

Every now and then I'd think, "What's going on???  Did I take
something?"

But I could never remember for sure.  A couple of times I would think
of the Salvia extract, but I couldn't remember if it was just
something I'd heard of, or if I'd actually used it.  And I'd decide,
"Nah, couldn't be salvia...reality doesn't work that way.  That would
be like magic."

After about 30 minutes of dreaming it was 1978, and I was 7, and in
Arkansas,  I came to enough to look at the clock, and I remember
thinking, "It didn't work..."

THEN, I was underwater looking up towards the surface, and there was a
giant squid passing over me.

About 20 minutes later, I got up and starting writing up what I'd
seen, but I was still drifting in and out, like I was having day-
dreams.  And they were still about Arkansas 1978, but it was like I
was there, and there was a plan, and I was part of it.  Something was
about to happen, and I was like part of a group that knew about it.

Over the next hour the day-dreams stopped, and within 2 hours of
starting it was over.

Very interesting.


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[Bruno Marchal]

Hi Kelly, and others,

Well, thanks for your report. Did you smoke the extract? It usually
last for 4 minutes. It is amazing it did last so long with you, I know
only one case of an experience lasting 20 minutes. I am happy you found
your experience interesting. You can consult and discuss your
experience, and those of others here:
http://www.entheogen.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=135

Now the real question is, does that experience helped in providing, for
example, an answer to my last remark to Quentin?

I quote the question again. It is important concerning
comp-immortality, and eventually how to derive physics from computer
science.
I do think such a question is difficult, and show the weakness in
identifying the self with personal memories, and this justifies the
necessity of the AUDA move, I think.

Of course, if you enjoy dream-state-like, you can enjoy Salvia without
troubling yourself with hard metaphysical questions. Yet I would be
interesting if Quentin or Stathis, or anyone, could acknowledge a
conceptual difficulty here.

<<Hmmm...
I ask you, and others, this question. What is the probability "now",
that you will find yourself in Washington and Moscow the 24 december
2009, when you are annihilated in Brussels, now, (17 March 2009) and
reconstituted in both Moscow and Washington the 18 March 2009, say)?
The problem is that the reconstitution machine did dysfunction in
Washington, so that, from the 18 March 2009 up to the 20 Augustus 2009
you (the you in Washington) suffered a  "total amnesia".  And then,
"you" recovered slowly and progressively from that through adequate
medication up to a total recall, the 23 December (and none of yous did
move from W or M).

Note that with high concentrated extract of Salvia Divinorum, people
can "suffer" (or "enjoy") a total amnesia, where you forget not just
your name and memories of life, but you forget even what is a person,
what is space, what is time.  Yet you remain conscious. Life appears as
a dream, that you recall vaguely, and then forget, and then you forget
you did that dream. Yet "you" come back. (See the reports, I don't
encourage its consumption, but anyone interested by consciousness can
be interested by such reports).>>





Le 28-mars-09, à 20:50, Kelly a écrit :

>
>
> I tried Salvia for the first time yesterday.  Very similar to
> dreaming, but more intense, with a lot more sounds.
>
> At first I thought, "Nothing's happening".  Then I thought, "I seem to
> be about to slide sidewise...I need to stop".
>
> Then, I was sitting somewhere...in a tilled field I think, and I
> couldn't remember who I was.  Then I thought, someone's going to be in
> trouble...I need to tell my sister.
>
> Then, for the next 30 minutes it was 1978, and I was in Arkansas, and
> I was a kid again.
>
> Every now and then I'd think, "What's going on???  Did I take
> something?"
>
> But I could never remember for sure.  A couple of times I would think
> of the Salvia extract, but I couldn't remember if it was just
> something I'd heard of, or if I'd actually used it.  And I'd decide,
> "Nah, couldn't be salvia...reality doesn't work that way.  That would
> be like magic."
>
> After about 30 minutes of dreaming it was 1978, and I was 7, and in
> Arkansas,  I came to enough to look at the clock, and I remember
> thinking, "It didn't work..."
>
> THEN, I was underwater looking up towards the surface, and there was a
> giant squid passing over me.
>
> About 20 minutes later, I got up and starting writing up what I'd
> seen, but I was still drifting in and out, like I was having day-
> dreams.  And they were still about Arkansas 1978, but it was like I
> was there, and there was a plan, and I was part of it.  Something was
> about to happen, and I was like part of a group that knew about it.
>
> Over the next hour the day-dreams stopped, and within 2 hours of
> starting it was over.
>
> Very interesting.
>
>
> >
>

http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/


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[Stathis Papaioannou-2]

2009/3/30 Bruno Marchal <marchal@...> wrote:

>
> Hi Kelly, and others,
>
> Well, thanks for your report. Did you smoke the extract? It usually
> last for 4 minutes. It is amazing it did last so long with you, I know
> only one case of an experience lasting 20 minutes. I am happy you found
> your experience interesting. You can consult and discuss your
> experience, and those of others here:
> http://www.entheogen.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=135
>
> Now the real question is, does that experience helped in providing, for
> example, an answer to my last remark to Quentin?
>
> I quote the question again. It is important concerning
> comp-immortality, and eventually how to derive physics from computer
> science.
> I do think such a question is difficult, and show the weakness in
> identifying the self with personal memories, and this justifies the
> necessity of the AUDA move, I think.
>
> Of course, if you enjoy dream-state-like, you can enjoy Salvia without
> troubling yourself with hard metaphysical questions. Yet I would be
> interesting if Quentin or Stathis, or anyone, could acknowledge a
> conceptual difficulty here.
>
> <<Hmmm...
> I ask you, and others, this question. What is the probability "now",
> that you will find yourself in Washington and Moscow the 24 december
> 2009, when you are annihilated in Brussels, now, (17 March 2009) and
> reconstituted in both Moscow and Washington the 18 March 2009, say)?
> The problem is that the reconstitution machine did dysfunction in
> Washington, so that, from the 18 March 2009 up to the 20 Augustus 2009
> you (the you in Washington) suffered a  "total amnesia".  And then,
> "you" recovered slowly and progressively from that through adequate
> medication up to a total recall, the 23 December (and none of yous did
> move from W or M).
>
> Note that with high concentrated extract of Salvia Divinorum, people
> can "suffer" (or "enjoy") a total amnesia, where you forget not just
> your name and memories of life, but you forget even what is a person,
> what is space, what is time.  Yet you remain conscious. Life appears as
> a dream, that you recall vaguely, and then forget, and then you forget
> you did that dream. Yet "you" come back. (See the reports, I don't
> encourage its consumption, but anyone interested by consciousness can
> be interested by such reports).>>

It does indeed present conceptual difficulties. The problem is that
our notion of personal identity is dependent on the world in which we
evolved, where these duplication experiments don't happen. The
conceptual difficulties vanish if we say that there is no such
metaphysical entity as a person persisting through time, but rather a
set of observer moments, each one complete in itself and independent
from the others, which only associate due to their information content
- their psychological connectedness. In other words, we all survive
only momentarily, but we have the illusion of persisting through time
due to memory, quasi-memory or partial memory.

I would consider a period of consciousness with complete destruction
of the ego, such as induced by Salvia Divinorum, as equivalent to a
period of unconsciousness or an unrelated person's consciousness,
provided there were no memory of the event as the experience was
resolving.


--
Stathis Papaioannou

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[Quentin Anciaux-2]

Hi,

2009/3/30 Bruno Marchal <marchal@...>

Hi Kelly, and others,

Well, thanks for your report. Did you smoke the extract? It usually
last for 4 minutes. It is amazing it did last so long with you, I know
only one case of an experience lasting 20 minutes. I am happy you found
your experience interesting. You can consult and discuss your
experience, and those of others here:
http://www.entheogen.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=135

Now the real question is, does that experience helped in providing, for
example, an answer to my last remark to Quentin?

I quote the question again. It is important concerning
comp-immortality, and eventually how to derive physics from computer
science.
I do think such a question is difficult, and show the weakness in
identifying the self with personal memories, and this justifies the
necessity of the AUDA move, I think.

Of course, if you enjoy dream-state-like, you can enjoy Salvia without
troubling yourself with hard metaphysical questions. Yet I would be
interesting if Quentin or Stathis, or anyone, could acknowledge a
conceptual difficulty here.

<<Hmmm...
I ask you, and others, this question. What is the probability "now",
that you will find yourself in Washington and Moscow the 24 december
2009, when you are annihilated in Brussels, now, (17 March 2009) and
reconstituted in both Moscow and Washington the 18 March 2009, say)?
The problem is that the reconstitution machine did dysfunction in
Washington, so that, from the 18 March 2009 up to the 20 Augustus 2009
you (the you in Washington) suffered a  "total amnesia".  And then,
"you" recovered slowly and progressively from that through adequate
medication up to a total recall, the 23 December (and none of yous did
move from W or M).

Well I think all of this depends on the fact that your memories "come back". If it doesn't then I will not be in washington, cqfd.

What you're talking about salvia (loosing your personnal identity during the experience) is only correct because you have memories of it (salvia experience) on your current self which knows he is Bruno. If you had no memories of it then it makes no sense to say you did loose your "identity".

As for conscious dream... I don't think you *do* know you're conscious while dreaming, but you do know it after the dreaming experience.

Regards,
Quentin

 

Note that with high concentrated extract of Salvia Divinorum, people
can "suffer" (or "enjoy") a total amnesia, where you forget not just
your name and memories of life, but you forget even what is a person,
what is space, what is time.  Yet you remain conscious. Life appears as
a dream, that you recall vaguely, and then forget, and then you forget
you did that dream. Yet "you" come back. (See the reports, I don't
encourage its consumption, but anyone interested by consciousness can
be interested by such reports).>>

Le 28-mars-09, à 20:50, Kelly a écrit :

>
>
> I tried Salvia for the first time yesterday.  Very similar to
> dreaming, but more intense, with a lot more sounds.
>
> At first I thought, "Nothing's happening".  Then I thought, "I seem to
> be about to slide sidewise...I need to stop".
>
> Then, I was sitting somewhere...in a tilled field I think, and I
> couldn't remember who I was.  Then I thought, someone's going to be in
> trouble...I need to tell my sister.
>
> Then, for the next 30 minutes it was 1978, and I was in Arkansas, and
> I was a kid again.
>
> Every now and then I'd think, "What's going on???  Did I take
> something?"
>
> But I could never remember for sure.  A couple of times I would think
> of the Salvia extract, but I couldn't remember if it was just
> something I'd heard of, or if I'd actually used it.  And I'd decide,
> "Nah, couldn't be salvia...reality doesn't work that way.  That would
> be like magic."
>
> After about 30 minutes of dreaming it was 1978, and I was 7, and in
> Arkansas,  I came to enough to look at the clock, and I remember
> thinking, "It didn't work..."
>
> THEN, I was underwater looking up towards the surface, and there was a
> giant squid passing over me.
>
> About 20 minutes later, I got up and starting writing up what I'd
> seen, but I was still drifting in and out, like I was having day-
> dreams.  And they were still about Arkansas 1978, but it was like I
> was there, and there was a plan, and I was part of it.  Something was
> about to happen, and I was like part of a group that knew about it.
>
> Over the next hour the day-dreams stopped, and within 2 hours of
> starting it was over.
>
> Very interesting.
>
>
> >
>

http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/

--
All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain.

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[Brent Meeker-2]

Bruno Marchal wrote:

> Hi Kelly, and others,
>
> Well, thanks for your report. Did you smoke the extract? It usually
> last for 4 minutes. It is amazing it did last so long with you, I know
> only one case of an experience lasting 20 minutes. I am happy you found
> your experience interesting. You can consult and discuss your
> experience, and those of others here:
> http://www.entheogen.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=135
>
> Now the real question is, does that experience helped in providing, for
> example, an answer to my last remark to Quentin?
>
> I quote the question again. It is important concerning
> comp-immortality, and eventually how to derive physics from computer
> science.
> I do think such a question is difficult, and show the weakness in
> identifying the self with personal memories, and this justifies the
> necessity of the AUDA move, I think.
>
> Of course, if you enjoy dream-state-like, you can enjoy Salvia without
> troubling yourself with hard metaphysical questions. Yet I would be
> interesting if Quentin or Stathis, or anyone, could acknowledge a
> conceptual difficulty here.
>
> <<Hmmm...
> I ask you, and others, this question. What is the probability "now",
> that you will find yourself in Washington and Moscow the 24 december
> 2009, when you are annihilated in Brussels, now, (17 March 2009) and
> reconstituted in both Moscow and Washington the 18 March 2009, say)?
> The problem is that the reconstitution machine did dysfunction in
> Washington, so that, from the 18 March 2009 up to the 20 Augustus 2009
> you (the you in Washington) suffered a  "total amnesia".  And then,
> "you" recovered slowly and progressively from that through adequate
> medication up to a total recall, the 23 December (and none of yous did
> move from W or M).
>
> Note that with high concentrated extract of Salvia Divinorum, people
> can "suffer" (or "enjoy") a total amnesia, where you forget not just
> your name and memories of life, but you forget even what is a person,
> what is space, what is time.  Yet you remain conscious. Life appears as
> a dream, that you recall vaguely, and then forget, and then you forget
> you did that dream. Yet "you" come back. (See the reports, I don't
> encourage its consumption, but anyone interested by consciousness can
> be interested by such reports).>>

It seems to me this creates a problem for the idea of "closest
continuation".  Why, having entered this memoryless, dream-like state,
should the closest continuation be the former "you"?  Of course the same
problem arises from ordinary dreams in which you dream you are someone
else.  The continuity of "you" through these dreams is straightforward
on a materialist model.

Brent

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[Bruno Marchal]

On 30 Mar 2009, at 14:02, Stathis Papaioannou wrote:

>
> 2009/3/30 Bruno Marchal <marchal@...> wrote:
>>
>> Hi Kelly, and others,
>>
>> Well, thanks for your report. Did you smoke the extract? It usually
>> last for 4 minutes. It is amazing it did last so long with you, I  
>> know
>> only one case of an experience lasting 20 minutes. I am happy you  
>> found
>> your experience interesting. You can consult and discuss your
>> experience, and those of others here:
>> http://www.entheogen.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=135
>>
>> Now the real question is, does that experience helped in providing,  
>> for
>> example, an answer to my last remark to Quentin?
>>
>> I quote the question again. It is important concerning
>> comp-immortality, and eventually how to derive physics from computer
>> science.
>> I do think such a question is difficult, and show the weakness in
>> identifying the self with personal memories, and this justifies the
>> necessity of the AUDA move, I think.
>>
>> Of course, if you enjoy dream-state-like, you can enjoy Salvia  
>> without
>> troubling yourself with hard metaphysical questions. Yet I would be
>> interesting if Quentin or Stathis, or anyone, could acknowledge a
>> conceptual difficulty here.
>>
>> <<Hmmm...
>> I ask you, and others, this question. What is the probability "now",
>> that you will find yourself in Washington and Moscow the 24 december
>> 2009, when you are annihilated in Brussels, now, (17 March 2009) and
>> reconstituted in both Moscow and Washington the 18 March 2009, say)?
>> The problem is that the reconstitution machine did dysfunction in
>> Washington, so that, from the 18 March 2009 up to the 20 Augustus  
>> 2009
>> you (the you in Washington) suffered a  "total amnesia".  And then,
>> "you" recovered slowly and progressively from that through adequate
>> medication up to a total recall, the 23 December (and none of yous  
>> did
>> move from W or M).
>>
>> Note that with high concentrated extract of Salvia Divinorum, people
>> can "suffer" (or "enjoy") a total amnesia, where you forget not just
>> your name and memories of life, but you forget even what is a person,
>> what is space, what is time.  Yet you remain conscious. Life  
>> appears as
>> a dream, that you recall vaguely, and then forget, and then you  
>> forget
>> you did that dream. Yet "you" come back. (See the reports, I don't
>> encourage its consumption, but anyone interested by consciousness can
>> be interested by such reports).>>
>
> It does indeed present conceptual difficulties. The problem is that
> our notion of personal identity is dependent on the world in which we
> evolved, where these duplication experiments don't happen. The
> conceptual difficulties vanish if we say that there is no such
> metaphysical entity as a person persisting through time, but rather a
> set of observer moments, each one complete in itself and independent
> from the others, which only associate due to their information content
> - their psychological connectedness. In other words, we all survive
> only momentarily, but we have the illusion of persisting through time
> due to memory, quasi-memory or partial memory.

I agree, but this does not answer the question. To extract the  
physical laws we have to define that psychological connectness, and it  
refers to the notion of person. It is no metaphysical than atoms  
molecules or galaxies. Those are also mind composition which can be  
considered as relative stable and useful constructs. We have to relate  
those things, to extract information from the assumptions. The point  
is no more philosophical.

>
>
> I would consider a period of consciousness with complete destruction
> of the ego, such as induced by Salvia Divinorum, as equivalent to a
> period of unconsciousness or an unrelated person's consciousness,
> provided there were no memory of the event as the experience was
> resolving.

But the amnesic, the dreamer and the salvia experiencer have a memory  
of the events. Kelly did not dream that he disappears, but that he was  
7 old. To eliminate the first person white rabbits, the devil comes  
from the fact that we have to use *some* notion of person.

Bruno



http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/




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[Bruno Marchal]

On 30 Mar 2009, at 17:03, Quentin Anciaux wrote:

Hi,

2009/3/30 Bruno Marchal <marchal@...>

Hi Kelly, and others,

Well, thanks for your report. Did you smoke the extract? It usually
last for 4 minutes. It is amazing it did last so long with you, I know
only one case of an experience lasting 20 minutes. I am happy you found
your experience interesting. You can consult and discuss your
experience, and those of others here:
http://www.entheogen.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=135

Now the real question is, does that experience helped in providing, for
example, an answer to my last remark to Quentin?

I quote the question again. It is important concerning
comp-immortality, and eventually how to derive physics from computer
science.
I do think such a question is difficult, and show the weakness in
identifying the self with personal memories, and this justifies the
necessity of the AUDA move, I think.

Of course, if you enjoy dream-state-like, you can enjoy Salvia without
troubling yourself with hard metaphysical questions. Yet I would be
interesting if Quentin or Stathis, or anyone, could acknowledge a
conceptual difficulty here.

<<Hmmm...
I ask you, and others, this question. What is the probability "now",
that you will find yourself in Washington and Moscow the 24 december
2009, when you are annihilated in Brussels, now, (17 March 2009) and
reconstituted in both Moscow and Washington the 18 March 2009, say)?
The problem is that the reconstitution machine did dysfunction in
Washington, so that, from the 18 March 2009 up to the 20 Augustus 2009
you (the you in Washington) suffered a  "total amnesia".  And then,
"you" recovered slowly and progressively from that through adequate
medication up to a total recall, the 23 December (and none of yous did
move from W or M).

Well I think all of this depends on the fact that your memories "come back". If it doesn't then I will not be in washington, cqfd.

What if half of your memory come back?

What you're talking about salvia (loosing your personnal identity during the experience) is only correct because you have memories of it (salvia experience) on your current self which knows he is Bruno. If you had no memories of it then it makes no sense to say you did loose your "identity".

Yes, but retrospectively, I can assert that I remain conscious, despite the loss of identity. So, why should we not take such "computational ontinuations" into account, in the immortality question, and in the hunt of 1-white rabbits? This is certainly not clear for me.

As for conscious dream... I don't think you *do* know you're conscious while dreaming, but you do know it after the dreaming experience.

John Mikes seems to think so too, but here I certainly disagree. Lucid dreamer, who are verifiably in the paradoxical state of dream (through EEG) , can communicate with the observer in the lab, through eyes moves or through extremity of fingers (which are not paralysed). They have made all the usual experience (singing, computing, walking, running in the dream) and they have discover it generate the same activity in the dream than in the waking life. The experience of Laberge and Dement have definitely convinced me that the hypothesis that we are unconscious during dream is badly founded. 

Consciousness should not be confused with awakeness.

Bruno

http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/

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