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Messages that can only be understood under the influence of psychedelics

(qri.org)
637 points robinhouston | 11 comments | 05 Jun 23 07:27 UTC | HN request time: 0s | source | bottom
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codeflo ◴[06 Jun 23 10:39 UTC] No.36210706[source]▶
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 computational advantage of psychedelic states of consciousness.

LSD fans might hate this conclusion, but there's no "computational advantage" to having a 2.5x to 4x slower processing speed, which his the only thing actually being shown here.

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moomoo11 ◴[06 Jun 23 13:51 UTC] No.36212742[source]▶
I feel like time goes by “slower” for me ever since I did a heroic dose a few years ago. Used to be stressed the f out all the time. Now I feel like I can enjoy every full second. Crazy how much time we have in life when we just stop paying attention to the negative energies like stress and instead channel them into storage for something positive later.

I’ve always been efficient and quick at learning new things and doing work. So it’s like being given a superpower to “slow” time.

(Obviously time hasn’t slowed down only for me. It’s just how I personally perceive it now.)

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LastTrain ◴[06 Jun 23 15:27 UTC] No.36214318[source]▶
The problem is, of course, you have no idea if that dose is what caused the change. That change in personal outlook may have been coming your direction anyway, or you may have experienced it sooner if you hadn't been doing LSD at all.
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1. di456 ◴[06 Jun 23 15:47 UTC] No.36214639[source]▶
> The problem is, of course, you have no idea if that dose is what caused the change

What problem exactly? This seems like a dismissive take on someone's positive experience.

Are your referring to the scientific problem of studying cause & effect of the psychedelic experience? Science is figuring that out.

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2. LastTrain ◴[06 Jun 23 16:35 UTC] No.36215397[source]▶
No I’m talking about this one’s person’s experience. They are putting out their notion of cause and effect on a public forum and I am questioning it. That is OK, right?
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3. hutzlibu ◴[06 Jun 23 16:56 UTC] No.36215753[source]▶
"That is OK, right?"

The way you are doing it, could maybe be improved.

"The problem is, of course, you have no idea if that dose is what caused the change"

You clearly judged here based on little information. How do you know, that he cannot know?

(Unless you argue about philosophical limits of "knowing")

When till time X there was behavior Y and at time X there was a strong trip - and afterwards differences,then it seems pretty linked to me.

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4. unethical_ban ◴[06 Jun 23 17:21 UTC] No.36216099[source]▶
Maybe it isn't. What I mean is, it doesn't seem to be a problem for them. A peer reviewed study of their own life experience isn't necessary for them to be a lot happier post-trip than pre-trip. Correlated with many other peoples' experiences, there is at least strong correlation evidence between certain drug use and epiphanies.

Sure, "person ready to take drugs to have epiphany" might mean they were on the cusp of one anyway, but it doesn't really matter.

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5. LastTrain ◴[06 Jun 23 17:48 UTC] No.36216513{3}[source]▶
Hey thanks, I'll work on that. You try and work on staying on topic and not making meta comments.
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6. LastTrain ◴[06 Jun 23 17:51 UTC] No.36216561{3}[source]▶
Well I guess I was not very clear with my words then. I didn't say it was a problem for them, and they seem to be perfectly happy at the idea of their big epiphany coming from LSD. But I wasn't taking issue with that, I believe they believe that. I simply meant the "problem" with ascribing the epiphany to LSD is there is no way to know in an individual case if LSD had anything to do at all with it, because we know very little on that subject at the current time.
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7. skinnymuch ◴[06 Jun 23 18:47 UTC] No.36217327{4}[source]▶
We know very little about a lot. Including things society believes we know a lot or all about. Scientific evidence isn’t infallible or the be all end all.
8. hutzlibu ◴[06 Jun 23 19:52 UTC] No.36218239{4}[source]▶
Sorry, but that is quite similar. You asked a question and I decided to answer it. No meta comments initiated from my side, as far as I am aware.

(I did not take part in the conversation before).

So you are not really in a position to tell me, what to do, yet you did. And I am not in a position to tell you, what to do. I merly answered your open question on what I think you could improve.

But if you would like a meta comment from me: I think you might benefit from not considering every online discussion as something you have to win.

(I have been there as well)

9. anigbrowl ◴[07 Jun 23 17:22 UTC] No.36229970[source]▶
It really isn't. They certainly have more insight into their subjective mental state than you, so basically you're just saying 'coincidence?!' about an unmeasurable phenomenon where the observer has qualia and you do not.

It'd be like if you said 'I had an idea yesterday...' and I responded with 'Did you though? Maybe you just overheard it and thought it was yours! Maybe you just thought of it now and incorrectly associated it with something you did yesterday!' It doesn't add any extra information while dismissing your own conscious experience completely.

10. di456 ◴[07 Jun 23 19:50 UTC] No.36232526[source]▶
Sure, but it's your problem, not OP's.
11. di456 ◴[07 Jun 23 19:58 UTC] No.36232638{4}[source]▶
That's one of the signatures of a psychedelic experience. There's plenty of research on the subject, this study came up on a quick Google search.

https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acsptsci.0c00194

> Our position contrasts the idea that subjective effects of psychedelics may be irrelevant to their therapeutic effects.

> The meaning and significance attributed to psychedelic experiences has been well established in laboratory settings. Psilocybin administration studies have repeatedly shown that participants frequently rate their psychedelic experiences as among the most meaningful of their entire lives (5,6,8,16−19) and they are sometimes compared to the birth of a first-born child or death of a parent. Due to their salience, such experiences may serve as narrative “inflection points” in one’s life that could provide an impetus for changing one’s identification with certain patterns of thoughts, feelings, and behaviors.