I guess I am a "psychonaut"...

[????????]

I have just read the wikipedia article on psychonauts (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychonaut) and it was really interesting because in there are condensed a lot of things that I find really interesting, but not because I read similar stuff or anything, these ideas, like exploring one's mind and thought processes is highly appealing to me, and I've read things about it on the internet from different sources; I don't know why but from what I know there's something in psychedelic substances that makes you look to yourself, makes you aware of your own self and reflect about it... But I think you'll know that already!! anyway I wanted to share this:

Back then when I was having my first highs with cannabis I remember one day that, after the high, I said something like I UNDERSTAND FEAR. Seriously, somehow I began thinking about what fear really is and why I/someone feels scared, all this while really baked. And something clicked and made sense (this epiphany thing with psychedelic substances really interests me) anyway that wasn't just stoner babble, from that day something changed, and it's not like before I was an easy to scare person or anything but I can actually say now that nothing "scares" me anymore, not physical things I mean, that feeling of "being scared" is gone, drop me in some woods in the middle of the night with no light/lanterns and I won't be sweating like oh no something is going to attack me I can't see ***, I instead would calm down and try to think of a way of getting out of there or something...

Why is it that the so called hallucinogens or psychedelics makes one more aware of "oneself"? It's like looking to the inside of your mind and wondering why do we do all the things we do? I know I'm not alone in this because of what I've read, and other people experiences on the internet (my friends who smoke only do it recreationally/for fun ) So what do you think?? This is one of the things that, I consider, separates and differentiates these substances from other "drugs" that apparently just seem to "*** you up"... I have only experienced THC so far but I'm planning on taking LSD when I finish this semester, and hopefully gain insight and deeper knowledge of my "thought processes"

 

[????????]

those lame *s are there because I didn't post from my computer and used a spellchacker that did'nt like "shit" and "fuck" :wink:

 

[Guest]

I'd say that would qualify you as a psychonaut

 

[BrainEater]

yeah man that's cool. i'd say that being a psychonaut means to learn to use your brain and not let your brain use you. what i mean is that you can get all the "automatic" stuff which is what you say the "thought processes" in your brain into your awareness. you can do that by using psychadelic drugs, too.
in fact it's not only your brain what does the thinking, it's everything in the body CONNECTED with the brain. the brain is what does the controlling and thinking and the controlling of the thinking.

my message to you all: use your brain and don't let your brain use you. your brain in a way is like a computer, it's programs which process the information you have stored already and the information which comes in new either from seeing, hearing or feeling in other words sensory information or information that you think of. the point is as the brain is like a computer some programs get automatized to make it easier to process, but these "programs" can also limit you or let you do things all the time the same way so if you want to change yourself you got to be aware of the programs and change them.

greetings :mrgreen:

 

[????????]

Thanks for the info, I completely understand the programs analogy and find it fitting. In fact, after having said experiences I have sort of become obsessed by it and everytime I do those "automatic" things I question why I did them or what motivated me to do them in the first place!

What you're referring to at the end of your post is metaprogramming! I find that very interesting and I'm currently reading lots of crazy things about that

 

[Rymmen]

That, BrainEater, is what we call metaproramming. I think that a K junkie thought it up. That person also invented the isolation tank... John Lilly, was it? Pretty cool guy, anyway.

But I think there's so much more than just that. What I've used psychedelics and dissociatives for is: get to know myself, try and change things I don't like about myself, discover the world through a different, unsane eyes (including ideas, sounds, images...), intensify and mix emotions and become enlightened. Of course, it's also great fun.

 

[GOD]

I think what Brainy was saying is :- There is a difference between having thoughts and thinking ? AAAaaaUUUuuuMMMmmm !

Nice discussion , understanding instead of just accepting , through psychedelic consciousness expansion . Trips make 10% intelligenter........humans are 10% intelligenter than apes !!!!! ? If you give an ape a good dose of LSD he would be as intelligent as loads of humans....aren`t . Most of them are just a series of conditioned responses.....like Pavlovs dog .

 

[????????]

I love you GOD but sometimes you just don't make any fucking sense!!! :lol:

 

[silv]

I love you GOD but sometimes you just don't make any fucking sense!!! :lol:

I'll second that.

 

[Guest]

Pavlov was the guy who discovered "conditioning"

He trained his dog, everytime he would ring a bell he would give his dog a treat or something to eat.
After a while, when he rang the bell, the dog's mouth began to water.

That's conditioning. If you repeat a thing over and over, you're so used to it.
(I'm not getting the whole story behind conditioning here, but hey, at least I've tried :mrgreen


Aum (also Om, Devanagari

 

[GOD]

Thanks Space .

"I love you GOD but sometimes you just don't make any fucking sense!!!"

Thanks for the roses , i love me to . The "to me" was missing from the end of your sentance .

I dont understand what , or why , you dont understand ???? I thought i should / could make things a bit easyer to understand as things were getting a bit ???? Personaly i think making things easyer to understand is better than making them more complicated . = I dont like big words and explanations that keep getting longer and longer !!!

Having thoughts means things like "Duuuh!!! Tree .....Duuuuh !!!.....Tree green..." . = seeing things and recognising them and knowing their names for instance = Conditioned responses , weather mental or physical . Thinking means analysing , questioning , extrapolating(?) , understanding thoughts and making strategys . = "understanding instead of just accepting" . A person who has had a trip is statisticaly 10 IQ points or 10% more intelligent afterwards . = "psychedelic consciousness expansion" .

I was also refering to uncle Terrance who said that the apes came down from the trees and became humans because they ate psychedelic mushrooms wich made them more intelligent , wich caused an evolutionary jump forwards . I also ment that if you gave an ape LSD it would make him 10% intelligenter , wich should mean that he would be about as intelligent as normal humans are , but that it wouldnt work because the average human is not intelligent and that apes are more intelligent anyway .

Have you understood now ??? If you still dont understand tell me what you dont understand and i`ll explain .


P.S. Humans didnt evolve from apes anyway , apes are a seperate evolutionary line . Both evolved from gorillas .

 

[Rymmen]

Well, I don't think I've risen from the 130-145 IQ area.

I'd like to see the statistical evidence, too, and their research methods.

 

[GOD]

I will look for it and references to it . I think it came from early psychedelic research at about the time that Timothy Leary was doing his psychedelic experiments with alcoholics and prisoners , before he got dropped by the scientific world .

Not wanting to boast , or needing to , here is an irelevant example .

My intelligence was tested at school at the age of 16 with one intelligence test and i scored 125 . Later that year i did the test to get into MENSA and scored 130 , but again it was only 1 test . A few years later i had to do one for the courts and scored 132 . I dont know if you know but you can`t judge a persons intelligence with one alround test you have to do several different types . Those results were not realy relevant because i was not inerested in scoring high points as things like that bore me to death .

A few years ago i got sent by the government to a 6 week assesment cource where i had to do a real intelligence test series . That ment geting up at 6 in the morning still half stoned and mega tired , i usualy get up between 12 midday and 4 PM . I had to do 1 intelligence test a day , and be assesed by social workers and psychologists every day . On some days the intelligence test was in the morning and the assesment in the afternoon and on other days the other way round . Every day a diferent sort of intelligence test to asses a different type of intelligence . After the first 3 weeks the series started again , the same sort of tests , but not the same questions . At the end they told me that i had an IQ of 154 .

My friends now are teachers , a headmaster , a psychiatrist/neurologist , a judge and 2 university professors/tutors . I have no difficulty keeping up with them , they usualy bore me because they have learned their subjects like parrots repeating things that they dont realy understand the implications of . The only one of them that is open and realy clever is the psychiatrist/neurologist .

If i talk to experts in any subject , thats people who know what they are talking about enough that they can explain it , i have no difficulty understanding what they are talking about . I`m better than the best soliciters here and always win my court cases or get off very lightly because i defend myself . My only problems in that drection are that my short term memory is totaly burned out through using to many drugs and not sleeping through stress and i cant spell .

The only thing in my life that had changed since the first test at 16 and the last test series was loads of trips .

I dont claim to be infalable , if anyone doesnt understand what i mean sometimes ask me and i will try to explain , and if i dont understand you tell me and then explain to me please .

 

[????????]

jeje thanks for being so polite and explaining yourself you DID make sense, it just seems like your mind goes like really fast and you said a lot of things in few words so it appeared a little chaotic but I like that, it's like your personality gets in your posts :wink:

Wow that thing about people like Pavlov's dogs, I agree 100%, a lot of people seem to say the same things in the same circumstances everyday and its really boring!!!! and what they say it's like what they're supposed to... or what they have heard it's ok to or what some character in tv would!!! It really irks me because a lot of friends of mine, they are really good people but are like this and it frustrates me because how you say something like stop being so predictable and boring and WAKE UP!! It' like what one of my friends said last nigh, he was talking about the scenario of letting his hair grow long and his beard (he shaves like every day) but that he would do it at the start of the year (?) and with a tan! :x I said why don't start now!! :roll: ... and just saying that psychedelic substances can open your mind and see things differently... they'll think I'm crazy :? ... psss and maybe I'm saner than them...

I would like to know more people that realize this everyday bullshit we do... like a lot of guys here in the forums... It's not a coincidence that these things are illegal, I guess governments don't need people thinking for themselves huh??

GOD I wish I knew you in person you seem like a really cool, grounded guy!! jaja or maybe not so grounded at all!! 8)

 

[thadivine]

jeje thanks for being so polite and explaining yourself you DID make sense, it just seems like your mind goes like really fast and you said a lot of things in few words so it appeared a little chaotic but I like that, it's like your personality gets in your posts :wink:

Wow that thing about people like Pavlov's dogs, I agree 100%, a lot of people seem to say the same things in the same circumstances everyday and its really boring!!!! and what they say it's like what they're supposed to... or what they have heard it's ok to or what some character in tv would!!! It really irks me because a lot of friends of mine, they are really good people but are like this and it frustrates me because how you say something like stop being so predictable and boring and WAKE UP!! It' like what one of my friends said last nigh, he was talking about the scenario of letting his hair grow long and his beard (he shaves like every day) but that he would do it at the start of the year (?) and with a tan! :x I said why don't start now!! :roll: ... and just saying that psychedelic substances can open your mind and see things differently... they'll think I'm crazy :? ... psss and maybe I'm saner than them...

I would like to know more people that realize this everyday bullshit we do... like a lot of guys here in the forums... It's not a coincidence that these things are illegal, I guess governments don't need people thinking for themselves huh??

GOD I wish I knew you in person you seem like a really cool, grounded guy!! jaja or maybe not so grounded at all!! 8)

i agree 100%

 

[GOD]

Sorry i cant write your name as my computer hasnt got those characters in it , so i cant adress you directly . Yes i feel the same , most people are an act , or just a bad imitation of who they want to apeare to be instead of just being themselves . And that about governments is exactly my point of view , there is no education nowardays its all mental castration , teaching people to be subserviant and happy little slaves .

Rymmen

I cant find the information that i am thinking about at the moment , i have lots of books on the subject and havent got the time or concentration to read them all again now . I am sure that i have read about it in several studies , i thought that it was allso mentioned in those by Timothy Leary with Psilocybin , or is mentioned in the books about his work . I will keep it in mind and some time i will find it again and tell you .

What i did find is information about a pre 1975 report from "The Spring Grove Hospital, Cantonville , Maryland= . Wich was the main center for studying the effects of LSD for the american government in those days . Wich says that patients who were administered LSD in tests were shown to have a 10% intelligence increase .

Other indirect references i have found are :-

A report in "California Medicine 107 - 45" from 1967 . Where a 5 year old girl was admitted to a hospital under the effects of an acidentaly administered dose of LSD , wich means she had had an adult dose wich would be a massive overdose for a child of that age / body weight . The report say that they didnt know her IQ before the overdose but that on the day after she was tested as having an IQ of 108 , after 5 days it was 94 ( but she was calmer !!!) , after 2 months it was 102 and after 5 months it was 121 .

In the Masters and Huston book "The variety of psychedelic experience" in the section about the effects of LSD on consciousness they dont give a percentage , but the description that they give says that intelligence and concentration was increased .

In "Smart drugs and nutrients" by W,Dean and J.Morgenthaler on pages 101 to 107 it says that many ergot derivatives have been shown in tests done by Sandoz since 1940 to display intelligence , memory and learning enhancing effects . Dihydroergotoxin ia used all over the world to improve the mental abilitys of old people and demence / senility and alzheimers patients . There are also 14 other non sandoz sources of information about ergot alkaloids doing the same there .

I have seen a documentary film where several Nobel prize winners said that if they had never taken LSD they would never have won the prize . Saying that under the effects that they could concentrate better and visualise the problem better and manipulate those visualisations to be able to solve the problems with them and find the answers .

From my personal experience i can say that all of the children that i know that had psychedelics have grown up to be the most allround intelligent , honest and calmest people i know , and also have the least mental and social problems . All the adults i know who have taken it are allso the most intelligent and socialy stable people i know . I realise that the average intelligence quotient of people who take psychedelic drugs is higer than the average person , but non of them have become less intelligent , as the most people i know who have never taken psychedelics have . All those people seem much more awake , aware of themselves , their suroundings , are open to learning asnd have less social , family and personal problems as well .

I know that most of that is subjective and irelevant to what i said about a 10 point or 10% rise in intelligence but its something to think about . I will keep looking .

I am sure that it if we all think about our own experiences and the people that we all know who have taken psychedelics that our conclusions will match eachothers .

Comments and observations from you all would be very interesting , and i think will back up what i have said .

 

[Rymmen]

Rymmen

What i did find is information about a pre 1975 report from "The Spring Grove Hospital, Cantonville , Maryland= . Wich was the main center for studying the effects of LSD for the american government in those days . Wich says that patients who were administered LSD in tests were shown to have a 10% intelligence increase .

Is it on the 'net, for me to see (not that I don't believe you, I just want to see the whole thing they say)? How did they come up with the data?

Other indirect references i have found are :-

A report in "California Medicine 107 - 45" from 1967 . Where a 5 year old girl was admitted to a hospital under the effects of an acidentaly administered dose of LSD , wich means she had had an adult dose wich would be a massive overdose for a child of that age / body weight . The report say that they didnt know her IQ before the overdose but that on the day after she was tested as having an IQ of 108 , after 5 days it was 94 ( but she was calmer !!!) , after 2 months it was 102 and after 5 months it was 121 .

I do believe that the measurement of children's IQs is varies a lot.

In the Masters and Huston book "The variety of psychedelic experience" in the section about the effects of LSD on consciousness they dont give a percentage , but the description that they give says that intelligence and concentration was increased .

Can I look it up? How'd they get to that conclusion?

In "Smart drugs and nutrients" by W,Dean and J.Morgenthaler on pages 101 to 107 it says that many ergot derivatives have been shown in tests done by Sandoz since 1940 to display intelligence , memory and learning enhancing effects . Dihydroergotoxin ia used all over the world to improve the mental abilitys of old people and demence / senility and alzheimers patients . There are also 14 other non sandoz sources of information about ergot alkaloids doing the same there .

Are these psychedelics? (I apologize for my ignorance.)

I have seen a documentary film where several Nobel prize winners said that if they had never taken LSD they would never have won the prize . Saying that under the effects that they could concentrate better and visualise the problem better and manipulate those visualisations to be able to solve the problems with them and find the answers .

I've heard of that. It is widely known that the creator of the modern DNA model found the model, or at least got the idea for such model on LSD. Psychedelics heavily increase creative thinking, and, out of personal experience, speed up the linking of ideas and concepts.

From my personal experience i can say that all of the children that i know that had psychedelics have grown up to be the most allround intelligent , honest and calmest people i know , and also have the least mental and social problems . All the adults i know who have taken it are allso the most intelligent and socialy stable people i know . I realise that the average intelligence quotient of people who take psychedelic drugs is higer than the average person , but non of them have become less intelligent , as the most people i know who have never taken psychedelics have . All those people seem much more awake , aware of themselves , their suroundings , are open to learning asnd have less social , family and personal problems as well .

I have to say that I've experienced the same.

I know that most of that is subjective and irelevant to what i said about a 10 point or 10% rise in intelligence but its something to think about . I will keep looking .

While you're looking, you should probably think about how reliable an IQ test is... I do believe it's fading away in importance these days. I, personally, don't believe we even know enough about what 'intelligence' means, what causes it (or lack thereof) to be measuring it.

I am sure that it if we all think about our own experiences and the people that we all know who have taken psychedelics that our conclusions will match eachothers .

They do, on average. At the very least, people that have dabbled in psychedelics are more aware, as you put it, and much more apt in social departments, in my opinion.

Comments and observations from you all would be very interesting , and i think will back up what i have said .

 

[????????]

An idea:

Perhaps this consciousness expansion thing does not always happens?? You have to have a well set --set and setting-- of mind if you partake in the psychedelic activities or you'll face some consequences --bad trips--, so it could depend of the person and you know people who smoke but it doesn't affect them in the same way that, at least, to me and others, from what I've read and seen in my short life (21), does?

 

[????????]

About all you said GOD, I find this deeply fascinating. It's great that there exists somewhere data supporting this, when doing my first psychedelic experiences I realized some things. For instance, music appreciation, without a doubt, increased and I guess maybe everyone can agree on this, other things like increased pattern recognition too, while high looking at the sky you see some really cool characters and faces and jesuses and whatnot,it's too in those oddly shaped walls or floors (while taking a nice shit), again this is common, I too experienced some weird motion-like stuff. I remember one of my first highs, doing movements with my hands that were like very precise and constant (I hope this makes sense) I closed my fists --imaging me holding 2 maracas and then moving the hands making a möbius strip kind of way infinite symbol :shock: I know it sounds weird but I was really enjoying it! :lol: and who hasn't felt like they had a lot to say but did not find the words? like your thoughts are going too fast, but with practice you can control them? or the old psychedelic rant that apparently it's some random mess but it actually makes a lot of sense --which i imagine is better understood to fellow trippers, surrealist art, creativity, clearer imagination, closed eye visuals of really weird but appealing and interesting stuff, etc...

and what about all those geometrical patterns??? sometimes I think it's like they're trying to tell us something!! :wink:

 

[GOD]

Good morning Rymmen ,

1:- I dont know , i dont know and i read about it in "Encyklopädea der psychedelische drogen" by Peter stafford .

2:- its in a book called "LSD - A total study" by Siva Sankar . But......the doctors that reported it came to the conclusion tht LSD fucked the girls intelligence . I didnt put that in because i dont know how they were trained or what methods they used . I do know that when sensible people look at studys about LSD the studies seem to come in a ratio of 1 positive and 1 negative , and that the scientific methods that are used are mostly not scientific . That is explained quite nicely in two books "Encyklopädea der psychedelische drogen" by Peter stafford and "Psychedelic chemistry" by Michael valantine smith .

3:- Read the book !!! I might have it as a pdf , i will look later and if i have i will post you an adress for it . And as i said it was my conclusion from what they said there . Its also in "Encyklopädea der psychedelische drogen" by Peter stafford .

4:- No they are ergot alkaloids and their derivatives = the start chemicals for making LSD . Maybe look at the Sandoz web site and see if there are any references to studys . Ergot alkaloids are supposed to be some of the most tested chemicals arround , there are supposed to be loads of studys by Sandoz . If i have a bit more energy later i might give you the titles of the 14 sources mentioned in "Smart drugs and nutrients" by W,Dean and J.Morgenthaler .

5:- That sounds like the documentary that i saw . It was realy good wasnt it .

6:- Thats why i said that some of the things i said are indications , and partly why i didnt tell you about the conclusions of the doctors that treated the 5 year old girl . I allso explained that in the previous post about my "intelligence" .I think that intelligence tests are mostly a waste of time ,as i said they bore me , mostly they are reflecting the "intelligence" of the person who designed them and not the person who is doing them . Its a bit like testing animal intelligence , judging it by human standards . I often wonder what would happen if a human had to do an intelligence test designed by a mouse !!! For example dump a mouse anywhere in the countryside and it will build a house and find food and survive , if you did that with a human he would die on the third day ,.....probably .

"what 'intelligence' means, what causes it (or lack thereof)"

Thats why i said that about getting up half stoned and mega tired . its well known that the brain doesnt do good work under those circumstances . I dont sleep much and i know that that causes me problems and that when i do sleep every thing comes much easyer .

I did say that i couldnt find the original reports that i had read about and that what i have said here are indirect indications .


"Perhaps this consciousness expansion thing does not always happen"

Yes i agree , but that is mostly because these drugs are "illegal" . If people were not brain washed and virtualy forced to have a guilty conscience , and through that a "bad" trip , because of the "ilegality" , and the social stigma caused by the way that psychedelics are falsly represented in the media and schools/education , and we had trained guides it would be a different story . Just looking at scientific studys , the experiments by T.Leary for instance , and the ayahuasca scene proves that when there is a ritual and an experienced guide that there are hardly any bad experiences .

"making a möbius strip kind of way infinite symbo"

I think you mean "after vision" = moving your arm across your field of vision and seeing loads of arms following it . That used to be one of the things people did to see how strong their trip was .Plus looking to see if the walls and floor were moving , sort of breathing in and out , if they werent then the trip was a weak one = boring .