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Post by Arlon10 on Aug 1, 2018 0:11:51 GMT
1. The city in Alaska is Juneau.
2. Timothy Leary died without leaving any scriptures.
HTH
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Post by Deleted on Aug 1, 2018 10:21:50 GMT
'Show me the evidence'. -- Somehow I don't think you'd consider the fact that thousands and thousands (millions?) of people have reported having spiritual experiences while using psychedelics to be any kind of evidence. The fact that thousands and thousands - or millions - of people have reported having spiritual experiences while using psychedelics certainly is evidence. It's evidence that psychedelics can cause experiences that some people class as spiritual. What it isn't is evidence that those experiences say anything at all about the nature of the actual real world. For that you would have to have some method of confirming that those experiences map to something in reality. Which there isn't.
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Post by OldSamVimes on Aug 1, 2018 10:32:52 GMT
'Show me the evidence'. -- Somehow I don't think you'd consider the fact that thousands and thousands (millions?) of people have reported having spiritual experiences while using psychedelics to be any kind of evidence. The fact that thousands and thousands - or millions - of people have reported having spiritual experiences while using psychedelics certainly is evidence. It's evidence that psychedelics can cause experiences that some people class as spiritual. What it isn't is evidence that those experiences say anything at all about the nature of the actual real world. For that you would have to have some method of confirming that those experiences map to something in reality. Which there isn't. Then we'd also have to define exactly what a 'spiritual experience' is.. and that could take awhile. As far as the 'actual real world' goes, I doubt any of us understand it at all. I agree that it's hard to make sense of some experiences, but mapping everything to something in reality is unnecessary and in many cases simply impossible. Trying to make sense of it all and trying to 'fit it into reality' will make you fight it and prevent you from letting go completely. Things like Dark Matter and Dark Energy can't be explained by modern science, neither can what happens to your mind when you 'breakthrough' on DMT.
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Post by faustus5 on Aug 1, 2018 10:49:05 GMT
Then we'd also have to define exactly what a 'spiritual experience' is.. and that could take awhile. That's the least of your issues. The definition game is not the problem. I've had spiritual experiences on psychedelics, no question. I just have enough understanding about how reality works that I don't draw bullshit conclusions from those experiences. There is something called "science" which you should read up on. If you have genuine, honest interest in what the real world is like, there is no more a useful discipline to study than this.
The moment you try to claim that your experiences prove the existence of X, for whatever X, then that is exactly what you are doing, whether you admit it or not. You and Peterson just happen to be doing it very, very badly.
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Post by OldSamVimes on Aug 1, 2018 11:07:30 GMT
Then we'd also have to define exactly what a 'spiritual experience' is.. and that could take awhile. That's the least of your issues. The definition game is not the problem. I've had spiritual experiences on psychedelics, no question. I just have enough understanding about how reality works that I don't draw bullshit conclusions from those experiences. There is something called "science" which you should read up on. If you have genuine, honest interest in what the real world is like, there is no more a useful discipline to study than this.
The moment you try to claim that your experiences prove the existence of X, for whatever X, then that is exactly what you are doing, whether you admit it or not. You and Peterson just happen to be doing it very, very badly.
I'm not trying to 'prove' anything. I'm simply pointing out that we don't understand. I don't claim to understand physics, but I'll read 'Amazing physics facts' and some articles. Seems like there is more mystery and unexplained things than most of us are aware of in our day to day lives. I've never heard of this thing you call 'science' though, I'll have to look it up. Thanks for your response.
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Post by Arlon10 on Aug 1, 2018 11:58:37 GMT
That's the least of your issues. The definition game is not the problem. I've had spiritual experiences on psychedelics, no question. I just have enough understanding about how reality works that I don't draw bullshit conclusions from those experiences. There is something called "science" which you should read up on. If you have genuine, honest interest in what the real world is like, there is no more a useful discipline to study than this.
The moment you try to claim that your experiences prove the existence of X, for whatever X, then that is exactly what you are doing, whether you admit it or not. You and Peterson just happen to be doing it very, very badly.
I'm not trying to 'prove' anything. I'm simply pointing out that we don't understand. I don't claim to understand physics, but I'll read 'Amazing physics facts' and some articles. Seems like there is more mystery and unexplained things than most of us are aware of in our day to day lives. I've never heard of this thing you call 'science' though, I'll have to look it up. Thanks for your response. My profound concern is that the experiences are not really valuable, that they are a deception. Sometimes deception is good. If it's necessary for medical reasons and you're having your leg cut off, drugs can give you the illusion that all is fine. Of course you can still know intellectually, at some time anyway, that everything is not fine, your leg is cut off, but with less pain. I suspect the "entheogenic" drugs are not doing anything but messing up your wiring and giving you worthless illusions. You know how difficult proofs can be though.
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Post by OldSamVimes on Aug 1, 2018 12:21:47 GMT
I'm not trying to 'prove' anything. I'm simply pointing out that we don't understand. I don't claim to understand physics, but I'll read 'Amazing physics facts' and some articles. Seems like there is more mystery and unexplained things than most of us are aware of in our day to day lives. I've never heard of this thing you call 'science' though, I'll have to look it up. Thanks for your response. My profound concern is that the experiences are not really valuable, that they are a deception. Sometimes deception is good. If it's necessary for medical reasons and you're having your leg cut off, drugs can give you the illusion that all is fine. Of course you can still know intellectually, at some time anyway, that everything is not fine, your leg is cut off, but with less pain. I suspect the "entheogenic" drugs are not doing anything but messing up your wiring and giving you worthless illusions. You know how difficult proofs can be though. I don't think we know enough to draw any conclusions yet. They're just starting to do research again after the illogical demonizing in the late sixties early seventies. In our society where 'spirituality' and religion is often mocked.. and alcohol, a drug that makes us dull and dumb, is encouraged, I don't think our society has much to lose. I work in mental health and depression and anxiety is pandemic right now. It frustrates me how ineffective antidepressants are, and how long people have to take them before they can expect any positive results. The results they got in Saskatchewan in the 60's working with alcoholics and addicts was very promising ( Psychedelic Revolutionaries )( More about Saskatchewan) Of course people will need to be taught that you use such drugs more like a sacrament and not at all like party drugs like cocaine and alcohol.
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Post by captainbryce on Aug 1, 2018 12:48:47 GMT
I stumbled across this YouTube video. It's a weekly, internet only, call-in talk show called The Atheist Experience. It is run by a group in Austin, Texas. In this photo from yesterday's show, they are talking to a man named King. What kind of a name is King? Does anyone else see anything wrong with this screen-scrape? I’ll say!
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Post by Deleted on Aug 1, 2018 12:50:07 GMT
The fact that thousands and thousands - or millions - of people have reported having spiritual experiences while using psychedelics certainly is evidence. It's evidence that psychedelics can cause experiences that some people class as spiritual. What it isn't is evidence that those experiences say anything at all about the nature of the actual real world. For that you would have to have some method of confirming that those experiences map to something in reality. Which there isn't. Then we'd also have to define exactly what a 'spiritual experience' is.. and that could take awhile... I agree that it's hard to make sense of some experiences, but mapping everything to something in reality is unnecessary and in many cases simply impossible. Trying to make sense of it all and trying to 'fit it into reality' will make you fight it and prevent you from letting go completely. Then let me put it this way - my view is that the "spirit world" exists in much the same way that Superman exists. Both exist as fictional constructs which people created because they fulfil a basic human desire - in Superman's case, the desire for a shared mythology and for heroes that populate it. In the "spirit world" a shared desire for some kind of external meaning and purpose to human consciousness. But in both cases, these things do not exist as a part of actual reality. You cannot meet Superman in actual reality, and you cannot visit the spirit world as an actual place, because both of them do not exist outside of people's invention. But it is entirely possible that the drug simply causes some people to experience something that is not real, is it not?
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Post by OldSamVimes on Aug 1, 2018 13:02:01 GMT
Then we'd also have to define exactly what a 'spiritual experience' is.. and that could take awhile... I agree that it's hard to make sense of some experiences, but mapping everything to something in reality is unnecessary and in many cases simply impossible. Trying to make sense of it all and trying to 'fit it into reality' will make you fight it and prevent you from letting go completely. Then let me put it this way - my view is that the "spirit world" exists in much the same way that Superman exists. Both exist as fictional constructs which people created because they fulfil a basic human desire - in Superman's case, the desire for a shared mythology and for heroes that populate it. In the "spirit world" a shared desire for some kind of external meaning and purpose to human consciousness. But in both cases, these things do not exist as a part of actual reality. You cannot meet Superman in actual reality, and you cannot visit the spirit world as an actual place, because both of them do not exist outside of people's invention. But it is entirely possible that the drug simply causes some people to experience something that is not real, is it not? What do you mean by 'actual reality'? Seems like the physicists are still having trouble with that one.. I see this world as being just as 'real' as any world I conjure during a dream. No more, no less. The difference is how much time passes before waking. If a breakthrough DMT experience is simply 'Experiencing something that is not real', how do you account for people from different cultural backgrounds having a similar experience? An experience of being in a completely different place that feels more real than our world.Why do people who have breakthrough DMT experiences so often lose their fear of death? I don't know the answers.. but I enjoy the mystery.
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Post by Terrapin Station on Aug 1, 2018 13:04:30 GMT
Yeah I'll sometimes watch it, some of the callers are pretty funny. In case you don't know, that's Matt Dillahunty on the right, a fairly well known atheist commentator who started the Athiest Experience. He debated Jordan Peterson a few months ago (Peterson got his ass handed to him) I've never seen the Atheist Experience, and it doesn't seem like the kind of thing that would be of much interest to me, but Dillahunty comes across well in that debate. Peterson is a ridiculous jackass, and so vague and obscurantist whenever he talks about anything relating to religion or philosophy. Dillahunty does a good job of pinning him down on what his positions actually are. People online always wank over Peterson but on the youtube comments there a lot of them seem to realize just how shallow he is. I watched a few minutes of the debate just now, but honestly, I couldn't tell what Peterson was even talking about half of the time. For example, when he starts mentioning Dostoyevsky, etc., I have no idea what the "thesis" of that section of his comments would have been. He seemed to just be rambling on in a stream-of-consciousness way without much of a point. Maybe it would make more sense if I'd watch more than a few minutes of it, but I couldn't take Peterson's ramblings longer than that.
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Post by Terrapin Station on Aug 1, 2018 13:18:01 GMT
Then let me put it this way - my view is that the "spirit world" exists in much the same way that Superman exists. Both exist as fictional constructs which people created because they fulfil a basic human desire - in Superman's case, the desire for a shared mythology and for heroes that populate it. In the "spirit world" a shared desire for some kind of external meaning and purpose to human consciousness. But in both cases, these things do not exist as a part of actual reality. You cannot meet Superman in actual reality, and you cannot visit the spirit world as an actual place, because both of them do not exist outside of people's invention. But it is entirely possible that the drug simply causes some people to experience something that is not real, is it not? What do you mean by 'actual reality'? Seems like the physicists are still having trouble with that one.. I see this world as being just as 'real' as any world I conjure during a dream. No more, no less. The difference is how much time passes before waking. If a breakthrough DMT experience is simply 'Experiencing something that is not real', how do you account for people from different cultural backgrounds having a similar experience? An experience of being in a completely different place that feels more real than our world.Why do people who have breakthrough DMT experiences so often lose their fear of death? I don't know the answers.. but I enjoy the mystery. Maybe you explained this earlier--I haven't carefully read every word in every post in this thread--but why would you interpret your experiences on hallucinogenics/psychotropics/etc. as being anything other than brain phenomena catalyzed by the drug you took?
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Post by faustus5 on Aug 1, 2018 13:22:07 GMT
What do you mean by 'actual reality'? Seems like the physicists are still having trouble with that one.. Not in any sense that is remotely connected to what you've been suggesting in this and other threads. Not even close. We actually understand quite a lot more than you give credit for, particularly consciousness, a topic people love to pretend is entirely mysterious when we already have a sold scientific model for what it is and how it works (learn about the global neuronal workspace model if you have any intellectual curiosity at all in the subject, which honestly I doubt). Then you obviously have no interest at all in reality. I can't imagine a more intellectually lazy position to take, the sort of thing you believe if you have no interest at all in the hard work necessary for understanding anything.
And again, you don't seem to appreciate the irony that this "anything goes" nonsense is exactly the sort of thing your cult leader is critiquing when he decries postmodernism. And it is diametrically opposed to the Enlightenment values of reason that he (falsely) claims to be promoting. I mean, good for you for not robotically following everything he advocates, but one would hope you'd part company with him in favor of clearer, more evidence based thinking instead of retreating further into silliness. Easy: they are the same species with the same brain structures being acted upon by the same chemical. This isn't hard to understand unless you actively don't want to understand.
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Post by OldSamVimes on Aug 1, 2018 13:32:17 GMT
What do you mean by 'actual reality'? Seems like the physicists are still having trouble with that one.. Not in any sense that is remotely connected to what you've been suggesting in this and other threads. Not even close. We actually understand quite a lot more than you give credit for, particularly consciousness, a topic people love to pretend is entirely mysterious when we already have a sold scientific model for what it is and how it works (learn about the global neuronal workspace model if you have any intellectual curiosity at all in the subject, which honestly I doubt). Then you obviously have no interest at all in reality. I can't imagine a more intellectually lazy position to take, the sort of thing you believe if you have no interest at all in the hard work necessary for understanding anything.
And again, you don't seem to appreciate the irony that this "anything goes" nonsense is exactly the sort of thing your cult leader is critiquing when he decries postmodernism. And it is diametrically opposed to the Enlightenment values of reason that he (falsely) claims to be promoting. I mean, good for you for not robotically following everything he advocates, but one would hope you'd part company with him in favor of clearer, more evidence based thinking instead of retreating further into silliness. Easy: they are the same species with the same brain structures being acted upon by the same chemical. This isn't hard to understand unless you actively don't want to understand.
You seem like you're really trying to win. I don't know what you're trying to win, but you're certainly trying. I don't care. Call me 'intellectually lazy' all you want. I don't have a cult leader. I don't believe everything just because Peterson, Watts or someone else says it. Have a nice day.
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Post by OldSamVimes on Aug 1, 2018 13:38:23 GMT
What do you mean by 'actual reality'? Seems like the physicists are still having trouble with that one.. I see this world as being just as 'real' as any world I conjure during a dream. No more, no less. The difference is how much time passes before waking. If a breakthrough DMT experience is simply 'Experiencing something that is not real', how do you account for people from different cultural backgrounds having a similar experience? An experience of being in a completely different place that feels more real than our world.Why do people who have breakthrough DMT experiences so often lose their fear of death? I don't know the answers.. but I enjoy the mystery. Maybe you explained this earlier--I haven't carefully read every word in every post in this thread--but why would you interpret your experiences on hallucinogenics/psychotropics/etc. as being anything other than brain phenomena catalyzed by the drug you took? IMO having a sense that you are connected to everything is a divine experience. One thing psychedelics seem to do is break down the ego and make make people feel more connected to 'the Universe'. So, I can look at a sunset even when not on psychedelics and for me it's a spiritual experience.. like I'm looking at the face of God. Would I have that if I had never touched any psychedelics? Maybe, but it's hard to say. How much of it is from medication and simply progressing through life and all it's sufferings and lessons? Again, hard to say. People can say 'You're not really experiencing that', but I couldn't care less.
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Post by Terrapin Station on Aug 1, 2018 13:45:00 GMT
Listened to a bit more of the debate. Peterson makes the rudimentary mistake re understanding analogies that is made so often in internet discussions. The mistake goes this way:
Aspect x of F is analogized to aspect x of G.
The person listening to the analogy thinks about aspect y of F (or G) and its relation to G (or F). They subsequently say that the analogy was "false" or it was a "false equivalency" etc., or as Peterson does, they take the suggestion of the analogy by the first person to imply an endorsement of an analogy comparing (a supposed) aspect y of F and G.
This is a very rudimentary misunderstanding of analogies, though. No one making any analogy is saying that F and G are alike in all aspects/all respects. After all, if that were the case, then simply F would equal G--they'd be identical and indistinguishable. Analogies are simply saying an aspect of two different things is similar.
It's too bad that Dillahunty didn't catch that mistake from Peterson.
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Post by Terrapin Station on Aug 1, 2018 13:49:37 GMT
Maybe you explained this earlier--I haven't carefully read every word in every post in this thread--but why would you interpret your experiences on hallucinogenics/psychotropics/etc. as being anything other than brain phenomena catalyzed by the drug you took? IMO having a sense that you are connected to everything is a divine experience. One thing psychedelics seem to do is break down the ego and make make people feel more connected to 'the Universe'. So, I can look at a sunset even when not on psychedelics and for me it's a spiritual experience.. like I'm looking at the face of God. Would I have that if I had never touched any psychedelics? Maybe, but it's hard to say. How much of it is from medication and simply progressing through life and all it's sufferings and lessons? Again, hard to say. People can say 'You're not really experiencing that', but I couldn't care less. I don't know if you're understanding my question. I'm not saying anything like "you're not really experiencing that." Obviously you are. Anything you experience is something you really experience. (Keeping in mind that experience is a mental phenomenon.) What I'm asking you is why you'd interpret what you're experiencing as not just a brain phenomenon, but as something external to yourself that you're perceiving (via information arriving at your senses somehow, etc.) Take something simpler for a moment for comparison. I don't know if you're in the same boat that I am, but I have "floaters" in my eyes, for example. Sometimes they can look like, say, a mosquito flying by. Well, I can interpret that as either a mosquito really flying by--that is, something external to my body that I'm perceiving, or I can interpret it as one of the floaters in my eyes--that is, something of my body that can give the appearance of something (external) I might be perceiving (to simplify the explanation). So I'm asking why you'd interpret the experience as something external to your body that you're perceiving.
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Post by 🌵 on Aug 1, 2018 14:03:57 GMT
I've never seen the Atheist Experience, and it doesn't seem like the kind of thing that would be of much interest to me, but Dillahunty comes across well in that debate. Peterson is a ridiculous jackass, and so vague and obscurantist whenever he talks about anything relating to religion or philosophy. Dillahunty does a good job of pinning him down on what his positions actually are. People online always wank over Peterson but on the youtube comments there a lot of them seem to realize just how shallow he is. I watched a few minutes of the debate just now, but honestly, I couldn't tell what Peterson was even talking about half of the time. For example, when he starts mentioning Dostoyevsky, etc., I have no idea what the "thesis" of that section of his comments would have been. He seemed to just be rambling on in a stream-of-consciousness way without much of a point. Maybe it would make more sense if I'd watch more than a few minutes of it, but I couldn't take Peterson's ramblings longer than that. Peterson thinks that most atheists don't contend with the best arguments for theism, and that these arguments are found in books like Crime and Punishment. I've never read this so I can't comment on Peterson's interpretation of it, but his view in a nutshell is that Dostoyevsky shows that a genuine atheist would have no moral objections about committing murder or any other serious crime. Most people who claim to be atheists are simply mistaken about their own beliefs - they do actually believe in God, even though they think they don't, and this is what gives them moral values. IIRC he also suggests that activities like art aren't really possible without a belief in God.
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Post by rachelcarson1953 on Aug 1, 2018 14:16:10 GMT
'Show me the evidence'. -- Somehow I don't think you'd consider the fact that thousands and thousands (millions?) of people have reported having spiritual experiences while using psychedelics to be any kind of evidence. The fact that thousands and thousands - or millions - of people have reported having spiritual experiences while using psychedelics certainly is evidence. It's evidence that psychedelics can cause experiences that some people class as spiritual. What it isn't, is evidence that those experiences say anything at all about the nature of the actual real world. For that, you would have to have some method of confirming that those experiences map to something in reality. Which there isn't. Well said!
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Post by Terrapin Station on Aug 1, 2018 14:18:31 GMT
I watched a few minutes of the debate just now, but honestly, I couldn't tell what Peterson was even talking about half of the time. For example, when he starts mentioning Dostoyevsky, etc., I have no idea what the "thesis" of that section of his comments would have been. He seemed to just be rambling on in a stream-of-consciousness way without much of a point. Maybe it would make more sense if I'd watch more than a few minutes of it, but I couldn't take Peterson's ramblings longer than that. Peterson thinks that most atheists don't contend with the best arguments for theism, and that these arguments are found in books like Crime and Punishment. I've never read this so I can't comment on Peterson's interpretation of it, but his view in a nutshell is that Dostoyevsky shows that a genuine atheist would have no misgivings about committing murder or any other serious crime. Most people who claim to be atheists are simply mistaken about their own beliefs - they do actually believe in God, even though they think they don't, and this is what gives them moral values. IIRC he also suggests that activities like art aren't really possible without a belief in God. Thanks for the explanation. He sounds like one of those folks who can't grasp the idea that mental phenomena are brain phenomena. Right where I stopped listening again he was starting to ask questions about consciousness where it was sounded like maybe he believes that consciousness wholesale is perceived somehow.
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