12/19/15 - "What's Real, and What's for Sale?" Is the experience a person has after consuming a psychedelic substance simply the product of having consumed a drug, as is the common understanding, or is it real? These drugs are classified as hallucinogens, and modern psychology diagnoses the experience as a psychotic break. But, is that accurate? A figure that has appeared in many cultures throughout human history is the shaman, in various forms. Whenever there is discovered a psychotropic substance in a local area, human beings tend to use it, and the shaman seeks divination through such substances. The experience of this type of drug is universally one of enlightenment - a great sense of understanding comes over the user, and they report having gained many insights previously unavailable in ordinary states of consciousness. After coming down from such a high, the user finds that the memories of the experience were state-dependent - They have general recollections upon what they experienced, but relating precisely what they learned is impossible. Whatever they understood about their selves and the world around them requires that they enter an altered state of consciousness. This makes it easy for a non-user or bigoted prohibitionist to write-off the experience as false, defining it as "hallucination". It seems to me that altered states are as real as ordinary states of consciousness; and, perhaps, should be taken more seriously for their unique fragments of experience - Lending a glimpse into a region of the mind that is unfamiliar. The argument remains, however, that the validity of such an experience which dissipates at termination is real. Some people want to believe that these experiences are real, and others do not, which influences a consensus opinion. What is the objective truth? Are all the human beings that experience enlightenment actually having a "psychotic break from reality"? There are non-drug-induced states of consciousness experienced by individuals of religious orders that exhibit the same character as drug states, and are respected as real experiences of enlightenment. You could say that these people who practice various religions are having the same sort of psychotic break as users of psychedelic drugs. Or, we might conclude that everyone's experience is valid. If a person experiences a sense of understanding, it must have a real source (I would postulate) - in the absence of such a source, the experience of understanding does not occur ;) |