Vodsel said:
If you want to follow a reductionist approach, you might look at many processes in the brain circuitry, but even then you should start looking in the visual cortex, not the retina. Claiming that "in a nutshell, that's all just your retinal cells bombarding brain with sensory signals" is more than a large oversimplification, it's simply not true.
Sure that was oversimplified but the idea is that what you see in an altered state of consciousness, i.g. while dreaming or under influence of a drug may be triggered by:
1. Bodily signals.
No matter how distorted they are and where particularly that distortion happens. The initial trigger is sensor-cell that converts some external, real-world signal into a nervous impulse that is then transmitted further. The neurotransmitter's role - whatever particular receptor mechanism you take - is just to transmit the impulse from one cell to another. This is where distortion happens. The drug either mimics the NT thus triggering an extra pulse at a synapse or blocks such impulse. Psychedelic drugs are classified as hyperstimulants which means that they are agonists of a particular receptor type. If a particular drug interacts with the NT chain of the optic nerve you see fractal patterns, if it doesn't you don't. DMT is highly visual 5-MEO-DMT is not. The drugs trigger extra pulses every time the impulse travels from cell to cell therefore overloading braing with non-existing details. In IT that's called aliasing. Say one portion of photons hits your retinal cell and that NORMALLY triggers one impulse. Under the drug you get a whole series of them from the same portion of photons. Or, from the normal noise-floor of this system. This is exactly the reason of what this topic is about. Caleidoscopic patterns, fractal shapes etc. They all are triggered by the sensor cells. Retinal cells if we talk about visual perception, and ear-cell if we discuss auditory "fractals". The cause of the fractallness and caledioscopicness of the psychedelic imagery is this. But NOT the content of it. If you recognize a pink elephant in a TV noise, of in a Rorschach test OR in that distorted and fractalized by DMT or LSD retinal noise that's because of:
2. Imagination. You will see some internal images even if you have your retinal cells and your optic nerve destroyed. This is what happens when you pass out and cross over. You get disconnected from you the bodily signals and plunge into pure subconscious imagery. There's a HUGE difference in the nature of 1 and 2. It is mixed when you haven't crossed over and are still awake. Then you have the TV noise situation - firstly, your cells trigger some impulse the transmission of which is being distorted by the drug, secondly you brain assembles some image out if it.
And if we dig even further, the pure, "internal" images, separate from the bodily triggers may be your forgotten memories collecting dust on the distant shelves of your subconsciousness, or some archetypes - the imagery of genetic programs, instincts. Or it may be something else. Not triggered by your body, not being your personal memories, not being the genetic programs of your species, but being something truly transcendent and mystic.
And the point of my statement is that there are very few people who treat the problem of perception methodologically and can discern the phenomena that CAN be classified as mystic experience from distorted bodily signals and forgotten memories. And most of the "mystic" reports is schizoteric bullcrap
