Salvinorin Olfactory Embodied Memory Space

[T.Harper]

Mu and kappa opioid modulation of olfactory bulb evoked potentials - PubMed

"Results indicate that mu and kappa opioid agonists can interfere with sensory transmission at the level of second-order neurons of the olfactory pathway, the mitral and/or tufted cells."

Nice. This is great.

One aspect of my salvia experiences has been not just interference with sensory transmission but a stimulus of a sensory channel without any input.

Same here, also im sure we have all found a few lost objects in Salvia Space. 8)

Ive become highly focused on the memory action since it seems to be a really interesting mechanism which can help people process or reorganize core imbalanced material, not just healing and transformng out from the obvious target areas like: depression, trauma, ptsd, body dysmorphia, ..... looking at it from this angle and it starts to overlap with the tricky dis-orders: fibromyalgia, Parkinsons, Dementia, Alzheimers.

 

[trncefigurate_aomn]

Mu and kappa opioid modulation of olfactory bulb evoked potentials - PubMed

"Results indicate that mu and kappa opioid agonists can interfere with sensory transmission at the level of second-order neurons of the olfactory pathway, the mitral and/or tufted cells."

Nice. This is great.

Ive become highly focused on the memory action since it seems to be a really interesting mechanism which can help people process or reorganize core imbalanced material, not just healing and transformng out from the obvious target areas like: depression, trauma, ptsd, body dysmorphia, ..... looking at it from this angle and it starts to overlap with the tricky dis-orders: fibromyalgia, Parkinsons, Dementia, Alzheimers.

This article (i've put most of the article text in the space saving box below ) seems to mention many areas relevant to your work! A new cell type was discovered in the olfactory bulb in 2006, this is mentioned at the end and describes a possible connection to Alzheimers! The earlier parts are amazing as well!

Spoiler

Using an innovative home-built laser microscope, Strowbridge and Gao were able to determine that the olfactory bulb does in fact have long-term potentiation. This specialized microscope used an advanced imaging technique called "2-photon excitation" which enabled the researchers to see entire brain cells and then test whether different types of inputs to the cell could mediate olfactory memory.

"The real surprise in the study was the specific brain connection that changed following experience. It was a rarely-studied brain projection from the cortex back to the olfactory bulb" said Strowbridge.

Neuroscientists commonly believe that the way the brain processes information is similar to climbing a pyramid—starting from the bottom and working up to the top. All of the sensory systems have a large number of low-level cells that do very simple things (forming the base of the pyramid), and then they feed their results to brain areas higher up the pyramid. The brain cells in these "higher" regions begin to reflect abstract concepts, such as the shape of human faces, in the visual system or melodies in the auditory system. The brain areas related to our conscious perception of the world are presumably at the top of pyramid.

However, the Case Western Reserve University researchers found that the brain circuit had the ability to change with experience was unexpectedly a connection from high in the pyramid (the olfactory cortex) back to a lower level (the olfactory bulb).

One of the implications of Strowbridge and Gao's work is that the brain may learn about different smells by having higher brain areas first make a prediction about which scent it might be, and then test that prediction against the actual sensory data coming into the brain.

"Our work suggests that there is much more talking back-and-forth between higher and lower brain areas during olfactory learning," continued Strowbridge. "We are just beginning to explore the function of the feedback circuits that inform low-level parts of the brain, like the olfactory bulb, about predictions made by higher-order brain regions. The 2-photon microscope used in this study is an ideal tool to ask what these different brain circuits are actually doing."

Previous studies had suggested that the circuit changes associated with olfactory learning, such as sheep learning to recognize their own lambs though their characteristic scents, involved changes in the olfactory bulb. Strowbridge and Gao discovered that certain olfactory brain circuits can change with experience. This discovery provides a possible explanation for how animals can form memories of particular scents.

In 2006, Strowbridge's group discovered a new type of brain cell, the Blanes cell, in the olfactory bulb, also using the same home-built 2-photon microscope. Ramón y Cajal, an important Spanish anatomist, had drawn pictures of these cells and named them for one of his medical students in the late 1800s. They stayed a curiosity item in very old textbooks until Strowbridge's laboratory found that they represented a very important cell type in the brain. Using 2-photon imaging, the CWRU group showed that Blanes cells have unusual properties that may help the brain maintain memories of smells and also opened a new approach to understanding the basis of memory impairment in Alzheimer's disease. That study was published in the March 16, 2006 issue of the journal Neuron.

Article about long term potentiation in the olfactory bulb

I will try to find more and bring the most relevant portions here!

 

[trncefigurate_aomn]

Olfactory bulb (main) Blanes cell
(original page is linked here!)

Creation date: 2007-09-05
Last modified date: 2012-3-9
Version number: 170331
Comment: Persistent firing (about 6.3 Hz) for up to 15-min after activation
Editorial note: Preferred label: Olfactory bulb main short axon cell deep

Cellular synaptic target: Olfactory bulb (main) granule cell

Subcellular synaptic target: Dendritic spines of distal apical dendrites of granule cell

Firing patterns: (in response to normal physiological input) Regular spiking

 

[Nathanial.Dread]

A quick search of the Allen Brain Atlas shows reasonably high expression of the kappa opioid receptor in the olfactory bulb of mice. Might be something there.

Blessings
~ND

In that line,

I found this:

Mu and kappa opioid modulation of olfactory bulb evoked potentials - PubMed

Modulatory influences of the mu opioid agonist morphine and the kappa opioid agonist U-50, 488H on field-evoked potentials from the main olfactory bulb (MOB) in response to stimulation of the olfactory nerve were studied. Topically administered morphine upon the MOB dorsal surface produced a...

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

"Results indicate that mu and kappa opioid agonists can interfere with sensory transmission at the level of second-order neurons of the olfactory pathway, the mitral and/or tufted cells."

One aspect of my salvia experiences has been not just interference with sensory transmission but a stimulus of a sensory channel without any input.

I was in the dark and I smoked enhanced leaf. Along with space/time fragments I experienced a series of bright flashes, as bright as flash bulbs, one after the other, as if I were getting a light perception straight from somewhere inside my optic sensory channel.

Very nice find. Olfaction is not my area of expertise, so I'm not sure how much I can add, but on the Atlas, expression seemed to be concentrated in the anterior olfactory nucleus - and I'm not sure about that region's specific functions, or what the KOR is doing in there at all.

The KOR is widely expressed in the brain, and my hunch is that any activity of salvinorin A in the olfactory system is largely incidental to it's consciousness altering effects. High levels of KOR expression in the claustrum seem to me to be the most likely explanation for the reality-bending effects of salvia.

Blessings
~ND

 

[trncefigurate_aomn]

A quick search of the Allen Brain Atlas shows reasonably high expression of the kappa opioid receptor in the olfactory bulb of mice. Might be something there.

Blessings
~ND

In that line,

I found this:

Mu and kappa opioid modulation of olfactory bulb evoked potentials - PubMed

Modulatory influences of the mu opioid agonist morphine and the kappa opioid agonist U-50, 488H on field-evoked potentials from the main olfactory bulb (MOB) in response to stimulation of the olfactory nerve were studied. Topically administered morphine upon the MOB dorsal surface produced a...

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

"Results indicate that mu and kappa opioid agonists can interfere with sensory transmission at the level of second-order neurons of the olfactory pathway, the mitral and/or tufted cells."

In searching for more information about the Blanes cell type, the passage that describes research into their functions mentions interaction with mitral and tufted cells!

Functional Significance of Blanes Cells and Persistent Firing in the Olfactory Bulb

Our study demonstrates that Blanes cells represent a new class of bulbar interneurons that inhibit granule cells by releasing GABA from axon terminals. There have been no previous reports of local circuit synaptic responses mediated by axonal transmitter release from interneurons located in the mitral or granule cell layers of the olfactory bulb. Blanes cells may regulate the output cells of the olfactory bulb through at least three mechanisms. First, Blanes cells mediate feedforward inhibition onto granule cells (Figure 3 and Figure 7E, and 9B–9D) and thus are in a position to control mitral and tufted cell activity through disinihibition. We directly demonstrated that the same synaptic stimuli that triggered persistent firing in Blanes cells evoked tonic GABAA receptor-mediated inhibition onto granule cells. These inhibitory barrages onto granule cells are unlikely to result from persistent activation of mitral cells, as we have previously shown that mitral cells do not receive prolonged excitation following trains of GCL stimuli (Halabisky and Strowbridge, 2003). The close similarity between the frequency of persistent firing in Blanes cells and spontaneous IPSCs in granule cells strongly suggests that these inhibitory barrages arose from one or a small population of activated Blanes cells. We also showed directly that persistent firing in a Blanes cells evoked a persistent train of inhibitory synaptic responses in monosynaptically coupled granule cells. Periodic inhibitory barrages had powerful effects on granule cell excitability and reduced the average number of action potentials triggered by a test stimulus by half. Our results suggest that Blanes cells play an important role in regulating the excitability of inhibitory granule cells and therefore are well positioned to control the strength of recurrent and lateral inhibition onto mitral and tufted cells. Next, Blanes cells also can influence activity in the olfactory bulb by regulating activation (or inactivation) of active currents in granule cells. Inhibitory postsynaptic potentials in granule cells may interact with voltage-dependent Ca currents expressed by these currents. Recently, Egger et al. (Egger et al., 2003) demonstrated that granule cells express low-threshold T-type Ca currents. In other cell types, GABAergic IPSPs can generate rebound discharges by deinactivating T-type Ca currents (McCormick and Bal, 1997). Additional studies will be required to determine whether Blanes cell-mediated IPSPs play a similar role in olfactory granule cells. Finally, because Blanes cells may potentially innervate hundreds of granule cells, spiking activity in Blanes cells may represent a novel mechanism to generate synchronous activity in subpopulations of olfactory bulb neurons. Synchronization may result from correlated rhythmic inhibition of large groups of granule cells activity, which then could lead to synchronization of mitral and tufted cells through periodic disinhibition or by triggering rebound spikes.

~~

What I have read today seems to indicate that there are some neural behaviors and cascade processes/electromagnetic variances that happen in the olfactory bulb especially including the above process which match the described first stage that seems to reoccur with the buccal extract experiences!

 

[T.Harper]

... and my hunch is that any activity of salvinorin A in the olfactory system is largely incidental to it's consciousness altering effects. High levels of KOR expression in the claustrum seem to me to be the most likely explanation for the reality-bending effects of salvia.

Agreed. The olfactory bulb/system memory channel can't be the primary mechinism responsible for all the effects. Especially when you look at onset phase of such a viseral -unzipping- -unfolding- that looks more like what the claustrum does, which if I am understanding it correctly is that it smoothly assembles multiple inputs into a unified field.

The Claustrum explanation seems to cover the basic effect of how the body exits into or interacts with Salvia Space, it doesnt explain her soul, or speak to the very specific landscapes in postbody. The claustrum is the cycling out reality dissassembling part.

The Olfactory Memory relational alongside the Dopamine(d2) disphoria mixed with the Claustrums 'Balancing of the Worlds' together seem to guide the consciousness into very very specific states.
One where a re-ordering of negative or imbalanced reality imprints can occur, not just on a mental level but through every level of constructed reality. There are helpers too, and enchanted beings but that is another whole box to unpack.

.

What I have read today seems to indicate that there are some neural behaviors and cascade processes/electromagnetic variances that happen in the olfactory bulb especially including the above process which match the described first stage that seems to reoccur with the buccal extract experiences!

Im still trying to wrap my head around this Blanes cell type & in its interaction with tufted/mitral cells. Any help translating this process?

 

[Nathanial.Dread]

I have to say, I'm not experienced enough in the salvia relms to speak with any real authority to the phenomenological nature of the experience.

Do you have anything you can send me on the role of D2 receptors in the salvia experience? I don't know much about the KOR pathway and would like to know more.

Blessings
~ND

 

[T.Harper]

Do you have anything you can send me on the role of D2 receptors in the salvia experience? I don't know much about the KOR pathway and would like to know more.

From my folk approach- coming from subjective transformative effects and then digging through the academapshere flotsum, I'll try my best to pull up a few useful links:



KOR action mows down the dopamine systems that are affected by opiates & cocaine & boooze & pleasure pleasure pleasure pleasure, im not sure sure exactaly how, but KOR seems to upregulate D2 receptors. D2 acts as the balancing agent, the feedback from encoded memory to the immediate reward stimulis. Its also the disphoric aspect and turns down the body signals (which are a mojor factor of behavior, it not all the brain!) and D2 helps open up certain qualities of visionary experience.


Receptor limits the rewarding effects of food and cocaine
Receptor limits the rewarding effects of food and cocaine



And while not specifically looking at D2:
"...decrease in the locomotor stimulant effects of the D2 agonist quinpirole. Although we did not observe an effect of acute or repeated SalvA on D2 receptor agonist-induced locomotor activity, our combined findings suggest that repeated activation of KORs alters DA receptor signaling in a context-dependent manner."

Exposure to the Selective κ-Opioid Receptor Agonist Salvinorin A Modulates the Behavioral and Molecular Effects of Cocaine in Rats
http://www.nature.com/npp/journal/v33/n11/full/1301659a.html#close




D2 & the production of prolactin
This leads down the MilkMotherly-> Sheppardess -> Olfactory -> Childhood Openess qualities

D2 & Prolactin
http://press.endocrine.org/doi/full/10.1210/edrv.22.6.0451



Ok thats it for me, Im off to thebeach for a few days
much love everyone.


-Twig

 

[T.Harper]

Also I have a lot to say about working with potentiators to increase the memory +/- relation channel to move deeper int these healing aspects and lessen the discombobulation of the KOR/claustrum.

but more on that later.

 

[trncefigurate_aomn]

Im still trying to wrap my head around this Blanes cell type & in its interaction with tufted/mitral cells. Any help translating this process?

Ok! I mostly wanted to place the writings in the thread to be a bit like a library, without saying what I thought to make sure you and others felt free to interpret!

My interpretation is that the onset phase of the Salvinorin A interactions could be mediated by the Blanes cells in the olfactory bulb. There are images available in the publication about them that very much resembles your spiking wave/spiritual/mental/physical diagram. The Blanes cells can change the electromagnetic (and therefore consciousness-influencing i think) qualities of the cell types downstream en masse... which reminds me of the "repeating pattern" images reported by those who experience a fast onset phase.
These interactions are described as relating to oflactory memory no less!

Ok thats it for me, Im off to thebeach for a few days
much love everyone.
-Twig

Wishing you amazing, energizing and soothing experiences!!

 

[trncefigurate_aomn]

A short but fascinating article for when you return!
From June this year, it seems to relate very strongly to when people experience the unusual directional cues/pulls.

Humans' built-in GPS is our 3-D sense of smell

A new study shows we can use our sense of smell not just to identify objects, but to navigate. (iStockphoto) Like homing pigeons, humans have a nose for navigation because our brains are wired to convert smells into spatial information, new research ...

news.berkeley.edu

Similar investigations have been conducted on birds and rodents, but this is the first time smell-based navigation has been field-tested on humans. The results evoke a GPS-like superpower one could call an “olfactory positioning system.”

“What we’ve found is that humans have the capability to orient ourselves along highways of odors and crisscross landscapes using only our sense of smell,” said study lead author Lucia Jacobs, a UC Berkeley psychology professor who studies evolution and cognition in animals and humans.

[...]

After being walked in circles again for disorientation purposes, they were tasked with sniffing their way back to the starting point where they had smelled the two fragrances.

Overall, study participants navigated relatively closely to the targeted location when using only their sense of smell, compared to when other sensory inputs were blocked. Moreover, they were not just following one scent, but using information from both scents to orient themselves toward a point on an odor grid.

“We never thought humans could have a good enough sense of smell for this,” said Jacobs. But in retrospect, she noted, the results are “as obvious as the nose on my face.”

 

[trncefigurate_aomn]

Anything Salvia related is incredibly fascinating to me and I also enjoy horticulture and botany/ethnobotany.

Pineapple sage is a lovely salvia that grows at about 6,000 feet in the Madrean "sky island" ranges, amidst mountain moisture and mountain streams.

Salvia elegans - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

"The leaves and flowers of S. elegans are edible.[4] The plant is extensively used in Mexican traditional medicine, especially for the treatment of anxiety, and also for lowering of blood pressure."

They taste good and they are beautiful in their own right. When you wander in the "sky islands" you come across them. And who was that first person who ate enough of them for long enough and quietly enough to listen to them and know of such effects? They had to become as shy and as wandering and ephemeral as dew on sky island sage.

A curiosity and a willingness to experiment, a quiet listening, a noticing of effects without priming, a listening inside of oneself for the signature of that taste, of that flavor.

Have you seen the connection with flavones? flavonoids and such? The taste the flavor of this my sweet, sweet sage. My bitter sage. My green sage.

And now I was just reading how tears were green for the greeks, how moisture was green for them, because green was the color of alive.

Of course she is green. Yes she is green and she lives in a sky island of the mind.

Thank you for posting about this sage! I have been living with one for a while now but i had not read about its medicinal help to us! A tiny bit of leaf that has already dried, taken sublingually, has a wonderful effect! I need to work on learning the buccal method as well; this has been strong enough (though gentle in a way that sage can be) so far as well as with a second sage type (Salvia coccinea) that i've tried in the same way (taking part of an already dried leaf tip) which is also from Mexico!

Sky island sage has effects on inner and outer environment. Hummingbird sage when taken before sleep somehow presents me with an alternate hypnogogic state. These are both very new explorations so i will try to make a thread for them in a few moonths once more has been experienced!

 

[drfaust]

Thank you for posting about this sage! I have been living with one for a while now but i had not read about its medicinal help to us! A tiny bit of leaf that has already dried, taken sublingually, has a wonderful effect! I need to work on learning the buccal method as well; this has been strong enough (though gentle in a way that sage can be) so far as well as with a second sage type (Salvia coccinea) that i've tried in the same way (taking part of an already dried leaf tip) which is also from Mexico!

Sky island sage has effects on inner and outer environment. Hummingbird sage when taken before sleep somehow presents me with an alternate hypnogogic state. These are both very new explorations so i will try to make a thread for them in a few moonths once more has been experienced!

Thanks so much to everyone who contributed to this thread, and especially to Twig for starting it and for inspiring us/me to go into Kappa-opioid reveries.

I've been experimented at buccal and low levels with a number of sages. I'm fascinated by what I want to call the "downregulation" I experience when chewing these "mints". I find them very cooling, and in fact, I see that Siebert points out that divinorum produces some degree of hypothermia.

I assume you'all have seen Dale Pendell's references to it as the "just so" plant or the "as it is" plant. I take that as part of its "downregulation" phenomenology. I don't experience it necessarily as "dysphoria" but as a kind of "aphoria" or a kind of attenuation of the euphoria/dysphoria channel.
This experience along with emotional work makes me skeptical of some of the simplistic speculation on euphoria/dysphoria and the dopamine/reward pathways. But that is another discussion.

Research I've been looking at concerns the early mother-child affective interactions and their influence on the experience of affective and emotional life. The maturation and development of the orbitofrontal cortex and it's linkages with the subcortical limbic system are dependent upon the early mother-infant relationship. A mix of need and satisfaction, of arousal and calming, of
anxiety and safety. And, lo and behold the Kappa-Opioid receptors play a key role.

Prefrontal Cortical Kappa Opioid Receptors Attenuate Responses to Amygdala Inputs.

Prefrontal Cortical Kappa Opioid Receptors Attenuate Responses to Amygdala Inputs - PubMed

Kappa opioid receptors (KORs) have been implicated in anxiety and stress, conditions that involve activation of projections from the basolateral amygdala (BLA) to the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC). Although KORs have been studied in several brain regions, their role on mPFC physiology and on...

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

I can see why these sages are sometimes used to treat anxiety. Something of the calming and holding that takes place in a good enough mother environment may endogenously attentuate "amygdala" and other limbic inputs. The space of "mediation" may be a kind of downregulation or cooling and calming.

I'm reading right now about preverbal memories and how the early experiences we cannot remember may be accessible or how we may work with the "dysphoria" or "aphoria" experience as an opportunity.

I'm guessing that a number of these central american "mint" sages may have terpenes that approximate to Kappa-Opioid agonism and that this agonism mimics the endogenous "downregulation" that an early loving environment provides the child.

These experiments are getting into some very subtle territory that might be marked as "placebo" in a double blind study that uses not very sensitive individuals from a broad spectrum of the public.

These are not "experiences" per se, especially when they get in to "as it is" and "just so" states in which reality "simply as it is" comes to the fore. In fact, "dysphoria" may be a term that applies to what happens when people looking for stimulus are somehow "downregulated" without expectation or without much capacity to "just be"?

The sense of smell is a perfect sense for this experiment because it both links directly to the emotional and limbic layer and it requires fine reveries of the higher brain at the same time. Those pathways or the relationships between the limbic/emotional level and the higher functions are exactly those pathways that salvinorin travels? Fascinating.

I will continue my explorations and my thanks for all your inputs.

 

[T.Harper]

This experience along with emotional work makes me skeptical of some of the simplistic speculation on euphoria/dysphoria and the dopamine/reward pathways. But that is another discussion.

As for the other discussion. I agree that the nature of the Sage is so corely embedded and simplistic dopamine/reward mechinisms are not anywhere the only truth of how the transformative aspects of the sage operates....

BUT...

It does appear that people who have more reward seeking behaviors will need much more Salvia to have an effect. Especially working with people struggling with substance abuse, they can take doses that would send most into the Salvia Void just to get mild effects. (observations via buccal extract ROA from my work over here)

.... early mother-child affective interactions and their influence on the experience of affective and emotional life. The maturation and development of the orbitofrontal cortex and it's linkages with the subcortical limbic system are dependent upon the early mother-infant relationship. A mix of need and satisfaction, of arousal and calming, of
anxiety and safety. And, lo and behold the Kappa-Opioid receptors play a key role.

I can also see how this model relates to how children who experience trauma can fall into addictive &/or depressive behavior patterns.

Would this have anything to do with how people develop individual 'fight or flight' responses?
Iv noticed in myself that generally post Salvia session it subtlely brings attention to my programs around these areas.

I'm guessing that a number of these central american "mint" sages may have terpenes that approximate to Kappa-Opioid agonism and that this agonism mimics the endogenous "downregulation" that an early loving environment provides the child.

'Common' mint! Menthol is a kappa-opioid agonist, too. Swallowing 10 drops of menthol essential oil will give you quite the spins.
*** EDIT start slow & low if you decide to start experimenting with menthol (or any essential oils) A near fatal case of high dose peppermint oil ingestion- Lessons learnt

The sense of smell is a perfect sense for this experiment because it both links directly to the emotional and limbic layer and it requires fine reveries of the higher brain at the same time. Those pathways or the relationships between the limbic/emotional level and the higher functions are exactly those pathways that salvinorin travels? Fascinating.

completely fascinating.

 

[drfaust]

This experience along with emotional work makes me skeptical of some of the simplistic speculation on euphoria/dysphoria and the dopamine/reward pathways. But that is another discussion.

As for the other discussion. I agree that the nature of the Sage is so corely embedded and simplistic dopamine/reward mechinisms are not anywhere the only truth of how the transformative aspects of the sage operates....

BUT...

It does appear that people who have more reward seeking behaviors will need much more Salvia to have an effect. Especially working with people struggling with substance abuse, they can take doses that would send most into the Salvia Void just to get mild effects. (observations via buccal extract ROA from my work over here)

I can also see how this model relates to how children who experience trauma can fall into addictive &/or depressive behavior patterns.

Thanks Twig. That is very interesting. I want to hear more about your work with people.

Yes. The research/theory that I am reading and my intuition point to "containment" and mediation of the stimulus. In some more poetic theorizing, they simply call it "the capacity to dream". The dreaming capacity "mollifies" the raw and traumatic inputs of the real, where that "real" is both internal and external.

That dreaming capacity is another way of talking about "synapses" or circuits between the "basal ganglia" and the cortex.

Schizotypal Personality

This book is devoted to examining schizotypal personality and provides a comprehensive overview of our current knowledge. It includes reviews of genetics, neurodevelopment, assessment, psychophysiology, neuropsychology, and brain imaging. Central themes are the exploration of categorical and...

books.google.com

Salvia, as a "dreaming herb" is right there in that "synapse" it seems to me. So my guess or take is that if someone does have that dreaming capacity they may be less prone to concrete addictions and to a need for concrete stimulus.

So stimulants may be less interesting, and dysphoriants more interesting to those who have some dreaming capacity?

What if you don't have that dreaming limb very well developed. I'd guess that you would not notice anything except the absence of "inputs" on a mild salvia dose.

That "downregulation" space is such an interesting space.

Some of my research has involved starting to read The Master and his Emissary

The Master and His Emissary

Why is the brain divided? The difference between right and left hemispheres has been puzzled over for centuries. In a book of unprecedented scope, Iain McGilchrist draws on a vast body of recent brain research, illustrated with case histories, to reveal that the difference is profound—not just...

books.google.com

He pulls together quite a bit of research.

More later. I'm off to camping for a few days! Thanks so much.

 

[drfaust]

I'm back from camping and I want to report further on my thoughts and explorations.

I want to roll back the tape slightly and I want to pull back from using the word "downregulation" as that would probably only highlight the D2 axis.

What it is with salvia is and will remain a mystery. And I think one of the reasons it will remain so is that the mind-body-brain-spirit-soul is one whole and that our analytic work in which we divide that one whole into parts is only one aspect of the larger reality of "living a life".

Ian McGilchrist does a decent job of not losing the forest of the whole mind-body-self-soul for the trees of the divided/lateral brain. I'd like to keep that in mind as well.

So yes, we have this kappa-opioid partial agonist that does something to our brains, and then we have a set of experiences. And it feels to me to be a healing thing. And it is correlated with a reduction in "anxiety" and with a greater freedom of spirit. I find it helpful, and I'm growing from it.

The "brain" parts of the story only enhance that growing living reality for me. I don't reduce my experience to a chemical or to a part of the brain, but rather I make use of the richness of my experience and of research to enhance and add another layer to my experience. And to my understanding.

I'm with Twig and his sense that these are all metaphors, or ways of talking about, or trails to explore. That's why I'd like to veer from using "downregulation" to something that would be more synthetic and paradoxical like "mediation".

KOR expression is a really interesting area of "cutting edge" research going on right now. As you can see the wikipedia page is being updated regularly with new research: κ-opioid receptor - Wikipedia

What strikes me is that although KOR agonists are described here as "antirewarding" in one sense, KOR expression is tied to "mediation" and amelioration of inputs, rewarding or otherwise.

So, for example, stimulants are not necessarily addictive if a "mediation" capacity is developed in a person.

One of the most synthetic words I can think of to sum up that space for "amelioration" or toleration or "dreaming" would be a simple word: trust.

This word, trust, takes me back to the earliest mother/child interactions and the babies first experiences of satisfaction of needs and trust in the environment.

I found a really cool piece by Allan Schore on "the primary caregiver’s psychobiological regulation of the infant’s maturing limbic system, the brain areas specialized for adapting to a rapidly changing environment" Key: "right brain" and KOR expression

http://www.allanschore.com/pdf/SchoreIMHJAttachment.pdf

"The reattuning, comforting mother and infant thus dyadically negotiate a stressful state transition of affect, cognition, and behavior."

I'd gather that through KOR agonists such as salvia one can return to these early "olfactory memory spaces" and build "trust networks" and more robust mediation and capacity for "novelty."

Schore gets into lateralization as well as mediation here.

And on lateralization and emotions, stress and pain I found this piece:

Asymmetry of the Endogenous Opioid System in the Human Anterior Cingulate: a Putative Molecular Basis for Lateralization of Emotions and Pain

Abstract. Lateralization of the processing of positive and negative emotions and pain suggests an asymmetric distribution of the neurotransmitter systems r

cercor.oxfordjournals.org

More later!

 

[drfaust]

Here is an interesting article on smells and vocabulary.

http://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2015/11/the-vocabulary-of-smell/414618/

If we think in terms of the work and works mentioned in this thread, then this very sense of smell, in all it's simultaneous primitivity and sophistication both is a privileged sense.

The art of smelling is both an art of primitive directness, or rawness, and of flexible differentiation or comparison and vocabulary.

 

[T.Harper]

This is all very good information yer pulling up, ive been horribly busy lately again over here fixing broken pumps and plastering.

Gotta make time to dig through all these.

i am continually humbled and enchanted by her clear and practical metaphysical landscape which seems be that there is minimal mystisical presence once you are allowed through the fools door.

 

[T.Harper]

Also of note that I think of sometimes:

I have a horrible sense of smell. i mean horrible, its as if sometimes i do not even have it... wonder how that relates to that I am super sensitive to Salvia, and really its the only power plant i work with anymore.

 

[UgraKarma]

This thread has been a fascinating read!

with a world that is unzipping from the inside out

This in particular resonates with some notions on the Salvia Divinorum experience I've always been inclined towards,,,

That one of the most confounding accents to the Salvia trance is the mirroring/splitting/coalescing of directionality. Coordinates diffuse, as if the coordinates were shaken to entirely separate, but also fixed coordinates.

I've thought of this as myself as a paper bag filled with small bouncy balls being dropped to the floor and spilled out in reverse... I'm bobbling my way down into this barren container.

But even to suggest this analogy falls short by neglecting to place an emphasis on the fourth dimensional coordinates being confused, and time collecting itself in a completely inconsistent fashion (not unlike trying to keep time with one of Dali's clocks.)

Other olfactory notes on salvia might point towards why I've always personified the thick floral musk that hangs in the room after my ego is able to resolve itself as the mysterious guy at the end of the bar in the trench coat who always looks soaking wet but also as if he's been in the seat for long enough to have dried off. Personally, I find his presence unnerving. If I'm going to enjoy my drink I think I'll find someone else to have it with, even if he might indeed have some knowledges to impart.

NOTE: Originally posted in the wrong thread. That comment has been deleted and has now been relocated to correct thread.