What If It's All BS?

[PowerfulMedicine]

But now I see her entire life's work as just plain wrong. I've seen enough to realize that my own understanding of the relations and mechanics of the universe and of consciousness is much, much further reaching than hers, and the thousands of other academics prevailing over consensus reality. These academics are the ultimate gate keepers to what trickles down to the layperson as common knowledge. It doesn't exist unless they say it exists. That's why I know it's all wrong, and why she is wrong. I have countless examples where I have had serious scientific questions, and have asked the researchers straight to their face about it, and seen the emotional response as words come out of their mouths. They're always scared or angry/annoyed when you ask them something they don't know. They are scared because they are afraid of what they don't know. It's denial, which is a memory game we play to avoid facing fear.

What are you basing these judgements on? Do you really believe that your knowledge and experiences are so unquestionable that you can say she is just plain wrong. Maybe your understanding is further reaching, but maybe it's reaching farther than it has a right to reach. Maybe your understanding is actually wrong.

In that video you posted, she makes the claim that everything is reducible to science, which is a spiritual claim. It is the claim that there is no such thing as the spiritual. Your idea then seems to be that there is a spiritual realm beyond the reach of science. These are contradictory claims. So one of you is definitely wrong. But since neither idea is testable at this point, they both essentially amount to opinions.

You don't seem to be posing this judgement as an opinion though. So what makes you think that you are the absolute authority in this case with some special access to the absolute truth that another person doesn't have?

Some scientists do get angry when they don't know something. Science itself is without bias, but individual scientists are never totally free of bias. I agree that it is a form of denial and I see it as an expression of the ego. But it's also egocentric to be so sure about your opinion that you start to believe it is absolute truth.

I'm currently working on two bachelor's degrees. One in geology and one in biology. I interact with scientists almost daily. None of my professors have ever been scared or angry when someone has asked them something they don't know. Most of my professors are very open about what they don't know. Maybe it's just a different sort of culture. Geologists and field scientists tend to be more laid back in my experience. I imagine I'd get cagey too if I was always cooped up in some lab.

 

[PowerfulMedicine]

I never made this into some kind of science vs. spirituality discussion, or about my 'beliefs' (I try not to have any), so I'm not sure why you're focusing on this and lecturing me on what you think science is. I'm simply pointing out a trend in thinking I see these days, and why I find it odd and contradictory. I think we are in agreement about much more than you think.

Oh, I can tell we agree about most of this, but I like parsing out the subtleties and ambiguities in a discussion. Plus, discussions get boring when everyone is just agreeing. And I'm not lecturing you or anyone for that matter. I'm just expressing my belief system. The core discussion of this thread is basically science v. spirituality.

Or are these simply questions that hadn't found the answer to or enough evidence for just yet? Instead of answering the question with 'BS' from the get-go, and then perhaps later revising our answer as evidence comes along(or perhaps not), why not just admit that we don't know either way yet?

I will say that I pretty much agree here, but for the sake of dispelling with ambiguity I will also say that to science the statement, "Plants consciously communicate with people in any way," is total BS. But the statement, "Plants might consciously communicate with people in some way," is not total BS. It's a far out idea that has little to no support at this point, but it is something that should one day be looked into.

I'd have to disagree here. In my experience, most completely dismiss the question of plant consciousness outright. Not all - some remain open minded about it - but most.

Defined in the most generic way, plants have some level of consciousness. They are conscious enough of their surroundings to be able to react appropriately (within their means) to changing conditions. No true scientist will disagree to this statement. Though, if you mean that plants have a consciousness that is comparable to humans, then no scientist will believe you at this point. And to state that plants act with conscious intent is BS at this point.

Now I bid you all adieu while I go drink a brew of acacia and syrian rue.

 

[Jees]

Something is no BS if it fits science?

Science is a way of understanding the world, not a mountain of facts...Science does not prove anything absolutely -- all scientific ideas are open to revision in the light of new evidence. The process of science, therefore, involves making educated guesses (hypotheses) that are then rigorously and repeatedly tested.

The empiric definition of science allows it to be BS itself, only but a fair attempt not to be so.
What else can be used for deciding BS or not?

 

[SKA]

The question "are DMT visions real, or just an illusion?" reminds me of a great
Zen Koan I once read that ends with a question that is pretty parallel to this question:

Yamaoka Tesshu, as a young student of Zen, visited one master after another. He called upon Dokuon of Shokoku.

Desiring to show his attainment, he said: "The mind, Buddha, and sentient beings, after all, do not exist. The true nature of phenomena is emptiness. There is no realization, no delusion, no sage, no mediocrity. There is no giving and nothing to be received."

Dokuon, who was smoking quietly, said nothing. Suddenly he whacked Yamaoka with his bamboo pipe. This made the youth quite angry.

"If nothing exists," inquired Dokuon, "where did this anger come from?"

In a similair way we can look at DMT visions. I smoalk DMT, get visions and get inspiration that I paint on a canvas.
If the DMT visions weren't real, where did the inspiration and the subsequent painting come from?

 

[Global]

I think a big part of this plant intelligence issue stems from the long-conditioned approach that we've grown accustomed to of behaviorism. This is to note that the behaviorism model has been demonstrated numerous times to not be a reliable way of examining the world. A behaviorist will deduce the way something thinks and feels by its behavior and the way it reacts to the environment. We tend to allot the mystical status of "sentience" or "intelligence" to those organisms whom most closely mimic our behavior. Since plant behavior is so far removed from our own, it's all too easy to assume that they don't have a conscious experience. If we dump the behaviorist outlook, then the waters become much more murky in the ways of declaring what plants think and feel.

To go on a slight tangent, we also tend to empathize with those that most closely mimic our own behavior. Dogs are easy to relate to. They have hair, skin, eyes, a face and "voice" that seem to convey emotion. They can respond to language, and share more similarities with us. We tend to feel we can empathize with them because we purport to know the kinds of things going on in their head (to some degree) because they behave similarly. On the other hand you have insects and lizards that don't look like us, and don't act like us which results in a noted lack of empathy allowing many more humans the ability to kill them off without doing harm to their consciences whereas killing a higher mammal would be a big no-no. I think there's a reason why everyone isn't up in arms or in tears when you have a show about killing gators. If it were about killing big cats, the show wouldn't make it past the second episode. I'm not condoning that kind of a show one way or another, but it's really easy to see how everyone gets hysterical when you see a hunter with a lion draped over his shoulder, but these are many of the same people who go fishing. This lack of empathy also leads to people being more apathetic about the chopping down of trees, destruction of grasses, and other plant-icidal tendencies.

 

[SKA]

Right on, Global!

It is for exactly this Reason I find many Vegetarians to be insufferable hypocrites.
They don´t eat meat, because "they don't want to have any part to the immense suffering
brought uppon the animals". I allways counter this argument asking "How can you be so sure
the plants you eat don't suffer equally when they are harvested/cut down and genetically mutilated?"


Then they always answer something along the lines of "Plants don't have complex nervous systems, like
us and other animals do so they don't feel pain" and that's just a self-absorbed, disempathic assumption.

It's just because plants are so very different from us human animals. These vegi-hypocrites can only feel compassion for other lifeforms if they can recognise THEMSELVES in them. They cannot recognise themselves in plants and thus they
feel no empathy towards plants.


Plants, when attacked by an army of lice for instance, give off pheromones; Chemicals with which they communicate to other plants "Predators! Prepare your defenses!" and to other insects "Lice are attacking me; Come help me get rid of them and have a free lice-meal!"

That defenitely goes to show plant consciousness must be more advanced and complex than is often believed.
The plants must feel pain when they get eaten. This pain let's them know they're under attack and need to do something about it, much the same way an infected wound hurts humans and the pain tells them to do something about the attacking bacteria. We then proceed to wash out the wound, treat it with anti-bacterial medicine and cover the wound up with a bandage untill it has healed.

Plants respond to pain by sending out pheremones to surrounding plants to go in defense mode and to nearby insect allies to come to their aid. So plants defenitely feel pain.


Allthough there is no definite proof, I certainly find it conceivable that plants have at least an equally complex consciousness as us humans, if not more complex. Just because scientists haven't proven it(AFAIK they've hardily properly studied it) doesn't mean this isn't possible.


So often, when on natural, plant-based psychedelics or when looking back on experiences with them I wonder:
Where did this change, this boost of consciousness come from? I have often felt it may be a union between the consciousness of the plant/fungi I consumed and my own. Who's perspectives are these different perspectives that I was shown in plant-based psychedelic experiences? Perhaps those perspectives are of the consciousness belonging to the plant you consumed?

It seems quite obvious, intuitively, that the "extra" consciousness experienced in a mushroom experience must come from the consciousness of the living being you consumed to produce that experience: The Mushrooms.
Where else could it have come from?

 

[mailorderdiety]

what if DMT, psychedelics, everything is all BS? Maybe they're just molecules that happen to fit into our brains in such a way as to stimulate the 'profundity' switch in our brains, and we're all just buying into what are essentially psychotic visions.

First

Second: Who are you to say what we have or have not "bought in" to?

There are no answers...only more questions. Imo, when it comes to psychedelics, the interesting question is not, "Is this experience 'real'..." whatever that means, but rather, "What can we do with this experience?"

thank you for this snoz... i'm totally digging this documentary

 

[hug46]

It is for exactly this Reason I find many Vegetarians to be insufferable hypocrites.
They don´t eat meat, because "they don't want to have any part to the immense suffering
brought uppon the animals". I allways counter this argument asking "How can you be so sure
the plants you eat don't suffer equally when they are harvested/cut down and genetically mutilated?"
Then they always answer something along the lines of "Plants don't have complex nervous systems, like
us and other animals do so they don't feel pain" and that's just a self-absorbed, disempathic assumption.

Yes goddamn those hypocritical veggies with their lack of empathy! I think, if a person wishes to become a vegetarian on moral grounds, they should walk the walk, go the whole hog and not eat anything at all.

 

[Entheogenerator]

Yes goddamn those hypocritical veggies with their lack of empathy! I think, if a person wishes to become a vegetarian on moral grounds, they should walk the walk, go the whole hog and not eat anything at all.

I second this. Those cruel planticidal hippies! Vegetarianism is murder!! :lol:

 

[sØrce]

I think it's all suggestibility.

However, suggestibility seems by nature to be profound and unlimited, and with ego loss/detachment seems to access the sub- or superconsciousness.

If you are saying consciousness without limits is bullshit or existence without a body is impossible, I'd have other questions for you.

Some folks say NDE (near-death experiences) are bs. However, the experience has been scientifically verified in a variety of ways (pictures placed high up on the tops of hospital cabinets, the names of deceased verified and no souls ever encountered in the great beyond that are currently living [like a dream could mussy up facts on us more easily- "JoeBob, you died? shoot." when JoeBob is alive and well... and lots of other neat stuff.) I encourage you to read "saved by the light" if you are interested.

I'd ask what you were before you were born. We cant exist in a state of non-existence. So we are nothing, and as nothing there'd be nothing to know.

We always exist (imo) body or not.

I really think DMT is magic. All drugs are pixie dust to this fella. Explain it all with science or serotonin receptors or whatever. It's perfect and beautiful and magical and true. Archetypal entities, mathematics, beauty, symbolism and truth.

I feel it is god consciousness touching our lives now, before we merge with the greater universal mind. It's whatever we need, whenever we needed it, and a great relief from mundanity. "like I died and went to heaven" but came back to feel the joy and relief that there's more, so much more and so much greater than this primal banal violent plane of a lack of love.

If this place is school then DMT is like when the lawnmower man plugs into the virtual learning machine on nootropics. DMT is the gifted class.

It's a gift and we are blessed. I think some of us have been chosen to know. Maybe we are just about done with this world. Perhaps this is the actual trip to heaven. Zen mind unfolding in its true beautiful way.

Or, complete bullshit.

I believe shit from a bull is antiseptic/sterile and can be applied to wounds to heal them. Don't quote me on it but I remember reading it. The hindus considered the cow sacred. Shoot, tryptamines grow off of cow plop.

And dmt degrades to psilocybin or some similar whoop de bloop. So yeah maybe DMT is nearly bullshit because it makes psilocybin.

Cows = sacred and cows = DMT in its ability to produce the psilocybin metabolite so therefore DMT is Sacred.

(if A=B and B=C then A=C)

DMT is a Sacrament =)

 

[primordium]

On a more personal note, Patricia Churchland used to be among my professional and intellectual heros. I took neuroscience classes based on her books and lectures. I even met her during a period when I had consumed a lot of her material, (which makes this all the more strange to me, thinking back on it all). But now I see her entire life's work as just plain wrong. I've seen enough to realize that my own understanding of the relations and mechanics of the universe and of consciousness is much, much further reaching than hers, and the thousands of other academics prevailing over consensus reality. These academics are the ultimate gate keepers to what trickles down to the layperson as common knowledge. It doesn't exist unless they say it exists. That's why I know it's all wrong, and why she is wrong. I have countless examples where I have had serious scientific questions, and have asked the researchers straight to their face about it, and seen the emotional response as words come out of their mouths. They're always scared or angry/annoyed when you ask them something they don't know. They are scared because they are afraid of what they don't know. It's denial, which is a memory game we play to avoid facing fear.

:thumb_up:

I used to be a card-carrying eliminative materialist. I denied propositional attitudes, played Dennettian philosophical games with people trying to define "consciousness," etc.

Of course, at some point, their epistemology reveals itself to be overreaching, an arrogant reduction of the ineffable, staggering Mystery.

Here's a quote from a book review that I especially like: "The search for firm foundations for knowledge is misguided, especially if it leads to attempts to resolve conflicts between different realms by pretending that one of them - mind or body, nature or culture, subjectivity or objectivity - is irrelevant. [Mary Midgley] sums it up rather nicely when pointing out Descartes' mistake in looking for a philosophical grounding as secure as Newton's gravity: 'What we need is not an ultimate floor at the bottom of the universe but simply a planet with a good strong pull that will keep us together and stop us falling off.'"

 

[primordium]

Ultimately, being on drugs--or having an altered state of consciousness--can reveal genuine, truth-apt propositions. Simply because one is not "sober" does not mean one cannot reach cognitive/personal/etc. insights.

For instance, the famed mathematician Paul Erdős would generate mathematical theorems while high on amphetamines. He even said he would just see blank pieces of paper before beforehand, but they were filled with ideas after ingesting his drugs. These were legitimate intuitions, facilitated by the drugs.

While he or anyone else is high or tripping, not all of their thoughts are fallacy-free and not all of their insights are genuine. However, that is inescapably true, whether people are sober or not.

When people are tripping, they think differently and see differently. That can hurt, but it can also help. Drugs can help you see more clearly. When you’re on MDMA, you might have the truest conversation you’ve ever had with your wife. When you’re on ayahuasca, you might have a sense of the world’s interconnectedness, a sense that is as tangible as when one feels the skin of an orange. Of course, when you’re on meth for seven days straight, you might think shadow people are chasing you. Discernment matters. Like always.

 

[PowerfulMedicine]

That defenitely goes to show plant consciousness must be more advanced and complex than is often believed.
The plants must feel pain when they get eaten. This pain let's them know they're under attack and need to do something about it, much the same way an infected wound hurts humans and the pain tells them to do something about the attacking bacteria. We then proceed to wash out the wound, treat it with anti-bacterial medicine and cover the wound up with a bandage untill it has healed.

Plants respond to pain by sending out pheremones to surrounding plants to go in defense mode and to nearby insect allies to come to their aid. So plants defenitely feel pain.

This doesn't prove anything. Pretend that someone creates a simple computer that squirts sulfuric acid and sends emails to ask for help from people when it is under attack by some physical force. By your logic, the computer must then be conscious and it must feel pain. The computer is sending out a distress signal and going into defense mode.

But it's ridiculous to think this. The computer is just doing what it's programmed to do. And it seems at this point that plants are just doing what their genes program them to do.

Another example is single celled organisms. Amoebas have defensive responses. And bacteria communicate through quorum sensing, the use of chemical signals that allow the bacterial community to act as a single unit. By your logic, individual single celled organisms are conscious and can feel pain.

But this is also ridiculous. Single celled organisms are too simple to be conscious in a physical way that is somehow comparable to human consciousness. There is no way that they feel pain either. There just is no mechanism inside their cells that could allow them to feel pain.

This brings me to your point that just because plants don't have a nervous system, it doesn't mean they don't feel pain. Well, in reality it does mean that. Let's look at humans. If you tweak our nervous system in the right way, you can completely block pain. Pain is an emotional response and emotions require a central nervous system. If plants could feel pain, then they would have to have something analogous to our nervous system, and you would be able to prevent their defensive responses by blocking this nervous system. Maybe one day someone will find some sort of nervous system in plants, but at this point it seems unlikely. Pain requires an amount of neural processing that plants just don't have.

Consciousness also requires some kind of central nervous system. A person with a living body but a dead brain will not be significantly conscious. Their body will still work and they may respond to a very limited set of stimuli, but they are not self conscious and cannot perform any intentional task. Consciousness in the physical realm must come from a physical source. If plants are conscious in the way that we are, then where does their consciousness come from?

When you’re on ayahuasca, you might have a sense of the world’s interconnectedness, a sense that is as tangible as when one feels the skin of an orange. Of course, when you’re on meth for seven days straight, you might think shadow people are chasing you. Discernment matters. Like always.

Why should we exercise discernment? How do you know that shadow people don't chase you if take meth for seven days straight? What makes the revelations/delusions of one drug more real than another? How do you know that meth doesn't open up a portal that allows evil entities to harass you? Those shadow people might seem as real as anything to a person seeing them.

Isn't it hypocritical to think that meth induced revelations are just BS if you think that ayahuasca revelations are "real"? The counterargument to this would be that the plants in ayahuasca are somehow highly conscious while methamphetamine isn't. But who decides this? If we are going to be throwing out scientific understanding for unsubstantiated beliefs, then why isn't meth conscious?

If plants are conscious why can't individual compounds be conscious? Where does this leave synthetic psychedelics like LSD, which can potentially reveal the same exact sorts of things as DMT? And to be fair, when you smoke purified DMT, you are smoking something that is arguably removed from the spirit of the plant that produced it, so is the plant really communicating with you and if not then what is?

I see this as an example of the rigidity of belief systems. People tend to hold on to their belief systems despite evidence to the contrary. Some people may want to believe that plants are conscious like they are, so the hallucinations caused by plant based drugs are somehow more real than the hallucinations caused by a meth binge because they can't conceive of consciousness in methamphetamine. This is a scientific claim. So people who subscribe to this belief system use science when they feel it benefits their arguments but reject it when it contradicts their beliefs.

 

[abusedtoaster]

Shadow people are probably real. I've had ones fly me around and show me through different scenarios. all in astral projection..

Validation for my belief in the realness of these situations was given to me at one point by a vocal reception of a creature who looked like little cat person. He told me that "Mobius" was running the show, and the voice this cat creature used stayed with me. I wondered about it; it stuck in my head and, the next day I Googled the name "Mobius" some how ended up watching Tron - a movie I had not seen yet. When I watched it I heard the voice of the cat-man in the character of Kevin Flynn.

I've had copious seemingly genuine vivid astral experiences, and I would say they have served their purposes; By this statement I reveal my belief in higher plan.

I do not necessarily believe there is always someone perceiving on the other end of the line so to speak when I deal with other entities, human or non human, but I accept situations I have moved through for what they are worth.

A change from baseline perception is fundamental for exaltation of spirit I think.

http://postimg.org/image/qwmafaghd/

 

[edge2054]

This doesn't prove anything. Pretend that someone creates a simple computer that squirts sulfuric acid and sends emails to ask for help from people when it is under attack by some physical force. By your logic, the computer must then be conscious and it must feel pain. The computer is sending out a distress signal and going into defense mode.

How are people different? We have inputs and outputs. That we can choose among outputs and predict to some degree the probability of success from a given action only shows that we're more complicated. That doesn't mean our programming isn't still programming.

Hello World is way less complicated than Windows but they're both programs.

 

[PowerfulMedicine]

^Edge2054, you're right. Human consciousness is a result of our genetic programming. It also might be that our consciousness is just an illusion and that we control none of our actions. It might be that our actions are all preprogrammed (and based on environment).

I accept this as a possibility.

The difference is that the computer and its programming are not conscious. As long as we assume that we have free will, it is undeniable that we are self conscious and can act with intent.

A simple computer can convince you that it is self aware or that it is acting with conscious intent, but that doesn't mean that it is. If you suddenly saw a computer display the sentence, "I am self aware", would you think that the computer is self aware? It becomes clear that their is no consciousness in it if you look deep enough. Just as it is possible to be convinced that a plant is self-conscious, even though it's actions are just a result of genetic programming.

 

[hug46]

If plants are conscious in the way that we are, then where does their consciousness come from?

I think the point that Global initially made was that plants maybe conscious in a completely alien way to how we view conciousness and does this necessarily detract from the validity of their feelings?

Isn't it hypocritical to think that meth induced revelations are just BS if you think that ayahuasca revelations are "real"?

Agreed. But i think that it is a survival mechanism to segregate BS induced from meth induced lack of sleep into a paranoid delusion over a positive piece of BS from a psychedelic experience that may contribute to well being in the material world.
There is good BS, bad BS and ugly BS.

Going back to plant intelligence i enjoyed watching the secret life of plants (especially the bit where the Japanese lady was trying to teach her cacti the alphabet). It maybe BS but it has reinforced my opinions on needless wholesale plant slaughter.

I am also going to buy a midi sprout when i have a few spare shekels.

 

[edge2054]

The difference is that the computer and its programming are not conscious. As long as we assume that we have free will, it is undeniable that we are self conscious and can act with intent.

The causality of human will is still an open question for philosophy.

A simple computer can convince you that it is self aware or that it is acting with conscious intent, but that doesn't mean that it is. If you suddenly saw a computer display the sentence, "I am self aware", would you think that the computer is self aware? It becomes clear that their is no consciousness in it if you look deep enough. Just as it is possible to be convinced that a plant is self-conscious, even though it's actions are just a result of genetic programming.

Again all of this can apply to human beings as well.

 

[--Shadow]

If plants are conscious in the way that we are, then where does their consciousness come from?

The problem is that we don't know exactly what consciousness is. We have the feeling of consciousness - that part of you that is looking out of your eyes and making conscious decisions etc. But if consciousness is a product of the brain, then it would seem that only other forms of life with a brain can be 'conscious in the way we are'.

This whole idea becomes really important to our society, even when the judicial laws are concerned. There are no laws for harming trees in an specific act of 'cruelty by causing suffering to the victim'. I'm not talking about laws against taking trees from national parks type of offence, but by the conscious intent to inflict suffering.

Could you imagine the chaos if it was manslaughter offence for accidentally (or even intentionally) killing a bug or a fly, or a plant that dies in your care

 

[PowerfulMedicine]

But if consciousness is a product of the brain, then it would seem that only other forms of life with a brain can be 'conscious in the way we are'.

When I say 'conscious in the way we are' I mean that they are self aware and that they can act and/or communicate intentionally. It's clear that plants don't have brains. So if they were conscious, it would have to be due to something else.

The causality of human will is still an open question for philosophy.

True again, but for the sake of this discussion it seems easiest to assume there is free will. At the very least, humans have the illusion of free will. So if you don't believe in free will then you can just insert "the illusion of" before "free will" or "intent".

If plants are conscious in the way that we are, then where does their consciousness come from?

I think the point that Global initially made was that plants maybe conscious in a completely alien way to how we view conciousness and does this necessarily detract from the validity of their feelings?

I think the point still stands that if they are conscious in the physical world, then their consciousness must come from a physical source. Even if plants are highly conscious by mechanisms completely unknown to us and completely unlike the mechanism that gives humans consciousness, it should still lead to the same results. They should be self-aware and be able to consciously communicate and consciously act in complex ways. The consequences of consciousness should be visible despite being unable to identify its source.

No one has ever been able to show that plants are self-aware or that they can do things intentionally. And there is no known way by which plants could be conscious. This may change one day but, with the knowledge we have now, the best explanation is that plants are not conscious.