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Knight
 
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Coops (2/6/2008)
the mixed message i saw with cannabis came from the other angle - they declassified it, rather than decriminalised it. Sort of a "You can do it, but its still illegal, and we will still arrest you but we wont bother to chase you in helicopters about it".
It was a decriminalisation, that left the production and market control in the hands of the criminals while telling the consumers it was (vaguely) permitted.
The police no longer have to arrest you for it as far as I was aware. It all depands on the situation, where you are smoking and how much you have on you.
___________________________________________
"We broke the law. We betrayed the code!"
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I do talk a good fight
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That's up to you. 
I've tried most means of consciousness alteration at some point during my life -- dance, chant, exhaustion, song, music, intense exercise, sleep deprivation, tantric sex, deliberate abstinence from sex, ritual magick, religious devotion, meditation, sensory deprivation, sensory overload, fasting, etc. They all work -- religions round the world have been using them for thousands of years -- but none of them work as fast as certain drugs do, and almost all of them can be enhanced when done using drugs as well. (I do not condone or condemn the use of drugs, dancing, abstinence from sex, or any other means of consciousness alteration, mind.)
The brain is a self-patterning system because the thoughts we have, have the capability to alter the physical structure of the brain. Every thought we have DOES alter the physical structure of the brain, by an infinitesimal amount. It's possible to use that fact to deliberately alter the brain for the better -- to get rid of bad habits, for example, or establish good ones. There's a stack of science behind the principle, though most mainstream scientists would advocate more gentle methods of consciousness alteration than the ones I've listed above.
http://www.hyboriantales.com
PD: Ghostdance ("The most irritating curse I've ever encountered" -- NPC played by H.)
Riftworld: Rossar Kuug ("Clearly mad, because he thinks he's a Com-Trow Skirmisher" - Aela)
Hyborian Tales: Crew, cook, dogsbody, general labourer, toilet cleaner ("Dangerously overoptimistic ref" -- Tom Nowell)
Otherwise usually crew ("Quite spry & fit, & willing to wear a big costume & run around a lot" -- various event organisers)
"My other oversized foam weapon is THE LORD" -- Questionable Content
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Wag
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Ian Sturrock (2/8/2008)
There's a stack of science behind the principle, though most mainstream scientists would advocate more gentle methods of consciousness alteration than the ones I've listed above.
There isn't if you're defining "the self" as something which trancends the material (but somehow operates on it) - that would be definitively pseudoscience.
Marios
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Wag
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Ian Sturrock (2/8/2008)
I've tried most means of consciousness alteration at some point during my life -- dance, chant, exhaustion, song, music, intense exercise, sleep deprivation, tantric sex, deliberate abstinence from sex, ritual magick, religious devotion, meditation, sensory deprivation, sensory overload, fasting, etc. They all work -- religions round the world have been using them for thousands of years -- but none of them work as fast as certain drugs do, and almost all of them can be enhanced when done using drugs as well. (I do not condone or condemn the use of drugs, dancing, abstinence from sex, or any other means of consciousness alteration, mind.)
I suspect a very heavy blow to the head with a blunt object is a faster way than drugs to alter your consciousness, although I accept, it's probably the most dangerous.
I have a feeling that what you are describing as a state of altered consciousness is what I would call a malfunction. The brain is a pretty sensitive piece of kit and it is fairly easy to send it haywire if you push the right buttons. I've never quite understood the fascination with the brain in a haywire state, it's no more biologically significant than the kidneys in a haywire state as far as I can see, but I appreciate it must feel pretty weird if it's your brain that is broken and there is no doubt that primitive people have often assumed some enormous cosmic significance to the experience of having your brain malfunction.
The brain is a self-patterning system because the thoughts we have, have the capability to alter the physical structure of the brain. Every thought we have DOES alter the physical structure of the brain, by an infinitesimal amount.
Is this significantly different to the fact that a body builder's activity causes his "self-patterning" muscle system to respond to his activities by bulking up? That to can be enhanced with drugs and the right diet of course.
It's possible to use that fact to deliberately alter the brain for the better -- to get rid of bad habits, for example, or establish good ones. There's a stack of science behind the principle, though most mainstream scientists would advocate more gentle methods of consciousness alteration than the ones I've listed above.
That sounds quite dodgy to me. I think it's well established that brain activity, especially at particularly receptive times, changes the connections in your brain. But the implication that you can direct the process of "self-patterning" to alter your own personality sounds like you're inflating a very simple idea into something much bigger than it really is. You certainly can't consciously direct the brain alteration process, it's a response as automatic and uncontrolled as muscle development after exercise. The brain is no more under our control biologically than the soft tissue of our kidneys.
The brain thinks, that's essentially it's purpose. By thinking in certain ways you can get rid of bad habits or establish good ones. That's undeniable, we have New Year's Resolutions for a reason.
But the word "self-patterning" and the way you describe the phenomena contains the elusive implication that somehow, by understanding or even controlling the process of neural connections in the brain you can control that directly to produce a direct change to the personality. The only scientific way I know to do exactly that is very crude and largely discredited (at least as a medical technique) - it's called a lobotomy. And I wouldn't recommend that to anyone unless you're a goblin, in which it's good for ya.
I'll shut up now, before I derail another thread.
History is an important source for LRP. Along with other works of fiction.
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I do talk a good fight
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Marios -- I'm not, obviously.
http://www.hyboriantales.com
PD: Ghostdance ("The most irritating curse I've ever encountered" -- NPC played by H.)
Riftworld: Rossar Kuug ("Clearly mad, because he thinks he's a Com-Trow Skirmisher" - Aela)
Hyborian Tales: Crew, cook, dogsbody, general labourer, toilet cleaner ("Dangerously overoptimistic ref" -- Tom Nowell)
Otherwise usually crew ("Quite spry & fit, & willing to wear a big costume & run around a lot" -- various event organisers)
"My other oversized foam weapon is THE LORD" -- Questionable Content
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I do talk a good fight
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Matt Pennington (2/8/2008)
I have a feeling that what you are describing as a state of altered consciousness is what I would call a malfunction. The brain is a pretty sensitive piece of kit and it is fairly easy to send it haywire if you push the right buttons. I've never quite understood the fascination with the brain in a haywire state, it's no more biologically significant than the kidneys in a haywire state as far as I can see, but I appreciate it must feel pretty weird if it's your brain that is broken and there is no doubt that primitive people have often assumed some enormous cosmic significance to the experience of having your brain malfunction.
Malfunction? You think? What about the body of evidence that suggests there are benefits to religion -- specifically, increased happiness, physical health, and longevity -- and that the most likely reasons for those benefits are the endorphins released by most of the aforementioned consciousness-altering activities, combined with the fact that those activities take place in the context of a community? Sounds pretty functional to me.
Is this significantly different to the fact that a body builder's activity causes his "self-patterning" muscle system to respond to his activities by bulking up? That to can be enhanced with drugs and the right diet of course.
Probably not, no -- that's not a bad analogy, except that personally I'd prefer functional brain fitness along with functional body fitness (i.e. not bodybuilding, because bodybuilding is just about looking good, for one especially unusual value of "looking good" that is not shared by most of the population, including me -- I prefer to be able to deadlift twice my bodyweight than to have 15" biceps or something silly like that).
That sounds quite dodgy to me. I think it's well established that brain activity, especially at particularly receptive times, changes the connections in your brain. But the implication that you can direct the process of "self-patterning" to alter your own personality sounds like you're inflating a very simple idea into something much bigger than it really is. You certainly can't consciously direct the brain alteration process, it's a response as automatic and uncontrolled as muscle development after exercise. The brain is no more under our control biologically than the soft tissue of our kidneys.
You can consciously direct the muscle development process by using evidence-based fitness methods & dietary practises. For me, that's the Crossfit.com workout of the day, and the Zone diet, both of which have given me demonstrably massively greater & more varied fitness gains than any other fitness & dietary programme that I've ever tried, particularly given the relatively small amount of exercise time involved. Of course, it draws on stacks of earlier sports science research, including Dr Tabata's work -- if you want to increase aerobic and anaerobic fitness but don't have any interest in training more than once a week, than Tabata squats for 4 minutes once a week will give you the best "bang for the buck" (as well as leaving you gasping on the floor the first time you try them, like some drugs, I expect).
So -- yeah -- slight tangent aside, by employing my brain to follow the fitness programme that has been proven to be the most effective, I absolutely CAN consciously direct my muscle development to give me the body I want. I just have to consciously direct my body to do the exercises and eat the food that will have those effects.
Likewise with the brain -- I'm talking about performing specific actions and/or deliberately causing specific thoughts & feelings to arise (which a good book, stage play, or whatever can also do, of course -- in that case, though, one is allowing a fair amount of control over the changes to pass to the writer, director, etc.) so as to take conscious control over the brain's development.
I'm not talking about sitting around thinking to oneself "Must get cleverer and happier and more focused, today", if that is one's intent, but of performing the practises that demonstrably create such effects.
Here's an example from the science of happiness -- the 4th recommendation, which is basically daily, conscious, thankfulness, has been proven to significantly reduce depression. It's not dissimilar to certain Buddhist practises, I believe:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/saturday/story/0,,2232986,00.html
With a little more mystical mumbo-jumbo (which, of course, works for patterning the brain -- that's what all the trappings of ritual magick are for, to get the brain more easily into a relevant mood, hence red robes, much waving of swords and clashing of spears, appropriate music, and spicy incense for a ritual to Mars -- it's all stage props, really, to help with one's suspension of disbelief and maintain the mood), here's a ritual designed for self-patterning the brain:
http://www.hermetic.com/heidrick/mq/20.html
The daily, conscious repetition of any ritual or practise will affect the brain. Robert Anton Wilson is probably the best writer to check out on this subject, if you want to look at it from an entirely irreligious perspective (but one that is willing to learn from the established practises of magick & religion, as well as from those of science). Edward de Bono has an even more secular perspective, and one widely accepted outside of the leftfield -- so far as I know, de Bono is the guy who came up with the phrase "the brain is a self-patterning system", though the science clearly supports that perspective (he goes into some detail about the science in "Teach Your Child How To Think", an awesome book for anyone interested in brain exercise & development).
http://www.hyboriantales.com
PD: Ghostdance ("The most irritating curse I've ever encountered" -- NPC played by H.)
Riftworld: Rossar Kuug ("Clearly mad, because he thinks he's a Com-Trow Skirmisher" - Aela)
Hyborian Tales: Crew, cook, dogsbody, general labourer, toilet cleaner ("Dangerously overoptimistic ref" -- Tom Nowell)
Otherwise usually crew ("Quite spry & fit, & willing to wear a big costume & run around a lot" -- various event organisers)
"My other oversized foam weapon is THE LORD" -- Questionable Content
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Wag
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Ian Sturrock (2/8/2008)
Marios -- I'm not, obviously.
It's off topic and unlikely to be resolved quickly, but what you're saying seems to assume dualism. If you're a materialist you can take one of two viewpoints (i) we can view the brain as a physical system and consider specifically what's happening where _or_ (ii) we can take the intentional stance and view it as embodying - via whatever mechanisms - a responsive agent. It's not a brain-specific thing - it applies to analysis of any system (e.g. genes are _either_ specific collections of amino acids _or_ they are patterns of amino acids that can be viewed as responsive agents optimising their relative fecundity).
What you can't do is try to hold both viewpoints at the same time if you're a materialist because you end up with immaterial concepts like a Cartesian theatre (where _we_ are receiving information which we can then use to decide how to alter 'the brain').
"It's possible to use that fact to deliberately alter the brain for the better -- to get rid of bad habits, for example, or establish good ones."
I think the keyword here is deliberately. Systems don't 'deliberately' evolve (if you're a materialist) because there's nothing external to the system to deliberate. If you're taking the (not unreasonable position) that 'good'/'bad' habits are conditioned - then why isn't the decision to alter/not alter these habits also a matter of conditioning? This sounds very much like the targeted gmail ads I get exhorting me to pray to improve my memes.
If you're taking the weaker position of orthopraxis "Do some stuff, you'll feel better" then it might be true, but it's a fairly packed market and research to date isn't at all conclusive beyond "people who do 'things' sometimes feel 'better' - sometimes they even have slightly improved health - although it's hard to separate that from the vast number of confounding factors/statistical noise". Mostly it seems to boil down to "get out more".
Marios
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