Psychedelics' place in Virtual Reality

[phuckingnutz]

exactly^...http://www.iflscience.com/health-and-medicine/your-red-same-my-red

 

[Modelogy]

Currently the VR world is created and rendered by a computer. But as stated earlier, the whole world we see around has been rendered by our minds (as copy of the real-world), so why not make the mind render something different (which it actually does under dissociatives or lotta psychodelics)? It would be great to program our good old brain (the best computer in the world) to put us in VR we could never tell is not real. Or maybe we already did that?

 

[atara]

I'm pretty sure that psychedelics would interfere with your ability to use any current VR device. None of them -- Oculus Rift, Google Glass, etc -- are actually immersive enough to evade the constant perception that you're using a device, and I think that while tripping I wouldn't like that very much.

 

[vortech]

Lots of different perspectives here, lots of valid points in their own right. The essence of what I am positing is being touched upon, but let me hit the nail on the head for a moment and let's go from there.
What I am seeing on the horizon is a strong synergy between the ability of psychedelics to dissolve the inner world and the ability of VR technology to dissolve the outer world. Each componant by itself is unable to completely transport one's consciousness, but when used together there may be a new field of possibility.
As mentioned, VR technology can take over the senses but cannot disembody the ego. On the other hand, psychedelics can disembody the ego but not fully take over the senses. See what I'm getting at? Combined, we have the potential to essentially transport consciousness in a way we never have before.

 

[Vurtual]

Interesting idea, but some psychedelics can totally take over the senses, and most disrupt the sensory input enough that the influence of the VR could become incidental (like how much you notice the light show after you peak). However it could certainly be used to guide the experience strongly on the way up which could have a lot of potential (i can imagine wanting to rip off the goggles at the top though).

I think that future VR might actually be closer to the way psychedelics already work than computers/goggles - ways to manipulate our brain internally and tap into its vast processing power like psychedelics already do in a fairly chaotic way (as described above); maybe achieved through more advanced drug chemistry, engineered viruses producing neurotransmitters (as in 'fairyland') or external electromagnetic connection to neural circuitry (like tapping into the optic nerve); or maybe just refining exisiting ancient methods to access our internal computers (facilitated by technology or not) - this latter, being harder to achieve obviously doesn't work as 'commerce' and so won't be a 'thing'; but commerce-thinking may not be the only game in town in the future. Like DNA I'd like to hope that we could evolve socially (a social singularity (or revolution if you like)) so all this stuff 'we've' got really means something to the majority of humans - and if we do the potential of technology unshackled from commerce/capital could become a totally different thing.

 

[vortech]

I think that future VR might actually be closer to the way psychedelics already work than computers/goggles - ways to manipulate our brain internally and tap into its vast processing power like psychedelics already do in a fairly chaotic way (as described above); maybe achieved through more advanced drug chemistry, engineered viruses producing neurotransmitters (as in 'fairyland') or external electromagnetic connection to neural circuitry (like tapping into the optic nerve); or maybe just refining exisiting ancient methods to access our internal computers (facilitated by technology or not) - this latter, being harder to achieve obviously doesn't work as 'commerce' and so won't be a 'thing'; but commerce-thinking may not be the only game in town in the future. Like DNA I'd like to hope that we could evolve socially (a social singularity (or revolution if you like)) so all this stuff 'we've' got really means something to the majority of humans - and if we do the potential of technology unshackled from commerce/capital could become a totally different thing.

Great points all the way through, and you are right that psychs can take over the senses, mostly through amplifying the imagination, and also through sensory 'glitching', but there is still room for sensory input to guide the experience even in fairly hard trip states. Once biofeedback is implemented into VR (when computers can use information about what is going on in our brain/body) we can enable more meaningful relationships between VR sense data and the mind states induced by these drugs.

I also believe that is where technology is ultimately heading, towards a more complete mind-computer interface at the neural leval, whether by nanobot swarms in the brain, electromagnetic waves or some way else. It may be through a convergence of drugs and technology. Psy drugs are helping us learn about the way the brain and consciousness are formed which may lead to these technologies.

 

[Vurtual]

...I also believe that is where technology is ultimately heading, towards a more complete mind-computer interface at the neural leval, whether by nanobot swarms in the brain, electromagnetic waves or some way else. It may be through a convergence of drugs and technology. Psy drugs are helping us learn about the way the brain and consciousness are formed which may lead to these technologies.

It depends on how far you agree with the kurzweil-type ideas of technology increase; i see a high chance of the economic system breaking down before his predicitions could happen widely (not to mention peak oil or climate change). Also the gap there seems to be between the predicitons about machine/mind interface and our actual grasp of how the brain or consciousness works. Maybe the 'singularity' doesn't actually need technology particularly, except to connect up human brains - you could think of some of the new ideas growing under the influence of the internet as a potential singularity of sorts; or on a smaller scale, the new ideas that come out of the connections available in a city like ancient alexandria/london/new york.

I tend to think that we need a social evolution before we can really reach the full potential of technology - currently the choice of which innovations to pursue is skewed by profitability (as in planned obsolesence) or imperial strategy (eg military research). This is especially true if the true engine of innovation actually comes from connecting up more and more humans as equal nodes in a complex network (ie a more egalitarian system)

 

[transitionsynth]

Currently the VR world is created and rendered by a computer. But as stated earlier, the whole world we see around has been rendered by our minds (as copy of the real-world), so why not make the mind render something different (which it actually does under dissociatives or lotta psychodelics)? It would be great to program our good old brain (the best computer in the world) to put us in VR we could never tell is not real. Or maybe we already did that?

This is what I'm talking about--the brain is not a computer, doesn't do anything like a computer does. There is a specific notion of computation, it is not very well-defined except that we have a kind of equivalence class for it. Look at the Church-Turing thesis. Perception is not a computation.

Look up Moravec's paradox, and think about the implications of Godel's incompleteness theorems. Read some cognitive science and phenomenology of perception.

I'll give you another easy example:

“On a good day, the best human chessmaster can defeat the world’s best chess-‐playingcomputer. Not every time, but sometimes. The computer program is relentless; every second, it examinesupward of 200 million possible moves. Its makers incorporate sophisticated methods for evaluatingpositions, and they implement strategies gotten from grandmaster consultants. Arrayed against theseformidable techniques, it is surprising that any human can compete at all.
If, like the computer, humans played chess by searching through possible moves, pittinghuman versus computer would be pointless. Estimates of human search in chess suggest that even thebest players examine on the order of four possible move sequences, each about four plies deep (where aply is a pair of turns by the two sides). That estimate is per turn, not per second, and a single turn cantake many seconds. If the computer were limited to 10 s of search per turn, its advantage over thehuman would be about 1,999,999,984 moves searched per turn.
Given this disparity, how can the human even compete? The accomplishment suggests

information-‐processing abilities of remarkable power but mysterious nature. Whatever the human isdoing it is, at its best, roughly equivalent to [200 million] moves per second of raw search. It would notbe overstating to describe such abilities as ‘magical’” (Kellman and Massey 2013) http://cognitrn.psych.indiana.edu/rgoldsto/courses/cogscilearning/kellmanmassey.pdf

Even if "perception is reality," plugging into computational machines is an activity different in kind than basic perception, and the cognition will take account of that as you're playing the game.

 

[Vurtual]

This is what I'm talking about--the brain is not a computer, doesn't do anything like a computer does...

I believe that's arguable - there are ideas linking how the brain, cells, dna and even evolution work to cellular automata and describing natural systems as computation; described in melanie mitchell's 'Complexity a guided tour'. And here.

I agree that there seem to be orders of magnitude of understanding between our current computers and how biological systems like the brain operate, hence how we can make them good at chess (a finite linear problem) but not Go (or metaphors or poetry). I also agree that it seems difficult to imagine how the point of view which perceives your thoughts and still remains after 'ego-loss' can arise/emerge from 'programming', biological or otherwise; but accepting it doesn't may mean postulating some brain-as-receiver-of-consciousness idea which i find hard to accept in a chicken and egg way (but who knows - sorry for the waffle)

 

[Modelogy]

By the way, are there any videos that try to hypnotize you or put in special state? Like binaural stuff but hopefully better? On youtube or sth?
If there is such thing, it might be specially appliable for LSD trips. Some FullHD fractal maze or waves, all simply sensor food for thought inspiring mind to create even deeper stuff based on that. People watch leaves and grass and are overwhelmed, but video can be even reacher. Please anybody let know about these videos.

 

[Chickzterminator]

Imagine playing Far Cry in Ultra High Definition VR while on 200- 300 mg DXM.. I catch myself already beeing fully emmersed in games and movies while on robo, i guess that combination would be beyond awesome *shudders*

 

[vortech]

Yeah I eagerly await the future and want to get into 3D developing as soon as possible. I have already been developing a lot of ideas for VR 'rooms' in which the most amazing things can happen!

 

[Jesusgreen]

I'm glad someone else already brought up this idea. It's rare these days that I actually feel like tripping, and rather than diving in and out of the rabbit hole like I didn't know which one was mine I'm more of a few times a year tripper now, plus the Oculus is pretty expensive, so I don't know when I'll ever get around to trying this but it's definitely something on my wishlist.

I imagine Ketamine or another dissociative plus VR glasses would be more than a little mind-blowing considering how I can already readily reproduce the sensation of being inside a video game, tv show or film when on a dissociative without them.

As for regular psychedelics, I actually think it might be less exciting than you'd expect - I feel like watching films and engaging in video games on psychedelic trips takes away from the meaningfulness of the trip for me, rather than learning a valuable life lesson and putting something positive into action I'm just wasting away a few hours watching a wavy colourful version of the same story I could have watched sober. Even on a purely recreational trip (which is something I don't even really believe in, I think -every- psychedelic trip comes with a lesson, whether you want one or not) games and movies are ultimately quite distracting, especially ones that are already trippy in nature as you don't get to appreciate what the drug itself is doing fully when the media is already doing some of it for you.

That said, I think it could be put to use in psychedelic or empathogen based therapy, exploring for example a 3D representation of a childhood home built up from drawings/photographs/or a digital reconstruction - or exploring a tranquil digital garden with a voice guide who would talk with the person while they walked and admired the sights and used the visual and sensory stimuli as a basis for allowing the patient to relax and feel comfortable with the therapy. It's the kind of thing that it would be perfectly suited to, since you really need someone sitting with you and keeping you from getting overwhelmed or falling over/losing balance when you're wearing a VR headset when tripping, and when tripping with a partner it's always good to let out your feelings and thoughts and do some healing.

 

[weadazoid]

maybe I am old school but the idea of being on a psychedelic and putting that thing on my head seems like a ginormous waste of time. I never understood people who thought playing video game whilst tripping or trying to watch an entire movie while tripping was any real good kind of use of a trip.

Don't get me wrong, I have been at a house party or two and I can remember being very fascinated by the classic Anime Neo Tokyo especially considering there was no sound on and techno was being played loudly by the DJ. It captivated me, but only for a few moments. Other highlights were a Raw is War prematch promo by the Rock that seemed hilarious back when he was coming up as a heel, that drew me into pro wrestling briefly

Trying to concentrate on something as meaningless as the world within the Rift seems pointless. two friends of mine thought it would be an awesome idea to drop LSD and go see Jurrasic Park. They dropped right as they got into the theater. They made it to the first T - Rex chase and then Bailed, mainly because that shit got way to loud.!. According to both of them.

They had more fun smoking a joint in field that night then sitting and trying to concentrate on the pointless world created by SFX.

 

[vortech]

Fair points weadazoid, and I basically agree with you- I was never compelled to play video games or even watch the vast majoroty of movies while tripping (although there are a few exceptions you can see from the 'movies on dissociatives' thread).

But I'm not talking about playing conventional video games on the rift. I'm thinking of something else entirely. Once the brain is tricked into thinking it actually is somewhere else (which appears to be possible on the newest rift prototype) then the device has real value and potential for altered states of consciousness, especially those that open up the senses and the mind to really soak in the moment and be open to the possibilities to grow with the experience. That's when it becomes a serious tool for learning, healing and connecting with the world and oneself in powerful ways. The idea is far from *most* conventional video games.

 

[weadazoid]

Interesting point Vortech, I suppose many would see a sensory deprivation tank in the same light, within an oldschool potentially therapeutic light when thinking about psychedelic therapy. To the average tripper the idea of floating around in water in a closed off tube may sound like a terrible idea, to me it still kind of does. As does the idea of confining a trip to the rift..... to each his own.

 

[Xorkoth]

I floated in a sensory deprivation tank pretty recently, for 2 hours... I did smoke weed beforehand, but it was really, really intense in there... I am kind of scared to try it with a psychedelic.