What causes LSDs visual effects

[PsychaStevic]

While tripping under the stars last night i got to thinking whilst watching the clouds and stars dance in sync to shpongle around the full moon, what's the actual science behind LSDs visual effects, why do we see geometry, breathing walls, magnified spots in our vision, or even hieroglyphs on higher doses? Anyone know the actual science behind this?

 

[mr peabody]

There are chemicals in the brain that help transmit and modulate information. This happens by the chemicals binding to a site, similar to a lock and key, where the key (neurotransmitter) unlocks a lock (receptor) and this lets the brain know that certain information was exchanged. This information typically releases something known as an action potential, or essentially an electrical signal - basically it lets another part of the brain know that this part of the brain was 'activated'.

LSD has a structure that is very similar to a few neurotransmitters that are naturally produced. The key it is most similar to is a neurotransmitter known as serotonin. Serotonin is used to modulate and signal a variety of things in the brain. Visual processing (or what you see) utilizes a lot of serotonin. Almost all of the senses have some serotonin input as well. Emotional processing (sad, happy, excited, etc.) is also heavily serotonin influenced.

LSD is even better at activating serotonin receptors than serotonin itself, so it essentially increases the normal levels of signaling by serotonin (it does this through a variety of mechanisms,
not just limited to better binding - it actually releases extra serotonin, changes the lock to accept keys more readily, etc.). In a lot of ways its like turning up the volume on quiet music. Not only are the already audible pieces more audible, but things you previously could not hear are now audible (whispers you might have missed, or background noise might now become audible).

Because it increases the signal, it also increases the signal noise (like turning up the volume on a microphone very high, you sometimes get feedback, or that annoying high pitched noise). In addition, if you have the volume extremely high, you may not be able to differentiate between the louder sounds very well. On LSD, this results in hallucinations - hearing, seeing, touching, tasting, etc. things that are not actually there.

In addition, through a relatively unknown mechanism, LSD increases 'cross-talk' between areas of the brain. That is to say, it helps stimulate areas of the brain that don't normally talk to each other, to start talking to each other. Over the long term, it can even help create connections that previously didn't exist - much like putting up extra telephone or internet lines. This increased cross-talk while under the influence of LSD (combined with the increased sensory input) often results in something known as synesthesia, or a mixing of the senses. What this means is that people might experience a sense across multiple senses - they might see sound, taste colors, or feel smells.

-Gaywallet

When ingested into the human body, LSD acts as 5-HT (Serotonin) autoreceptor inhibitor, thus it is a 5-HT agonist, meaning that LSD activates serotonin receptors.

LSD increases the level of active 5-HT molecules by disaffecting their autoreceptors (a safeguard type feature in the brain which reduces levels of certain neurotransmitter sand the like).

There are 15 different serotonin receptors, but LSD specifically activates the 2A subtype (5-HT2A). The HT2A receptor is involved in cognitive processes in the prefrontal cortex.

And this is an important point, for this is where many of LSD’s benefits come from: its involvement in the prefrontal cortex.

The prefrontal cortex is thought to be active in planning complex cognitive behavior, personality expression, decision-making, and moderating social behavior.

It also plays a key role in a human’s ability to process information from all other brain systems, and make goal-directed decisions as a result.

https://thethirdwave.co/lsd-effects-on-the-brain

 

[PsychaStevic]

So basically our brain is pre wired for these experiences

 

[pupnik]

1. Some of the effects like the dancing stars around the moon are in the category of Dream State Synthesis which happens only with higher dosing. The most astonishing ones to me are when you are very stoned, and you turn around deliberately and it seems like you can still see behind you as well as what you are now facing, even to the point of seeing 360 degrees instead of just a narrow cone in front.
2. While some geometric visions require the full dream synthesis ability, at medium dosing, wall paper effects often called polyopia, which has repetition often at a regular spacing - like geometry, and pareidolia which may be regularly spaced interval visions, or in which visual cues at any spacing all become eyes, faces, animals or hands.
3. At Lighter dosages visual effects like stars or feathery mandalas around lights will occur and these are partly due to pupil dilation while otherwise they seem to be produced by visual processes similar to diffraction and interference. The more stoned the more detailed the mandalas or feathers of light and rainbow will be.

for #1 to work - to seem to see behind you after you have turned - persistence of visual experience is at hand, essentially a large block of experience fades more slowly even as new experience is happening, and they superimpose and mesh into a new reality that is more incredible than 3-d.

for #2 to work - the same mechanism is at play - persistence with regular interval - elements in a progression persist (like tracers) and rows of elements persist and propagate following a body gesture (like scanning the ceiling looking at hieroglyphics) or idea like geometric progression or alex grey paintings or chackra visualizations.

for #3 to work - diffraction grating type mandala's around points of light, we can easily imagine that interference of energy fields in the visual cortex are producing the effects, this also is supported by longer duration pulse trains from each individual rod or cone.

over all, the effect in consciousness is that sensory input (and ideas) are still mixing in the brain as usual, but each signal is lasting a bit longer (duration persisting by dose effects).

the kinds of chemical changes that we note from psychedelics are synaptic serotonin receptor facilitation which could easily support extended neurotransmitter response, or longer signal pulse trains for each affected group of neurons.

I think that this ties back nicely to the three descriptions I have listed above.

 

[PsychaStevic]

1. Some of the effects like the dancing stars around the moon are in the category of Dream State Synthesis which happens only with higher dosing. The most astonishing ones to me are when you are very stoned, and you turn around deliberately and it seems like you can still see behind you as well as what you are now facing, even to the point of seeing 360 degrees instead of just a narrow cone in front.
2. While some geometric visions require the full dream synthesis ability, at medium dosing, wall paper effects often called polyopia, which has repetition often at a regular spacing - like geometry, and pareidolia which may be regularly spaced interval visions, or in which visual cues at any spacing all become eyes, faces, animals or hands.
3. At Lighter dosages visual effects like stars or feathery mandalas around lights will occur and these are partly due to pupil dilation while otherwise they seem to be produced by visual processes similar to diffraction and interference. The more stoned the more detailed the mandalas or feathers of light and rainbow will be.

for #1 to work - to seem to see behind you after you have turned - persistence of visual experience is at hand, essentially a large block of experience fades more slowly even as new experience is happening, and they superimpose and mesh into a new reality that is more incredible than 3-d.

for #2 to work - the same mechanism is at play - persistence with regular interval - elements in a progression persist (like tracers) and rows of elements persist and propagate following a body gesture (like scanning the ceiling looking at hieroglyphics) or idea like geometric progression or alex grey paintings or chackra visualizations.

for #3 to work - diffraction grating type mandala's around points of light, we can easily imagine that interference of energy fields in the visual cortex are producing the effects, this also is supported by longer duration pulse trains from each individual rod or cone.

over all, the effect in consciousness is that sensory input (and ideas) are still mixing in the brain as usual, but each signal is lasting a bit longer (duration persisting by dose effects).

the kinds of chemical changes that we note from psychedelics are synaptic serotonin receptor facilitation which could easily support extended neurotransmitter response, or longer signal pulse trains for each affected group of neurons.

I think that this ties back nicely to the three descriptions I have listed above.

Well said, not that Mr Peabody's wasn't, this pretty much summed up what i wanted to know about it. Strange how Lucy activates sertonin receptors more than serotonin itself. Can't quite wrap my head around that one yet

 

[pupnik]

normally you would not imagine that a person will have to wait 3 to 7 days for serotonin tolerance to fade from serotonin, because the action is not the same

lsd does not just activate receptors - it overdrives just a few million of them. which are enough to do the trick.

After that the tolerance period is about adequately regenerating the synaptic receptors that the lsd locked up.

I'm speculating

 

[LandsUnknown]

According to science, it's the agonism of the 5-HT-2A receptor and other 5-HT receptors (e.g. serotonin receptors) in the brain. I personally am inclined to believe that the psychedelic experience has to do with the brain tuning into a higher dimension of some kind or perhaps even the spirit world. Somehow, the action of the drug causes the brain to become aware of these higher dimensions.

 

[Hodor]

So basically our brain is pre wired for these experiences

Our brain is wired to process information.
Our senses constantly receive massive amounts of data, but there is only so much that can be handled by our conscious mind at once. So redundant information has to be filtered out, patterns have to be identified, novel sensations have to be analyzed, information critical to our survival has to be prioritized (there is a quality called "salience" which describes how much an object stands out from the environment, and thus how likely it is to catch our conscious attention)...
Drugs can interfere with these mechanisms, and thus fundamentally alter the way we perceive the world when we're on them.

That is, of course, something of an oversimplification (others in this thread have already posted more detailed descriptions of the actual neural effects), but I just wanted to stress that it is very unlikely that whatever supernatural identity you believe in deliberately engineered our brains in such a way that we could communicate with them using psychedelics (if that is what you're implying).

 

[stoned.crazy]

Our brain is wired to process information.
Our senses constantly receive massive amounts of data, but there is only so much that can be handled by our conscious mind at once. So redundant information has to be filtered out, patterns have to be identified, novel sensations have to be analyzed, information critical to our survival has to be prioritized (there is a quality called "salience" which describes how much an object stands out from the environment, and thus how likely it is to catch our conscious attention)...
Drugs can interfere with these mechanisms, and thus fundamentally alter the way we perceive the world when we're on them.

That is, of course, something of an oversimplification (others in this thread have already posted more detailed descriptions of the actual neural effects), but I just wanted to stress that it is very unlikely that whatever supernatural identity you believe in deliberately engineered our brains in such a way that we could communicate with them using psychedelics (if that is what you're implying).

I wouldn't be so sure about that last part. I'd argue that that exact process is ultimately what's going on. It's completely natural though, not supernatural, but that doesn't change the process.

Psychedelics allow communication with parts of our own minds that are normally cut off from each other. No "supernatural identity" needed besides ourselves. But the process that causes that cross communication seems to just be a twist on how our brains normally communicate.

Like you said, we normally block out information deemed irrelevant. While on psychedelics we perceive information that we normally block out.

So it's kind of like removing all the walls in a house. Once the partitions are gone, you can see into every room in the house versus just whatever individual room you happen to be in. So they can allow us to perceive input from portions of our minds that we can't typically access. Thus we communicate relatively new information between portions of our own minds.

I know this thread is more centered on the technical, step by step process, but depending on how you view the process, both interpretations could be considered valid.

The chemistry of our minds alter our perceptions of reality, which cause us to interpret the world differently, which leads us to draw different conclusions, which alters the chemistry and form of our minds. So that is technically new information being communicated, spured on by psychedelics, just through a relay process that begins and ends with us. The alpha and the omega

 

[DrugOmen]

Someone attempted to answer about the process of why we see hieroglyfics but they just mentioned seeing them on external things. I wonder why I've seen them on high dose DOB trips but they were coming from within me.

 

[pupnik]

We do know that association is how the mind works: stuff that is similar gets linked, and stuff that happened together gets linked.
Later, what matches in our sensorium triggers recollection of memory by similarity.

We actually block out or avoid fewer things than imagined - blocking out is a distinct effort - like running behind a wall.

It is more likely that while we are engaged in habits (and are focused on specific details that affect the progress of our habitual activities), we miss paying attention other things that are happening.
This is not avoiding or blocking, but it does interfere with some aspects of experience getting center stage. Getting center stage is special. Not getting it does not mean we are blocking, it just means we are already busy.

The main business of the brain is association - even complex processing is achieved by linking bits and pieces conditionally in some sequence or progression then pulling in lateral issues from situations we recall from the trigger.

Aldous Huxley when alluding to opening the doors of perception, convincingly explains that psychedelics remove "filters" - Personally I think all that stuff is habit, filters and blocks are not realistic ways to describe what our daily consciousness is doing.

When stoned however, we are not so busy making connections, things are a bit strange, so the usual chain of connections fails, things match up less strongly, other stuff begins to get center stage attention in our minds because the habit is interrupted.

The end result is the same, I am just saying that there is no drug induced brain apparatus to turn off filtering or blocking out of experience (except the reticular formation that blocks off much of body sensation and random muscle activity during sleep in the brain stem (before reaching the brain but that is more about going to sleep than tripping)); but we do have an entire brain that is highly developed for association of like mental forms with like, and recalling what happens together in the similar situation, and what happened last time in series (i.e. linking fading moments to arising ones for the story line effect)

In summary, psychedelic does not remove filters, but you can say that doors of perception do open as a result of habits being disrupted and random things getting center stage in mind. The unfamiliar is the real door opener. Habits just don't latch well to unfamiliar cues. (except in the case of fear of the unknown, if you are inclined to that you have plenty opportunity)

 

[Xorkoth]

^^ Great post, thought-provoking. I have always thought that psychedelics help me to remember how to be childlike. To reach that state where all input is acknowledged and pondered, rather than discarded as "ordinary".

 

[pupnik]

i guess part of being like a child, is having fewer knee-jerk responses: like cynicism, judgement, lust, greed...
our habits are still there just not triggered amidst euphoria and strangeness that alter what would otherwise be cues for knee-jerking

 

[stoned.crazy]

So than they do remove/alter our normal filtering process. Metaphorically of course. Not trying to argue semantics because I always enjoy your perspective pupnik, but it seems like you're saying two different things. That psychedelics don't remove filters but they synchronize your thoughts into new patterns. New thought patterns means a break from the normal. So normal habitual thoughts are pushed to the side and a new set takes over. Sounds like a change in our perceptual 'filters' to me.