[Debate] What is ego-death?

[Ismene]

I don't really see human beings as that complex - they're an african ape. When they take drugs certain things happen in their brains. If we gave a chimpanzee LSD would we consider he was having an "ego-death" or simply reacting to a drug?

you ever tried DMT?

I've had a little DMT yeah.

anyone who thinks there's no such thing as ego-death have never gone deep enough to experience it, full-stop

Perhaps it's simply that some people can handle their high better than others? Some people take acid and then go jump off a building, does that mean they experienced acid deeper than anyone else? Or is it that they couldn't handle their high?

 

[Beavesmx44]

I don't really see human beings as that complex - they're an african ape. When they take drugs certain things happen in their brains. If we gave a chimpanzee LSD would we consider he was having an "ego-death" or simply reacting to a drug? Agreed but humans are capable of thoughts that expand past that of other animals. Do animals have a concept of self?

Perhaps it's simply that some people can handle their high better than others? Some people take acid and then go jump off a building, does that mean they experienced acid deeper than anyone else? Or is it that they couldn't handle their high?This example is just that( not handling the high) but what does it have to do with ego death?

aaqa

 

[lovepsychadelics]

Purely from a psychological point of view the concept of the "ego" is dead and buried along with Freud and his infatuation with fucking his mum. Read the DSM V and tell me if the concept of the "ego" is still a valid one in terms of Freud's theory. Consciousness = ego? What about the super ego? Hysteria? Well we all know women are hysterical due to them having a womb and therefore we must remove the womb to cure hysteria. The term "ego" as Freud applied it has been dropped from psychiatry like a hot stone. So ego death = death of consciousness? So we pass out?

I'll accept dissociative identity disorder before I accept some completely bullshit theory cooked up to make taking a drug seem more mystical and divine. A drug is a drug, a medicine is a drug and drugs are medicine. Subjective experience is what people are trying to define and if some twat 40 years ago read Freud and thought: "Oh man I get it... LSD is making me experience death of ego... my sense of self and awareness. The universe and I are one. I need a credible scientific sounding term for what I have experienced. Yeah ego death!!" well good shit. Lets all transfer our metaphysical beings to the multiverse and commune with the archytypal beings and sentient alien entities via telepathy.

Ok so using a term coined by Freud who appart from being completely discredited is the founder of psychotherapy simply because no one before him had tried to analyse the human mind in such a fashion. According to Freud basically we all want to fuck our mums and dads and he transferred his own psychological issues onto his patients and convinced them he was helping them. Mostly rich women who he then slept with. Let's not forget that hysteria is caused by a woman's womb and all women are hysterical... yeah right Freud. Freud also really liked cocaine until his mate OD'd. By that stage he was screwed anyway as he had developed oral cancer and had to take cocaine to numb the pain as it was one of the only anesthetic substances available during that time period. SO basing "ego death" on the writings of some trippers in the 60's and 70's which in turn were based on the works of... well a madman. Gold.

Notice the Indigenous peoples who utilize psychedelic substances do not talk of such crap. They use the substances to commune with spirits of the plants and animals in the world around them and induce shamanic visions in order to better understand the cycles of the seasons or where to hunt for a particular animal or what plant to use to help cure toothache for example. Psychedelics open awareness to stimuli and sensory perception that we normally subconsciously block out as our brains can only cope with x amount of stimulus at any one time, particularly visual. So "ego death" or sensory awareness/overload? Make your own call because I do not need to justify something that I know is pure fiction. Psychedelic overdose? Sure. Ego death I call bullshit. Again my opinion and like I've been told many times before opinions are like ass holes we all have one.

The use of the word I is central to the subjective rather than objective experience. I perceived x therefore it must be so. Maybe you perceived something you lacked capacity to relate to or understand so grasped onto some semi intellectual concept to justify your experience. An objective experience could have scientific methodology applied as the event/experience could be reproduced in a number of individuals and quantified data collected that would prove beyond dispute that experience x was valid. This is not the case. You are experiencing a uniquely individual subjective moment whilst intoxicated on a psychedelic substance. If anything look to those who have been doing this for countless generations: traditional indigenous shamans/healers whatever. Their experience and knowledge of psychedelic intoxication is more valid than the attempted justification of a group of hippies getting high on LSD 40 odd years ago.

Animals do indeed have some capacity for concept of self and self awareness. Is humanity that far evolved that we no longer have any connection to our origins and environment? What about the people who still practice similar life styles to our ancestors? Has buying a big mac made us that much more than any other life form on this planet or have we created a paradoxical shift up our own ass due to our modern urban lifestyle? How many of you have had to kill, skin, clean, cook and eat an animal and not buy it frozen from a supermarket freezer? Animals are aware of themselves and their environment especially higher mammals. A dolphin is aware of self, so is a chimpanzee and so are dogs for example. Animals can detect emotions and express their own needs and desires. Animals can use tools to solve problems such as a bird using a stick to reach grubs that they could not otherwise reach and eat. Humans have taken that ability to it's extreme. Sure we have greater intellectual capacity but we are still animals at the end of the day. Deny that and you deny your own nature.

Ohh yeah I've tried almost every fucking drug known to man psychedelic, dissociative, stimulant, opiate/opioid, benzo, barbituate, Etoh, cannabis/noids, hallucinogen, you name it I've researched it and in some pretty crazy doses. Sure not Thantos or whatever crazy with his 16 grams of shrooms, 35 mg 4 ho mipt, 1 mg LSD, 60 mg 4 aco dmt and whatever the fuck else (bullshitter) all at the tender age of 15. However I've "broken through" taken "heroic doses" aka stupid doses and had experiences to rival T. McKenna except I'm not mentally insane. I have a number of academic qualifications. I also remember being very young and doing my first mushroom trip and being told "don't fight it let the experience wash over you, go with it" so I did. I've had visual hallucinations of endless corridors of closed doors, of crazed landscapes, of endless spheres I have gone so far but I always am aware of my own being and my own self. My body, my heart, the environment around me even though it dissolves into a blur of visual overload. If that is ego death as others wish to describe it so be it but to me it's just an extreme psychedelic intoxication. Loss of ego or consciousness? Well one would need to lose consciousness and black out. If you are aware you are conscious and therefore cannot by definition experience ego death.

 

[max_freakout]

The term "ego" as Freud applied it has been dropped from psychiatry like a hot stone. So ego death = death of consciousness? So we pass out?

The phenomenon of psychedelic "ego death" has absolutely nothing to do with the Freudian concept of "ego". Freud's concept of ego was part of his overall strained artificial model of the human mind as a tripartite system consisting of id + ego + superego. The function of the Freudian ego is to negotiate between the moral values of the superego and the base instincts of the id.

Psychedelic ego death is an entirely different thing, nothing to do with Freud. Ego death relates to the cognitive phenomenology of the psychedelic altered state of consciousness, ie the psychological phenomena that are typically encountered by people who are under the influence of psychedelic drugs - "what happens when people trip?".

The sense of "ego" as in "ego death" is the Cartesian (ie the philosopher Descartes') sense rather than the Freudian sense. Descartes characterised the ego as the "I" that thinks it exists, the thing that thinks that: "I think therefore I exist". Psychedelic ego death occurs when the Cartesian ego loses its ontological foundations in the altered state of consciousness and thinks to itself something like "I've died/stopped existing/never existed/merged forever with the oneness etc etc". It occurs quite commonly when people trip heavily, in ego death one commits mental suicide by claiming one's own nonexistence to oneself.

Don't get Freud confused with psychedelia, they are miles apart from each other, Freud knew nothing about tripping and ego death.

If you don't believe that people experience ego death when they trip hard, have a look at the trip report vaults on erowid, there are many examples of ego death trips there, such as this one: - http://www.erowid.org/experiences/exp.php?ID=6409

"Well one would need to lose consciousness and black out. If you are aware you are conscious and therefore cannot by definition experience ego death. "

Ego death does not involve any kind of blacking out or loss of consciousness. It is precisely the opposite to a "loss" of consciousness, in ego death consciousness is all that there is, it is a fully conscious experience

 

[Solipsis]

The term is obviously a bit of a misnomer and gets a lot of people confused.

I actually think that in a complete ego-death state there isn't really any differentiated consciousness beyond the just 'being', so there isn't really that much to experience about it. But the really jarring part is transitioning to and fro... and also usually the state is not entirely complete and there still remain parts of the self-awareness intact. I have only once been in a long-lasting psychedelic ego-death. But I have had many more transient states of advanced ego dissolution.

In ego death self-awareness ceases but self-awareness does not equal consciousness in the being-awake sense. If you lose your sense of self, you can still retain general awareness. It is very abstract and difficult to explain what it is just to be, with your awareness stopping there. It is an absolute baseline state. We are entirely used to having some form of mental process or activity.

Typically IME timelessness (also loss of sense of space next to loss of sense of time) is experienced since every event is normally put in a frame of reference where you are a person who is experiencing event after event. There is no telling what happened or how much time passed during total ego-death since there is no frame of reference at all. The model of the world we have in our minds and experience as unmistakenably present is entirely based on that frame of reference just like the model of our 'self' is.

Casually considered there might not seem much difference between that and just being unconscious, but the existential / ontological relevance and how it relates to mysticism that is both very important if you ask me.

Max freakout is right: in this current context the ego is considered to be the model of our self and our sense of it which are completely co-dependent.

Also note that we have a centralized ego-death thread here: http://www.bluelight.org/vb/threads/375388-The-Big-amp-Dandy-Ego-Death-Thread
There are 26 pages of discussion and 5 subthreads already! (This thread will be merged with the B&D later though perhaps this current thread is considered significant and we can close the B&D and use this one to be the start of part 2)

Some people might say that the discussion is just disagreement about an elusive or esoteric term, I think that it matters whether someone participating in the discussion has experienced it or not (I don't mean that in an elitist way, it is just more difficult to comprehend and accept if you have not been there), and the term is not meaningless but can tell us something about very basic, fundamental psychological or spiritual processes.

I surely won't pretend that it is something everyone should try to experience, but I'd like it if others don't devalue or deny its existence or validity either.

 

[lovepsychadelics]

"Psychedelic ego death is an entirely different thing, nothing to do with Freud. Ego death relates to the cognitive phenomenology of the psychedelic altered state of consciousness, ie the psychological phenomena that are typically encountered by people who are under the influence of psychedelic drugs - "what happens when people trip?".

The sense of "ego" as in "ego death" is the Cartesian (ie the philosopher Descartes') sense rather than the Freudian sense. Descartes characterised the ego as the "I" that thinks it exists, the thing that thinks that: "I think therefore I exist". Psychedelic ego death occurs when the Cartesian ego loses its ontological foundations in the altered state of consciousness and thinks to itself something like "I've died/stopped existing/never existed/merged forever with the oneness etc etc"." Quote: Max-freakout.

Cheers that makes things seem a little clearer. Very esoteric but at least it is the concept of "I think therefore I exist". As most people seem to be banging on about Freudian "ego" I thought I'd shove that in there. However as animals have a sense of awareness and a concept of self and they obviously are capable of thought so do they think therefore they exist? This is the issue with philosophy as a whole as opinions, social beliefs and subjective data make up the core of the philosophical theory or hypothesis. This concept of ego death is then a purely philosophical notion much like metaphysics. The only philosophy that really counts IMO is that of ethics. I have been there Solipsis but I chose not to define such an experience in those terms as "ego death". I do not even define it as a "spiritual awakening". If anything it's an unexplainable subjective experience unique to each individual and to coin a phrase to describe that experience actually lessens the transient moment being defined. As such if one chooses to describe their subjective experience as "ego death" for want of a better term then so be it.

I feel that it is more of a enhanced awareness of environment and subconscious thought that would otherwise be unobtainable. Delve deeply enough and one becomes entangled within one's own thought complexes, external stimulus and immediate environment. We are no longer able to comprehend the sensory overload and the subjective experience of "ego death" is achieved if that is what one wishes to call it. As for the loss of consciousness I am referring to the post prior to my own as they describe the Freudian concept of ego and conscious. I however believe that indigenous peoples utilizing such tools as yage for example have a much better understanding of the psychedelic state than what the modern psychedelic community does. That is my point. It is an individuals subjective experience at the end of the day and how one wishes to describe or define that experience is up to the individual in question. I would rather define my experience as a type of conscious connection to my subconscious mind and my external environment as opposed to ego death.

Due to my background I also would define the psychedelic overload as a "vision quest" as opposed to "ego death" in other words to explore the external via internal consciousness and analysis. If you wish I could say my spirit totem guides my journey, in my case a black wolf or dog like creature/phantasm, who allows me to access suppressed thoughts, ideas and concepts. In the end we are exploring our own minds via ingesting psychedelics and/or dissociatives. That is as new age as I get but it's based on traditional practices of part of my cultural heritage. To term a phrase to define the indefinable is what irks me so when the term "ego death" is applied. A concept is only as valid as it's meaning to the individual utilizing that concept as a descriptive of an experience they want and/or need to define. So if you chose to define your experience as "ego death" then it's valid to you as an individual but it may not be valid to the next person or their concept of ego death may be skewed when compared to another individuals concept.

Philosophy vs technology. In more simple terms an individuals thoughts and concepts of a subjective nature vs objective data compiled and correlated using scientific methodology. Due to the nature of "ego death" it is an undefinable an completely individual experience and one can refute or accept it if it helps one understand or come to terms with their subjective experience or not. It's validity is entirely individual as a subjective experience is what "ego death" is. I just really hate the term "ego death" and that people take dangerous amounts of substance in attempt to attain a state of being that they have no experience of due to not understanding the concept or just because they read some book. I recall one BLer posting about taking 3 or 4 mg of 25b Nbome in attempt to obtain an "ego death" experience and they ended up in hospital with no memory of events post ingesting the substance until they became aware whilst in hospital. That is why I dislike the term "ego death". Due to it's entirely subjective nature it is in my opinion a dangerous ideology.

 

[Ismene]

I wouldn't deny the experience of others but we need to get away from this idea that an ego-death is an objective experience available to everyone if only they "tripped right" or "were in the right frame of mind". To me, it's more like someone being a born again Christian or becoming a scientologist. I'm positive I've experienced all the "timelessness" and "feeling at one with nature" feelings but that hasn't led me to losing all idea of who I am. And it's never going to. I've been tripping long enough to know that.

It's like a born again Christian telling me "If you came to Church and believed in the Lord you'd feel the overwhelming power of his presence". Nope. No I wouldn't. Never in a million years. I'd feel something vaguely like "Wow, this is impressive architecture and wow, those people singing the hymns seem passionate" but I wouldn't fall on my knees, lose all sense of who I was and praise de Lord. Some people are affected like that and some arn't. So while I can believe people who had ego-deaths or born again christians are passionate about what they feel, I can't ever feel the same thing.

 

[Solipsis]

Ego-death isn't a very sane experience at all, it's up there with insanity or enlightenment. But I think it is arrogant to say that you could never experience something like that just like you are not immune to psychosis. The difference being that a psychosis is a diagnosis and a state of mind described by a different group of people than the group describing ego-death. Still, there is purpose to the concept of psychosis existing, just like I think the concept of ego-death is useful to call certain mystical states that indeed can happen under the influence of psychedelics. But also without. Since there is no apparently activity in the sense of self at all rather than there being schism, fragmentations of the mind... I would not really call ego loss something actively sick though. Rather absence of health since it is just absence of almost everything.

I can't really explain why it has not happened to you other than that apparently you are not wired to slip into it readily and while I can think of ways that would be likely to start inducing the type of state that is not the same as saying there are recipes that work the same for everyone.
It's totally unfair to compare it to religion, because that involves supernatural beliefs while I don't think it is supernatural at all that the human mind may temporarily lose the coherence to form a sense of self but still be in a conscious type of state rather than unconscious. Show me where that is unscientific? Please tell me what is so hard to accept Ismene, what way do you think I should describe or call those severe cases of loss of sense of self?
How do you explain people coming here describing such a state? It sounds closed minded to reject the possibility and validity, and the unwillingness to even accept that it may exist seems to be related to the fact that you didn't happen to experience this type of consciousness state.

While it is not the same as feeling something like the "presence of the Lord", having your sense of self "rebooted" can sometimes be felt as a rebirth experience so I do see where your analogy follows there... but it is incorrect to just to conclusions about that becoming unscientific, which I feel is what you imply.
Buddhist ideas actually resonate a lot more in me ever since I experienced ego death, and I think a part of those ideas don't have to go against science... you just have to make a little translation. The cosmologies (dont know how else to call it) can still fit IMO.

The word objective is meaningless here since there is no such thing as objective experience of sense of self, it is a personal experience.

I do hate the term ego-death by the way, I have been saying multiple times now that it seems to be inviting people to trap people into different sorts of fallacies and misunderstandings.

People actually seem to be disturbed and scared of the thought that these states of mind are possible. I don't fully blame you, but denial is not a fair answer.

P.S. it cannot be true that instead of ego-death being a true thing, people are following it as an ideology and allow it to happen because they are primed to accept it as something that exist and accept it as something they can experience. When it happened to me for the first time (the very severe case I keep telling about) I didn't know much about psychedelics at all, let alone mystical states of consciousness, ego-death, or virtually any uncommon state of consciousness. But it happened anyway. Only much much later did I start learning about things that slowly started matching bit by bit until after years I pieced together crude theories.

You should do some research on mysticism before you continue.

 

[pmoseman]

Ya. It is just an experience. Like getting a B on an exam or looking for a sock, saying the word hello to someone. It just is hard to imagine other people have actually experienced it.

It is essentially the opposite of passing out.

It is tuning your mind and tapping into something.

I am not sure everyone who uses the term ego-death is talking about the same thing, but I think here we are. There are other words for it in other languages.

I see it is as a source of religion but I take no religious ideas from it. In fact it caused me to reject religion even more deeply. By knowing what they were referring to and being able to judge for myself.

 

[Solipsis]

Actually AFAIK mysticism is at the basis of just about every known religion (e.g. gnosticism for christendom), but it is about focusing on pure direct awareness... which is hard to refute unlike the religious beliefs drawn from that subsequently.

 

[Ismene]

Ya. It is just an experience. Like getting a B on an exam or looking for a sock, saying the word hello to someone. It just is hard to imagine other people have actually experienced it.
.

I don't think it's an experience like saying hello to someone. That would mean everyone would experience it. It's more like becoming a born again christian or finding that you believe in L Ron Hubbard. Only certain people are going to experience that.

 

[Solipsis]

That is a really weak baseless thing to say rather than to actually engage the discussion and the questions raised.

 

[max_freakout]

we need to get away from this idea that an ego-death is an objective experience

This ^ is a self-contradiction, because experiences are inherently subjective, never objective.

Subjective = from a particular point of view

Objective = from no particular point of view

available to everyone if only they "tripped right" or "were in the right frame of mind".

The ego death experience is potentially available to anyone who takes psychedelics, anyone who explores the psychedelic state of consciousness to a sufficient extent is bound to come across it eventually.

I'm positive I've experienced all the "timelessness" and "feeling at one with nature" feelings but that hasn't led me to losing all idea of who I am.

Did you ever think you had died during a trip? Did you ever have a bad trip and become convinced that you could never return to ordinary sobriety? Those are the hallmark features of ego death.

 

[max_freakout]

I don't think it's an experience like saying hello to someone. That would mean everyone would experience it. It's more like becoming a born again christian or finding that you believe in L Ron Hubbard. Only certain people are going to experience that.

Anybody can experience ego death, nobody is immune to it, it just requires tripping sufficiently intensely so that you lose control of your mind.

 

[Ismene]

That is a really weak baseless thing to say rather than to actually engage the discussion and the questions raised.

I'm trying to find a reason why only a few people experience it. Either the definition of "ego-death" is so vague as to be meaningless - which is certainly one thing that confuses the issue or certain people interpret feelings in a different way. Like a christian might recover from an illness and say "I felt God was with me". Whereas, anyone else might simply say "I felt poorly and then got better". People attribute different feelings to different things. I don't believe there's this mysterious experience that only happens at certain times for certain people. That sounds a bit too much like born again christianity to me.

 

[max_freakout]

I see it is as a source of religion

I think this ^ is a hugely important point, every religious story can be interpreted as an allegorical description of psychedelic ego death and rebirth, in this way the ego death experience can be seen as the ultimate source and essence of religion.

Jesus' crucifixion
Mohammed's revelation
Buddha's enlightenment

etc etc

 

[Ismene]

The ego death experience is potentially available to anyone who takes psychedelics, anyone who explores the psychedelic state of consciousness to a sufficient extent is bound to come across it eventually.

No they arn't and I'm the proof. I'm pretty sure I've tripped more and with heavier doses than 99% of the people who take psychedelics. Not even a sniff of this mysterious "ego-death" bollocks. Your argument has about as much weight to it as a christian telling me that "You'll believe in the Lord one day you just wait". I'm sorry it ain't gonna happen.

Did you ever think you had died during a trip?

Nope.

Did you ever have a bad trip and become convinced that you could never return to ordinary sobriety?

Nope.

I've had a few feelings of panic at the peak of a heavy trip and it crosses your mind that "I've taken too much" but all you do is lay down and keep calm and after a while those feelings decrease. I can certainly see that someone who wasn't experienced with tripping might hit the peak of a trip start to think "I've taken too much" and panic so hard he starts to think he's "dying". I wouldn't put that down to any mysterious ego-death, I'd put it more down to not being able to handle your high.

 

[Ismene]

I think this ^ is a hugely important point, every religious story can be interpreted as an allegorical description of psychedelic ego death and rebirth, in this way the ego death experience can be seen as the ultimate source and essence of religion.

Jesus' crucifixion
Mohammed's revelation
Buddha's enlightenment

etc etc

I'm really against equating psychedelics with man-made religions. I don't see any similarity whatsoever. All man-made religions are debilitating, hideous brainwashing bullshit. They only survive because they get foisted on kids when they're too young to stand up and say "Wait a minute, that's complete shit".

Psychedelics are a completely differen thing to hideous man-made religions. There's just you and the drug. No God needed.

 

[max_freakout]

I'm trying to find a reason why only a few people experience it. Either the definition of "ego-death" is so vague as to be meaningless - which is certainly one thing that confuses the issue or certain people interpret feelings in a different way. Like a christian might recover from an illness and say "I felt God was with me". Whereas, anyone else might simply say "I felt poorly and then got better". People attribute different feelings to different things. I don't believe there's this mysterious experience that only happens at certain times for certain people. That sounds a bit too much like born again christianity to me.

It is uncontroversial and easily provable that people who trip quite commonly experience this phenomenon of apparently dying then coming back to life when the trip ends, there is nothing vague or meaningless about this, there are many trip reports on the internet (ie erowid, bluelight etc) that describe ego death.

And regarding its attribution, it is completely obvious that it can only be attributed to taking drugs and tripping hard, there is no mystery about how it is caused.

 

[Ismene]

Yeah but it's become a dick-sizing thing hasn't it. You havn't really tripped unless you say you "died" have you. Some teenager who'se had his first trip on 1.5g of cubensis will say he "died and came back again dude" in a trip report. Saying "I felt a bit dreamy and the colours were brighter" isn't going to get you any plaudits in trip report land is it.

If you want to believe what people say in trip reports then go ahead. You might as well say "There's a load of reports of people saying they've seen aliens so that's proof aliens exist".

Talking about dying in your trip reports reminds of something Jimi Hendrix said about rock stars dying young - "Once you are dead you are made for life".