Trip Plataus?

[caroline55]

I've been reading several threads here, and I've seen "level plateaus" mentioned as some sort of way to measure the intensity of a trip.
I've never heard of this before!! How does this work?

 

[Help?!?!]

I only use plateau method for dxm. For psychedelics I use the + system coined by Shulgin. I think this is what your thinking of but if not you should check it out as its most certainly IMO the best measurement for trips.

 

[solistus]

I've also only heard it for DXM.

With DXM, it's said that there are four or five 'plateaus' based on dose, each with distinct effects. First plateau is more like being drunk than anything, just somewhat clumsy and euphoric. Second plateau is more intensely dissociative. 3 and 4 start to approach ketamine-like dissociation, and some people use the term 'plateau sigma' to refer to spreading a large dose out over several hours, which apparently produces still different effects.

The most common 'scale' for rating psychedelic trips is the Shulgin Scale. A 0 is no effect. A +/- is "maybe an effect, maybe just placebo," some minor noticed effect that, if it repeats on future trials, confirms some tiny level of activity. +1 means it's intense enough that you can definitely tell when it starts and stops but it's not strong enough to get a great feel for the nuance and little details of the high. +2 means the effects are fully pronounced, but not so overwhelming that you can't focus on day-to-day tasks if you choose to. +3 means the experience is intense enough that you can't really ignore it and do something 'normal' with your day.

+4 is reserved for those super intense, almost spiritual peaks - things like ego death, or sense of oneness with the universe. These types of experiences are almost impossible to put into words very well at all, and when most people take a really high dose of a psychedelic what they're aiming for is a +4. Shulgin was fond of saying that if any compound could be discovered which safely and consistently triggered a +4 experience, it might represent some new 'evolutionary' stage in human existence, transforming culture and society around the experience. It's like a "perfect ten rating" for the intensity of the experience, and as such most people who describe their own trips with the Shulgin scale use +4 VERY sparingly if at all.

 

[caroline55]

Thanks, I was refering to the Shulgin system, so will now get to work and get hold of a copy.
Very interesting the DXM explanation.
You learn something new every day!!
Cool
(-:

 

[jamaica0535]

The Shulgin Rating Scale

PLUS / MINUS (+/-)
The level of effectiveness of a drug that indicates a threshold action. If a higher dosage produces a greater response, then the plus/minus (+/-) was valid. If a higher dosage produces nothing, then this was a false positive.

PLUS ONE (+)
The drug is quite certainly active. The chronology can be determined with some accuracy, but the nature of the drug's effects are not yet apparent.

PLUS TWO (++)
Both the chronology and the nature of the action of a drug are unmistakably apparent. But you still have some choice as to whether you will accept the adventure, or rather just continue with your ordinary day's plans (if you are an experienced researcher, that is). The effects can be allowed a predominant role, or they may be repressed and made secondary to other chosen activities.

PLUS THREE (+++)
Not only are the chronology and the nature of a drug's action quite clear, but ignoring its action is no longer an option. The subject is totally engaged in the experience, for better or worse.

PLUS FOUR (++++)
A rare and precious transcendental state, which has been called a 'peak experience', a 'religious experience,' 'divine transformation,' a 'state of Samadhi' and many other names in other cultures. It is not connected to the +1, +2, and +3 of the measuring of a drug's intensity. It is a state of bliss, a participation mystique, a connectedness with both the interior and exterior universes, which has come about after the ingestion of a psychedelic drug, but which is not necessarily repeatable with a subsequent ingestion of that same drug. If a drug (or technique or process) were ever to be discovered which would consistently produce a plus four experience in all human beings, it is conceivable that it would signal the ultimate evolution, and perhaps the end of, the human experiment.

Taken From:
http://www.mdma.net/alexander-shulgin/shulginscale.html

But yea, I consider my first acid trip to have been a +4..... Anything considered truely lifechanging or pivotal moment in ones existance being produced its a +4....

Also your mileage may vary.... I know some people who have gone about their everyday plans fully tripping balls, like work.... I can be tripping quite hard and be very socially acceptable if i want to be without much effort.... I had planned to attend shpongle on no less than 5 hits of very strong acid in a very small venue, but i had planned to work the next day and couldn't go in still kind of tripping.... So i ended up going with like 2.5 and that turned out fine....