Why? Why use substances?

[Biovail]

What extra dimensions do you mean? I can create a manifold with as many complex extra dimensions as I damn well want/need to. It's no biggie...I mean look at Bosonic String theory, it works in 24 dimensions.(Regular old quantum field theory works in a function space with dimension infinity!) Plus we use all sorts of extra dimensional measures (above those of the 3 spatial and 1 temporal) every day.In that for e.g. if I say "It pays $15.00" The quantity $15.00 is not a dimensionless quantity. It is a measure in the dimension "money" That is, I can not be $15.00 tall, or have $15.00 density. Additional "proof" of it being dimensional is it readily able to be worked with via dimensional analysis.

If I have $15.00 AND I've worked for 1 hour, I am getting $15.00/hr. Remembering time is also a dimension, we conclude that dimensional analysis does in fact apply to IRL, and that IRL we make use of extra dimensions on regular basis.

tl;dr we don't need drugs to be aware of so called extra dimensions.

Would you disagree that drugs are useful for putting previously understood concepts (or even those not well understood) in a new context and for gaining an alternate perspective on them?

The human mind is very odd. Once a person thinks they have an understand of something, it can be very difficult to change that opinion or alter their understanding. Take for example the common old woman/young woman optical illusion:

Once you have the image of the young woman in your mind, it can be difficult to alter your perspective in order to see the old woman. I would argue the same concept applies to generalized thinking. Drugs might not literally enable you to perceive additional dimensions, but they may allow you to think about them in ways you didn't previously consider meaningful.

 

[rangrz]

^

I was merely trying to say that "dimensions" are a very common concept in everyone's life, and that one works with "extra" dimensions as matter of mundane everyday life without ever thinking of them as dimensions all the time.

A dimensionless quantity is a pure number. i.e. Pi, Euler's number, The Golden Ratio, etc are all dimensionless.

But how much money is in your bank account, how many gigabytes of ram your computer has, or how many liters of gas your car holds are not dimensionless. Yet they are also not measures of length, height, width, or time, and thus are higher order dimensions. (i.e. 5th, 6th, 7th or whatever arbitrary Nth you wish to call them.)

Drugs can give you new perspectives? I guess so? I never found them useful that way. I mean yeah, I find stimulants helpful when I'm shuffling endless equations around, but I understand the equations the same way when I'm sober, but I may be too lazy to shuffle them so vigorously.

Aside from that, drugs usually just distort my perspective into being less correct.

 

[P A]

Aside from that, drugs usually just distort my perspective into being less correct.

This has been my experience as well. People often talk about the 'crucial insights' that they acquired under the influence of hallucinogens. This has always puzzled me somewhat, since my own run-ins with that variety of drug produced something between psychic rapture and profound mental confusion. The experiences themselves were certainly sensational, and I don't regret them in the least, but I couldn't honestly claim to have been as profoundly altered by them as others so frequently report of themselves. The first time I ingested a megadose of methorphan in the form of an orange-flavored cough remedy, I can attest to having achieved a state of mind that I had never, in my wildest dreams, thought possible. Same goes for acid, maybe. But no matter how hard I search, I can't locate any particular attitude, disposition, or mental process of mine that was affected in any lasting way solely by the ingestion of those substances. Perhaps this is a good thing...

 

[rangrz]

^

I agree fully. The only drugs which have given me any true intellectual benefit have been clear headed stimulants, not psychedelics. Even then, as I said, the only benefit is the ability to sit there and shuffle numbers around for 12 hours solid, not any change in how I understand the numbers.

Psychedelics are fun I agree. But NOTHING I've thought of while under their influence had any true value besides it's hedonistic reward of enjoying it at the time. I think perhaps people who find them to be enlightenment either did not think the idea's over critically afterwards, or else, do not think critically or deeply while sober, and thus the intoxication is the only time they grapple with ideas bigger then Who's dating who and what shirt matches what pants.

 

[P A]

I think perhaps people who find them to be enlightenment either did not think the idea's over critically afterwards, or else, do not think critically or deeply while sober, and thus the intoxication is the only time they grapple with ideas bigger then Who's dating who and what shirt matches what pants.

Lol. I'm inclined to agree with you, at least insofar as these 'enlightenments' make actual truth claims about the natural world. However, I don't think I'm in any position to critique the private insights that some claim to have procured while under the influence. Hell, if something as undeniably real and life-altering as PTSD can be cured/treated (or, on the flip side, triggered) with the help of these drugs, I'll certainly hesitate before knocking their purportedly transformative potential.

 

[rangrz]

No, I was not referring to internal emotional insight. I was more referring to people with the whole "3rd eye" nonsense. (Sorry guys, I've done dissection in my studies and your Pineal gland REALLY does not have the functional capability to "see" anything) or even EXTERNAL emotional insight. (Your LSD trip and how you felt on it does not in anyway give you insight into MY emotions or feelings, so please, just ask me what I'm feeling instead of TELLING me.) that sort of thing.

Or you know, crank stuff like the Earth being shaped as a cube taking a cubic orbit around a cubic sun. lolwut?

 

[P A]

I lold.

 

[gforgregarious]

The answer to this question varies greatly based on the individual, I'm sure. For some, drugs are used to medicate some psychological problem. For others, it's used spiritually. For others still, it's for the pleasure.

I suspect that whatever the reason, many, if not most, drug users give themselves a different reason than the true one for their usage. Addicts are notoriously skilled rationalisers, so they will say something like "weed helps me think, and I sleep better on it" not seeing or acknowledging that it's really the avoidance of withdrawal that is helping them think or sleep better.

 

[adamski10]

Why Take drugs? why ask why when you can ask why not.

It is in our evolution, our forefathers ate the psychedelic plants. it is our modern society that has demonised the use of these tools of our conciseness. The western world wants to mould me into a cog- wants me to get a job, settle down and pay my taxes. I'll do that one day, but first i want to feel the mystical states that i've been blessed to come into contact with.

Drugs are dualistic just like everything within this world, anything can be good and anything can be bad- it is intent, set, setting and education that define how you interact with anything. lsd and mushrooms showed me our intrinsic divinity or link to every person and to the planet, coke and meph taught me the power of desire, ketamine turned off my body and let me travel the world within. Ecstasy opened my heart, showed me the pure compassion that the buddah spoke off.

On the flip side, drugs showed me the worst aspects of humanity. Greed, Deceit and lust all flowed through me so prominently because of these substances. I was lost in the forest and having these revealed to you is shocking. That moment in the mirror where you realise that you are a good person on a wrong path is empowering.

Don't dedicate your life to these tools, but use them like a wise man uses knowledge, sparingly and with reason.

Peace, Love and Happy Traveling. remember you are divine.

XXxXXXXXXXXXX

 

[Jean-Paul]

we are all chemistry. i see no reason to deprive a chemistry set of various helpful and medicinal chemicals that it is lacking. i don't see it as "escaping reality" or "being in a different world". it isn't. it's just changing the chemistry of your body. i pity those who assume the body we are born with is the right one to be in, and we should make no additional changes apart from what a doctor may prescribe you. that is not to say we shouldn't respect the power of the drugs or that they can cause harm to you or cause you to be less than who you are normally.

doctors do not always know what is right for your body and it is certainly not their responsibility to know what is right for you intellectually. changes that are largely mental and do not strictly effect the body separately from our cognitive thinking and emotions are taboo because of a bullshit social structure that has nothing to do with reality. there is certain class of moron that cannot handle or understand the use of chemicals beyond what a doctor could/would prescribe to them. this kind of moron would likely destroy themselves in some other kind of way and it is not our responsibility to keep them from doing so.

you might argue that psychiatric medications take care of what regular doctors cannot, that would be naive. it took me over a decade to find proper psychiatric medication and i still have a problem getting them. does all of the suffering i went through on the wrong medications matter to these doctors? no. do they take my intellectual ability into account? no. is any trust placed into my hands at all? no. i am forced to look far and wide just to find one more doctor who will actually listen. it should be our right to give ourselves whatever we wish to. enforcing a safer and actually humanitarian safety net for those in danger because of chemicals would be helpful, as opposed to the police state and system-street-system catch 22 social programs we have now. the only so called "humanitarian" drug groups are hard core religious fanatics using drug addicts and poor people to keep their own wheel of bullshit turning. "use the used up, brainwash the washed up"

that definitely turned into a stream of consciousness rant
edit~ of course the latter shit i got into won't matter if you can afford a nice private rehab facility but i deal mostly with the street level addicts when i get all angsty political philosophy

 

[Jabberwocky]

Why? because joy is the central purpose proper to man, and drugs can potentiate this past what is "naturally" possible.