Some initial comments, because I´m very interested on these alterations of conscience. The rest of my comments will appear along the conversation:
I´m persuaded, by very simple evolutionary analysis that plants produced whatever chemical substance that stops from eating them. this is their only mechanism of defence since they can not run, apart from spines, indigestible tissues and so on (by the way, if you find a plant with spines, it is very likely that this plant is edible). To deter being eaten, the plants produce whatever work for this purpose: from consciousness alteration substances to venoms that interfere critically with varius psysiological functions. The nauseas, diarrea, very bad taste experienced by the plant eater is a logical reaction: the organism detect the alteration and try to stop eating and to expel the substance eaten from the digestive tract (by both orifices ;). By the way when we feel the unnatural sensation of acceleration and movements without walking, for example in a car in a curvy road, it is erroneously interpreted by the organism as an alteration of conscience produced by something eaten, so it trigger the same reaction, trying to expel some substance that we has not eaten. (see Evolutionary Psychology and the generation of *Culture* (ISBN 0195101073)) some drugs seem to debilitate the control centre that integrate information form different modules in the mind-brain. Some people that has suffered a trauma in the brain experience these alterations permanently. This control center is in charge of ordering the relevance of the inputs both the external inputs and the output produced by other mental modules.this mental control center can be called "consciousness". That's why under hallucinogenous drugs we receive an stream of non filtered events: We see the furniture, but also the interpretation of the furniture as a monster. This monster interpretation is also produced by the visual interpretation module in a normal state, among other alternative interpretations, but these bizarre interpretations would never arrive to the conscious. The drugs break this filter. What the consciousness perceive in a normal state is a consensual, coherent picture of the environment, according with what existed a moment ago. What the hallucinogen produce is a disruption of this process, Just like a venom interfere in other physiological functions. Plants simply essay different variations of chemicals and the ones that deter being eaten. that why the amazing variety of effect that produce different species. Animals have livers to detoxify these chemicals by enzymes. I have no dout that, we have a mythological religious and social modules that produce their own outputs, in the form of feelings, but also interpretations or colourations of visual images. It also produce hallucinations that are not arbitrary. In a normal state the conscience module produce the effect is a sort of super-ego conversations or a conscientious feeling. I sometimes talk with my father and I don´t think that I´m crazy But when the raw output of the conscience is not filtered, sometimes these outputs associate themselves with the visual output and form of hallucinations who talk to us. The double reaction of fear and admiration , peace and terror are universal against the unknown and hallucinations trigger these reactions. These are the reactions produced by the unscontrolled stream of elaborations that would arrive to the consciousness under hallucinative state. Life is about to deal with the unknowm. According with evolutionary psychologiests, the dreams in normal dream state are probably a training for tuning the mind for possible situations that may happen in the future. The construction if dreams follows the same logic, at other level, than the altered consciousness produced by drugs. Finally, hallucinations don´t say arbitrary things, since they are exaggerated products of our own mind. The conscience speak in favour of the social interests and the own long term interest, and also about what we have to fear and what we have to love. If a mythical entity talk with us in an altered state, he is talking about us and about how we must feel and behave about others, and its narration is a result of our evolutionary past in combination with event of the personal experience That´t why religious people in a society are very important. They are in more close contact with this spiritual self and know the best practices -traditions- of the society. Lastly, Reality is our shared consciousness. we have no other reality reachable to us. The rejection of any of the phenomenological elaborations of our mind is not only an impoverishment of our life, but an unscientific rejection of study the reality available to us, and -for the matherialist minded ones- an impairment of our possibilities of survival as individuals and as a society. 2013/2/8 Bruno Marchal <marc...@ulb.ac.be> > > On 08 Feb 2013, at 10:09, Russell Standish wrote: > > On Fri, Feb 08, 2013 at 07:31:06PM +1100, Kim Jones wrote: >> >>> >>>> Salvia, like Ketamine, (but quite less dangerous, and anti-addictive) >>>> has a dissociative effect which might illustrate the "Galois connection" >>>> between 1p-mind (consciousness) and its 3p local handlings (the 3p-brains). >>>> By making a peculiar dissociation at some place in the brain, one are left >>>> with the feeling that we are *less* than we are used to think, and that we >>>> are consequently in front of *more* possibilities. That "Galois connection" >>>> occurs in many place in math: less equations = more solutions, or less >>>> axioms = more interpretations/models. Somehow less brain = more experience, >>>> or more intense and richer feeling of experience. This would make the brain >>>> being more a filter of consciousness than a producer of consciousness. >>>> >>> >>> >>> Hmmmmmmm……"less is more". Another of my favourite expressions. Please >>> explain the "Gallic connection" (connection galoise à laquelle tu pointe). >>> I am currently convinced that the brain "receives" the mind, much as a >>> radio receiver receives signal, so this makes INTUITIVE sense to me. >>> >> >> I assume he was referring to >> >> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/**Galois_connection<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galois_connection> >> > > Not bad article. I was alluding to the syntax/semantics (Galois) > connection, and its generalization into machine and machine's behavior, or > machine and machine's mind, when the brain becomes a filter of > consciousness instead of "producer" of consciousness, but all this are open > problems (in arithmetic/computer science). > > Bruno > > > > > >> Cheers >> >> -- >> >> ------------------------------**------------------------------** >> ---------------- >> Prof Russell Standish Phone 0425 253119 (mobile) >> Principal, High Performance Coders >> Visiting Professor of Mathematics hpco...@hpcoders.com.au >> University of New South Wales http://www.hpcoders.com.au >> ------------------------------**------------------------------** >> ---------------- >> >> -- >> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups >> "Everything List" group. >> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an >> email to >> everything-list+unsubscribe@**googlegroups.com<everything-list%2bunsubscr...@googlegroups.com> >> . >> To post to this group, send email to >> everything-list@googlegroups.**com<everything-list@googlegroups.com> >> . >> Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/** >> group/everything-list?hl=en<http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en> >> . >> For more options, visit >> https://groups.google.com/**groups/opt_out<https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out> >> . >> >> >> > http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~**marchal/ <http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/> > > > > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "Everything List" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to > everything-list+unsubscribe@**googlegroups.com<everything-list%2bunsubscr...@googlegroups.com> > . > To post to this group, send email to > everything-list@googlegroups.**com<everything-list@googlegroups.com> > . > Visit this group at > http://groups.google.com/**group/everything-list?hl=en<http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en> > . > For more options, visit > https://groups.google.com/**groups/opt_out<https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out> > . > > > -- Alberto. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. 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