From: jimruttshow8596
The discussion on consciousness often extends to understanding higher states of consciousness (HSCs) and their perceived reality compared to everyday experience [02:24:00]. While some traditions, particularly religious philosophies like Buddhism and Taoism, consider HSCs as “more real” and capable of profound individual transformation [02:35:00], a more neutral term, “altered states of consciousness,” might be preferred [03:11:00].
Perception of Reality in Altered States
Unlike dreams, which are often strange but not generally considered more real or coherently integrable with one’s worldview [03:34:00], higher states of consciousness can be unique and ineffable yet lead individuals to judge them as being “of what’s really real” [03:55:00]. This perception of hyper-vividness or pretentiousness in an altered state might not, however, lead to a more accurate modeling of reality for everyday navigation [04:48:00].
Phenomenology vs. Functionality
A crucial distinction is made between the altered phenomenology (the subjective experience) and the underlying functionality of these states [05:22:00]. While the phenomenology can be fascinating, the true value lies in the increased capacity for insight they afford [05:50:00]. Insights gained can be profound, systemic, and lead to breakthroughs across whole areas of endeavor or even one’s life [06:28:00].
“It’s not altered states of consciousness that matters, it’s altered traits of character.” [07:01:00] “The problem with the fixation on the phenomenology is it tends to enhance… spiritual narcissism… and also spiritual bypassing, escaping from reality into this wonderful phenomenology.” [07:09:00]
Fluency, Insight, and Flow States
The concept of fluency is central to understanding insight [07:43:00]. In psychology, fluency refers to the brain’s use of processing ease to make judgments about information content, often equating ease with trustworthiness [08:08:00]. More profoundly, fluency is seen as the brain achieving an “optimal grip” on a situation [09:14:00].
Insight involves a sudden shift from a non-optimal to an optimal grip on a problem, accompanied by a flash of vividness or “more realness,” metaphorically represented by a light bulb going on [11:58:00]. When a series of insights are chained together, such as in improvisational jazz, it leads to a flow state, an “extended aha experience” [12:16:00].
The Continuity Hypothesis
This leads to the “continuity hypothesis,” which proposes a progression from fluency to insight, to flow states, to mystical experiences, and ultimately to transformative experiences, all utilizing the same underlying machinery [10:05:00]. A mystical experience is theorized as a flow state where the capacity being exercised is an optimal grip on the world or reality itself [12:54:00]. This offers a “meta-stance” towards the world, analogous to a martial arts stance that prepares for any optimal action [13:57:00].
De-centering and Insight
A significant benefit of altered states of consciousness is de-centering [15:11:00]. This refers to the process of moving beyond egocentrism, making one more “world-centric” (onto-centric) [16:57:00]. Just as children are more egocentric than adults, adults can be egocentric compared to a “sage” [15:35:00]. Egocentrism drives many cognitive biases like confirmation bias [16:11:00].
The “Solomon effect” is a practical example of de-centering [15:21:00]. By re-describing a personal problem from a third-person perspective (as if a friend were talking about it), individuals can gain insights they wouldn’t access from a first-person perspective [17:29:00]. Mystical experiences, by radically re-centering individuals and making “realness” salient, weaken the “blinding glare of the ego” [17:43:00]. Similarly, flow states reduce the “nattering nanny manager ego,” demonstrating that agency can be enhanced without constant egoic oversight [18:24:00].
The Role of Community and Tradition
Engaging with altered states of consciousness, particularly psychedelics, necessitates embedding these experiences within an ecology of practices and a community that has some kind of tradition [20:00:00]. This is because collective cognition generally outperforms individual cognition, helping to overcome individual biases like confirmation bias through mutual correction and shared intelligence [20:20:00].
When one messes with their “salience landscape” through these experiences, it opens them up powerfully [21:45:00]. A “perennial” corrective is to regularly and reliably subject personal revelations to the witnessing and critique of others [21:53:00]. This “inter-subjective collective verification” is akin to how science works and how face-to-face communities operate [22:10:00].
Complexification and Emergence
The concept of “complexification” describes a system that is simultaneously differentiating and integrating [26:14:00]. This process produces emergence, allowing a system to perform more actions in a coordinated manner [26:20:00]. The brain is an example of a complex system that integrates and differentiates at multiple levels of analysis [26:47:00].
When the process of complexification is coupled with the complexity of the world, an individual can increasingly fit the world’s complexity by appropriately complexifying [27:29:00]. Many contemporary problems arise from attempting to address complex phenomena with merely complicated (flow-chart mechanistic) solutions, rather than recognizing and engaging with emergent complex systems [27:52:00].
Overcoming Parasitic Processing
Buddhist practices, such as the Eightfold Path, can be understood as a means to combat “parasitic processing” [28:28:00]. Parasitic processing occurs when individually adaptive heuristics (like confirmation bias or availability heuristic) self-organize and mutually reinforce each other, leading to anxiety or depression spirals [30:09:00]. These “sprialling” patterns feed on themselves, sucking life from the individual [31:44:00].
Such self-deceptive, self-destructive behaviors, built from adaptive machinery, are resistant to direct intervention [32:11:00]. The genius of the Buddha, it is argued, was to create “counteractive dynamical systems” – ecologies of practices that intervene at multiple points and levels in a parallel fashion to dismantle these maladaptive patterns [32:40:00]. This model of parasitic processing helps define “foolishness” (as opposed to mere ignorance) and, conversely, “wisdom” as the cultivation of such ecologies of practices [34:04:00].
The Buddhist concept of dukkha, often translated as “suffering,” is reinterpreted not as mere pain or distress, but as a “loss of agency” [35:06:00]. Parables used to describe dukkha often emphasize self-entrapment and a loss of freedom, rather than physical pain [35:41:00]. The Buddha’s teaching, in this view, offers the “taste of freedom” – the recovery and restoration of agency [36:44:00]. Ignorance is considered a primary mark of dukkha because it profoundly diminishes agency [38:26:00].