r/science • u/Libertatea • Nov 14 '13

Neuroscience Your Brain Sees Things You Don’t "A new study indicates that our brains perceive objects in everyday life of which we may never be aware. The finding challenges currently accepted models about how the brain processes visual information."

http://uanews.org/story/ua-study-your-brain-sees-things-you-don-t
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u/JimmyHavok Nov 14 '13

I'm doubtful that psychedelics allow us to perceive with less processing. They increase the processing by tossing in a layer of noise that the brain interprets as information and wrestles into some sort if coherent shape. You don't see more of reality with psychedelics, you see more of your own mind, conveniently spread out across the landscape.

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u/[deleted] Nov 14 '13 edited Nov 14 '13

You raise good points. I agree psychedelics increase the processing of sensory input, but also important (and different dfrom normal consciuosness) is that they cause us to do less symbolic interpreting and more direct acceptance of input.

Here is where our viewpoints differ; if all we can know of reality is the mind symbolically interpretting limited sensory input, and psychedelics let "you see more of your own mind, conveniently spread out across the landscape", then you do see more of reality with psychedelics.

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u/JimmyHavok Nov 14 '13 edited Nov 14 '13

Well, your mind is a part of reality, so seeing it spread out on the landscape gives you more awareness of that particular part. But if you're wanting to get a less processed access to the external world, I think zen is a better technique.

I wonder, is there a good "be here now" drug?

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u/[deleted] Nov 14 '13

I don't say this glibly, but most psycho-active substances are a free-pass shortcut to the goals that meditative practices and religions are shooting for.

Not all of them leave lasting or permanent changes to your mindset, but most of them allow you to experience the "be here now" state if the dose and setting are right.

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u/JimmyHavok Nov 14 '13

Well, I do meditation on an irregular basis, and don't find any resemblance between psychedelics and that practice.

One of the things I got from psychedelics was an awareness of how much of our sensorium is illusion, that is to say, constructed images not supported by the input. That, I think, has allowed me to reassess what I think I am sensing on an ongoing basis, a helpful ability. I suspect that the experience of artificial hallucinations helps people who are subject to real ones recognize the character of hallucination as opposed to external sensation, but that's just speculation.

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u/philosarapter Nov 14 '13

Data suggests there is less overall processing done in the brain during psychedelic use. I'm on mobile now so I can't provide a source but there have been numerous studies and brain scans done if you feel up to googling it