Consciousness - 9/11

Aug 22, 2013Jun 17, 2016

Scientists Officially Recognize Animal Consciousness Equal to Humans

Animal consciousness seems like a forgone conclusion at this point of our existence, but now it’s official.

The Cambridge Declaration of Consciousness was signed by a group that consists of cognitive scientists, neuropharmacologists, neurophysiologists, neuroanatomists, and computational neuroscientists.

The Field of Consciousness Research is Rapidly Evolving

Abundant new techniques and strategies for human and non-human animal research have been developed. Consequently, more data is becoming readily available, and this calls for a periodic re-evaluation of previously held preconceptions in this field.

Studies of non-human animals have shown that homologous brain circuits correlated with conscious experience and perception can be selectively facilitated and disrupted to assess whether they are in fact necessary for those experiences. Moreover, in humans, new non-invasive techniques are readily available to survey the correlates of consciousness.

Emotion and Evolution

The neural substrates of emotions do not appear to be confined to cortical structures. In fact, sub-cortical neural networks aroused during affective states in humans are also critically important for generating emotional behaviors in animals. Artificial arousal of the same brain regions generates corresponding behavior and feeling states in both humans and non-human animals. Wherever in the brain one evokes instinctual emotional behaviors in non-human animals, many of the ensuing behaviors are consistent with experienced feeling states, including those internal states that are rewarding and punishing.

Deep brain stimulation of these systems in humans can also generate similar affective states. Systems associated with affect are concentrated in sub-cortical regions where neural homologies abound. Young human and non-human animals without neocortices retain these brain-mind functions. Furthermore, neural circuits supporting behavioral/electro-physiological states of attentiveness, sleep and decision making appear to have arisen in evolution as early as the invertebrate radiation, being evident in insects and cephalopod mollusks (e.g., octopus).

Consciousness is Everywhere

Birds appear to offer, in their behavior, neurophysiology, and neuroanatomy a striking case of parallel evolution of consciousness. Evidence of near human-like levels of consciousness has been most dramatically observed in African grey parrots. Mammalian and avian emotional networks and cognitive micro-circuitries appear to be far more homologous than previously thought. Moreover, certain species of birds have been found to exhibit neural sleep patterns similar to those of mammals, including REM sleep and, as was demonstrated in zebra finches, neurophysiological patterns, previously thought to require a mammalian neocortex. Magpies in particular have been shown to exhibit striking similarities to humans, great apes, dolphins, and elephants in studies of mirror self-recognition.

In humans, the effect of certain hallucinogens appears to be associated with a disruption in cortical feed-forward and feedback processing. Pharmacological interventions in non-human animals with compounds known to affect conscious behavior in humans can lead to similar perturbations in behavior in non-human animals. In humans, there is evidence to suggest that awareness is correlated with cortical activity, which does not exclude possible contributions by sub-cortical or early cortical processing, as in visual awareness. Evidence that human and nonhuman animal emotional feelings arise from homologous sub-cortical brain networks provide compelling evidence for evolutionarily shared primal affective qualia.

BBC’s documentary, Super Smart Animals, exemplifies the high cognitive functions that animals possess.

Consciousness is everywhere and we will uncover more of its tracks as our egoic human nature subsides so that we may be open to more possibilities within a conscious universe.

Aug 19, 2013Jan 25, 2018

Magic Mushrooms Stimulate Growth of New Brain Cells (Study)

Psilocybin Drawing by Sara K. Glazier

New studies from The University of South Florida indicate that psilocybin found in “shrooms”, triggers new brain cell growth, and erases frightening memories from mice.

The studies showed that mice treated with low doses of psilocybin had significant growth of new brain cells, because the mushroom binds to a brain receptor that stimulates new brain cell growth, and short term memory formation.

This interesting discovery has given more plausibility to the Stoned Ape Theory, Terence Mckenna’s suggestion that human evolution was initiated by the mind expanding benefits of psychedelic experiences.

Researchers are eager to look into the idea of using magic mushrooms to cure mental problems like PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder) and chronic depression but the legal status of shrooms restricts freedom in experiments.

Mice trained to fear electric shock when hearing a noise associated with the shock, stopped reacting in fear to the noise when given a small dose of psilocybin, much more quickly, in contrast to mice given no psilocybin.

The science behind psilocybin treating depression is, depressed individuals typically have over active medial prefrontal cortex regions of the brain, and psilocybin eases this, and makes the brain function normally here.

Despite its harmlessness, amazing medical potential, and ability to produce phenomenal spiritual/mystical experiences, the governments across the world have nearly all banned Psilocybin Mushrooms. Dangerous pharmaceutical pills can’t compete with the toxic cell purging benefits of cannabis and the positive mental state that shrooming promotes.

Evidence of Psilocybin “Magic Mushrooms” Growing New Brain Cells

Juan R. Sanchez-Ramos, Professor of Neurology at USF presents the effects of psilocybin mushrooms on neurogenesis (birth of new neuron cells).

> Psilocybin Mushrooms Promote Growth of New Brain Cells, Can Even Cure PTSD And Depression | Banoosh

Aug 14, 2013Jun 17, 2016

Does Consciousness Exist? (Video)

Does consciousness exist? Why is it that we are so intimately aware of it everyday, yet incapable of properly identifying or defining it?

Why is Consciousness so Mysterious? – Notable Excerpts

Ray Kurzweil: …some philosophers say that consciousness is just an illusion, it doesn’t really exist. Do you think otherwise?

David Chalmers: I think consciousness is a thing we know about more directly than we know about anything in the world.

Ray Kurzweil: You can question that “I think consciousness exists” and that “I seem to have a focal point”…you think you’re this unified conscious but really you have these streams of data that you’re focusing on, and that’s all it is.

David Chalmers: I can question your consciousness, I can’t be 100% certain that you’re conscious…I can’t question my consciousness. I’m experiencing, I’m experiencing it directly. It’s more real than anything else.

Ray Kurzweil: …During the evolutionary process consciousness somehow came in, it was selected for because if we have an awareness of our environment we can avoid tigers a little better, maybe plant the crops better. Who knows what?
But consciousness was a selected factor that maybe emerged at random then developed.

David Chalmers: The fact is any story anyone’s every told about the evolutionary role of consciousness has been quite obscure and doesn’t quite make sense. The trouble is, anything you want evolution to explain; how we react, what we see and so on. I can find some explanation for how that happens that goes wholly in terms of mechanisms and algorithms in the brain and so on. Once I spell out that story you say, “Why do you need consciousness for that?”

Ray Kurzweil: You’ve become quite well known for defining the easy problem and the hard problem. Go for it.

David Chalmers: You might want to explain how my brain perceives something in the environment. A stimulus is my retina, my brain integrates information; I react, I point, I say something. Maybe you could give an explanation of those things in terms of circuits in my brain or algorithms in my brain. But those are just the easy problems of consciousness…

David Chalmers: The hard problem of consciousness is, why is all that processing accompanied by conscious experience? Why does it feel like something from the inside? Why do we have this amazing inner movie going on in our minds all the time. The whole story you tell about neural circuits and computational mechanisms just leaves that question out.

Aug 11, 2013Jun 17, 2016

Meditation in a Sensory Deprivation Tank – VICE Documentary (Video)

Sensory deprivation tanks are a wonderful way to relax and meditate. The best way to eliminate all sensory input is to step inside a sensory deprivation tank.

Floating in a tank allows you to lose all sense of self and merge with the energies of the universe. Take a trip to the center of your inner-verse.

In part 1, we talk to Joe Rogan about what happens to the mind, body, and spirit while inside the tank.

In part 2, VICE Correspondent Hamilton Morris spends five hours inside a tank only to come out with more questions than answers. We head to Isolation Floatation in Colorado to learn more.

In part 3, VICE correspondent Hamilton Morris tests the Rolls Royce of sensory deprivation tanks at Cloud nine Float Center in Boulder, Colorado.

> Tanks for the Memories | VICE

Aug 4, 2013Jun 17, 2016

Terence McKenna – The Psychedelic Experience is Illegal Because it Promotes an Open Mind

In this kinetic typography animation, Terence Mckenna talks about the core reasons that prevent us from exploring our consciousness with psychedelics.

The psychedelic experience is as central to understanding your humanness as having sex, or having a child, or having responsibilities, or having hopes and dreams, and yet it is illegal.

We are somehow told, we are infantilized. We are told you know you can wander around with in the sanctioned playpen of ordinary consciousness, and we have some intoxicants over here if you wanna mess your self up, we’ve got some scotch here and some tobacco and red meat and some sugar and a little T.V. and so forth and so on.

But, these boundary dissolving hallucinogens that give you a sense of unity with your fellow man and nature are somehow forbidden. This is an outrage! It’s a sign of cultural immaturity and the fact that we tolerate it is a sign that we are living in a society as oppressed as any society in the past. – Terence Mkcenna, Eros And The Eschaton Lecture

Jul 18, 2013Jun 17, 2016

Terence McKenna, Alan Watts – Surrender Your Ego to the Universe (Video)

Alan Watts and Terence McKenna talk about our need for a collective consciousness as our solvable global issues get neglected, causing us to become enemies of our planet and each other. Video produced by the Omega Point

What I am involves what you are, the problem is you see… We haven’t been taught to feel that way.

The myths underlying our culture and underlying our common sense have not taught us to feel identical with the universe, but only parts of it, only in it, only confronting it–aliens. And we are, I think, quite urgently in need of coming to feel that we ARE the eternal universe, each one of us.

– Alan Watts, The Nature Of Consciousness

It comes out of a personal act of courage made by the individual. An act of courage which involves Surrender. Surrender is the opposite side of the coin of Ego. The central issue of our times is the inability to surrender to what we KNOW is right.

We have the ability to feed the hungry, we have the ability to educate our children, to clean up our environment, to eliminate sexism, to eliminate racism. The question is: CAN WE CHANGE OUR MINDS FAST ENOUGH?

– Terence McKenna, MAPS (Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies) Conference 1990

Jul 14, 2013Jun 17, 2016

Alan Watts – Is the Bible Used to Manipulate Self Worth? (Video)

Alan Watts provides a philosophical analysis of the bible.

Alan Watts – Notable Excerpts

The Gospel of Jesus, which of course was hushed up since its inception, was that, wake up everybody and find out who you are.

Is it not written in your law, “I have said ye are gods.” And if that is what the scripture says it can’t be denied. So why do you tell me I blaspheme because I say, “I am a son of god.”

“Son of” in Hebrew and in Arabic means of the nature of. When we call someone a son of a bitch, we mean bitchy. And so if you call someone a son of god, you mean divine.

What happened was, that this being blasphemous for the Jews. It became blasphemy for the Christians for anyone else than Jesus to say it.

They said, “Ok baby it was so with you, but there it stops. No more of this business.” And as a result of that Jesus was made irrelevant by pedestalization, by being kicked up stairs! In spite of the fact that he’s said greater works than these, that I do, shall you do; oh no, upstairs with you baby…because we just can’t have that sorta thing going on in a monarchical universe. We are not gonna have democracy in the kingdom of heaven.

This is why the gospel is impossible, because we’re suppose to follow the example of Christ…where he says for example, “Be not anxious for the morrow. Do not worry about what you shall eat, what you shall drink and what you shall wear. God will take care of you! Doesn’t he take care of the birds? Don’t the flowers grow? And they’re wonderful, they’re crazy, they’re great. What are you worrying about? I’ve never heard a sermon preached on that…never. Because it’s totally subversive the economy would crash! So they say, “That’s all very well, but that was the boss’s son!” See he had that colossal advantage…

He had an unfair advantage. So how can you ask us to follow the example of Christ. But supposing he didn’t have an unfair advantage. Supposing that was true about Jesus as a son of god is true of us.

Why talk about this? Is it interesting? Is it important for the human being to realize that in some sense of the word, whatever it means, he is god or one with god?

The importance of it is this. To know that you are god is another way of saying that you feel completely with this universe. You feel profoundly rooted in it and connected with it.

If you don’t know that. If you don’t feel that. Well naturally you feel alien. You feel a stranger in the world and if you feel a stranger you feel hostile. And therefore you start to bulldoze things about to beat it up and to try and make the world submit to your will.

You obviously can blame someone and say, “I didn’t ask for this! Take it away!” And yet very few people are all too ready to take it away. Camus said that the only serious philosophical problem is whether or not to commit suicide. And if you don’t, if you don’t say take it away. What are you gonna do? You really gotta assume responsibility for it, you have to say yes to what happens.

The real meaning of Karma, the word in Sanskrit means simply: doing. And if I say of an event, “it is your karma”, it is saying, “it is your doing.”

So the exposition, a book which would expound karma, would be not so much a who done it? But, a you done it. But that seems, fantastic.

Jul 11, 2013Jun 17, 2016

David Lynch – Consciousness, Creativity and the Brain, Transcendental Meditation (Video)

David Lynch (Mulholland Drive, The Elephant Man) explains his understanding about consciousness, creativity and the brain. Transcendental Meditation played a crucial role in developing his consciousness and boosting his creativity.

One lady in the audience says: I teach film, I make films. I would like to know what does meditation or how does meditation connect to your creative process or to how it might help the creativity of my students.

If you have a golf ball sized consciousness, when you read a book you’ll have a golf ball sized understanding, when you look out a golf ball sized awareness and when you wake up in the morning a golf ball sized wakefulness.

But if you could expand that consciousness then you would read the book with more understanding and when you look out more awareness and when you wake up more wakefulness – it’s consciousness. – David Lynch, Film Director

David Lynch Foundation for Consciousness Based Education
Introduction to Transcendental Meditation

Jul 8, 2013Jun 17, 2016

Inspirational Quotes to Refocus Your Mind

Inspirational quotes are perfect for refocusing the mind and reawakening the excitement that fills life with passion.

Happiness is Here. Not There

“The trick is to enjoy life. Don’t wish away your days, waiting for better ones ahead” – Marjorie Pay Hinkley

Do Not Be Your Own Worst Enemy

“You are confined only be the walls you build yourself.”

Life is Not About Winning or Losing

“Take risks: if you win. You will be happy; if you lose, you will be wise” – Author Unkown

Moving Forward is About Moving Now

“Success will never be a big step in the future; success is a small step taken just now.”

Love Yourself, It Will Show

“Love yourself first & everything else falls into line.” -Lucille Ball

Laugh, Smile and Be Happy; It Does Not Need to Be Complicated

“Always laugh when you can. It is cheap medicine.” -Lord Byron

Do What Drives You and You Will Go Farther Than Your Imagination

“Hard work beats talent when talent doesn’t work hard.”

Focus, Experience and Enjoy. Everything Is Happening Right NOW

“No matter how hard the past. You can always begin again.” – Buddha

Relax, Be Yourself and Leave Your Mark

“Work for a cause, not for applause. Live to express, not to impress. Don’t strive to make your presence noticed, just make your absence felt.” -Unkown

Let’s Fly Together Now

“Intelligence without ambition is a bird without wings.” – Salvador Dali

Let Go Of Duality and Embrace The Delicate Balance of Life’s Infinite Nature

“Stars can’t shine without darkness.”

Jun 24, 2013Jun 17, 2016

Psychedelics Provide Wisdom for Personal Growth

The following selected excerpts are from Tripping as a Tool for Self-Realization, originally published on The Psychedelic Frontier.
Psychedelics have a variety of uses, dependent on the user’s attitude. If you use them as intoxicants, you will become intoxicated. If you want to see pretty shapes and colors and “trip out” to music, then they will act as sensory enhancers. If you want a new mode of consciousness that leads you to experience life in a novel way, they will satisfy that urge.

These psychedelics can go much deeper than recreation. Those who never choose to explore psychedelics more seriously than as intoxicants or sense-enhancers will miss out on their greatest potential. Why stop at pretty sounds and colors when these medicines can catalyze deep epiphanies and lasting change?

Psychedelics Breaks Down Mental Conditioning to Reveal the Self

Psychedelics can show you your true self, dragging your insecurities and internal conflicts into the light for examination. Or mediate a conversation, even a partnership, with the subconscious. They unseat your deepest assumptions and lead you to question the most rigid of habits and biases.

Psychedelics are molecular battering rams, crumbling the castle called Ego and raising from the rubble a profound feeling of pure love and unity. Your real self is revealed, defenses down, moat drained, drawbridge lowered. A trip may be the first time you have a free reign in your own mental kingdom. A molecule may be the truest mirror you ever held up to yourself.

Going Beyond Recreational Use of Psychedelics

Myron Stolaroff, a researcher and advocate of psychedelic psychotherapy, describes how recreational use tends to taper off naturally:

The use of psychedelics is self-regulating in most cases. Their true purpose is to enhance growth and interior development. Used only for pleasure, or abused, the Inner Self is thwarted, which leads to unpleasant experiences and depression. Though everyone who pursues the use of psychedelics for personal growth must be prepared for the “dark night of the soul” experiences, those who seek only entertainment will lose interest in these substances.

“Tripping with intent” is not an alternative method so much as a complementary one. People use psychedelics for all sorts of reasons—to improve sex, deepen their connection with nature and other people, explore their internal emotional landscape, and so on. A focus on self-improvement, with proper preparation, method, and post-trip integration, will help bring more meaning to all of these activities.

For the whole article “Tripping as a Tool for Self-Realization”, please visit The Psychedelic Frontier.

Jun 18, 2013Jun 17, 2016

Alan Watts – Voluntary Versus Involuntary Choices. Are We Really In Control? (Video)

Alan Watts discusses the perceptually blurred line between voluntary and involuntary actions.

Going through everyday life seemingly exercising free will while apart of a larger system of life and creation is wondrous. You are not only a part of the big picture, you are the big picture.

Alan Watts – Voluntary and Involuntary Actions Transcript

You see the problem is this; we identify in our experience a differentiation between what we do and what happens to us.

We have a certain number of actions that we define as voluntary; we feel in control of those.

And then over against that there is all those things that are involuntary. But the dividing line between these two is very arbitrary.

Because for example, when you move your hand you feel that you decide whether to open it or to close it. But then ask yourself how do you decide?

When you decide to open your hand. Do you first decide to decide? You don’t do you. You just decide. And how do you do that? And if you don’t know how you do it; is it voluntary or involuntary?

Let’s consider breathing. You can feel that you breathe deliberately. You can control your breath. But when you don’t think about it, it goes on. Is it voluntary or involuntary?

So we come to have a very arbitrary definition of self; that much of my activity that I feel I do.

That then doesn’t include breathing most of the time. It doesn’t include the heart beats. It doesn’t include the activity of the glands. It doesn’t include digestion. It doesn’t include how you shape your bones, circulate your blood. Do you or do you not do these things?

Now if you get with yourself and you find out that you are all of yourself; a very strange thing happens. You find that your body knows that you are one with the universe.

In other words, that the so called involuntary circulation of your blood is one continuous process with the stars shinning.

If you find out that it’s you who circulates your blood you will at the same moment find out that you are shinning the sun.

Because your physical organism is one continuous process with everything else that is going on. Just as the waves are continous with the ocean. Your body is continous with the total energy system of the cosmos and its all you.

Only you’re playing the game that you’re only this bit of it. But as I’ve tried to explain there are in physical reality no such things as separate events.

So then remember also when I tried to work towards a definition of omnipotence. Omnipotence is not knowing how everything is done, it’s just doing it. You don’t have to translate it into language.

Apr 25, 2013Jun 17, 2016

Psychedelic Spirit Paintings, Alex Grey Art Gallery

Alex Grey’s paintings can be described as a blend of sacred, visionary art and psychedelic art.

He is best known for his paintings of glowing anatomical human bodies, images that “x-ray” the multiple layers of reality. His art is a complex integration of body, mind, and spirit.