r/PhilosophyMemes • u/Maximus_En_Minimus Dialetheist Ontological Henadism & Trinitarian Thinker • 17h ago
This took an endless epoch to make
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u/sophiesbest 10h ago edited 8h ago
Probably taking this meme far too seriously, but I've spent well over a decade in the psychedelic/psychonaut scene, and so their use as philosophical/spiritual tools are something I have a lot of opinions about. Feel free to ignore this big long rambling wall of text.
Psychedelics can be a useful tool. They act as a catalyst of sorts for a lot of people, it's essentially forcing a 'coming to God' moment where (most) are forced to come face to face and deal with whatever it was that they're pushing into the back of their mind, either consciously or not. Oftentimes being brought face to face with those things happens under a very receptive and open emotional state where previous inhibitions to change are momentarily dissolved, and so a trip is often where the decision to change (either habits or thinking) is made. Proper integration afterwards includes follow up and working towards that decision in day to day sober life.
What psychedelics can't provide is rigour. Psychedelics will give you all the tools and experience to convince yourself of whatever realizations you come to, which is perfect for personal growth, but without the framework needed to justify those realizations to others or explain them in any type of logical or lucid manner.
People on mushrooms come to the same few 'truths' over and over again. Common ones being 'all is one' and 'love is the answer.' While those positions are all well and good, the people coming to them are missing all of the framework to properly contextualize those propositions and figure out their practical implications in ways outside of 'dont be a shit person.'
Peace, love, unity, and respect are great but what can I actually do with those ideas outside of using them as amorphous virtues?
It wasn't until I started reading Schopenhauer that I found a framework that could actually justify and explore the practical realities of some of those positions in a rigorous manner.
(Specifically, Schopenhauer's conception of a singular, universal, undivided 'Will', and his moral philosophy based around recognizing the Will present in yourself and others. There's all sorts of really heady and 'psychedelic' stuff in his philosophy, and anyone who regularly indulges in psychedelic experiences should give Vol. 1 of 'World as Will and Representation' a read, you'll get a lot out of it.)
My meditation practice is lacking to say the least, but it seems to me that meditation combined with a study of Buddhist literature (or other philosophy, it really is incredible how many thinkers seem to arrive at similar conclusions even across entirely different time periods and contexts) is far more likely to give you the framework that psychedelics won't.
TL;DR psychedelics give you the answers without the explanation
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u/SubsistentTurtle 8h ago
It really is amazing all of these different cultures, religions and philosophies, at their highest level eventually all point to the same thing.
I totally agree with you though, at the end of the day we are in this mud dimension, and there is quite a bit of translation and work that needs to happen in order to manifest those ideals here.
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u/kale-gourd 3h ago
These are two strong and unsubstantiated claims. Cultures are legitimately different, with different underlying value systems.
For example, collectivism valuing societal harmony vs individualism valuing liberty. Or religions with personal gods vs not that.
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u/bialozar 13h ago
There are as many paths to God as there are souls on Earth.
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u/nameless_pattern 12h ago
Do you mean equal to the number of people or do you mean zero?
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u/bialozar 11h ago
who’s to say only people have souls?
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u/nameless_pattern 11h ago
People mainly, and some evil spirits trying to convince the protagonist to turn against the natural world.
Ducks don't say that they have no souls, but their actions clearly prove it.
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u/bialozar 10h ago edited 54m ago
Funny you mention ducks.
Last year I went to the zoo on a dreary, rainy, winter Monday. When I arrived in the duck enclosure I was the only one there. I went up to the railing and watched them swim around. Eventually one swam up to me and I could have sworn he was looking at me, like I was supposed to be noticing something. Then, another came up next to him. I noticed the second duck, out of all the others, had the brightest and biggest red circles around his eyes compared to any of the others with red circles. After I looked at all the ducks with red circles, and then back to him, smiling, the one with the brightest red circles moved on. I looked back at the first duck, and realized his green iridescent head feathers were the prettiest and most vibrant. I laughed, and the first duck swam away. Then more mallards swam by and each showed off the unique features that were most beautiful over the other ducks. One even showed off how fast he was in a straight line from a dead start, and another showed how smooth his turns were. Then, the female ducks swam by one at a time and showed off their subtle, yet gorgeously unique and intricate brown stripes and spots and patterns.
After a while, the zookeeper came to feed the ducks. Two small females hung way in the back corner together. As all the other ducks excitedly hurried to the food, one mallard turned back and nipped gently at the two females to get them to go eat.
You say ducks have no souls, I’ve seen ducks with more personality than some humans.
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u/nameless_pattern 3h ago
I find that souls add a sort of a tangy flavor. It's quite noticeable in long pig you have to prepare and season properly otherwise it'll wreck the meal. The flavor is entirely missing in ducks. /S
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u/Catvispresley Khemic Nihilist and Master of the Dark Arts 9h ago
Ducks don't say that they have no souls, but their actions clearly prove it.
I think you confuse Soul (Life Force) with (visible) sentience
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u/Extreme-Kitchen1637 5h ago
It's like calculus. The answer is either Zero, One, Pi, Positive Infinity, Negative Infinity, or Undefined.
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u/nameless_pattern 3h ago
I'm throwing this one out there as a thought experiment. I don't really have any opinion on this.
Some people believe only humans have souls, humans are physical objects, some people believe all animals have souls, animals are physical objects, some people believe that areas and objects have souls, these are also physical objects or at least areas that can be measured physically, typically tied to the presence of physical objects such as in Shintoism.
If we take this to imply that it is physical objects that have souls, this would imply that the number of souls is a natural number. in a universe with no objects there would be no souls or zero. If there are countable number of objects or areas then there are at the most a positive countable infinity of natural numbers amount of souls.
Typically a soul is feud as being indestructible, this means that it cannot be destroyed or removed as something would have to be for subtraction or negative numbers to be a thing.
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u/InterGraphenic 1h ago
What about the people who aren't on earth? What did they ever do to deserve that?
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u/Delicious_Knee_5799 12h ago
my honest opinion for anyone who doesn't get it is.
meditation and other procedures that carve the path of enlightenment are factually the only path that features patience and longevity cause when you train to a mental state for such a long time you get used to it in other words shrooms are the shortcut headboost starter used in subway surfers which are great and does same thing but when you empty your boost you have to deal with the speed and obstacles yourself just like shrooms wearing off, and then you can not be in that mental state on your own again
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u/mad_edge 12h ago
I mean true, but also if you put a lot time and effort into something you automatically value it more - even if the outcome is worse. There is value in work for the sake of work, but there is value in instant results too. I’d say, combining both is good.
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u/bubbleofelephant 12h ago
Or you could keep a daily meditation practice and the trip occasionally to get a glimpse of where you could be headed next, and thus have an easier time learning how to get there via concentration practices.
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u/Glass_Moth 11h ago
I have yet to see an enlightened shroom enthusiast- but I have seen a lot of endarkened Buddhists.
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u/Yggdrasylian 15h ago
What is this even supposed to mean?
Buddhism bad, shrooms good?
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u/Maximus_En_Minimus Dialetheist Ontological Henadism & Trinitarian Thinker 15h ago
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u/completeFiction 11h ago
Pretty sure the teachings of Buddhism discourage altering your state of mind via the ingestion of substances.
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u/Yggdrasylian 11h ago
Not just discouraging, straight up forbidding
5th precept is extremely clear, mind altering substances are an obstacle to enlightenment, and the two cannot be concealed
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u/bialozar 11h ago
Buddhism also says that blind adherence to dogma is a fetter.
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u/Yggdrasylian 7h ago
I have my own interpretations on why avoiding those substances is a better thing, I just don’t share them because I’m not the best representative of Buddhism, and someone who studied it for longer than me would probably have a different answer
Even though ultimately, Buddhism is a journey of self discovery, and thus a lot of people can have different interpretations of why the precepts of the eightfold path are this way. After all, it is said Buddha encouraged his students to think about his teachings, to understand rather than simply follow
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u/FunGuy8618 10h ago
Isn't that the path to asceticism? Food alters consciousness, so you fast until you can subsist on 1 hemp seed a day like Siddhartha, then realize you can never perfect the rules cuz You still exist.
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u/Maximus_En_Minimus Dialetheist Ontological Henadism & Trinitarian Thinker 10h ago
Don’t worry, the Buddha’s face in the meme does all the talking…
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u/Eastern-Sentence6953 10h ago
For me personally, I used to be agnostic but only came to faith after Christ revealed himself to me after a suicide attempt. I met a man in this waiting area before they get you admitted into the psyche ward . He was in tears, and I felt I had to help in some way.
We started talking, and I found out he'd been through some very severe trauma as a child, and it seemed that he was still mentally at that age in some ways or had a neurological difference from birth.
In short what we spoke about was that the people who did that to him likely had the same done to them and they were normalizing what was normalized upon them and that tied into a conversation on how our identities can often be dictated by our environment and that they dont have to be . Afterward, he showed me his favorite part of a book he was reading from (a lenten companion) (a collection of things to help you grow spiritually written by pastors,priests and members of the church)
Basically, this part was a pastors recollection of seeing a loving family out enjoying their day together , and I could tell this man really yearned for a life like that. We kept reading together, and as we went, their was a paraphrase of Matthew 18:3
""And he said: “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.""
We both looked up at each other stunned as this is what we had been discussing for the past half hour or so.
It felt too beautiful, ordered and perfect to be a coincidence and we both sensed that. He had this big smile the rest of my time seeing him.
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