Chaos Magic

[devnull]

A friend of mine had the "joy" of suffering from auditory hallucinations as a sideeffect of new medication. Suffice to say she quickly changed it.
There is also the possibility of auditory pareidolia and apophenia.

Yeh, I heard voices when I was on that antidepressant they use for smoking cessation (I forget the name).

I wasnt on it long

 

[AkuManiMani]

Well, first I would like to ask AkuManiMani how specific the information he received was.

I'm sorry but the idea of having a full on conversation with a mere "auditory hallucination" is a bit laughable to me. Yes, the information was specific and the exchange was as lucid as the one we're having now. That combined with the fact that the "voice" was also able to physically manipulate my body kinda clinches the issue for me. If what I experienced was just a "hallucination" then so is what I'm experiencing right now.

 

[AkuManiMani]

Why do you think they are doing this to you, and not some of the many people that are seeking out experiences like this? Also, was the odd experience the thing that you asked her about and found to be true? Was it specific, or something general that could be loosely applied with confirmation bias?

Like I said, the "voice" alluded to my friend having similar experiences. When I asked my friend a couple weeks later if she'd had any strange experiences she mentioned hearing a male voice speak to her on a few different occasions and a female voice speaking to her atleast once.

She reported that the male voice that spoke to her was preceded by a high-pitched ringing [at this point I had not filled her in on the details of my experience]. The voice then instructed her to stand in a particular location and do a series of odd hand gestures. She said she was a bit baffled by what was going on but followed the instructions she was given. After she did so she said she had a vivid three part vision. She said the male voice tried to communicate with her again on another occasion but her baby started crying in the other room and the voice simply said "You know what? Now is probably not the best time..."; there was a sound like a monitor being turned off and she felt the 'presence' leave.

And if you have never had a history of being delusional, are you sure you didn't start with that one event? The feeling in your brain sounds like there might be something wrong, you might aught to get that checked.

TBH, several years ago I'd be making the exact same arguments that Sceptic Tank and others have made here regarding the lack of evidence regarding "spirits" and other 'paranormal' stuff. I'm not gonna go into all the details of my life story but I've had some pretty odd experiences over the passed several years of my life than don't lend themselves very well to conventional explanations. IMO, its much more parsimonious to simply accept that there are many things about reality that our current level of scientific understanding does not encompass.

 

[PixyMisa]

IMO, its much more parsimonious to simply accept that there are many things about reality that our current level of scientific understanding does not encompass.

No, it's not. Well, that may be your opinion, but it's not true. It is not only vastly less parsimomious, it is, in the sense you are talking, pure baloney.

We know people hallucinate. We also know that people construct false memories. Indeed, the latter is so common that you have to be on constant guard against it.

You can't always trust your senses or your memories, much less intuition or introspection. If what you believe contradicts controlled, independently confirmed experimental data, you lose.

 

[Malerin]

True, but if I were a teacher I would have authority. And if I had authority, I would give you all reading assingments and mystical exercises to perform. Then, I would not have to explain and defend myself to uninitiated, ignorant students who think they already know it all, so what is there to learn?

Awesome.

 

[Malerin]

Many things, many ages. There's always (at least) few who already think they know everything. I'm sorry, I wasn't trying to derail your thread. I was just chuckling at your assumption that being a teacher automatically grants you authority.

It does.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_loco_parentis

 

[AkuManiMani]

No, it's not. Well, that may be your opinion, but it's not true. It is not only vastly less parsimomious, it is, in the sense you are talking, pure baloney.

We know people hallucinate. We also know that people construct false memories. Indeed, the latter is so common that you have to be on constant guard against it.

You can't always trust your senses or your memories, much less intuition or introspection. If what you believe contradicts controlled, independently confirmed experimental data, you lose.

Yes PixyMisa, you've caught me! I'm in a losing struggle against all science and reason. I'm so glad I have enlightened omniscient beings, such as yourself, to set me strait in my silly delusions and to instruct me in what I have and have not experienced. Thank you, oh great arbiter of reality and all that encompasses it! How can I ever express my eternal gratitude?

 

[Zanders]

Like I said, the "voice" alluded to my friend having similar experiences. When I asked my friend a couple weeks later if she'd had any strange experiences she mentioned hearing a male voice speak to her on a few different occasions and a female voice speaking to her atleast once.

She reported that the male voice that spoke to her was preceded by a high-pitched ringing [at this point I had not filled her in on the details of my experience]. The voice then instructed her to stand in a particular location and do a series of odd hand gestures. She said she was a bit baffled by what was going on but followed the instructions she was given. After she did so she said she had a vivid three part vision. She said the male voice tried to communicate with her again on another occasion but her baby started crying in the other room and the voice simply said "You know what? Now is probably not the best time..."; there was a sound like a monitor being turned off and she felt the 'presence' leave.



TBH, several years ago I'd be making the exact same arguments that Sceptic Tank and others have made here regarding the lack of evidence regarding "spirits" and other 'paranormal' stuff. I'm not gonna go into all the details of my life story but I've had some pretty odd experiences over the passed several years of my life than don't lend themselves very well to conventional explanations. IMO, its much more parsimonious to simply accept that there are many things about reality that our current level of scientific understanding does not encompass.

Do you have any theories of what it might be? A ghost, an alien? Possibly some sort of secret technology? And how long ago did this happen?

And no, I don't think just saying it didn't happen is logical or even intelligent. There are too many cases like this, and there are too many similarities. If you would only accept something that could be tested, how could we test spontaneous encounters like this? If whatever it is doesn't want to make itself exposed or obvious, or it takes complicated steps to communicate with, how could you ever prove it's reality without putting any effort in to it? And what would it take to except it's reality?

 

[The Norseman]

It really depends upon the sauce one uses... they should not be overcooked.

Overcooking is not the issue when they're all just half-baked.

 

[PixyMisa]

Do you have any theories of what it might be? A ghost, an alien? Possibly some sort of secret technology? And how long ago did this happen?

And no, I don't think just saying it didn't happen is logical or even intelligent. There are too many cases like this, and there are too many similarities.

Too many for what?

Certainly, where it is possible to investigate the claims (a rarity, but there are instances), we invariably find that things did not happen as reported.

Are there too many cases, too many similarities, for inaccurate and biased reporting? Clearly not.

If you would only accept something that could be tested, how could we test spontaneous encounters like this?

Define what it is. Form a hypothesis. Construct an experiment, or a system of observations.

We can't cause supernovae in the lab, and there hasn't been one observed in our galaxy since the invention of the telescope, but it's not like there's any question whether they happen. A neutrino can pass unhindered through a light year of lead, and we not only know those exist, we know that they oscillate between three different flavours.

The supernatural, on the other hand: Anecdotes uncounted, evidence zero. Stop making excuses.

If whatever it is doesn't want to make itself exposed or obvious, or it takes complicated steps to communicate with, how could you ever prove it's reality without putting any effort in to it? And what would it take to except it's reality?

Evidence.

 

[dlorde]

No, we call them lies.

'Confabulation' is a less emotionally loaded term...

 

[iknownothing]

Yes PixyMisa, you've caught me! I'm in a losing struggle against all science and reason. I'm so glad I have enlightened omniscient beings, such as yourself, to set me strait in my silly delusions and to instruct me in what I have and have not experienced. Thank you, oh great arbiter of reality and all that encompasses it! How can I ever express my eternal gratitude?

Hm. That doesn't seem to relate to what PixyMisa said.

 

[AkuManiMani]

Do you have any theories of what it might be? A ghost, an alien? Possibly some sort of secret technology? And how long ago did this happen?

I really have no way of knowing for sure but I don't think is a ghost(spirit of a deceased person) or the product of some secret tech and/or aliens. I've done some independent reading of accounts of those under the effects of DMT who report contacting and interacting with all manner of non-human intelligences and of indigenous interpretations of such things as contact with beings in the "spirit world".

Like I mentioned to Sceptic Tank I think it may be useful to think of the ostensibly 'physical' world we interact in our waking lives as a constrained subset of a much larger reality. 'Incarnated' beings like us could be compared to users tunned into this particular reality frame and these "spirits" would just be beings who are not currently 'logged onto this server', so to speak

And no, I don't think just saying it didn't happen is logical or even intelligent. There are too many cases like this, and there are too many similarities. If you would only accept something that could be tested, how could we test spontaneous encounters like this? If whatever it is doesn't want to make itself exposed or obvious, or it takes complicated steps to communicate with, how could you ever prove it's reality without putting any effort in to it? And what would it take to except it's reality?

Like I said, the "voice" specifically advised me against mentioning the encounter. Whether it was because she knew reporting such things would possibly get me labeled as mentally ill or there is some larger reason why such beings do not wish to be generally known, I can't say for certain. From accounts I've read of people who 'explore' the larger reality [via OBEs, ayahuasca, or some other modality] many of the entities they talk to tend to try and change the subject whenever the topic of their ontological status comes up.

I don't have enough personal experience to give any definitive answers myself. The best I can do is learn as much as I can from similar reported experiences and try to form my own conclusions about it. Whatever is going on here, I don't think it necessarily invalidates our current body of scientific knowledge; it simply means that our current models of reality are woefully incomplete.

 

[AkuManiMani]

Hm. That doesn't seem to relate to what PixyMisa said.

Thats because I'm openly mocking him. He knows why....

 

[D'rok]

Whatever is going on here, I don't think it necessarily invalidates our current body of scientific knowledge; it simply means that our current models of reality are woefully incomplete.

Why?

I cannot fathom why people who have these experiences look beyond the cause (drugs, meditation, electrical stimulation under the god helmet, or whatever) to some imagined higher reality.

The cause is right in front of you - you took the drugs after all - and there is no need to confabulate to explain the experience.

 

[AkuManiMani]

Why?

I cannot fathom why people who have these experiences look beyond the cause (drugs, meditation, electrical stimulation under the god helmet, or whatever) to some imagined higher reality.

The cause is right in front of you - you took the drugs after all - and there is no need to confabulate to explain the experience.

Right. I have a spontaneous lucid experience in which a voice converses with me, physical manipulates my body, and provides me with veridical information I'd hitherto been unaware of and the explanation is "drugs after all'? That makes about as much sense as trying to explain the people I'm conversing with on JREF in terms of being mere artifacts of my computer monitor. Its one thing to be skeptical; its quite another thing to rationalize to the point of absurdity.

 

[Limbo]

Right. I have a spontaneous lucid experience in which a voice converses with me, physical manipulates my body, and provides me with veridical information I'd hitherto been unaware of and the explanation is "drugs after all'? That makes about as much sense as trying to explain the people I'm conversing with on JREF in terms of being mere artifacts of my computer monitor. Its one thing to be skeptical; its quite another thing to rationalize to the point of absurdity.

Yeah, pathological rationality is...irrational. Its more rational it be in accord with the irrational. Then you can be rational without being rational, and irrational without being irrational. >.<

 

[sadhatter]

Like I said, the "voice" alluded to my friend having similar experiences. When I asked my friend a couple weeks later if she'd had any strange experiences she mentioned hearing a male voice speak to her on a few different occasions and a female voice speaking to her atleast once.

She reported that the male voice that spoke to her was preceded by a high-pitched ringing [at this point I had not filled her in on the details of my experience]. The voice then instructed her to stand in a particular location and do a series of odd hand gestures. She said she was a bit baffled by what was going on but followed the instructions she was given. After she did so she said she had a vivid three part vision. She said the male voice tried to communicate with her again on another occasion but her baby started crying in the other room and the voice simply said "You know what? Now is probably not the best time..."; there was a sound like a monitor being turned off and she felt the 'presence' leave.



TBH, several years ago I'd be making the exact same arguments that Sceptic Tank and others have made here regarding the lack of evidence regarding "spirits" and other 'paranormal' stuff. I'm not gonna go into all the details of my life story but I've had some pretty odd experiences over the passed several years of my life than don't lend themselves very well to conventional explanations. IMO, its much more parsimonious to simply accept that there are many things about reality that our current level of scientific understanding does not encompass.

So because you can't explain an incident, no one in the scientific community could? Isn't that a little bit egotistical?

 

[sadhatter]

I really have no way of knowing for sure but I don't think is a ghost(spirit of a deceased person) or the product of some secret tech and/or aliens. I've done some independent reading of accounts of those under the effects of DMT who report contacting and interacting with all manner of non-human intelligences and of indigenous interpretations of such things as contact with beings in the "spirit world".

Like I mentioned to Sceptic Tank I think it may be useful to think of the ostensibly 'physical' world we interact in our waking lives as a constrained subset of a much larger reality. 'Incarnated' being like us could be compared to users tunned into this particular reality frame and these "spirits" would just be beings who are not currently 'logged onto this server', so to speak



Like I said, the "voice" specifically advised me against mentioning the encounter. Whether it was because she knew reporting such things would possibly get me labeled as mentally ill or there is some larger reason why such beings do not wish to be generally known, I can't say for certain. From accounts I've read of people who 'explore' the larger reality [via OBEs, ayahuasca, or some other modality] many of the entities they talk to tend to try and change the subject whenever the topic of their ontological status comes up.

I don't have enough personal experience to give any definitive answers myself. The best I can do is learn as much as I can from similar reported experiences and try to form my own conclusions about it. Whatever is going on here, I don't think it necessarily invalidates our current body of scientific knowledge; it simply means that our current models of reality are woefully incomplete.

In the same post you say you don't know what it is, but then state that it can't be something mundane. Do you understand how contradictory this is?

 

[sadhatter]

Right. I have a spontaneous lucid experience in which a voice converses with me, physical manipulates my body, and provides me with veridical information I'd hitherto been unaware of and the explanation is "drugs after all'? That makes about as much sense as trying to explain the people I'm conversing with on JREF in terms of being mere artifacts of my computer monitor. Its one thing to be skeptical; its quite another thing to rationalize to the point of absurdity.

You have to see this from our point of view.

You come in here and say you had something that amounts to a standard hallucination, the kind claimed by schizophrenics all the time. Then say you have evidence you can't show us that proves it wasn't.

One would have to be terminally naive to accept this as any kind of evidence of anything other than a hallucination.