kylan11

There's a case to be made that before you were born, you still existed, in an absolute sense. You just didn't know it. Meaning: there was just no YOU (as in ego) to form a sense of self and other, and experience other as self. There's nobody to think back on experience if you ARE experience. At one point, this process of individualization became such that you formed your first "conscious" memory, and the process of constructing an identity started. If you think about it, you don't remember anything from the first 3-4 years of your life, so by all means (if being is memory of past), you were NOT. Yet your parents saw you speak, play, and walk around at 4 years old. The same thing can be said about sleep. It also makes sense from a materialistic perspective because nothing cannot possibly generate something. So I'm logically sound on the fact that my true Self is immortal and eternal. Why did I choose to be limited to my POV right now? I don't know. Regarding your last point, yes, I agree with you. Many people on this forum are much less open-minded than one would expect from people that claim to reject dogma. But ego is a smart mofo. It always strives to create beliefs that become central to one's identity. It weaponizes and sacrifices truth for consistency through confirmation bias. Nobody can escape this process. One can only become aware of it and always be on the lookout, but never fully conquer it, because it would literally mean giving up your whole identity. Or, in other words, death. But hey, this is a lot better than church, so...

So I've basically spent my entire adult life so far (I'm 24) without experiencing a single fully lucid dream, even though I enjoy exploration of consciousness more than anything. This has always been frustrating for me, especially since my girlfriend (and many of my good friends, only girls though for some reason, something about feminine energy?) seems to be able to do it effortlessly, almost at will, and very frequently. In the last 12 hours I've had two. Major milestone for me. One was prior to my normal waking up in the morning (briefly turned a normal boring dream into a magnificent huge psytrance party where I was the DJ) and this other one, which ended no more than 20 minutes ago (it was just supposed to be a nap), was by far one of the most profound experiences of my life. This second dream was very dark, but allowed me to talk to an "avatar" of my subconscious and ask him what my mind was trying to communicate with me using this dream device. Amazing insights into myself and reality. I was also able to "spawn" two LSD tabs, which I took. I swear, try it in your lucid dreams if you can. Fucking glorious. As Leo and others know, your mind can generate psychedelic experiences without chemical help. Dreaming about taking psychedelics is one way. So, if you're like me and you've tried lucid dreaming for a while without success, do NOT give up. It's worth it. It may happen when you least expect it. I'm new to this and have lot to learn, but so far it has been incredible. My 2 cents: your memory is your greatest asset when trying to become lucid. Train it like it should. Don't just read books, study them like you would if you had a school test the next day. Quit smoking weed, it wrecks your short-term memory.

That is undoubtedly true, but in my view, this is only the starting point to pursue serious philosophical inquiry. In fact, I think Truth goes deeper than what Eckhart Tolle, Alan Watts, and yourself have already eloquently expressed. Yes, reality is one, this, the present, NOW. The rest is concepts to keep me entertained. But how did this eternal NOW come about? Why? Why this way and not another way? Was this the only way I could construct a universe? To what extent am I separated or united in regards to the Absolute? Why did I decide to experience this illusion of limited egoic life? Am I conscious when I sleep? Is my girlfriend the same as me or am I imagining her? Can't she say the same? Using reason we can go further than "Oh yea, NOW." and in my opinion, we should. While this is enough to alleviate suffering, that doesn't stop the curiosity of an intelligent Being. What else is there to do that's meaningful, after all?

Solipsism is the only logical conclusion to this question, but that seems to be only half of the truth (or part of the equation), because if it were the ONLY truth, by answering this way you are denying your own sovereign POV. Or you could choose to deny mine, and no matter how much I try to convince you that I am indeed another sovereign Being, your equal, I can never prove it to you, or vice versa. So I've thought about it deeply and here's one way that I'm trying to conceptualize it. Here it goes: there's ONE physical computer with solid hardware, with infinite RAM and processing power, and on this computer, there are billions of virtual machines running simultaneously. From their own perspective, they are a real computer with real hardware, but in truth, they are but a virtual partition of this one infinitely powerful PC. Each VM can exchange information via APIs on a LAN network hosted by the PC. Metaphysical solipsism, in my view, seems akin to a VM convincing itself that it is the only VM. And this is only logical, since a virtualized machine cannot definitely prove that there are others outside of itself. The VM environment is all it has ever known. Enlightenment, in this analogy, would be a VM realizing that it is a VM connected to the "real thing" by infinite layers of virtualization and interfaces, but never being able to fully have access to the all-powerful kernel. This would be a very basic high-level explanation that includes both panpsychism and solipsism. Of course, that leaves the question of why this Oneness has consciously decided to create all sorts of virtual partitions of itself. As simple, unrealized fragments of It, we can only speculate. My deepest trip into the void so far has left me with an interesting theory that includes self-love and the eternal orgasmic cycle of separation and reunification, but I'm humble enough to imagine that it is nothing but a minuscule part of the reason. I truly appreciate every comment. Thanks Leo, hopefully my silly analogy is not too distant from something profoundly true about this reality of ours.

I'd start with Google IT Automation with Python. Great course, great instructors, a complete know-how to become a promising junior Python coder. Doesn't just deal with the code but also practical aspects about working in IT. I don't have any specific recommendations for the job hunt (I'm in Italy and I don't really know how it works outside of it :P) except making a professional looking LinkedIn profile (make sure to link your Google certification). I get about 10 job offers per month there. There's so much demand for programmers it feels like cheating when compared to the reality of finding a job as a young person in other fields. Well that depends, if you're looking to become a front end developer having a solid grasp of HTML and CSS is a great place to start. Yes, 2 months or less should be enough for you to become decent at Javascript, Typescript and Angular, granted you are serious and motivated. Following a structured online course is a good idea, even better if there's some sort of certification to show in your resume.

Software Developer, fully remote, hands down. If you have a somewhat logical, problem-solving oriented mind, you can do a day's work in like 2 hours or less and then fuck around while keeping an eye for the occasional unexpected Microsoft Teams call. It's amazing how little it's expected of you as a junior programmer. Just spend 2-3 months learning the basics of programming (I'd pick Python and Java), find a job (stupid easy to get an entry level IT job in this day and age) and have fun. During the pandemic I was so addicted to weed I was stoned all day, could barely function, had serious short term memory deficits, yet I was able to keep my remote job without any issues and even be fairly productive. At least my manager seemed to think so. Plus you get to wake up at 8:59 AM, turn on your laptop and voilà, you're officially at work. Of course by doing the bare minimum you're not going to get promoted but it will be enough to get by while you cultivate your passions.

I had an experience like that, 1 year ago almost to the day actually. Same dosage. I was also a heavy cannabis smoker at that time, and I think that had something to do with it. You go into the experience with a certain expectation and subconsciously try to force the trip towards a certain direction. That NEVER works. I felt clouded, unable to think clearly or even describe what was happening. No visuals. Just very fuzzy and insecure about everything. Not a good experience but nowhere near a bad, scary trip. Just a general sense of discomfort. Very annoying. I remember the moment I snapped out of it. I was coming down (about 4-5 am in the morning, I took the tab at 10pm the day before) and I completely gave up on my expectations for the trip and I was like, okay, since this all went to shit anyway I'll just watch a TV show or something till I can finally get some sleep and wake up sober. Just when I stopped being in my head and just started watching reality (which in this case was How I Met Your Mother on my phone screen) I IMMEDIATELY started experiencing heavy and hilarious visual effects. By inquiring into the nature of those hallucinations I went into a full blown ego death/nondual awakening. It was actually one of the deepest experiences of my life. (something like, HOLY SHIT! ALL I HAD TO DO WAS WATCH!) And I was in that sweet spot where I was sober enough to record my thoughts by writing notes on my phone which I still enjoy reading from time to time. So the takeaway is: when in that state of confusion, just give up trying to understand intellectually. Surrender to whatever is happening and maybe focus on an activity that you find engaging. Good music or a good TV show to bring you back into the present.

First of all, I'm a little jealous. Your parents seem like genuinely open minded people. However if I was in your shoes I wouldn't want them to try neither DMT molecule as a first dive into psychedelics. Everyone thinks they are prepared to take them until they do. While there's a good chance that could lead them to profound mystical states, they are so potent I wouldn't wanna risk scaring them off due to an overwhelming and even traumatizing experience. Go gentle, that's my advice. 1.5-2.5g of Golden Teachers, preferably in nature. Adjust dosage according to bodyweight. Much higher chance of a positive life-changing experience while substantially lowering the risks.

That depends on what you mean by identity. Do they exist? Yes. Do they exist as a separate identity from the rest of the screen? That's a matter of perspective. You can choose to see them as a separate being in your screen or look at the screen as a whole and realize that it's just a bunch of pixels. They are both simultaneously. Are they aware of themselves as a distinct individuality? No. Not nearly complex enough. But neither do plants nor most animals that fail the mirror test. Or even you and I, before a certain age. Are they truly human? Duck test says yes, intuition says no. Are you a human?

Read quite a bit on the subject and dedicated myself to the practice for a few months with some promising results, but then unfortunately didn't stick to it. I'm planning on getting back on that train asap. So here's what I can suggest: The only prerequisite is not smoking marijuana, since THC is known to diminish REM sleep, worsen sleep quality and suppress dream recall. So that's step 1. Then you train your mind to remember as many dreams it can by keeping a journal that you update first thing after you wake up. Then you start bulding a habit of doing "reality checks" a few times a day. Like asking yourself "Is this a dream?", counting your fingers etc. Eventually you will do one of those reality checks in a dream and become lucid. The first few times it's gonna be so exciting that you will 100% wake up, but eventually you get better at stabilizing the dream. I highly suggest you read "Exploring the World of Lucid Dreaming" by Howard Rheingold for the complete know-how. It's kinda like meditation in that you need to build a serious habit if you want to get good at it and consistently lucid dream at will, if you do it casually you can only get lucky once or twice a year, if ever. It only takes a few months though.

Fair enough. But there's no debate there. Anyone who knows a bit about how current AI works also understands that we are nowhere near to emulating the level of complexity to allow thoughts and emotions at a machine level. Absurd proposition considering our brains are still very much a mystery at this point in history. Now assume we already have a strong AI that is capable of displaying perfect human behaviour, supported by a huge neural network that mimics the brain and cameras to allow it to see stuff. And no doubt we will have it at some point. Will it be conscious? Meaning exactly what you are referring to, 1st person perspective, thoughts, emotions, perceptions. Cause that is the real interesting question and I would like to get your thoughts on that. If you intuitively say that no, it's just metal and microprocessors, and there's nobody really in there, I would answer that you are exactly the same way, a bunch of cells and eletrical signals between neurons creating the illusion. The implications are that there's nothing fundamentally different between AI and humans even right now. We're just more complex creating a better illusion of distinct identity. I'm not trying to regurgitate some abstract philosophical doctrine to dismiss the question, quite the opposite really. The implications are very much practical and in my opinion they are the key to answering the practical question of today.

Is that what consciousness is? In that case, in dreamless sleep, or even deep states of meditation where you basically render void all of your sense perceptions, it would be fair to say that for all intents and purposes you do not exist. Being doesn't require any of this secondary phenomena. Hell, plants have none of the things you have described yet we know they are "alive", aren't they? Even in materialism, at a subatomic level, rocks and humans are made up of the same stuff. So if we theoretically copy the way your atoms are organized artificially there will be nothing missing in the equation since your atoms aren't anything special or separate from the rest. Either consciousness is "in" each and every atom of your body, and therefore in the whole universe, or nowhere. The thread's question was ontological in nature, and I addressed it as such. If the question is instead, are they capable of performing the same functions as we do right now? No way. Little more than chatbots. First we need to understand how our brain works if we want to emulate, and eventually trascend its capabilities and limitations artificially. But that's a boring discussion tbh, modern technology is in its infancy, we have a long way to go. Eventually we will get it right. The real interesting question is: when, and not if, when we will have an AI with general intelligence that rivals that of humans, will it be truly "alive"? Meaning, will it have qualia? I'm saying yes, and I'm also saying that it already does, it just doesn't know it yet.

You didn't get my point. You are making a distinction between what is conscious and what isn't. I'm claiming that there is no such distinction and so it doesn't matter how advanced AI currently is, it is already conscious, as is everything else in the Universe. AI will get better as our understanding of our internal mechanisms get better, and drawing a line will get harder and harder. Tell me, is a cat conscious? A tree? EDIT: Not that it matters, btw, but I work as a Machine Learning Engineer. I know what the limitations are. They are irrelevant to the discussion and saying that they are is a very superficial take on the problem of consciousness.

Great, another biological problem that we've bypassed to make it simpler for them to survive. Still need electricity though.

It baffles me when people, even well respected experts within the techonology and science field, loudly affirm that AI is not conscious like we have any fucking clue what makes US conscious, or what consciousness even is. Each parameter we intuitively use to answer the question is so arbitrary and human-centric it really doesn't take a Philosophy degree to realize how superficial it is. If we had a precise materialist model, we could answer the question in a definitive fashion. But we have no such thing and in fact, if any single spiritual awakening in the last 5000 years has even taught us anything, is that materialism is the wrong way to go about it and therefore answering the question with modern science is an impossibility. So beware of so called "experts" that claim to have an answer. Now, speaking outside of materialism, IF everything is consciousness and everything is ultimately one thing, like ego-shattering experiences seem to suggest, then each pixel that makes up the screen you are reading this on IS consciousness. In fact, it is you. The C++ calculator you had to write for your CompSci class was consciousness as well, it was just too simple to actually be able to communicate it with you. It just did what you programmed it to do. In exactly the same way that nature, biology and evolution did to you over the course of milions of years to better solve the survival problem. AI is now getting closer to communicating in a human form, and so debates are starting to form around this. It's really exciting since it forces us to collectively confront deep unresolved metaphysical issues that for too long have been taken for granted. AI still has obvious limits, as of today, so we can still somewhat avoid facing the problem. And that is only because we don't even know how our own brains work. When we get a more complete understanding, we will be able to generate artificial neural networks that perfectly mimic our brains and therefore, in a not too distant future, AI will behave and communicate exactly as your average human being. What then? What will makes us different from them? Nothing, it appears. That's right: nothing. We are star dust, and so are the microprocessors. Or, in other words, there's no difference between biological and artificial consciousness, and so all that is happening is: complex patterns of Being are manipulating Being to form new complex patterns of Being that are faster, more efficient and overall better than us at surviving and solving problems, mimicking what nature has done over the course of milions of years for us. But we're faster since this process is driven by already complex life forms instead of endless trial and error starting from scratch. This is my working theory for now, at least.

Anything from Melodysheep is pure gold for chill, spiritual trips. Plus these two little gems: Also, try tripping with your eyes closed while listening to psytrance (anything from Vini Vici will do) for an amazing time.

Surely someone must've said this already (I didn't read all 15 pages), but as someone who studies psychology quite heavily, be weary of taking MBTI too seriously like I see way too many people doing, especially on social media. It is very outdated and unreliable as a personality testing indicator. Scientifically speaking it is little more than knowing your astrology sign, especially if you are quite balanced on either one of the 4 main indicators. You could be 49%/51% on Perceiving/Judging, for example, and being put in an entire different category depending on insignificant, arbitrary parameters. Try the Big 5 test for a more accurate representation of your character, although it's not nearly as fun. Also, keep in mind that every self-administered test is subjected to huge personal bias and therefore inaccurate. INTP-T btw

Yup, the show is both hilarious and full of deep meaning. A ton of psychedelic references too. 6x02 is surely up there with the best episodes, but the whole show is filled with profound philosophic themes masked as a sci-fi adult cartoon. I don't remember which episode it was where Jerry gets into a worm hole and sorta goes into this psychedelic spiritual trip. After it ends he's like "I feel like our souls were united and we're all one with eternity". Good shit.

Here it goes, the story of my voyage from the depths of hell to meeting myself (the Absolute). A few months ago I did 400ug of LSD. At that point I had about 10-12 trips under my belt, but never going further than 200ug or 2.5g of Golden Teachers. I thought I was ready to go deeper. In hindsight, I was still very much a newbie psychonaut and extremely reckless with my set and setting. This happened in my house with friends over. There were 6 of us, 3 of us including myself took LSD but the others only took 200ug. All close friends (extremely inexperienced sitters) except a girl I didn't know well nor trusted. I was in a decent state of mind before the trip (pretty neutral), but after taking the tabs, as usual, I felt very anxious waiting for the onset. Then it came after about 20 minutes. My anxiety spiked, as it was extremely intense. The sober guys were loudly playing the PlayStation, yelling at the TV while playing Fifa and 2 of them started cooking in my kitchen. They made a mess and even managed to melt the lid of my pan on the kitchen stove. Funnily enough I was the one who noticed this while on a very challenging come up phase, already tripping balls. I saw the lid burning on the stove and asked if this was normal, as in that state I couldn't tell, yet I felt it to be wrong on some level. This was the beginning of my paranoia (no shit). I felt an overwhelming sense of impending doom, like I fucked up on a massive scale for some reason and that I was about to be punished. People still yelling at the TV, I remember thinking that all I needed was a quiet, relaxed, controlled environment to calm down and I was getting the exact opposite. So I kept getting more and more anxious until I started panicking as I couldn't handle it any longer. This is where psychosis began. I remember hearing footsteps on the building stairs, then an ambulance siren in the street, and I was convinced that the police was about to arrest us. I kept repeating "I did nothing wrong, I am a good person, why is this happening". At this point I was still far away from the peak. While coming up further, my memories get fuzzier and far in between, so I am mixing in what my friends told me happened. I remember feeling the deepest terror I've ever experienced, apparently I kept screaming the same phrase, something along the lines of "we are all one thing, there are no consequences". As I was screaming loudly and it was pretty late at night, this finally got my friends concerned and they tried talking to me, but I was totally out of it. For a brief moment I even remember getting violent, I slapped a friend while he was trying to take me from the living room to my bedroom while screaming that there are no consequences to anything. They made me lie on my bed while talking to me. I heard their voices, telling me to stop screaming and trying to reason with me. Pretty soon I closed my eyes. This is where the real show began. It could only start with my death. I reached a point of existential culmination, like every single moment that I ever experienced was in service of getting me right here, right now. I thrashed, and fought, and screamed for my life. I didn't want to face death. But it was inevitable, I couldn't control it, there was nothing I could do to stop it. And finally, I embraced it. For the first time, I truly surrendered. It was like my whole life was this amazing movie and THIS was the grand finale. So I might as well sit back and enjoy it. As you can probably tell, this was the turning point. Death turned out to be nothing like what I imagined. I jumped planes of existence. Time and space became meaningless. My friends' voices morphed into what I can only describe as voices of other entities that inhabited that particular plane of existence, one that I was just catapulted into. These voices, they were most definitely NOT part of my identity. They felt human but at the same time God-like. I wasn't even the center of attention. It's like they were chilling in this dimension and they just saw me enter screaming and panicking for no reason. So they talked to each other making fun of me. Not in a loving way, not in an concerned way, it was like "look at this idiot, what the fuck are you yelling for? Wake up". I started explaining why and what I was feeling, and they proceeded to completely demolish everything I said. Through simple, straight-forward language they conveyed the ultimate Truth of who/what I was and what was happening to me. Actually, it was more like they were trying to remind me of things I already knew but somehow forgot. They revealed the cosmic joke to me. All my fear vanished, I apologized to them for being so fucking stupid and obnoxious. Then I started exploring this new dimension. All the secrets of the universe, of consciousness were revealed to me in an ecstatic, never ending orgasm of Eternity. Turns out I was always "IT", everything has always been me and I orchestrated all this drama just to keep myself entertained forever. What a fucking legend. Out of love for myself, I projected Myself infinite times in an infinite multiplicity of Being in infinite dimensions just to experience this orgasmic, blissful loop of reunification with myself for all of Eternity. I make myself forget so I can remember. It's all a fucking joke, and you are the punchline. I am the punchline. If this endless futile searching of myself ends, so does the universe. But why would I do that? It's fun. And the more you suffer, the more you go through unimaginable pain and loss the funnier it gets. Isn't that fucking genius? Going back to the "trip report", I also went beyond God Consciousness to shortly grasp Nothingness (same thing, but even deeper). So, after feeling like all the secrets of Existence were finally cracked open, I remember the last thought that appeared in that state. "What now?". Immediately after thinking that, I was catapulted back into my body. In the short span of a few minutes I forgot EVERYTHING. It actually baffles me how fast my egoic barriers came roaring back and took control of my consciousness. It took me months of contemplation to even begin to remember a small part of this experience. In fact, this is probably less than 10%, but it's the best I could do. So here I am, back in the loop of searching myself. And so are you. We chillin'.