Adventures Through The Mind
Using Psychedelic Molecules to Explore Alternate Worlds | Andrew Gallimore, PhD ~ ATTMind 176
Episode guests
Podcast summary created with Snipd AI
Quick takeaways
- Psychedelics act as tools to switch and fine-tune our perception of different world spaces by altering brain functioning and prioritizing or deprioritizing certain hypotheses.
- Classic psychedelics like LSD, psilocybin, and DMT disrupt the structure and dynamics of our world model, allowing access to different regions of the world space.
- Psychedelics broaden the range of potential hypotheses, destabilize the dominance of certain models, and enhance the brain's ability to perceive unfamiliar worlds within the world space.
- Psychedelics open the door to new insights, expanded consciousness, and profound self-reflection, expanding our understanding of the brain, perception, and the nature of reality.
Deep dives
Information, Brain, and World Building
Our brain works with information and selects specific data to generate a world model. This model is rendered into our experience, creating a subset of potential worlds that we collectively perceive as consensus reality. This baseline reality is shaped by evolutionary and socio-cultural factors. However, our brain has the capacity to access and experience different worlds within the larger world space. Psychedelics act as tools to switch and fine-tune our perception of different world spaces by altering brain functioning and prioritizing or deprioritizing certain hypotheses. The brain operates within an attractor landscape, but certain psychedelics can flatten this landscape, allowing access to novel areas of the world space.
The C-Switch and Classic Psychedelics
The C-switch is a multi-level mechanism in the brain, involving specific serotonin receptors and intracellular signaling pathways. Classic psychedelics like LSD, psilocybin, and DMT interact with these receptors and disrupt the structure and dynamics of our world model. They activate certain neurons, causing them to fire more easily and spread information between different areas of the cortex. This disrupts the finely tuned patterns of connections and loosens the rigidity of the model. As a result, our perception becomes more fluid, dynamic, and unpredictable, allowing access to different regions of the world space.
Effects on Perception and Hypotheses
The C-switch and classic psychedelics impact our perception by altering the strength and stability of our hypotheses. They broaden the range of potential hypotheses and destabilize the dominance of certain models, allowing the brain to explore alternative possibilities. By increasing neural activity and breaking down the rigidity of the model, psychedelics promote the generation of novel hypotheses and enhance the brain's ability to perceive unfamiliar worlds within the world space. This results in the characteristic hallucinatory and transformative effects of classic psychedelics.
Fine-Tuning and Exploring World Space
Psychedelics offer the opportunity to fine-tune our experience of the world by exploring different regions of the world space. This exploration allows us to encounter and engage with novel worlds and perspectives. By temporarily disrupting the stability of our baseline reality, psychedelics open the door to new insights, expanded consciousness, and profound self-reflection. The C-switch and classic psychedelics play a crucial role in expanding our understanding of the brain, perception, and the nature of reality.
Understanding the Brain's World-Building System
The podcast explores the brain's world-building system and how it is influenced by different psychedelics. It discusses the concept of the world-space landscape and the different switches that can be activated to induce various altered states of consciousness. The episode explains the role of error signals in the brain and how they affect our perception of reality. It also highlights the importance of exploring these different states for scientific research and potential therapeutic applications.
Exploring Different Switches: Classical Psychedelics
One of the switches discussed in the podcast is the classical psychedelics switch, which includes LSD, DMT, and psilocybin. These psychedelics alter the brain's world model by increasing error signals and allowing for more sensory information to flow in. The episode explains how these psychedelics can create a more dynamic and fluid perception of reality, leading to visual and conceptual shifts in how we perceive objects and relationships.
Exploring Different Switches: Tropane Alkaloids
Another switch mentioned in the episode is the tropane alkaloids switch, found in plants like datura and bergamotzia. These substances block the M1 acetylcholine receptor, disrupting the brain's ability to trust sensory information. As a result, the world model becomes divorced from the environment, leading to a deliriant and dissociative experience. The episode emphasizes the unpredictable and potentially dangerous nature of these substances.
Exploring Different Switches: NMDA Receptor Blockers
The podcast also discusses the NMDA receptor blockers switch, which includes substances like ketamine and PCP. These drugs inhibit the NMDA receptors, causing an alternating pattern of inhibited and highly active neural states in the brain. This leads to dissociative and anesthetic effects, as well as psychedelic experiences at lower doses. The episode highlights the complex push-pull effect of these substances on neural activity and emphasizes the unique and abstract state of consciousness induced by them.
In this episode, we welcome back Dr. Andrew Gallimore to explore the content of his new book 'Reality Switch Technologies: Psychedelics as Tools for the Discovery and Exploration of New Worlds'.
We discuss how the brain builds an experiential world model from patterns of information at the neural level; how all of those worlds are correlated with specific neural patterns; how we can disturb that neural pattern to encounter new worlds; essentially, using psychedelic molecules to explore alternate worlds.
We explore how different classes of psychedelics affects the brain differently and thus switch us to different potential worlds, focusing specifically on the neural and world-switching effects of classical psychedelics, tropane alkaloids, and ketamine.
We also explore why the brain doesn’t care if its models are true, only if their adaptive; how perception of reality flows from conceptual hypothesis down, not from sensory information upwards; the self-model and its disintegration (ego death); we talk about schizophrenia and hearing voices; and about how every experience is “real” but not all experience is accurately mapped to our environment.
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For links to Gallimore's work, full show notes, and a link to watch this episode in video, head to bit.ly/ATTMind176
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Episode Breakdown
- (0:00) Opening and introduction
- (3:10) Guest bio
- (4:38) Patreon Thanks | Support the Show
- (6:14) Interview Begins
- (7:38) All experience is “real”; all experiences are of models made by the brain
- (10:45) DMT worlds are made of the same stuff as our normal waking world
- (13:15) The brain builds a world model from patterns of information at the neural level
- (18:31) The Interface Theory of Perception; not every experience is an adaptive model of the environment
- (22:07) The brain doesn’t care if its models are true, only if it's adaptive.
- (24:26) Perception of reality flows from conceptual hypothesis down, not from sensory information upwards; predictive coding
- (35:40) The world falls out of the brain; how the brain builds the rich complexity of an entire reality
- (40:50) The self-model and its disintegration (ego death)
- (45:08) Schizophrenia and hearing voices
- (52:21) How the brain builds the world space of consensus reality, and how we can explore new world spaces by changing our brains with psychedelics
- (59:59) The C-Switch: how classical psychedelics affect the structure and dynamics of our models for reality
- (1:07:32) How classical psychedelics offer us profound insights and increase creativity through their effect on our brain’s hypotheses about reality
- (1:11:39) Ego death is the result of classical psychedelics producing a loss of distinction between self and other
- (1:14:20) Increased wonder and insights resulting from classical psychedelics destabilizing the brain’s hypotheses
- (1:23:08) Considering the difference between 5-MeO-DMT and DMT in the context of classical psychedelic effect on “the world space”
- (1:27:34) The M-Switch: how tropane alkaloids (aka datura) affect the structure and dynamics of our models for reality through acetylcholine, the M1 receptor, and the management of error signals
- (1:36:38) Tropanes, attention, and coming in and out of reality and hallucinations
- (1:39:30) The N-Switch: how ketamine and PCP affect the structure and dynamics of our models for reality through the NDMA receptor, the push-pull dance between anesthesia and high-psychedelia
- (1:45:23) James musing on his high-dose ketamine experiences
- (1:46:45) Ketamine is an abstract state of consciousness
- (1:50:11) What about Cannabis, MDMA, and Amanita Muscaria?
- (1:54:51) Using psychedelic molecules (and designing new ones) to explore and map alternate worlds
- (2:02:47) Follow-up links and socials
- (2:05:21) Outro
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