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Human Nature and Altered States

Jedunnigan
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In a recent interview with Mind Hacks, Wade Davis touched upon the state of the myopic Western mind. He believes such close-mindedness acts as the barrier towards a meaningful appreciation for and understanding of shamanism and psychedelics, ‘undeveloped’ cultures, and even ourselves:

“I don’t think any of this is about saying who’s right and who’s wrong but it’s just fascinating to recognize that there are different options and these other cultures aren’t failed attempts at being us but they’re unique answers to a fundamental question – what does it mean to be human and alive?”

Read Part I here.

Read Part II here.

Wade Davis is a featured guest on the upcoming video seminar series "Awakening the Cosmic Serpent: Shamanism and Plant Medicine in this Transformative Time" hosted by Jeremy Narby. The series also features Stan Grof, Kathleen Harrison, and Luis Eduardo Luna.  Click here to find out more.

Image: "Wade Davis" by Colorado College on Flickr courtesy of Creative Commons Licensing.

 

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Comments

There's Nothing Myopic about the Western Mind!

Submitted by The Cosmist on Sat, 01/08/2011 - 17:28.
For [Cosmic Void]’s sake, no more attacks on the “myopic Western mind”! This web site and nearly everyone writing here are products of the West, so please let’s not be delusional! The West gave us every one of your favorite psychedelic prophets, not the East, Islam or any other culture you can name. There is nothing myopic about a culture that has expanded human horizons beyond all others with our science and technology! My other problem with these “Reality Sandwich” narratives is they seem to suggest, not unlike the Christians and the Muslims, that there is a higher truth that only an initiated few are privy to. Yet this truth is never named or demonstrated, it is only hinted at in vague, rather meaningless language. Until something more convincing than “I took ayahuasca, I vomited and shit and something weird happened in my head” is offered, I remain radically skeptical. The default cosmic truth is that we inhabit a universe of unimaginable vastness, that everything we value will soon perish by entropy, and there are no gods to save any of it. Truly, the Cosmicism of Lovecraft and the Cosmology of Hawking are far stranger and more mind-blowing than any drug-addled claim of an Amazonian Shaman or a California hippie. I don’t say all this to be intentionally offensive, but to simply call bullshit on much of what passes for profundity here. From my perspective it is all very microscopic and delusional.

Slow down, breathe deep.

Submitted by Jedunnigan on Sun, 01/09/2011 - 04:33.
It sounds like you're reading way too far into the semantics and not enough into the message of the interview. You should really take a closer look at the interview before you get so defensive.

Did you not bother to read past the first sentence of my post?  I specifically put that Davis quote in to ward off misguided commentary like yours. The 'myopic Western mind' is not an all-encompassing statement about our culture; never does Davis try to attack or downplay the advances of Western culture. In fact, he speaks to it's positives: "f you get your arm ripped off in a car accident you don’t want to be taken to a shaman."

His point is that people [very much like you ("Until something more convincing than “I took ayahuasca, I vomited and shit and something weird happened in my head” is offered, I remain radically skeptical.")] from the 'west' are unwilling to appreciate or see the merit in other cultural customs. He was specifically talking about the Western viewpoint on drugs and overconsumption: "For whatever reason, people in the West define drugs by culturally routed moral and legalistic opinion and therefore the drugs we habitually use we dismiss with euphemisms....[and] That idea that only human beings can be animate or the idea that a bird could have animus was ridiculed and dismissed as ridiculous. It was pretty clear that the way that we treat the Earth as simply a raw resource to be consumed at our pleasure comes directly out of that process of devitalising the Earth."

I have a feeling you 'need something more convincing' because of your own cultural myopia. Davis wants the reader to realize that you must live and be the life experience of these cultures to understand it. Riding a high horse is preventing you from seeing that. There's nothing microscopic about his words: "And also cultural relativism and just the idea that other peoples of the world aren’t failed attempts at being you, that comes powerfully from the psychedelic experience.”

Then you say: ““Reality Sandwich” narratives is they seem to suggest, not unlike the Christians and the Muslims, that there is a higher truth that only an initiated few are privy to. Yet this truth is never named or demonstrated, it is only hinted at in vague, rather meaningless language.” Hmm…not following you there. The point of this site is to share information, not hide it. It’s all out on the table friend—we’re not talking about information available to a select few—none of the information presented in this interview is inaccessible. In fact, Davis invites you to join the party and he tells you how to do it. Don’t close yourself off to it.

There was nothing profound about his interview—you made that up. In fact, it’s rather bland if you ask me. Davis is just asking for some open mindedness. But then again, that might be profound for a myopic mindstate.

The statement was simple as

Submitted by PrimalFlow on Sat, 01/08/2011 - 16:51.
The statement was simple as well as accurate. I encounter and deal with this western mental myopia daily, and have done so my entire life. Most notions that people maintain are not based on their own perceptions, yet are informed by current or antiquated propaganda. Oft times in referring to the retrograde condition of the western attitude, people are not making a direct assault on progressive thought, rather, they are simply asserting the subjective nature of the herd mentality that just happens to be prevalent in the west. If this were not so, then we would, at this moment, be participating in a radically different culture and society than what we are coerced to endure in this present moment.

western mind

Submitted by wildthing on Sat, 01/08/2011 - 19:23.
So let me see this ah, "western mind" is what? Do we even know? Is it defined by not being an eastern mind? If you listen to some...ah, so-called western minds you would think they know just what defines them.What comes to mind is stuff that is not so western.Not so manifest destiny.Not so wild west.All these images that we have been raised on by Hollywood only feed into a christian myth, of pulling your self up from your boot straps.Not that there are not some genuine innovators, and thinkers that could be called western, or western thought, as it were.But is seems that some of the best is the west thinking happened when America was about to go into a Civil war.Since then, the thinking has been superseded by what is really what people mean by western mind, and we are talking about technology.And depending on how you have been educated and your mind been programed by what western thinking finally became, in the light of technological developments.So before getting all bunched up about the above phrase, the myopic western mind, take a pause, and wade into Wades interview, a western mind that has not been seduced by the "western mind set" but has taken the route of entering into the mind of others, not so with view right up the arse of Disneyland westworld.We are talking dropping the phony conditioning, and out right brainwash of the myth of the western mind.Great thinkers as I see them could be said to represent western thought, but that is only in the light of certain trends of thinking that have evolved in schools of thought that depending what side of those schools of thought you fall on or error on.When we see some thought seeing either the rise or fall of civilizations, seeing at some point the system becoming either closed(western thinking?) or open ended(other thinking?).It seems that now western thought has arrived in a cul-de-sac, or has become a innocent bystander(innocent?) of its own dead end hyper-myth.Yet there are pockets of thought, western being the direction the sun sets on, and not some movement west that destroys everything in its path to keep certain people in power, ie war war war.And this would be the inability to see others, to see that "God" is not just another word for not being able to see on either side of the self-imposed blinders on.As far as RealitySandwich is concerned, just think that the run of the internet(western directed?) has seen sites, where people can come together and see what other thinkers have come up with, but as far as people commenting and discussing, this is still a bit confusing, we don't all communicate the same way, usually to discuss a thinker one must be educated about certain things before being able to say any thing relevant.However language is still evolving, and ways of approaching using language to better come up with new ways of seeing things, not just from some point blank western stare.But from a true tradition of western thought that is not just defined by the word western, as a particular brand of thought.

The evasion cosmic truth is

Submitted by David Lee on Mon, 01/09/2012 - 02:34.
The evasion cosmic truth is that we dwell in a universe of unimaginable hugeness, onthebroadway that everything we worth will soon perish by entropy and there are no god to save any of it.