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One thing that I've found fascinating is that different cultures experience hallucinations differently. > We find that while there is much that is similar, the

One thing that I've found fascinating is that different cultures experience hallucinations differently. > We find that while there is much that is similar, there are notable differences in the kinds of voices that people seem to experience. In a California sample, people were more likely to describe their voices as intrusive unreal thoughts; in the South Indian sample, they were more likely to describe them as providing useful guidance; and in our West African sample, they were more likely to describe them as morally good and causally powerful. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26349837/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26349837/ I've wondered if there is some sort of feedback loop where western culture associates hallucination with possession, while other cultures may see hallucinations in a more positive light, or even as a sign that you are some sort of shaman.

kranke155 2y ago
Here’s my experience. This is the story. I have bipolar disorder and I accidentally ingested LSD at a festival by kissing someone who had just taken a tab on their tongue. I wasn’t aware that this could happen, yet it happened. The next day I woke up with a Voice. It appeared to me to be the voice of God. It was very difficult to go against it but I could negotiate. It told me things that it couldn’t possibly know, like that I should ask a stranger for a cigarette so I could later get a towel when I needed it. It seemed to have powers of foreshadowing and it would seemingly tell me things before they happened. It was also a trickster and it would play cruel jokes on me. After a while it became hard for me to take. At the same music festival I met a lady who would make songs just by looking at you. I carefully realised that she was likely in something like a permanent psychedelic state, which I had been before due to my bipolar condition. I asked her this directly and she confirmed it. She said I was one of the few people who could see it! I had purchased a ticket to her retreat. So a month after the festival I went to her retreat. It was a very difficult time and the voice was giving me a lot of trouble. I went to the song lady. I told her about my condition (the voice had told me to go and tell her!). She thought about it and said ok, I will help you, and you cannot do the retreat. She then did a session with me where she told me where she saw the entity - she called it a “walk in” spiritual entity, and said that because I’m very “open” with my bipolar, adding the LSD made me even more open, it happened that a “walk in” sneaked inside. She said she saw the entity down my legs, and kidneys, and she helped me expel it. She then taught me I could “close the door” to prevent it getting in. My condition was immediately much better. When she expelled the voice from my body, she spoke exactly like the voice spoke, telling me that the entity wanted to leave, didn’t really fight the expulsion, using the same tone of voice and words that I’d gotten used that the Voice would use. It was inexplicable and amazing. Now I still have a voice, but it’s a whisper in comparison. It tells me things, still seems to have some ability to warn me about the future (it’s debatable how much of this is connecting the dots later of course, but it has done some odd things, like warned me I wouldn’t go to certain places). Since the experience is not as intense, and I’ve lived enough to realise it’s not omnipotent or always right, I roll with it. I have no scientific explanation for what happened to me.
- rgrieselhuber 2y ago
  This is one of the reasons caution is strongly urged when instructed to do things like “open your chakras.” The idea that scientific explanations are only legitimate if they are purely materialist probably won’t last the next 20 years.
  - llamaimperative 2y ago
    It'll probably still be materialist at rock bottom, but with a whole lot more attention getting paid to the "cognition" software that's running on that hardware. You're already seeing this with the explosion in CBT methods, but of course there are "folk science" traditions that have been dealing with this stuff for literally thousands of years.
    - kranke155 2y ago
      It certainly made me go “oh, shit this is why shamans have always existed”. I was so so lucky I was right next to one when it happened to me.
      - llamaimperative 2y ago
        Indeed! Sorry you had such an experience, I hope you've been able to pull some good things from it.
  - Dylan16807 2y ago
    Science is interested in anything you can reproduce.
    - kranke155 2y ago
      How could I reproduce this experience ? It’s absolutely beyond me.
      - Dylan16807 2y ago
QuadmasterXLII 2y ago
I’m always curious if this affects the content of the messages or just the tone. We have constructive proof that a voice in your head saying “Take your son to the top of a mountain, tie him to a rock and threaten him with a knife” can be viewed as morally good and casually powerful without changing the content at all. In countries with women’s and children’s rights, the space of acceptable shamanic behavior is suddenly a lot narrower
- voiceblue 2y ago
  Not sure if you intended this, but you just turned causal into casual.
  - QuadmasterXLII 2y ago
    As the French say, “Tushy”
- GeekyBear 2y ago
  Previously, I've read an account of an Indian woman who would hear the voice of her grandmother offering advice and saying loving supportive things.
- tsol 2y ago
  Saying "raise your son to be patriotic and fight for his country" is acceptable in western societies. There isn't particularly a big difference in morality when it comes to the extremes
  - room4 2y ago
    > Saying "raise your son to be patriotic and fight for his country" is acceptable in western societies. Maybe kinda in some circles? I suspect almost none of the tech-worker urban liberals who are the majority on HN would embrace that as a parenting notion. Even among military veterans, your phrasing would likely sound a bit off the mark. They would generally see the call as being about protecting other people and serving their country. To address your second sentence, most people see a big difference in morality between "Protect the innocent from people who would harm them" and "Harm the innocent".
theaussiestew 2y ago
The reality is that these thoughts and voices are just coming from the subconscious of humanity as well as from greater existence, which includes spirits, both positive and negative. If people grow up in a western context where people frequently say and think phrases like "go kill yourself" to mentally vulnerable people, then these mentally vulnerable people will pick up on these thoughts and phrases. If people grow up in other cultural contexts where there is a recognition of the existence of a world beyond material existence, then they will be open to spirits in a general sense and not see it as a pathology. Additionally, people in these contexts aren't so violent towards the mentally ill, so they don't perceive the aggressive thoughts that mental patients in the west experience.
create-username 2y ago
Maybe in the western mentality, Those voices are invading your innermost private property. They are trespassers.
Aeglaecia 2y ago
surely I can use llms to help perform a meta analysis analysing the efficacy/risk profiles of western vs eastern sociological perspectives on hallucinatory symptoms ... then do a diff of the earnings in each country of corporations with vested interests in pharmapsychological methods (psychiatrists, antidepressant/antipsychotic manufacturers) ... would be interesting knowing how much big pharma pays per soul
krapp 2y ago
>I've wondered if there is some sort of feedback loop where western culture associates hallucination with possession, while other cultures may see hallucinations in a more positive light, or even as a sign that you are some sort of shaman. Yes, it's called Christianity.
- wahern 2y ago
  The West African example (upthread) of positive interpretations of hallucination was of Ghanian Christians. See section 4, paragraph 2 at https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/tops.12158 https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/tops.12158 What's distinctive about modern Western culture isn't its traditional religions.
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
  - krapp 2y ago
    I wouldn't consider African Christianity to be Western. Like Japanese Christianity, it evolved along a different path to allow for for a degree of syncretism that just doesn't exist within the Western paradigm. Western Christianity was primarily spread through imperialism and colonialism, and thus implemented in such a way that native traditions and cultures were either recontextualized within the Christian paradigm or else purged. The political and financial incentives involved in the spread of Christianity can't be ignored, as they formed the framework by which Western cultures now tend to interrogate and interpret the supernatural. Within that framework, hallucinations and visions can either mark one as possessed by God (a prophet) or possessed by Satan (a witch.) There's no affordance for a third way ("shamanism") as might exist in other orthodox Christian traditions because that would undermine the authority of the dominant imperialist hierarchy.
    - wahern 2y ago
      > undermine the authority of the dominant imperialist hierarchy. Ah, yes, the ever-present institutional forces conspiring to oppress the agency of independent, freedom-loving, free-thinking people. I wonder where the oppression-focused, conspiratorial, paranoid, anti-authoritarian mindset steeped in the language of violence that is so prevalent in the industrialized West, especially among those with mental disorders, comes from....
KK7NIL 2y ago
> in our West African sample, they were more likely to describe them as morally good and causally powerful. Believing voices in our head are causally powerful (as in deities) really reminds me of the theory of consciousness appearing from the collapse of the bicameral mind. Here's a good introduction to this idea: https://youtu.be/lgnMyF-o0sQ https://youtu.be/lgnMyF-o0sQ
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- finnh 2y ago
  Came here to say the same thing. Excellent book, a thought-provoking read for sure
- AlbertCory 2y ago
  The great thing about that book was: once you understood the title, you didn't really need to read the book.
  - Suppafly 2y ago
    >The great thing about that book was: once you understood the title, you didn't really need to read the book. Seriously, it's something I've never thought about, but once you hear "The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind" you kinda know what the theory is and it makes sense.
    - jl6 2y ago
      The thesis seems understandable to me from the title, but I couldn’t tell you whether we should believe it or not. I assume the content of the book provides evidence and justification. I assume, because I haven’t read it either.
      - AlbertCory 2y ago
        I did read it. Also, a recent summary of "the world since Jaynes" (forgot the link) They did say that he had something there. AFAIK they didn't say that he spawned a whole field of research, though.

kranke155 2y ago

Here’s my experience. This is the story. I have bipolar disorder and I accidentally ingested LSD at a festival by kissing someone who had just taken a tab on their tongue. I wasn’t aware that this could happen, yet it happened. The next day I woke up with a Voice. It appeared to me to be the voice of God. It was very difficult to go against it but I could negotiate. It told me things that it couldn’t possibly know, like that I should ask a stranger for a cigarette so I could later get a towel when I needed it. It seemed to have powers of foreshadowing and it would seemingly tell me things before they happened. It was also a trickster and it would play cruel jokes on me. After a while it became hard for me to take. At the same music festival I met a lady who would make songs just by looking at you. I carefully realised that she was likely in something like a permanent psychedelic state, which I had been before due to my bipolar condition. I asked her this directly and she confirmed it. She said I was one of the few people who could see it! I had purchased a ticket to her retreat. So a month after the festival I went to her retreat. It was a very difficult time and the voice was giving me a lot of trouble. I went to the song lady. I told her about my condition (the voice had told me to go and tell her!). She thought about it and said ok, I will help you, and you cannot do the retreat. She then did a session with me where she told me where she saw the entity - she called it a “walk in” spiritual entity, and said that because I’m very “open” with my bipolar, adding the LSD made me even more open, it happened that a “walk in” sneaked inside. She said she saw the entity down my legs, and kidneys, and she helped me expel it. She then taught me I could “close the door” to prevent it getting in. My condition was immediately much better. When she expelled the voice from my body, she spoke exactly like the voice spoke, telling me that the entity wanted to leave, didn’t really fight the expulsion, using the same tone of voice and words that I’d gotten used that the Voice would use. It was inexplicable and amazing. Now I still have a voice, but it’s a whisper in comparison. It tells me things, still seems to have some ability to warn me about the future (it’s debatable how much of this is connecting the dots later of course, but it has done some odd things, like warned me I wouldn’t go to certain places). Since the experience is not as intense, and I’ve lived enough to realise it’s not omnipotent or always right, I roll with it. I have no scientific explanation for what happened to me.

rgrieselhuber 2y ago
This is one of the reasons caution is strongly urged when instructed to do things like “open your chakras.” The idea that scientific explanations are only legitimate if they are purely materialist probably won’t last the next 20 years.
- llamaimperative 2y ago
  It'll probably still be materialist at rock bottom, but with a whole lot more attention getting paid to the "cognition" software that's running on that hardware. You're already seeing this with the explosion in CBT methods, but of course there are "folk science" traditions that have been dealing with this stuff for literally thousands of years.
  - kranke155 2y ago
    It certainly made me go “oh, shit this is why shamans have always existed”. I was so so lucky I was right next to one when it happened to me.
    - llamaimperative 2y ago
      Indeed! Sorry you had such an experience, I hope you've been able to pull some good things from it.
- Dylan16807 2y ago
  Science is interested in anything you can reproduce.
  - kranke155 2y ago
    How could I reproduce this experience ? It’s absolutely beyond me.
    - Dylan16807 2y ago

QuadmasterXLII 2y ago

I’m always curious if this affects the content of the messages or just the tone. We have constructive proof that a voice in your head saying “Take your son to the top of a mountain, tie him to a rock and threaten him with a knife” can be viewed as morally good and casually powerful without changing the content at all. In countries with women’s and children’s rights, the space of acceptable shamanic behavior is suddenly a lot narrower

voiceblue 2y ago
Not sure if you intended this, but you just turned causal into casual.
- QuadmasterXLII 2y ago
  As the French say, “Tushy”
GeekyBear 2y ago
Previously, I've read an account of an Indian woman who would hear the voice of her grandmother offering advice and saying loving supportive things.
tsol 2y ago
Saying "raise your son to be patriotic and fight for his country" is acceptable in western societies. There isn't particularly a big difference in morality when it comes to the extremes
- room4 2y ago
  > Saying "raise your son to be patriotic and fight for his country" is acceptable in western societies. Maybe kinda in some circles? I suspect almost none of the tech-worker urban liberals who are the majority on HN would embrace that as a parenting notion. Even among military veterans, your phrasing would likely sound a bit off the mark. They would generally see the call as being about protecting other people and serving their country. To address your second sentence, most people see a big difference in morality between "Protect the innocent from people who would harm them" and "Harm the innocent".

theaussiestew 2y ago

The reality is that these thoughts and voices are just coming from the subconscious of humanity as well as from greater existence, which includes spirits, both positive and negative. If people grow up in a western context where people frequently say and think phrases like "go kill yourself" to mentally vulnerable people, then these mentally vulnerable people will pick up on these thoughts and phrases. If people grow up in other cultural contexts where there is a recognition of the existence of a world beyond material existence, then they will be open to spirits in a general sense and not see it as a pathology. Additionally, people in these contexts aren't so violent towards the mentally ill, so they don't perceive the aggressive thoughts that mental patients in the west experience.

create-username 2y ago

Maybe in the western mentality, Those voices are invading your innermost private property. They are trespassers.

Aeglaecia 2y ago

surely I can use llms to help perform a meta analysis analysing the efficacy/risk profiles of western vs eastern sociological perspectives on hallucinatory symptoms ... then do a diff of the earnings in each country of corporations with vested interests in pharmapsychological methods (psychiatrists, antidepressant/antipsychotic manufacturers) ... would be interesting knowing how much big pharma pays per soul

krapp 2y ago

>I've wondered if there is some sort of feedback loop where western culture associates hallucination with possession, while other cultures may see hallucinations in a more positive light, or even as a sign that you are some sort of shaman. Yes, it's called Christianity.

wahern 2y ago
The West African example (upthread) of positive interpretations of hallucination was of Ghanian Christians. See section 4, paragraph 2 at https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/tops.12158 https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/tops.12158 What's distinctive about modern Western culture isn't its traditional religions.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- krapp 2y ago
  I wouldn't consider African Christianity to be Western. Like Japanese Christianity, it evolved along a different path to allow for for a degree of syncretism that just doesn't exist within the Western paradigm. Western Christianity was primarily spread through imperialism and colonialism, and thus implemented in such a way that native traditions and cultures were either recontextualized within the Christian paradigm or else purged. The political and financial incentives involved in the spread of Christianity can't be ignored, as they formed the framework by which Western cultures now tend to interrogate and interpret the supernatural. Within that framework, hallucinations and visions can either mark one as possessed by God (a prophet) or possessed by Satan (a witch.) There's no affordance for a third way ("shamanism") as might exist in other orthodox Christian traditions because that would undermine the authority of the dominant imperialist hierarchy.
  - wahern 2y ago
    > undermine the authority of the dominant imperialist hierarchy. Ah, yes, the ever-present institutional forces conspiring to oppress the agency of independent, freedom-loving, free-thinking people. I wonder where the oppression-focused, conspiratorial, paranoid, anti-authoritarian mindset steeped in the language of violence that is so prevalent in the industrialized West, especially among those with mental disorders, comes from....

KK7NIL 2y ago

> in our West African sample, they were more likely to describe them as morally good and causally powerful. Believing voices in our head are causally powerful (as in deities) really reminds me of the theory of consciousness appearing from the collapse of the bicameral mind. Here's a good introduction to this idea: https://youtu.be/lgnMyF-o0sQ https://youtu.be/lgnMyF-o0sQ

deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
finnh 2y ago
Came here to say the same thing. Excellent book, a thought-provoking read for sure
AlbertCory 2y ago
The great thing about that book was: once you understood the title, you didn't really need to read the book.
- Suppafly 2y ago
  >The great thing about that book was: once you understood the title, you didn't really need to read the book. Seriously, it's something I've never thought about, but once you hear "The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind" you kinda know what the theory is and it makes sense.
  - jl6 2y ago
    The thesis seems understandable to me from the title, but I couldn’t tell you whether we should believe it or not. I assume the content of the book provides evidence and justification. I assume, because I haven’t read it either.
    - AlbertCory 2y ago
      I did read it. Also, a recent summary of "the world since Jaynes" (forgot the link) They did say that he had something there. AFAIK they didn't say that he spawned a whole field of research, though.