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Comment by empath75 | Hacker News Reader

I don't know how they'll get their message past the machine elves from dimension 9 that also communicate with people on LSD.

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I thought elves were limited to the DMT experience. At least I hoped that was the case.

I found this interesting at the end of the article, regarding the Control Interrupt model:

This inhibitory control mechanism occurs a discrete number of times per second. Therefore “control interruption” caused by psychedelics, in this model, is conceived as a periodical failure of inhibitory control that allows aspects of one’s experience to be sustained for longer than usual. The frequency of control interruption is specific to the psychedelic used. As the article conjures, salvia and nitrous oxide produce control interruption at a frequency of 8-11 and 12-15 Hz, respectively. On the other hand, DMT disrupts control at a much higher frequency (24-30+ Hz). This control interrupt creates “a standing hallucinogenic interference pattern in the consciousness of the subject”.

It's interesting that different substances might have measurably different effects on perception. Would be nice to see a bit more scientific study into this, maybe seeing if there is a link to fMRI data at all.

One lesser known psychedelic, Salvia Divinorum, when taken responsibly and with a measured dose derived from incremental experimentation, tends to bring a person into the weird world too. Lots of beings, lots of entities.

Salvia takes you to a pretty weird place if you irresponsibly take an oversized dose too. According to my friend.

That wasn't the case for me when I experimented with that in high school years ago. Definitely no hallucinations or anything really close to that, though the extracts will put you in a weird (and very uncomfortable - it is not fun; about as fun as being tickled against your will) world for a brief period of time. Really the only thing that makes Salvia Divinorum worth trying is the "after glow" affect that lasts a couple weeks that can alleviate depression.

DMT is much different than LSD. I have never heard anyone talk about machine elves and LSD.

DMT is a legitimate mystery of science and is not a drug in the traditional sense.

It's so odd how there's a near-universal reporting of small elf- or dwarf-like creatures from that drug. Is there any proposed mechanism of action for how it works?

Priming seems likely. Most experience reports I've read describe the "entities" as ineffable, so I have to think the language used by McKenna is more a cultural staple/fallback than a consistent hallucination unique to DMT.

I'm sure that contributes to a lot of it, as well as experiences others have with harder drugs. But from my research, many people reported this experience without ever being aware that others have experienced it. I think there must be some factor unique to DMT that can create experiences like this.

I dit DMT once. No elves or other creatures.

Just for clarity, someone told me that 5-MEO-DMT is sometimes mistakenly called "DMT", but it is totally different from the "machine elves" N,N-DMT version: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/5-MeO-DMT

Same here.Extremely strange parallel dimension and some other entity, but not the sort of alien companions I hear about from other people. It might be that I'm very unsocial and a bit of mystic to begin with, my brain has always seemed to be wired quite differently from most other people.

My running theory is that the machine elves from Dimension 9 are actually a heavily modified perception of one's self. This is purely just based only on research done in my basement with DMT, so nothing approaching academic research, but I think those little people are actually our "mind's eye" perception of ourselves, just twisted by the DMT. Like when you imagine yourself walking through a hallway to go to lunch, as people sometimes do, you're "seeing" that image of yourself. I think this is what triggers most of the creature visions. Maybe I'm not making sense, but this is the first time I've tried to put that idea into words.

That makes sense, but were you already aware of the "DMT elf" mythology before taking the drug? If so, that could've influenced a lot of your experience.

Otherwise, I think that could be a plausible explanation. Though I've read about people actually talking to the elves, or hearing things from them, which would be weird if the elves were themselves.

The very first time I did DMT -- this is way before stuff like Erowid -- I was not aware of that, no, and I did sense what seemed to me to be some kind of otherworldly presence. In the times since, I have read all about it on Erowid but still haven't seen specifically the "machine elves" but have had similar "encounters". The presence was more aggressive and "dark" when I smoked it versus drinking ayahuasca (from a mix of B.Caapi and P.Viridis). Also sometimes I feel a similar (but different) "presence" when smoking salvia divinorum.

On LSD you become the alien.

On DMT the aliens come to you...

I spent a good amount of time a few years ago exploring the DMT realm, and its totally, completely and inexplicably mysterious. Either consciousness is a non-local phenomena and when you smoke it you end up in some kind of parallel dimension or for whatever crazy reason evolution decided it was important to incorporate these alien beings into our subconscious mind. Those with a rigid reductionist perspective would do well to explore it a bit. IMO there's nothing more mind expanding and question inducing than DMT, and it just begs out to science: "STUDY ME!"

"Evolution" has "decided" to "incorporate" plenty of unimportant things, or else everything is equally important, and thus nothing is important.

I have not tried DMT and to be honest i do not intend to, based on what i have read. So my insights might not be so cleaver as i think.

But here is an article that makes sense to me.

https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/unique-everybody-else/2...

Our brains are really not that good at letting us know what is going on in our lives. Our brains are however really good when it comes to making us believe that we know what is going on in or lives.

Just look at this list for some examples https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cognitive_biases

I'm both fascinated and very scared of DMT. As I get older and my want to experiment with unfamiliar substances wanes, I'm pretty confident that I'll probably never try DMT, but I wish I had when I was younger and more brash. I've had friends who have taken too much and went down the DMT-hole, and their description of it (as best they can recollect anyways) is absolutely terrifying. One example was a friend who felt he spent years in a completely different world, with completely different laws of physics - he had to literally give up his idea of how the world worked in order to embrace what he thought at the time was his new world/being. Once he accepted it, apparently he started to come out of it.

Yeah, I can very much sympathize with your friend. One thing I've learned is that setting an intention is important, and not being reckless with it is important too. There have been a few time where I've come back home after a night out and dove right in with half drunken bravery, and yes infinite thought loops are a thing! There was one time where I quite literally thought I had died and landed in hell and in that moment of time an indescribable suffering was transmitted through my being via some kind of demon which left me in tears for about a half of an hour afterwards. But lest I drive the curious away, whenever I have gone into it with respect I've had experiences that were deeply enlightening and, while always weird, seemingly benign.

Occams razor suggests the latter, i.e. it's all in your mind. Unless you can get one of the beings to factor some huge number for you, of course.

- http://www.ayahuasca-info.com/data/articles/paralleldmt.pdf - http://slatestarcodex.com/2015/04/21/universal-love-said-the...

People always use the large number factor as an argument which pretty much assumes we and they are on similar wavelengths, so to speak. Its a strawman.

They're way ahead of you.

http://in5d.com/energies-higher-self-decoding-matrix/

Plus, people on psychedelics are already communicating in a level that sober people cannot understand.

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