Drugs can help you understand philosophy

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BidenPresident

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William James’s chemically induced excursions into the introcosm of his own consciousness served as a complement to his serious, sober work as a philosopher and psychologist.

In fact, it was his philosophical peers’ enthusiasm for the writings of Hegel that originally compelled him to inhale nitrous gas. “He was instinctively repelled by Hegelian dogma,” Jay writes, “its pompous insistence on absolute truth, its sterile abstractions, its lofty disdain for the pragmatic and the specific.”

But under the intoxicating influence of various gasses, James found himself experientially closer to that truth. Nitrous oxide, James would write, “made me understand better than ever both the strength and weakness of Hegel’s philosophy.”

https://thebaffler.com/latest/brains-on-drugs-semley
 
BidenPresident said:
William James’s chemically induced excursions into the introcosm of his own consciousness served as a complement to his serious, sober work as a philosopher and psychologist.

In fact, it was his philosophical peers’ enthusiasm for the writings of Hegel that originally compelled him to inhale nitrous gas. “He was instinctively repelled by Hegelian dogma,” Jay writes, “its pompous insistence on absolute truth, its sterile abstractions, its lofty disdain for the pragmatic and the specific.”

But under the intoxicating influence of various gasses, James found himself experientially closer to that truth. Nitrous oxide, James would write, “made me understand better than ever both the strength and weakness of Hegel’s philosophy.”

https://thebaffler.com/latest/brains-on-drugs-semley
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His drug use made most of his writings incomprehensible
 
Drugs can help you understand philosophy

No they can't. The problem with drugs is eventually you sober up and when you do you don't have whatever insight you thought you had before. You're not as interesting as you think you are.
 
Lightbringer said:
Drugs can help you understand philosophy

No they can't. The problem with drugs is eventually you sober up and when you do you don't have whatever insight you thought you had before. You're not as interesting as you think you are.
Click to expand...

I don't agree. Neither does William James.
And many people think James is interesting.
 
Lightbringer said:
Drugs can help you understand philosophy

No they can't. The problem with drugs is eventually you sober up and when you do you don't have whatever insight you thought you had before. You're not as interesting as you think you are.
Click to expand...

His experiences with gas, and later, peyote, provided him with insight into mystical and religious states, which he elucidated in his landmark 1902 study, The Varieties of Religious Experience. “Depth beyond depth of truth seems revealed to the inhaler,” he wrote therein, and “the sense of a profound meaning having been there persists.” For James, nitrous oxide allowed him to comprehend religious epiphany and transcendence, and to account for their qualities.

https://thebaffler.com/latest/brains-on-drugs-semley
 
BidenPresident said:
I don't agree. Neither does William James.
And many people think James is interesting.
Click to expand...

I don't really care what you or William James thinks about this. The more drugs you do, the dumber you get...until you're at the point where you barely can figure out how to make an apple bong...so you can do more drugs.

You're not anywhere near as insightful as you think you are.
 
BidenPresident said:
His experiences with gas, and later, peyote, provided him with insight into mystical and religious states, which he elucidated in his landmark 1902 study, The Varieties of Religious Experience. “Depth beyond depth of truth seems revealed to the inhaler,” he wrote therein, and “the sense of a profound meaning having been there persists.” For James, nitrous oxide allowed him to comprehend religious epiphany and transcendence, and to account for their qualities.

https://thebaffler.com/latest/brains-on-drugs-semley
Click to expand...

Let's talk about YOU. Do you have to get high to understand philosophy?
 
Lightbringer said:
I don't really care what you or William James thinks about this. The more drugs you do, the dumber you get...until you're at the point where you barely can figure out how to make an apple bong...so you can do more drugs.

You're not anywhere near as insightful as you think you are.
Click to expand...

I take it you never read philosophy or William James.
 
BidenPresident said:
Wrong. The title is "can help." As in, it is possible to help. Not, without it you will not be able to understand.
Click to expand...

Stop lying. Your original post doesn't exist in a vacuum and anyone reading this thread can track back you your earlier posts to me.

Now tell me...do you have to get baked to think you're "deep?"
 
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