A foundational orientation to altered states of consciousness

Altered States of Consciousness, often abbreviated as ASCs, are not marginal or exotic phenomena.

They are central to how human consciousness varies, adapts, and reorganizes.

Across anthropology, psychology, neuroscience, philosophy, and religious studies, altered states appear as recurring modes in which perception, attention, self experience, and meaning are reconfigured.

This section exists to anchor altered states as an object of serious inquiry, not as novelty, pathology, or revelation.

· · ─ ·✶· ─ · ·

WHAT WE MEAN BY “ALTERED STATE”

The term Altered State of Consciousness is widely used, but it is not uncontested.

Across the scientific and cultural literature, multiple terms appear, each emphasizing different assumptions about what is changing and how it should be valued.

These include:

- Altered States of Consciousness (ASC), a broad umbrella term used in psychology and consciousness research

- Modified States, emphasizing deviation from a baseline rather than qualitative hierarchy

- Non ordinary States, highlighting contrast with everyday waking consciousness without implying improvement

- Exceptional States, focusing on rarity or phenomenological distinctiveness

- Patterns of Phenomenological Properties, which avoid “state” language altogether and focus on clusters of experiential features

- Modulated States of Consciousness, stressing dynamic regulation rather than rupture

- Expanded or Higher States, terms common in spiritual and cultural discourse that carry implicit value judgments

It is important to note that many of these terms are normative, not neutral.

Words like higher or expanded often imply progress, truth, or superiority, assumptions that are not supported by scientific consensus.

In the Cyberdelic context, we use Altered States as a pragmatic working term, not as a claim about value, truth, or development.

· · ─ ·✶· ─ · ·

A FUNCTIONAL DEFINITION

Rather than privileging one tradition or interpretation, we treat altered states as systematic deviations from ordinary waking consciousness along one or more experiential dimensions, such as:

- Attention and salience

- Sensory processing

- Temporal experience

- Sense of self or self boundaries

- Cognitive flexibility and meaning attribution

Different induction methods, pharmacological and non pharmacological, can produce overlapping configurations across these dimensions without sharing identical mechanisms or outcomes.

For this reason, altered states are better understood as families of experiential patterns, not singular or uniform conditions.

· · ─ ·✶· ─ · ·

WHY THIS DISTINCTION MATTERS

How altered states are defined shapes how they are interpreted.

If they are framed as higher, they invite inflation.

If framed as pathological, they invite suppression.

If framed as mere illusion, they invite dismissal.

A non normative, dimension based view allows altered states to be studied, designed, and integrated without assuming that they are inherently beneficial, dangerous, or revelatory.

This stance is essential for both scientific rigor and ethical cyberdelic design.

· · ─ ·✶· ─ · ·

A CULTURAL VIEW

Altered states are not a fringe curiosity.

They are one of the primary ways cultures have explored meaning, creativity, healing, and adaptation.

Across history, societies did not ask whether altered states were “real” or “true.”

They asked what they were for.

Shamanic rituals, rites of passage, contemplative practices, artistic trance, and communal ceremonies treated altered states as functional tools, ways of accessing perspectives unavailable in ordinary consciousness.

These states were not entered casually.

They were framed, trained, interpreted, and often restricted.

What modern culture largely abandoned was not altered states themselves, but the cultural intelligence to use them wisely.

Today, altered states persist through substances, media, technology, and overload, but without shared maps for interpretation or integration.

· · ─ ·✶· ─ · ·

A SCIENTIFIC VIEW

From a scientific perspective, altered states emerge when the brain changes how it filters, predicts, and integrates information.

Contemporary models emphasize:

- Predictive processing and Bayesian inference

- Changes in network dominance, such as reduced top down control

- Increased sensitivity to sensory and internal signals

- Temporary loosening of habitual patterns of cognition

In simple terms, the mind becomes less certain about its usual story and more open to alternative interpretations.

This openness can produce insight, confusion, creativity, fear, or meaning, depending on context and skill.

· · ─ ·✶· ─ · ·

Research Infrastructure: Comparing Altered States

To move beyond anecdote and single method bias, altered states research increasingly relies on comparative data.

The Altered States Database (ASDB) is an open science initiative that aggregates psychometric data from peer reviewed studies on altered states of consciousness.

It allows researchers and practitioners to:

- Compare altered states induced by different methods

- Identify shared and divergent experiential dimensions

- Examine where data is robust and where it remains sparse

Importantly, the database highlights a current imbalance in the field, where psychedelic states are well characterized, while many non pharmacological techniques remain under studied.

ASDB does not explain altered states.
It maps what we actually know.

Explore the Altered States Database

· · ─ ·✶· ─ · ·