[extropy-chat] An imaginary anecdote

[Gennady Ra]

At 09:50 AM 9/29/04 +0800, you Sean Diggins wrote:

>Somewhere along the way, Bill says "mind if I hum a tune" and I of course
>say "no problem." He starts humming the most beautiful, melancholic melody
>that I cant resist adding a "Nashville shaded third", and even stetching
>beyond, going in harmonic directions I never even normally think of.....but
>every decision works beautifully. Murray is stunned and naturally says "you
>must be a singer", which I'm not. I am a professional musician (double bass
>player) and audio engineer. I do sing harmony and the occasional lead, but
>I'm not very good at it and have a lot of trouble with pitch and note
>choices. I gravitate towards the 5th, swapping to the 3rd without any
>particular reason or at any particular time. And I often miss...unless
>extensively rehearsed. Even then, I mostly sing a bit flat. Yet in this
>dream, both Bill and I have perfect pitch. Other things subsequently occur
>involving Bill which are hilarious, but this is the part of the dream I'm
>most interested in. 
>
>My question to the list is this: Is it possible that conscious limitations
>to our musical abilities are bypassed when we are asleep? Is this a problem
>related to the fact that my physical senses were only functioning
>metaphorically? 

and then Hara Ra wrote

>I suspect "seeming", in which a sensation or event is replaced by an
>impression of same, is one of the brain's way of symbolizing or
>presymbolizing things without using all the resources needed for a full
>instance of same. While in dream or stoned space, I wouldn't be surprised if
>the "This is a marker" signal tends to be lost and the default is to
>experience the item as complete and real.
>
>In my younger years I liked to eat a few magic cookies and listen to music
>with headphones and eyeshades. It was often very visonary. I gradually
>became aware that most of the richness was from "seemings", and that a very
>close look at my experience revealed this aspect. Kind of the inverse of "If
>it walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, the it is a duck", ie,
>"Tag:'duck' - implies presence of walk and quack"

 From Review, by William L. Benzon, of The Antipodes of the Mind: Charting 
the Phenomenology of the Ayahuasca Experience by Benny Shanon:

...read the following statement by Shanon (pp. 351-352):

. . . under the intoxication, drinkers may move back and forth smoothly 
between radically different states of mind. Such movement need not be either 
erratic or chaotic, and for the experienced drinker it may even have the 
feel of playfulness. As I have suggested earlier, I would liken it to 
surfing the waves of the sea, or a bird’s flight, or perhaps a musician’s 
masterful playing (sic) of his or her instrument.

The surfing image conveys a sense that one is carried, that one only gives a 
nudge in this or that direction, allowing the board and the waves do the 
rest. That is certainly how improvisation feels when it is going well - and 
by that I mean routinely well, what an experienced player can achieve at 
will. You head off in this or that musical “direction” and expect hands, 
breath, and fingers to take care of all the details automatically; you do 
not have time to think things through at the level of specific notes and 
phrases. Further, you intend to hear certain sounds rather than intending to 
execute certain motor actions. Motor execution is automatic. It is only when 
something goes wrong that you may start thinking about what your lips, 
hands, lungs, and feet should be doing.

Given musical knowledge, on the one hand, and a willingness to allow the 
music to happen, on the other hand, one can improvise. That willingness, 
that attitude, is as important as the musical knowledge. With that in mind, 
consider the following story Shanon tells about a private ayahuasca session:

In an amateur fashion, I have been playing the piano since childhood. I have 
played only classical music, always from the score, never improvising . . . 
Once during a private Ayahuasca session, I saw the piano in front of me. A 
score of a Bach prelude was there. I played the piece repeatedly and felt I 
was entering into a trance. Then, I left the score aside and began to 
improvise. I played for more than an hour, and the manner of my playing was 
different from anything I have ever experienced. It was executed in one 
unfaltering flow, constituting an ongoing narration that was composed as it 
was being executed. It appeared that my fingers just knew where to go. 
Throughout this act, my technical performance astounded me. At times, I felt 
that a force was upon me and that I was performing at its command. (pp. 
220-221)

Someone who had been present during this performance remarked that “It 
seemed that the Muses descended upon you.” Shanon has subsequently continued 
to improvise without partaking of ayahuasca, though he remarks that “the 
quality of this playing is not like that under the intoxication.”
======

Here we have a sideliner, a presumably "strait" observer. I believe that the 
enhancement is real, be it with drugs or dream(like) states: Shanon then 
could improvise without any intoxication. And I read somewhere that 
McCartney heard Yesterday in his dream and then just wrote it down. A pretty 
pretty duck!  

Best!

Gennady
Simferopol Crimea Ukraine