Neuroscientists from the University of Sussex supplied new evidence that suggests taking psychedelic drugs, such as psilocybin, ketamin, and LSD, increases neural signal diversity (the complexity of brain activity) compared to a normal waking state. Neural signal diversity is considered by scientists to be an accurate gauge of the level of consciousness. For example, people who are awake or focused on a task have more diverse neural activity than those who are, say, asleep.
This study indicated that psychedelic drugs could push the baseline even further, higher than someone who is just “awake” or “aware.”
Understandably cautious, the team was quick to mention that this state is neither good nor bad — it just is. They confirmed that more sophisticated and varied models are needed to validate their results. Still, Professor Anil Seth, a member of the research team, said, “this finding shows that the brain-on-psychedelics behaves very differently from normal.
During the psychedelic state, the electrical activity of the brain is less predictable and less ‘integrated’ than during normal conscious wakefulness — as measured by ‘global signal diversity’…we can say that the psychedelic state appears as a higher ‘level’ of consciousness than normal — but only with respect to this specific mathematical measure.”...read more>>>....