> "The great object is sensation---to feel that we exist. It is the
> craving void which drives us to travel to intemperate but keenly felt
> pursuits of every description whose principal attraction is the
> agitation inseparable from their accomplishment." ~ George Gordon,
> Lord Byron
>
> I first learned about the topic of sensation addiction through my
> Buddhist practice.
>
> My Buddhist practice reminds me to be mindful of the present moment
> and not escape from it by abusing the senses.
>
> What is the hallmark of an addict?
>
> One who refuses to accept what is by abusing the senses to escape from
> the present moment.
>
> All our addictions have pleasure aspects within them and we get
> rewards for participating in them in the form of euphoric experiences.
> Euphoric experience can be related to the spiritual as well.
>
> The definition of a religious mystic is one that partakes in an
> altered state of conciseness with God / god or the spiritual realm.
> Our addictions also give us this altered state of consciousness and
> feeling of euphoria.
>
> So, we can say that our drugs are our gods and our addiction is our
> religion.
>
Still these are dangerous impulses, instincts that must be countered
by other instincts, say if you are a young man and see a delisciously
pretty young lady, you want to jump on er, but we can restrain thes
drives. But mainly its our "thinking habits" that imprint upon our
drives, please read shit at this link;
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.philosophy/msg/72357697afe13bfa
...Feelings of satisfaction are produced by stimulation of some of
these very areas----injury to which causes error of eating drinking
and sexual and other behaviour.....With electrode in some positions
the shocks have rewarding effects and are sought for as if they were
satisfying.......They give positive reinforcements or -rewarding
stimuli- causing an animal to come back for more
--Olds 1976 Hall et al 1977--
Jame Olds showed this by implanting wires into the brains of
rats......When the animals had recovered from the operation he
arranged that if they pressed a lever a weak electric current was
passed to the brain.....The rats soon learned to do this and evidently
obtained satisfaction from the shocks......They would press the lever
over and over again a 100 times a minute for hours at a time.....They
would even neglect food and starve to death while continuing to get
the reward.....More usually they showed pauses for eating drinking and
sleeping.
Marvin Harris - Our Kind - pg 172.........
Electrical stimulation of the portion of the brainstem known as the
septum produces sensations of pleasure in humans. In one male subject
- the electrical activity of the septum was recorded during orgasm and
showed a pattern of brainwaves similar to those found during epileptic
seizures__indicative of the synchronous discharge of a very large
number of neurons......Injection of a female subject septum with the
neurotransmitter acetylcholine produced intense sensations of pleasure
- culminating in repeated orgasm....These experiments leave to many
variables uncontrolled - and the exact pharmacology and
neurophysiology of the human addiction to sexual ecstasy remains one
of natures best kept secrets......But can the day be far off when one
of the major pharmaceutical houses announces that is is ready to
market substances that induce the mental sensation if not the
physiological reactions of orgasms?
If it were not for the intermittent nature of orgasmic highs - sexual
appetites might easily override essential life - supporting drives and
appetites and turn us into veritable sex junkies.....Natural selection
has made sobriety the norm and euphoria the exception....We need to
feel pain and anxiety in order to cope effectivly with the world
outside our heads.....And so natural selection has seen to it that we
get our biggest high only as a reward for stimulating the organs that
initiate the process of reproduction and not for stimulating our
fingers and toes......Through cultural evolution we have learned how
to defeat natures connection between sexual pleasure and
reproduction....Are we now on the threshold of learning how to defeat
natures connection between sexual pleasure and sex?";
OUR KIND by Marvin Harris 1989
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0060919906/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marvin_Harris
http://www.mnsu.edu/emuseum/information/biography/fghij/harris_marvin.html
http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/m/marvin_harris.html
...by appealing to the core principles of neurobiology, evolutionary
theory, and cognitive science, practitioners of a new human science
can reach a deeper understanding of why we feel certain courses of
action to be intrinsically correct. They can help us to understand why
we have moral feelings. For now, though, the scientists can offer no
guidance on whether we are really correct in making certain decisions,
because no way is known to define what is correct without total
reference to the moral feelings under scrutiny. Perhaps this is the
ultimate burden of the free will bequeathed to us by our genes: in the
final analysis, even when we know what we are likely to do and why,
each of us must still choose.
The challenge to science and philosophy to solve this dilemma is very
great-in our opinion, there is none greater. Society, through its laws
and institutions, already regulates behavior. But it does so in
virtual blind ignorance of the deep reaches of human nature. By
relying on moral intuition, on those satisfying visceral feelings of
right and wrong, people remain enslaved by their genes and culture.
Their minds develop along the channels set by the hereditary
epigenetic rules, and while they exercise free will in moment-by-
moment choices, this faculty remains superficial and its value to the
individual is largely illusory. Only by penetrating to the physical
basis of moral thought and considering its evolutionary meaning will
people have the power to control their own lives. They will then be in
a better position to choose ethical precepts and the forms of social
regulation needed to maintain the precepts.
Promethean Fire - Reflections on the Origins of Mind
Charles J. Lumsdem - E.O. Wilson - 1983
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/1583484256/
> There is a reason to our madness - it is not just pure madness as most
> addicts think.
>
> Some persons I run into feel guilty for having senses. They get super
> sensitized to anything that affects them. They do not look at the
> senses as a gift from a higher power, instead look at them as a
> curse.
>
> Coming to peace with our senses and learning to enjoy them - but not
> abuse them is the answer. And for those looking for an excuse to
> continue addiction, do not look upon this post as an excuse to keep
> using your drug of choice. If you missed my previous post "The 7
> Benefits Addictions Provide Us" and want a copy write me.
>
> From: How to Want What You Have:
>
> "People who dedicate their lives to the pursuit of sensual pleasure
> find that the more pleasure they get, the more they want. Small,
> ordinary pleasures soon lose their power to please and must be
> replaced with more intense or exotic ones. Heedless sensualists
> usually meet a bad end. They learn the hard way that their desires are
> relentless and insatiable."
>
> We are spiritual beings residing in a physical body and must balance
> this fact. The Buddha recognized this as he gave up being an ascetic
> himself in favor of the middle path, a path of moderation which
> rejected both sensory indulgence as well as extreme mortification.
>
> If we want peace with this subject it all revolves around whether or
> not you are abusing your senses and does not revolve around the fact
> that you have senses that nature provided you with.
>
> Try asking if the activity placing unreasonable demands on my time and
> energy, will it place me in legal jeopardy or endanger my mental,
> physical or spiritual health? You see, there never will be a shortage
> of ways that humans can find to abuse the mind or the body by living a
> life of extremes.
>
> The important question is how to find a balance between the mind and
> the body to be at peace in the present. So, don't feel guilty about
> having senses or desires, just work on not abusing them.
>
> Once I started to practice mindfulness of the present moment, this
> practice opened up a new area of sense enjoyment by just being
> present. Drugs took me away from the present and I was anything but
> aware of my real senses. In fact, my senses were dulled from being
> drugged up. I liked the artificial sense of euphoria I received from
> various drugs, but this euphoria was not sustainable, natural or
> healthy. Sustainability and health aspects are both areas I now use to
> judge things that affect my senses.
>
> If you look into your own addictive areas, you can see how your drug
> of choice affected your senses and how your were not necessarily
> addicted to the drug - you were addicted to the sensation the drug
> provided. This is where sensation addiction comes in. Without
> receiving these sensations our drug loses it luster. Sensation of the
> mouth, genitals, brain - addiction all revolves around sensations and
> how we respond to them.
>
> "I drink to keep body and soul apart" ~ Oscar Wilde
>
> Take Care,
>
> V (Male)
>
> Agnostic Freethinker
> Practical Philosopher
> AA#2
>
> For free access to my earlier posts on voluntary simplicity,
> compulsive spending, debting, compulsive overeating and clutter write:
> v...@
aol.com. Any opinion expressed here is that of my own and is not
> the opinion, recommendation or belief of any group or organization.
