I’m going to describe a situation, a house party in this case, that I’d like for you to try to imagine as best you can. Not necessarily visualize it in your mind—after all there are people who don’t or cannot do that—but how so ever you process hypotheticals. Take the time to honestly set the stage with the details provided, fill out the scene with whatever else you feel fits and needs to be there, and then play out the next moments of the scene.
Programming Simulation 1
The crowd is mostly a mix of casual acquaintances and familiar strangers. You notice someone walking around offering other party-goes…something. Seems a 50/50 split as to those who accept and who doesn’t. You don’t know the offerer, but you recognize them from other events that you attended. Not a complete stranger, but you’ve never had a conversation with them. They don’t go out of their way to approach you, but they get close enough to ask if you want any E. In their hand you see several white pills and black pills, both of them shaped like halves of a yin yang.
What do you do?
Processing Simulation 1
Emotion/intuition is guided by how you feel in the moment, the vibe of the party, and anything you or your crew feel about the substances in general, the person who made the offer, and how your day has been going.
Instinct is informed by experience and knowledge, like what you read about those yin yang pills on one of your favorite blogs earlier that day. The post said they were a pressed-pill form of MDMA, but only doses around 70mg rather than the more common 100mg to 120mg range. Thus people start with two pills and redose later with singles. You’ve never tried MDMA yourself, but you’ve had some bad experiences being in the presence of people on MDMA.
Logic and reason requires amassing the necessary information, discarding distortions caused by emotion, processing the information to come to a defined conclusion. Some of the variables that need to be tallied include the following:
- Is that actually MDMA? If so, how much is the actual dosage? Are there any additives or adulterants?
- How do I react to MDMA?
- What am I hoping to achieve tonight? Does this dose of MDMA improve the chances of success? And so on….
Crunch the “numbers” and process the data point, and the logical choice will be the result.
Which pathway felt more natural for you to use? What factors influenced your decision?
Programming Simulation 2
The basic setup is the same, but this time the party is at my house. Instead of someone who you sort-of-know-well-enough-to-smile-at offering you the pills, Erin and I are walking around together, welcoming people to our house. As we greet every guest with hugs and hearty hellos, we offer everyone MDMA. There is absolutely no pressure from us to take it, and roughly half the party attendees decline our offer. In Erin’s hand is one half of the ying-yan and in mine, the other.
What do you do?
Processing Simulation 2
Our presence in this scenario should influence the decision making process for both the emotion/intuition and instinct result. The process but not necessarily the outcomes. The reason the process should be influenced is that you have a different opinion of Erin and me than you do of the nameless almost-stranger offering “E” in Simulation 1.
At the very least, you are aware that I’m a knowledgeable and experienced MDMA consumer. If you have read enough of the blog, you also know I’m extremely cautious about offering things to people, and I feel responsible for the well-being of those to whom I provide substances.
None of that might change your decision, but all of that is factored in before emotion/intuition or instinct give you the answer. Even if the only thing you know about me is what you’ve read up until this point, that’s more than you know about the person in the other party. Your opinion of me could be such that this new info actually makes you likely to leave the party entirely. If so, shiny! That only furthers my point!
The influence of this info on the logic process should be minor. Perhaps instead of testing the pills yourself, you trust that the information I provide is as accurate as you would be able to determine on your own. I can show you every bit of data I used to determine the MDMA was of an acceptable quality for me to share it, and I’m happy to answer all questions and take in any extra data that needs to be evaluated. If anything, I can speed up computation time and improve the accuracy of logic’s results because the same variables exist in the equations in both simulations.
Did the results change? Could you pinpoint what changed them?
The Results Are In! You Have Decided to….
I don’t know because I don’t have access to your emotions, intuition, instinct, or logical computation. But I’d love to hear in the comments below (or @ me on Twitter) if you took the MDMA in either Simulation 1 or 2 and what factors were the most important in guiding your decision. What changed most between the two simulations?
In truth, this simulation cannot give a proper, definitive answer using any of these pathways because too many variables rely on being in the actual situation and not a simulation thereof.
You can make decent approximations that have a high probability of accuracy, but even I can’t say with 100% certainty whether I would or wouldn’t take a pill myself at that party.
Unless I made a promise that I would or would not do so. I would not deceive nor break the trust of my guests not living up to such a commitment.
Follow Up Inquiry About Your Simulation Experience
The answers to the following questions hold greater interest to me than if you took the drugs in either of the simulations. If you feel inclined to answer something, answer these!
Was the person who offered you the E in Simulation 1 male, female, nonbinary, or not constructed by your imagination enough for you to know? Do you think altering how that person was imagined would alter your decision to take the E?
When Erin and I offered you the MDMA in simulation 2, what color half did she offer you and which did I offer? Was that an active choice on your part, or did your imagination create that reality for you? Either way, do you know what knowledge, experience, or bias created that outcome? And if you decided to take MDMA from us, which pill did you take and from whom did you take it?
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