Whilst Shulgin has done many a great thing for the world of psychedelic compounds, IMO, we should not be so hung up on his rating scale as the final-word on the levels of experience.DMT, I think, is an intensely personal thing and being attached to his rating scale simply serves to 'constrict' , for want of a better word, our expectations.

IME, the mindset on venturing into the higher dose realms has a substantial bearing on what we experience.I only use DMT when Im certain I can just let myself surrender to the experience fully and, although each experience is pretty unique, the depth/degree of magnificence is to some degree predictable.But this is a function of mindset AND dose.

I dont discount the possibility that some have incredibly shattering experiences at doses that one would not imagine as being that extreme ie < 30ish mgs but I suspect this is more a function of mindset rather than dose.

It seems to me that one of the distinctions to be made is between a “deep” experience and a “transcendent” experience.

I agree that dose plays a big role in how “deep” an experience is, but I don’t think it plays as big a role in how “transcendent” an experience is. I think that's what you're saying?

(And don’t ask me to define “deep” and “transcendent”.

Yes Gibran2, kind of.For me, dose provides depth and the mindset, should you allow it, could provide the trancendence.

But because I have the same mindset each time I use, I suppose Ive never 'trancended'; this suits me fine for my reason for use is, as House has so eloquently put it, 'to wipe the slate clean'.

The mindset I adopt has served me well insofar as Ive not had a difficult experience with DMT.And this is the way I like it , but having had the dreaded looping of thoughts on fairly hefty doses of acid, where killing myself seems a rational path to take to make it stop, I know DMT could batter my head in a way I dont need

DMT is a tool and my method of use gives me what I need.

That's all I was getting at when I originally said I find dmt effects dose dependent. I've never had a ++++ experience so don't know how much of a role dosage plays in that. But generally I can predict easily the depth of experience from measuring the dose.

Most of my most profound experiences have been unmeasured though so maybe the unknown plays a big role for me in changing the level of experience.

Exactly what I stated

I never said we should all ascribe to Shulgin's scale and ignore all else, merely that he and embracethevoid have different definitions (ie.e there's no need to "disagree" with Shulgin's scale).

While it’s true that we don’t have to agree with Shulgin’s definition of what constitutes a “+4” experience, effective communication requires that we have at least some agreement about the meaning of the words and terms we use. Without such agreement, many terms become meaningless.

If someone says, “I have +4 experiences all the time” and defines “+4 experiences” one way, and someone else says “I only very rarely have +4 experiences” and defines the term differently, and someone else says “I’ve never had a +4 experience and don’t even think it’s possible for most people to have one” and defines “+4 experiences” yet another way, then what’s the point of even using the term?

Without an agreed-upon definition of the term, “+4 experience” can mean just about anything. Shulgin’s definition may not be ideal, but at least it’s a definition.

Agreed...that's exactly what I was getting into in this thread (starting around post 18, the auto-direct isn't working)...but the fact that people do like to use their own subjective definitions over consensus definitions is undeniable (and incredibly pointless, imo). As such, rather than getting embroiled in a tautological waste of time, I merely pointed out that they do have different definitions instead of arguing that Shulgin's definition gives an "objective" measure through which multiple people can measure and relate and that claims of frequent/consistent ++++ experiences simply don't align with his definition. As I think you've seen in a couple threads, gibran, people tend to get a little bent out of shape when you suggest their claims (which run counter to a consensus definition) do not fit that definition or fit only their personal definition of that phenomenon.