1 00:00:16,309 --> 00:00:21,310 Welcome to Mind Escape. Are you ready? 2 00:00:24,550 --> 00:00:28,470 Are you ready to escape your mind? 3 00:00:48,630 --> 00:00:52,030 Hello Mind Escapees, if you have not already, please go check out 4 00:00:52,030 --> 00:00:54,550 my other channel Masters of Rhetoric. 5 00:00:54,550 --> 00:00:57,030 I will have the link down below. It's also part of the Mind 6 00:00:57,030 --> 00:01:00,310 escape link tree link. It's something I'm very 7 00:01:00,310 --> 00:01:04,950 passionate about where I dissect the origins of Western thought 8 00:01:04,950 --> 00:01:09,080 through the pre Socratic thinkers all the way to 9 00:01:09,120 --> 00:01:10,840 Aristotle. And I'm probably going to go 10 00:01:10,840 --> 00:01:12,560 beyond that as well at some point. 11 00:01:12,960 --> 00:01:17,200 But right now I'm focused on the Ionian physicist all the way to 12 00:01:17,200 --> 00:01:19,880 Aristotle. 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Thank you. 21 00:01:40,480 --> 00:01:42,480 Tonight we have a special episode. 22 00:01:42,880 --> 00:01:45,520 This is somebody who's been on the show a handful of times in 23 00:01:45,520 --> 00:01:49,280 the past and has even been featured in our documentary As 24 00:01:49,280 --> 00:01:51,920 Within So Without From UFOs to DMT. 25 00:01:52,760 --> 00:01:55,880 He's a really, really interesting guy, super 26 00:01:55,880 --> 00:01:59,200 intelligent, and he has a new book out called Death by 27 00:01:59,200 --> 00:02:01,920 Astonishment, which I really, really enjoyed. 28 00:02:02,160 --> 00:02:04,960 Of course, I'm speaking about Doctor Andrew Gallimore. 29 00:02:05,160 --> 00:02:08,759 Doctor Andrew Gallimore is a computational neurobiologist, 30 00:02:08,840 --> 00:02:12,720 pharmacologist, chemist and writer who has been interested 31 00:02:12,720 --> 00:02:16,120 in the neural basis of psychedelic drug action for many 32 00:02:16,120 --> 00:02:19,640 years and is the author of a number of research papers on the 33 00:02:19,640 --> 00:02:24,360 powerful psychedelic drug NN Dimethyltrypt, or DMT and its 34 00:02:24,360 --> 00:02:26,600 effects on the brain and consciousness. 35 00:02:26,640 --> 00:02:31,000 In 2015, he collaborated with DMT pioneer Doctor Rick 36 00:02:31,000 --> 00:02:35,320 Strassman, author of DMT The Spear Molecule, to develop a 37 00:02:35,640 --> 00:02:41,200 pharmacokinetic model of DMT as the basis of a target controlled 38 00:02:41,200 --> 00:02:44,960 intravenous infusion protocol for extended journeys in the 39 00:02:44,960 --> 00:02:48,640 bizarre worlds to which DMT gates access. 40 00:02:48,640 --> 00:02:52,280 His current interests focus on DMT and other psychedelic 41 00:02:52,280 --> 00:02:57,040 molecules as tools for gathering access to otherwise inaccessible 42 00:02:57,040 --> 00:03:00,760 subjective worlds, their neuroscientific underpinning, 43 00:03:00,800 --> 00:03:04,680 and their possible ontological and metaphysical implications. 44 00:03:04,680 --> 00:03:06,920 He currently lives and works in Tokyo. 45 00:03:07,080 --> 00:03:09,600 We've had both. Andrew Gallimore and Doctor Rick 46 00:03:09,600 --> 00:03:13,680 Stressman on the show many times and both always bring the fire 47 00:03:13,760 --> 00:03:16,680 and the knowledge and I love talking to both of them and 48 00:03:16,680 --> 00:03:18,480 picking their brains on these topics. 49 00:03:18,880 --> 00:03:21,960 So please hit that like and subscribe button. 50 00:03:22,400 --> 00:03:26,280 And if you enjoy this episode, we have many more available on 51 00:03:26,280 --> 00:03:31,160 our YouTube channel, Spotify and all audio platforms, as well as 52 00:03:31,240 --> 00:03:34,080 a Patreon page with many archived episodes on there as 53 00:03:34,080 --> 00:03:36,200 well. So please click the link tree 54 00:03:36,200 --> 00:03:37,880 link down below. Here we go. 55 00:03:39,120 --> 00:03:43,200 Welcome back on Mind Escape. Andrew, it's been a few years. 56 00:03:43,240 --> 00:03:47,160 I really enjoyed your new book Death by Astonishment, and I 57 00:03:47,160 --> 00:03:50,680 have a couple of old favourites here as well. 58 00:03:53,720 --> 00:03:57,480 I actually did the audio book or Audible for Death by 59 00:03:57,480 --> 00:04:01,360 Astonishment so I don't have the physical copy, but I really 60 00:04:01,360 --> 00:04:04,440 enjoyed it and I appreciate you reading your own book as well. 61 00:04:06,600 --> 00:04:08,720 Yeah, I was. I insisted upon that. 62 00:04:08,760 --> 00:04:14,440 They, the publisher, wanted to bring in an, an actor first with 63 00:04:14,440 --> 00:04:17,920 a British accent. I said no, no, no, no, I'll do 64 00:04:17,920 --> 00:04:22,120 it because I live in Tokyo. It's a bit of a, a bit tricky 65 00:04:22,120 --> 00:04:25,400 to, to, to navigate. So they wanted to do it in the 66 00:04:25,400 --> 00:04:28,480 studio in New York. But I said no, no, we'll do it 67 00:04:28,520 --> 00:04:32,040 by remote, whatever it takes. So they sent all the equipment 68 00:04:32,040 --> 00:04:38,240 to me and covered my room with foam and stuff like that just to 69 00:04:39,880 --> 00:04:42,360 be able to do it myself. So I think it turned out well in 70 00:04:42,360 --> 00:04:44,200 the end. Awesome. 71 00:04:44,200 --> 00:04:46,200 Yeah, no, I, I really enjoyed it. 72 00:04:46,720 --> 00:04:50,960 And you know, they're obviously reading something like the 73 00:04:50,960 --> 00:04:52,920 physical copy. There's something to that, but I 74 00:04:52,920 --> 00:04:55,480 also think there's something to listening to it as well. 75 00:04:56,680 --> 00:04:58,920 And like I said, I really enjoyed it and got a lot out of 76 00:04:58,920 --> 00:05:01,480 it. But yeah, it's been, so it's 77 00:05:01,480 --> 00:05:02,760 been a few years since we've had you on. 78 00:05:02,760 --> 00:05:04,600 We've had you on a handful of times in the past. 79 00:05:04,600 --> 00:05:08,560 We even included you in the documentary we made, which I'll 80 00:05:08,560 --> 00:05:11,080 put a link there too if anybody wants to check that out. 81 00:05:12,040 --> 00:05:16,040 But I just want to kind of jump right in if that's OK. 82 00:05:16,920 --> 00:05:21,840 So the early explorers like Richard Spruce search for the 83 00:05:21,840 --> 00:05:24,440 plants such as the the copy vine. 84 00:05:24,760 --> 00:05:29,040 And you know, he documented harmene and harmolene, but it 85 00:05:29,040 --> 00:05:36,080 took a lot longer to connect the brew, or I should say the DMT 86 00:05:36,160 --> 00:05:40,560 containing elements and alkaloids to the brew because it 87 00:05:40,560 --> 00:05:45,040 was just kind of, I guess people were looking at it from the 88 00:05:45,040 --> 00:05:53,040 perspective of the MAOI. Yeah, I mean, well, spruce, 89 00:05:53,360 --> 00:05:57,160 Richard Spruce, he discovered. Well he discovered, well at 90 00:05:57,160 --> 00:06:02,240 least discovers a strong word, I mean he discovered from the 91 00:06:02,240 --> 00:06:09,000 Western scientists scientific perspective at least the Karpi 92 00:06:09,000 --> 00:06:12,560 vine, he named it Banisteriopsis karpi. 93 00:06:13,400 --> 00:06:18,120 And as far as he was concerned, when he first drank the brew and 94 00:06:18,120 --> 00:06:23,320 was shown where this vine was growing, this key vegetal 95 00:06:23,320 --> 00:06:29,040 component of this ayahuasca Brewer, carpi, as it was known 96 00:06:29,040 --> 00:06:38,240 in that area of the Amazon, it was assumed for the next 100 97 00:06:38,240 --> 00:06:43,800 years that there was going to be some alkaloid in the carpi vine 98 00:06:43,800 --> 00:06:45,520 that gave it its visionary powers. 99 00:06:45,960 --> 00:06:48,600 It was, it was assumed that it would be as simple as that, that 100 00:06:48,680 --> 00:06:52,120 if they were able to extract an alkaloid from the carpi vine, 101 00:06:52,720 --> 00:06:56,720 inject this alkaloid into people, then they would have 102 00:06:56,800 --> 00:06:59,320 experienced the same effects as ayahuasca. 103 00:07:00,040 --> 00:07:03,200 But it didn't work out. And we know in hindsight, we 104 00:07:03,200 --> 00:07:04,840 know exactly why it didn't work out. 105 00:07:04,840 --> 00:07:08,400 But you have to imagine this was, you know, Spruce discovered 106 00:07:08,400 --> 00:07:11,200 the carpy vine and named it in 1852. 107 00:07:11,520 --> 00:07:17,720 It wasn't until the beginning of the 20th century, so over 50 108 00:07:17,720 --> 00:07:22,040 years later, that the alkaloid which was, which went by many 109 00:07:22,040 --> 00:07:27,680 names, telepathy was the first name given to it, banasterine, 110 00:07:29,080 --> 00:07:34,680 etcetera, etcetera. And various groups, you know, 111 00:07:34,680 --> 00:07:39,440 attempted to recreate the effects of ayahuasca by giving 112 00:07:39,440 --> 00:07:43,280 people this alkaloid, which we now know, which was then 113 00:07:43,280 --> 00:07:46,960 discovered a few years later to be identical to an already well 114 00:07:46,960 --> 00:07:51,320 known set of alkaloids that the the Harmala alkaloids, which 115 00:07:51,320 --> 00:07:55,640 came from Paganum harmala, this medicinal shrub which was 116 00:07:55,640 --> 00:08:00,360 perfectly well known. So it was kind of like this. 117 00:08:00,600 --> 00:08:05,480 This doesn't really make any sense because these alkaloids, 118 00:08:05,480 --> 00:08:09,840 when you isolate them, they make people a bit dizzy, kind of 119 00:08:09,840 --> 00:08:14,240 drunken appearing, they feel a bit drowsy, they fall asleep. 120 00:08:14,240 --> 00:08:19,120 They might have some colorful but fairly unremarkable dreams, 121 00:08:19,480 --> 00:08:22,720 and that's about it. And so it didn't seem to match 122 00:08:23,320 --> 00:08:26,520 these fantastical reports that Spruce had heard. 123 00:08:26,520 --> 00:08:29,720 I mean, he'd heard about people travelling to other worlds and 124 00:08:29,720 --> 00:08:33,520 seeing, you know, beautiful cities and savage beasts 125 00:08:33,520 --> 00:08:36,320 preparing to seize them from one report. 126 00:08:36,320 --> 00:08:38,039 I mean, this was, it was wild stuff. 127 00:08:38,039 --> 00:08:40,880 And you'd never seen anything like it or heard about anything 128 00:08:40,880 --> 00:08:43,960 like it. And say it was kind of like, you 129 00:08:43,960 --> 00:08:48,040 know, scientists hit a dead end when they couldn't work out why 130 00:08:48,040 --> 00:08:51,760 they couldn't recreate these extraordinary visionary effects 131 00:08:51,760 --> 00:08:54,840 by injecting people with the alkaloids isolated from this 132 00:08:54,880 --> 00:08:58,240 very vine that spruce had first identified and named. 133 00:08:59,880 --> 00:09:05,040 And that dragged on until really the middle of the 20th century. 134 00:09:05,040 --> 00:09:12,560 Richard Schultz or Schulte's, the world's most famous and 135 00:09:12,840 --> 00:09:15,840 important ethnobotanist. He was very interested in the 136 00:09:15,840 --> 00:09:18,640 world's leading expert on ayahuasca. 137 00:09:19,600 --> 00:09:26,520 But he was struggling as as much as anyone, partly because when 138 00:09:26,520 --> 00:09:29,600 he, you know, he spoke to indigenous groups that were 139 00:09:29,600 --> 00:09:33,720 making ayahuasca, which went by dozens of different names 140 00:09:33,720 --> 00:09:35,840 depending on who you spoke to. And there are dozens of 141 00:09:35,840 --> 00:09:38,560 different recipes. So they've all contained the 142 00:09:38,560 --> 00:09:42,840 carpi vine, Banasteriopsis carpi, the ayahuasca vine. 143 00:09:42,840 --> 00:09:46,400 But then they also contained often dozens. 144 00:09:47,000 --> 00:09:49,360 You know, there was like, I think there's more than 100 145 00:09:49,360 --> 00:09:53,000 different plants have been documented used in ayahuasca. 146 00:09:53,000 --> 00:09:56,200 So it was, it was a Herculean task trying to work out what the 147 00:09:56,200 --> 00:10:01,520 hell was going on. And it wasn't really until 148 00:10:03,080 --> 00:10:08,920 William Burroughs, you know, the novelist, trekked into the 149 00:10:08,920 --> 00:10:13,040 Colombian rainforests with the aim of finding out about this 150 00:10:13,440 --> 00:10:17,160 drug that he'd read about in this magazine, Yahe, which was 151 00:10:17,160 --> 00:10:20,800 described as the world's most, you know, powerful psychedelic. 152 00:10:20,800 --> 00:10:22,360 And he went into the jungle to find it. 153 00:10:22,360 --> 00:10:26,560 And he found it. And he had several kind of 154 00:10:26,560 --> 00:10:30,840 fairly unimpressive experiences, probably just as infusions of 155 00:10:30,840 --> 00:10:34,240 the copy vine alone. And then finally he was led into 156 00:10:34,240 --> 00:10:41,760 this trade secret by this shaman called Saboya, who told him that 157 00:10:42,240 --> 00:10:46,280 we use the carpi vine. But there is this other secret 158 00:10:46,280 --> 00:10:51,360 ingredient, another leaf, sorry, a leaf rather than the vine. 159 00:10:51,360 --> 00:10:54,760 There was this leaf from this other plant which was essential, 160 00:10:55,520 --> 00:10:58,640 an essential catalysing component is how Burroughs 161 00:10:58,640 --> 00:11:02,960 described it. And he sent these leaves to 162 00:11:02,960 --> 00:11:06,960 Richard Schultz and said, I think this could be important. 163 00:11:06,960 --> 00:11:11,360 I think this could be the key. This is why the experiments have 164 00:11:11,360 --> 00:11:16,000 failed before is because you're, you're concentrating only on the 165 00:11:16,000 --> 00:11:19,600 harmala alkaloids, whereas there needs to be this other plant. 166 00:11:19,600 --> 00:11:22,480 You know, maybe this other plant contains some other chemical 167 00:11:22,480 --> 00:11:26,000 that's really important here. Richard Schultz ignored his 168 00:11:26,000 --> 00:11:30,200 letter and he never replied to William Burroughs, but he did 169 00:11:30,200 --> 00:11:34,800 keep the letter and the leaves. And then it was, I think, more 170 00:11:34,800 --> 00:11:39,080 than a decade later, when Richard Schultz is one of his 171 00:11:39,080 --> 00:11:43,680 graduate students, a guy called Homer Pinkley was in the 172 00:11:43,680 --> 00:11:48,160 rainforest, I think, in Ecuador, but my memory might fail me 173 00:11:48,160 --> 00:11:50,560 here. And he was invited to an 174 00:11:50,560 --> 00:11:53,040 ayahuasca ceremony. He observed the brew being made. 175 00:11:53,040 --> 00:11:57,000 And the following morning, he kind of rooted around in the the 176 00:11:57,000 --> 00:11:59,920 cauldron that was used to make the brew. 177 00:11:59,920 --> 00:12:05,280 And he found a few leaves that were that escaped the boiling 178 00:12:05,280 --> 00:12:08,520 intact and some seeds. And he was able to make a formal 179 00:12:08,520 --> 00:12:12,760 identification of this plant, which they call oprito, which 180 00:12:12,760 --> 00:12:16,760 means little heavenly men, which is kind of a clue in there 181 00:12:16,760 --> 00:12:18,760 perhaps knowing what we know about DMT now. 182 00:12:19,680 --> 00:12:23,400 And he identified it as psychiatry of the Ridis, also 183 00:12:23,400 --> 00:12:26,920 known as chakruna. The leaves were sent for 184 00:12:26,920 --> 00:12:31,280 chemical analysis and they were found to contain DMT and 185 00:12:31,280 --> 00:12:34,640 basically nothing else, so this was the first clue. 186 00:12:35,480 --> 00:12:40,200 Richard Schultz then went back to Burroughs letter that he'd 187 00:12:40,200 --> 00:12:43,040 written more than a decade earlier and found that actually 188 00:12:43,040 --> 00:12:47,360 Burroughs had indeed collected the same leaf that his graduate 189 00:12:47,360 --> 00:12:51,360 student would later identify. So really William Burroughs 190 00:12:51,360 --> 00:12:55,000 should be given the credit for discovering the the important 191 00:12:55,000 --> 00:12:58,000 DMT containing component of ayahuasca. 192 00:12:58,200 --> 00:13:01,120 But even that was only that wasn't the end of the story, of 193 00:13:01,120 --> 00:13:05,440 course, is because just a, you know, a couple of years before 194 00:13:05,440 --> 00:13:09,040 that discovery or a few years before that discovery, Stephen 195 00:13:09,040 --> 00:13:12,080 Zara, who discovered the psychedelic, the psychedelic 196 00:13:12,080 --> 00:13:17,560 properties of DMT, the Hungarian physician he had realised worked 197 00:13:17,560 --> 00:13:20,760 out by swallowing large amounts of pure DMT that it's not 198 00:13:20,760 --> 00:13:23,080 already active. So it didn't make any sense. 199 00:13:23,080 --> 00:13:26,240 Still, the story didn't make any sense because why would you have 200 00:13:27,440 --> 00:13:31,800 this visionary drink containing ADMT containing plant which is 201 00:13:31,800 --> 00:13:35,120 completely inactive orally and what the hell is this Karpivine 202 00:13:35,120 --> 00:13:37,840 doing in there anyway? You know, why is that there? 203 00:13:38,840 --> 00:13:44,880 And so it took again, more research the pharmacological 204 00:13:44,880 --> 00:13:47,120 properties of the harmalo alkaloids because the harmalo 205 00:13:47,120 --> 00:13:49,560 alkaloids being studied as a treatment for Parkinson's 206 00:13:49,560 --> 00:13:53,040 disease. And it was noted, discovered, 207 00:13:53,160 --> 00:13:55,800 observed that the Harmala alkaloids are very powerful 208 00:13:55,800 --> 00:13:59,960 inhibitors of this enzyme that's found in the gut, but also 209 00:13:59,960 --> 00:14:04,000 throughout the body, monoamine oxidase and this family of 210 00:14:04,000 --> 00:14:09,600 enzymes. And so it was kind of the, the 211 00:14:09,600 --> 00:14:13,680 hypothesis that developed from this was that, oh, maybe the 212 00:14:13,680 --> 00:14:17,520 Harmala alkaloids in the vine are inhibiting the monoamine 213 00:14:17,520 --> 00:14:22,680 oxidase enzymes, which we knew are important for metabolising 214 00:14:23,240 --> 00:14:26,320 amines, which includes tryptamines, which of course 215 00:14:26,320 --> 00:14:28,920 includes DMT. So that was the first, that was, 216 00:14:29,000 --> 00:14:32,960 that was the kind of the, the Eureka moment that that's maybe 217 00:14:32,960 --> 00:14:34,880 how it worked. And then it took more work. 218 00:14:34,880 --> 00:14:40,440 And eventually Dennis McKenna, Terence's brother, acquired a 219 00:14:40,440 --> 00:14:45,600 sample of pure raw ayahuasca brew made for him by a an 220 00:14:45,720 --> 00:14:49,800 indigenous group in the Amazon and was able to isolate harmene 221 00:14:49,800 --> 00:14:55,400 and harmoline and demonstrate that the ayahuasca brew was an 222 00:14:55,400 --> 00:15:01,400 inhibitor of monoamine oxidase. And from then there were kind of 223 00:15:01,400 --> 00:15:04,440 human studies where people were swallowing harmala alkaloids and 224 00:15:04,440 --> 00:15:08,160 DMT, you know, on their own and together and demonstrating 225 00:15:08,160 --> 00:15:13,120 finally that this so-called ayahuasca effect was, was 226 00:15:13,120 --> 00:15:15,960 responsible for the, the visionary effects of ayahuasca. 227 00:15:16,080 --> 00:15:17,280 So there we go. There's the history of 228 00:15:17,280 --> 00:15:21,120 ayahuasca. That was a good summary there. 229 00:15:22,760 --> 00:15:25,080 You know, reading the first few chapters, it is kind of 230 00:15:25,080 --> 00:15:26,720 frustrating. It's like you're not how you're 231 00:15:26,720 --> 00:15:29,920 not figuring this out, but you're, you're not really taking 232 00:15:29,920 --> 00:15:33,440 into the context, the time, how hard it is to get to some of 233 00:15:33,440 --> 00:15:38,160 these locations and probably the unwillingness of the Indigenous 234 00:15:38,160 --> 00:15:42,240 people to really open up on that end of things. 235 00:15:42,440 --> 00:15:45,840 My question is though, so you mentioned William Burroughs, you 236 00:15:45,840 --> 00:15:48,920 mentioned Homer Pinkley and Richard Schulte's. 237 00:15:52,400 --> 00:15:57,600 It seemed like they were doing these MAOI brews but never 238 00:15:57,600 --> 00:16:01,000 getting the DMT with were they doing it on their own? 239 00:16:01,240 --> 00:16:04,760 Because I know the William Burroughs, you describe an 240 00:16:04,760 --> 00:16:08,040 anecdote where he gets mad at the shaman or whoever was 241 00:16:08,040 --> 00:16:11,320 brewing it for him and thought that he was kind of like messing 242 00:16:11,320 --> 00:16:12,640 with them or something like that. 243 00:16:13,240 --> 00:16:15,640 Drunken fuck of a witch. Yeah. 244 00:16:15,640 --> 00:16:19,800 So like, were they doing this on their own or were they getting 245 00:16:19,800 --> 00:16:22,720 it from some indigenous people and just not getting the full 246 00:16:23,000 --> 00:16:25,600 the full picture, like what was going on there? 247 00:16:25,600 --> 00:16:27,720 Because I know that there's different varieties of 248 00:16:27,720 --> 00:16:31,160 concoctions and stuff like that. Yeah. 249 00:16:31,160 --> 00:16:36,840 I mean, there are some groups that still use, I say still use 250 00:16:36,840 --> 00:16:39,560 the assumption being that the original ayahuasca brew would 251 00:16:39,560 --> 00:16:42,720 have been the carpy vine and the carpy vine alone. 252 00:16:43,920 --> 00:16:49,360 And Burroughs was searching for the vine and he was basically he 253 00:16:49,360 --> 00:16:52,120 was, he acquired the vine and then he was looking for people 254 00:16:52,120 --> 00:16:56,680 to make the brew with the vine. Basically, he assumed as, as 255 00:16:56,720 --> 00:16:59,680 everyone else did, that the vine was the key component here and 256 00:16:59,680 --> 00:17:02,960 that he just needed someone to prepare the brew, you know, to, 257 00:17:02,960 --> 00:17:05,480 to, to prepare the infusion, the decoction. 258 00:17:05,920 --> 00:17:11,599 And that's what he did. Whether these were reputable 259 00:17:12,440 --> 00:17:16,560 ayahuascaros or shamans is, is an open question here. 260 00:17:17,079 --> 00:17:19,680 We don't really know. All we know is that his first 261 00:17:19,680 --> 00:17:23,680 few attempts were kind of nauseating. 262 00:17:23,680 --> 00:17:27,000 You know, he vomited and he passed out and he, he, he, he 263 00:17:27,000 --> 00:17:33,560 was extremely paranoid and he was extremely suspicious, even 264 00:17:33,560 --> 00:17:36,760 contemptuous, one would say, of these, these shamans. 265 00:17:37,400 --> 00:17:40,040 He didn't believe that they had, they didn't believe that they 266 00:17:40,040 --> 00:17:43,280 had secrets or special techniques or anything. 267 00:17:43,280 --> 00:17:45,920 He just thought that they were mixing up boiling up this vine 268 00:17:45,920 --> 00:17:51,360 in, in water and charging him a fee, which was normally like a 269 00:17:51,360 --> 00:17:54,880 bottle of extremely strong spirits. 270 00:17:54,880 --> 00:17:58,240 I mean, these are so, you know, I don't know the kind of shamans 271 00:17:58,240 --> 00:18:01,360 that he was dealing with. And he tried to make it himself 272 00:18:01,360 --> 00:18:03,560 as well using the vine and he failed. 273 00:18:04,680 --> 00:18:07,680 So yeah, that's that's and it wasn't until he found this this 274 00:18:07,720 --> 00:18:11,360 this other shaman that did have the secret who was using the, IT 275 00:18:11,360 --> 00:18:15,200 turns out was was using the Shakruna as well as the Karpi 276 00:18:15,200 --> 00:18:18,840 vine. What about Schultes, who's an 277 00:18:18,840 --> 00:18:21,640 ethnobotanist? He probably would have had more, 278 00:18:22,160 --> 00:18:25,920 I guess, of a history to get in with these indigenous tribes. 279 00:18:26,520 --> 00:18:30,520 How was he not able to kind of have luck with it, if you will? 280 00:18:31,840 --> 00:18:37,320 Well, I think the issue was that nobody knew what what the 281 00:18:37,320 --> 00:18:41,320 function of the harmala alkaloids was. 282 00:18:41,440 --> 00:18:44,800 Nobody knew what the Harmala alkaloids did pharmacologically. 283 00:18:45,160 --> 00:18:50,640 So the carpi vine was just one component of a mixture. 284 00:18:50,640 --> 00:18:55,240 It was just a drug mixture as far as anyone could making the 285 00:18:55,240 --> 00:18:58,520 pharmacological the pharmacological connection, 286 00:18:58,520 --> 00:19:02,200 right, that this is a pharmacological synergy and how 287 00:19:02,200 --> 00:19:04,920 it works that requires an understanding of the of the 288 00:19:04,920 --> 00:19:06,840 underlying chemical pharmacology, which no one 289 00:19:06,840 --> 00:19:09,240 understood. So Schulte's was doing lots of 290 00:19:09,240 --> 00:19:12,360 important work in documenting the different types of plants 291 00:19:12,360 --> 00:19:13,680 that were being put into this brew. 292 00:19:14,680 --> 00:19:21,120 But the but the the idea of this minimal binary decoction, this 293 00:19:21,120 --> 00:19:25,320 essential 2 components, the Karpivine and the DMT containing 294 00:19:25,320 --> 00:19:28,720 plant which might be crooner, it might be Chakrapanga was another 295 00:19:28,720 --> 00:19:33,920 one from Banisteriopsis ruz Bianna, although that's 296 00:19:33,920 --> 00:19:36,040 disputed. But anyway, but another DMT 297 00:19:36,040 --> 00:19:38,760 containing plant. So there was no indication that 298 00:19:38,760 --> 00:19:43,200 there was something special going on, so to speak. 299 00:19:43,200 --> 00:19:48,880 It was just a visionary drink that was made from one plant and 300 00:19:48,880 --> 00:19:51,680 plus often many other different types of plants, you know, 301 00:19:51,680 --> 00:19:54,840 tobacco and, and, and other plants containing tropane 302 00:19:54,840 --> 00:19:56,760 alkaloids. So it's not surprising that some 303 00:19:56,760 --> 00:19:59,640 of these decoctions were very, very visionary. 304 00:20:01,160 --> 00:20:04,040 But yeah, the the underlying pharmacology. 305 00:20:04,360 --> 00:20:07,080 Apology that we now everyone knows now everyone who knows 306 00:20:07,080 --> 00:20:11,280 about ayahuasca will tell you happily and knowingly about Mao 307 00:20:11,320 --> 00:20:14,200 inhibitors and stuff. But at the time this was, this 308 00:20:14,200 --> 00:20:16,080 was new, this was, this wasn't known. 309 00:20:16,080 --> 00:20:18,280 It wasn't known. I think, I think it was the 310 00:20:18,280 --> 00:20:24,320 1950s when monoamine oxidase was first discovered as, as the, 311 00:20:25,960 --> 00:20:28,920 this enzyme, this, this group of enzymes that are important in, 312 00:20:30,120 --> 00:20:31,840 in amine metabolism, particularly tryptamine 313 00:20:31,840 --> 00:20:33,240 metabolism. So. 314 00:20:33,240 --> 00:20:37,280 So nobody had any possibility. Doesn't matter how smart you 315 00:20:37,280 --> 00:20:40,240 were, it would have been impossible for you or I or 316 00:20:40,240 --> 00:20:44,680 anyone else working in the 1940s and early 50s to have worked out 317 00:20:44,680 --> 00:20:48,960 what was going on. Yeah, I guess hindsight's always 318 00:20:49,080 --> 00:20:51,240 easier to think, figure these things out. 319 00:20:51,240 --> 00:20:54,560 But I just, I was just saying from like a curiosity 320 00:20:54,560 --> 00:20:59,320 standpoint, if Schulte's was studying these tribes and stuff, 321 00:20:59,560 --> 00:21:02,160 I would have thought that maybe he'd either sit in or watch kind 322 00:21:02,160 --> 00:21:05,160 of what was going on and just, you know, observe from that 323 00:21:05,160 --> 00:21:06,800 standpoint, you know, I just, it's. 324 00:21:07,080 --> 00:21:08,760 Absolutely. Yeah, so. 325 00:21:08,880 --> 00:21:11,640 I don't know, did you know? And there is there are accounts, 326 00:21:11,640 --> 00:21:16,720 particularly in Wade Davies has a wonderful book, 1 River, where 327 00:21:16,720 --> 00:21:20,920 he is basically a biography really of Richard Schultz and he 328 00:21:20,920 --> 00:21:24,600 describes his experiences. You know that people used to say 329 00:21:24,600 --> 00:21:29,400 that if there's a psychedelic drug that Richard Schultz hasn't 330 00:21:29,520 --> 00:21:32,240 taken, it's because it hasn't yet been discovered. 331 00:21:32,240 --> 00:21:34,680 So I mean, he, he wasn't just documenting. 332 00:21:35,120 --> 00:21:38,440 He wasn't just like a botanist who was documenting and naming 333 00:21:38,440 --> 00:21:40,640 or whatever these plants, but he was taking them. 334 00:21:40,640 --> 00:21:43,120 He was taking these drugs. He always tried the drugs that 335 00:21:43,120 --> 00:21:48,960 he discovered, but, and that included ayahuasca. 336 00:21:49,520 --> 00:21:54,800 And he, he had actually come across Chakrapunga several years 337 00:21:54,800 --> 00:21:58,400 before, like I think almost 16 years before Homer Pinkley 338 00:21:58,400 --> 00:22:00,760 discovered Chakruna. Again, the analysis, the 339 00:22:00,760 --> 00:22:04,640 chemical analysis wasn't done. But even if it had of been done 340 00:22:04,640 --> 00:22:09,360 and they found DMT in there at the time, this would have been 341 00:22:09,360 --> 00:22:13,440 prior to people knowing what DMT did. 342 00:22:13,440 --> 00:22:16,440 I mean, DMT's psychedelic effects weren't discovered until 343 00:22:16,440 --> 00:22:20,080 1956. So all of these things are kind 344 00:22:20,080 --> 00:22:23,720 of happening at the same time. Discovery of the psychedelic 345 00:22:23,720 --> 00:22:28,800 effects of DMT, the discovery of monoamine oxidase inhibitors, 346 00:22:29,000 --> 00:22:31,440 the discovery of Chakruna, all is all. 347 00:22:31,440 --> 00:22:35,840 Within like a decade, all these things came together like a 348 00:22:35,840 --> 00:22:42,640 confluence of of these different research outcomes, which then 349 00:22:42,640 --> 00:22:48,800 led to within a decade, kind of the first ayahuasca effect 350 00:22:48,800 --> 00:22:51,760 hypothesis. I was. 351 00:22:51,760 --> 00:22:55,960 Really happy that you talked about Virola in there as well, 352 00:22:55,960 --> 00:22:59,680 because I remember reading true hallucinations and listening to 353 00:23:00,360 --> 00:23:03,640 Dennis McKenna talk about how they were looking for this 354 00:23:03,640 --> 00:23:07,320 Virola paste, this like orally active paste. 355 00:23:09,040 --> 00:23:12,280 And on the way they end up finding mushrooms and you know 356 00:23:12,360 --> 00:23:14,920 there, that's where the the story goes with that. 357 00:23:14,920 --> 00:23:21,840 But can you describe where Virola paste is used? 358 00:23:21,840 --> 00:23:25,920 And is it still used? Because you don't really hear 359 00:23:25,920 --> 00:23:28,160 much about it. It's kind of one of those like 360 00:23:28,160 --> 00:23:30,480 I. Don't know. 361 00:23:30,480 --> 00:23:32,040 Like I said, I'm. I'm glad you mentioned it 362 00:23:32,040 --> 00:23:34,040 because I don't really hear too many people talking about it. 363 00:23:35,000 --> 00:23:38,320 Yes, so. So the Virola Virola is is 364 00:23:38,360 --> 00:23:43,600 simply a particular genus of tree that occurs widely 365 00:23:43,600 --> 00:23:46,200 throughout the Amazon and there are a number of groups that with 366 00:23:46,200 --> 00:23:52,200 Toto is a good example. So when Richard Schultz, Richard 367 00:23:52,200 --> 00:23:57,160 Schultz is credited, I think rightly so with discovering 368 00:23:57,480 --> 00:24:02,920 these Virola snuffs. A Pena is the one that you will 369 00:24:02,920 --> 00:24:08,200 most hear about, but there are many different Virola snuffs 370 00:24:08,200 --> 00:24:13,000 that are made with the bark of these Virola trees or 371 00:24:13,000 --> 00:24:18,640 specifically the resin. So you you peel the bark off the 372 00:24:18,640 --> 00:24:23,880 virola tree and then you get this resin that beads and then 373 00:24:23,880 --> 00:24:27,960 you basically not dissimilar to ayahuasca, you boil this bark up 374 00:24:27,960 --> 00:24:31,800 and all of the resin is extracted into the water and 375 00:24:31,800 --> 00:24:34,440 then you boil it off until it forms a paste. 376 00:24:34,440 --> 00:24:37,520 And then you dry it in the sun until it's completely dry. 377 00:24:37,520 --> 00:24:39,640 And then you can break it up and form a fine powder. 378 00:24:39,640 --> 00:24:43,880 And it looks kind of similar to cinnamon or paprika or something 379 00:24:43,880 --> 00:24:46,760 like this. Then it's used as a snuff. 380 00:24:47,160 --> 00:24:52,200 And Virola contains high concentrations of so these penis 381 00:24:52,200 --> 00:24:56,080 snuffs contain high concentrations of tryptamines 382 00:24:56,480 --> 00:25:01,360 including DMT, but also sometimes 5 meo DMT, 5 hydroxy 383 00:25:01,360 --> 00:25:04,520 DMT, i.e. Bufotenine. 384 00:25:05,760 --> 00:25:10,680 And interestingly, there are also kind of a mysterious form 385 00:25:10,680 --> 00:25:13,960 of the roller, not a snuff, but a pellet. 386 00:25:15,040 --> 00:25:17,800 This is something again, that Richard Schultes discovered was 387 00:25:17,800 --> 00:25:23,160 that some groups were making. Rather than drying out the the 388 00:25:23,160 --> 00:25:27,800 resin and forming a powder, they're actually forming little 389 00:25:27,920 --> 00:25:32,040 pellets they swallowed. Now as soon. 390 00:25:32,040 --> 00:25:34,480 As I tell you that you should be thinking, wait a minute, if 391 00:25:34,480 --> 00:25:36,680 they're swallowing this, there must be, there has to be some 392 00:25:36,680 --> 00:25:40,440 kind of monoamine oxidase inhibitor and that isn't known. 393 00:25:41,880 --> 00:25:43,920 So it's kind of, that's kind of a mystery actually. 394 00:25:43,920 --> 00:25:47,000 I don't talk about in the book because it could lead, it would 395 00:25:47,000 --> 00:25:50,720 lead me down the garden path a little bit into thinking about 396 00:25:51,640 --> 00:25:53,880 the next book, right? Yes, the. 397 00:25:53,880 --> 00:25:56,320 Next book. But yeah, there are pellets. 398 00:25:56,320 --> 00:26:00,040 So there's oral forms in these oral hallucinogens as Schulte's 399 00:26:00,040 --> 00:26:03,200 described them, which are these pellets made from Virola resin? 400 00:26:03,880 --> 00:26:07,560 But the question is obvious there is that why? 401 00:26:07,560 --> 00:26:09,120 Why are these? Why are these active? 402 00:26:09,400 --> 00:26:14,480 Is there some monoamine oxidase inhibitor within the bark? 403 00:26:14,920 --> 00:26:21,360 If so, I've not seen analysis that would suggest that. 404 00:26:21,520 --> 00:26:25,760 Are there add mixtures? We know that the other major 405 00:26:25,760 --> 00:26:34,480 snuff variety principally from the yopo tree Anadenon Thera 406 00:26:34,480 --> 00:26:37,880 peregrina. So this produces the Yopo snuff. 407 00:26:37,880 --> 00:26:42,480 This is from the seeds and these seeds are ground up again to 408 00:26:42,480 --> 00:26:49,080 form a snuff and these are inhaled or normally you would 409 00:26:49,080 --> 00:26:54,560 have a partner, one with a you'd put the snuff into a long tube, 410 00:26:57,440 --> 00:26:59,720 you know, up to a teaspoon of this snuff, quite a lot of it 411 00:26:59,720 --> 00:27:01,720 would go into one end of the tube and then your part would 412 00:27:02,720 --> 00:27:05,760 blow it forcefully into your nostrils and it kind of explodes 413 00:27:05,760 --> 00:27:07,760 into your head and it's very unpleasant. 414 00:27:07,880 --> 00:27:10,400 It's not surprising and it's not particularly popular in the 415 00:27:10,400 --> 00:27:17,200 West, but analysis of of these snuffs again find DMT sometimes 416 00:27:17,200 --> 00:27:24,360 5 MEODMT befotonine, but also harmal alkaloids in some, in 417 00:27:24,360 --> 00:27:27,000 some analysis. Again, analysis vary. 418 00:27:27,000 --> 00:27:31,920 You've got a tree that grows over broad areas of, of the, of 419 00:27:31,920 --> 00:27:36,800 Amazonia and the Orinoco plains. And different, you get different 420 00:27:36,800 --> 00:27:40,600 subspecies or variants that contain alkaloid concentration 421 00:27:40,600 --> 00:27:43,240 and changes over time and throughout the season and 422 00:27:43,240 --> 00:27:45,000 growing stage and all this kind of stuff. 423 00:27:46,040 --> 00:27:49,240 But also admixture plants that could be added as well that we 424 00:27:49,240 --> 00:27:52,120 know there are certain admixture plants that are added to these 425 00:27:52,120 --> 00:27:55,440 yopo snuffs. It's not just the seeds, but the 426 00:27:55,520 --> 00:27:58,680 the presence of these Hamala alkaloids within this Yoppo 427 00:27:58,680 --> 00:28:04,560 snuff suggests again that these indigenous peoples are perhaps 428 00:28:04,560 --> 00:28:07,840 employing pharmacological synergy to enhance the effects 429 00:28:07,840 --> 00:28:12,520 of the snuff. Richard Spruce way back in 18 430 00:28:12,560 --> 00:28:18,560 you know 525354 he found he was wandering the Orinoco Plains and 431 00:28:18,560 --> 00:28:22,720 he came across this man from a tribe called the Guaibo who was 432 00:28:23,160 --> 00:28:26,160 who had a pouch of this yopo snuff. 433 00:28:26,880 --> 00:28:30,720 But he also had a piece of carpi vine hanging around his neck, 434 00:28:30,720 --> 00:28:36,080 which he used to chew. And he told Spruce that when you 435 00:28:36,080 --> 00:28:40,560 combine the the yopo snuff and the vine together, you chew a 436 00:28:40,560 --> 00:28:43,720 bit in the vine, take a bit of yopo snuff that this is that it 437 00:28:43,720 --> 00:28:46,200 kind of enhances the visions. And there are there are groups 438 00:28:46,200 --> 00:28:51,720 that will drink a ayahuasca so-called or khaki brew with a 439 00:28:51,720 --> 00:28:54,040 vine alone and then take the snuff. 440 00:28:54,760 --> 00:28:58,960 So that rather than having the DMT and the harmala alkaloids 441 00:28:58,960 --> 00:29:02,440 within the drink, they have just the harmala alkaloids in the 442 00:29:02,440 --> 00:29:06,920 drink which they drink 1st and then they take the snuff and 443 00:29:06,920 --> 00:29:11,600 this as they understand it, then they experience it. 444 00:29:11,600 --> 00:29:15,560 They this enhances the vision. So this, this pharmacological 445 00:29:15,560 --> 00:29:20,720 synergy is, is, is not isolated and, and doesn't seem to even be 446 00:29:20,720 --> 00:29:24,640 isolated to the same to, you know, to ayahuasca, but also is, 447 00:29:24,640 --> 00:29:29,400 is used to enhance Ophena possibly and certainly OPO as 448 00:29:29,400 --> 00:29:32,440 well. So these are sophisticated, you 449 00:29:32,440 --> 00:29:34,360 know, I describe them in the book, you know, these aren't 450 00:29:34,360 --> 00:29:36,600 just plant based drug preparations. 451 00:29:36,600 --> 00:29:40,800 These are true pharmacological technologies that were developed 452 00:29:40,920 --> 00:29:43,400 without an underlying, you know, an understanding of the 453 00:29:43,400 --> 00:29:45,040 underlying pharmacology for sure. 454 00:29:45,200 --> 00:29:48,240 But there were, you know, highly sophisticated technologies, 455 00:29:48,240 --> 00:29:51,000 pharmacological technologies that were developed perhaps over 456 00:29:51,520 --> 00:29:56,160 hundreds of years for the sole purpose of allowing these people 457 00:29:56,160 --> 00:30:00,520 to communicate and interact with and form relationships with 458 00:30:01,040 --> 00:30:04,520 these normally hidden beings that they can only see by using 459 00:30:04,520 --> 00:30:07,920 these various plant based drug technologies. 460 00:30:09,440 --> 00:30:11,920 Yeah, that was a. Interesting part too. 461 00:30:11,920 --> 00:30:14,920 I mean I've heard of the oppo, but when you're describing it 462 00:30:14,920 --> 00:30:19,600 that like shotgun method and the one guy you know that gets the 463 00:30:19,600 --> 00:30:22,600 hit all the sudden he's bleeding out of his nose, he's barfing. 464 00:30:22,600 --> 00:30:25,480 It's not just sounds terrible right, like it does not sound 465 00:30:25,880 --> 00:30:29,680 like a fun time. I mean, maybe afterwards, maybe 466 00:30:29,680 --> 00:30:34,360 the maybe the the DMT once it hits, you know, takes you and 467 00:30:34,360 --> 00:30:38,240 you don't really think about it. I don't know, But I want to talk 468 00:30:38,240 --> 00:30:43,080 about the quote little people now, the little people motif or 469 00:30:43,080 --> 00:30:46,880 machine elf like beans or, you know, they show up in multiple 470 00:30:46,880 --> 00:30:51,720 traditions. Do you think these consistent 471 00:30:51,720 --> 00:30:58,640 motifs reflect like, you know, and I know that's kind of like 472 00:30:58,640 --> 00:31:04,400 the the whole background behind your theories on this, but do 473 00:31:04,400 --> 00:31:09,240 you think that that shared vision and experience and realms 474 00:31:09,240 --> 00:31:13,080 and everything, Do you think that that speaks to the 475 00:31:13,080 --> 00:31:17,000 tradition and the culture? Like if if the little people 476 00:31:17,000 --> 00:31:20,760 that they were seeing on ayahuasca and before Western 477 00:31:20,920 --> 00:31:23,720 ethnobotanist and people came over, do you think that those 478 00:31:23,720 --> 00:31:25,640 are similar to ones that we're seeing now? 479 00:31:25,640 --> 00:31:27,120 Or do you think they're completely different? 480 00:31:31,280 --> 00:31:34,200 The short answer is I don't know. 481 00:31:34,600 --> 00:31:37,480 We can only go from their descriptions. 482 00:31:37,920 --> 00:31:45,760 Now, there are some good, the most detailed descriptions of 483 00:31:45,760 --> 00:31:47,600 these beings. So first of all, these beings, 484 00:31:47,600 --> 00:31:52,200 as you said, they are they. There are many groups that. 485 00:31:52,200 --> 00:31:57,520 Describe encounters with so-called little people that go 486 00:31:57,520 --> 00:31:59,640 by specific names. They wouldn't necessarily call 487 00:31:59,640 --> 00:32:01,040 them little people, but they are. 488 00:32:01,040 --> 00:32:06,560 They're described as small, sometimes humanoid, sometimes 489 00:32:06,560 --> 00:32:11,000 not. Beings that are that. 490 00:32:11,000 --> 00:32:14,240 Operate in. Great numbers that are colourful 491 00:32:14,440 --> 00:32:19,200 and bright and dance and sing, you know, they're very lively 492 00:32:19,200 --> 00:32:24,840 and very jovial and to me that is that's the. 493 00:32:26,480 --> 00:32:28,920 The DMT elf. Motif, you know when people 494 00:32:28,920 --> 00:32:31,240 describe now you know what, what, what are the unifying 495 00:32:31,240 --> 00:32:33,960 characteristics? I always say the machine elves 496 00:32:33,960 --> 00:32:36,400 or DMT elves or whatever you want to call them. 497 00:32:36,760 --> 00:32:39,360 They're, they come in a variety of forms, but they're unified by 498 00:32:39,360 --> 00:32:41,360 their character. So we can't say everyone's 499 00:32:41,360 --> 00:32:46,320 seeing exactly the same form of beings, but they, they all seem 500 00:32:46,320 --> 00:32:47,840 to have the same kind of character. 501 00:32:47,840 --> 00:32:49,680 They're, they're jovial, they're cheeky. 502 00:32:49,680 --> 00:32:52,440 There's lots of them. They like to dance around. 503 00:32:52,440 --> 00:32:56,960 So, So to me, when when I read of Yanomami, Yanomami shamans 504 00:32:56,960 --> 00:33:01,680 describing seeing these multitudinous beings with 505 00:33:01,680 --> 00:33:05,400 collared headdresses dancing and singing and operating in such 506 00:33:05,400 --> 00:33:07,560 great numbers that you can never get to the end of them. 507 00:33:08,240 --> 00:33:10,880 To me, they're describing the same thing, right? 508 00:33:10,880 --> 00:33:13,120 That's the same, but just by a different name. 509 00:33:13,120 --> 00:33:16,880 They, they, they call them the, the Hekkuda. 510 00:33:17,840 --> 00:33:23,600 But to me that's just another name for what, you know, we 511 00:33:23,600 --> 00:33:26,480 would describe as a machine out for what other people might 512 00:33:26,480 --> 00:33:29,160 describe as Pixies or fairies or or whatever. 513 00:33:29,160 --> 00:33:32,360 I think, I think you're talking about the same kind of is, is it 514 00:33:32,360 --> 00:33:35,800 the same? Ultimately, we don't know, but I 515 00:33:36,240 --> 00:33:40,960 it's certainly a it's a Rick. It's a recurring motif that is 516 00:33:40,960 --> 00:33:44,360 not modern. It's not a Terence McKenna Rism. 517 00:33:44,560 --> 00:33:50,760 Yes, he popularised it, but this thing goes back, you know much 518 00:33:50,880 --> 00:33:53,680 you know far, far before McKenna. 519 00:33:53,680 --> 00:33:56,920 It goes back to the first DMT studies in the 1950s and as you 520 00:33:56,920 --> 00:34:01,560 say all the way through back various types of indigenous 521 00:34:01,560 --> 00:34:06,520 peoples that use tryptamine based drugs. 522 00:34:06,680 --> 00:34:11,639 Mark Mark Plotkin who was one of shorties is another one of I 523 00:34:11,679 --> 00:34:13,800 think he was one of his students. 524 00:34:15,120 --> 00:34:19,120 He took the opinion snuff. So this Virola Snuff for the 525 00:34:19,120 --> 00:34:26,679 first time with a shaman, and he suddenly started seeing in the 526 00:34:26,679 --> 00:34:29,120 corner of his vision, he started seeing these beings, these 527 00:34:29,120 --> 00:34:32,760 lively dancing beings that became more and more lively and 528 00:34:32,760 --> 00:34:35,440 more and more of them. And he asked the shaman and 529 00:34:35,440 --> 00:34:38,560 said, you know, what are these small men that I'm seeing? 530 00:34:38,560 --> 00:34:41,960 And the shaman responded instantaneously and said, well, 531 00:34:41,960 --> 00:34:43,960 these are the hecker, the spirits of the forest, of 532 00:34:43,960 --> 00:34:45,920 course, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. 533 00:34:47,040 --> 00:34:49,360 So. So yeah, I do find that 534 00:34:49,360 --> 00:34:53,840 intriguing to say the least, that you have these these groups 535 00:34:53,840 --> 00:34:57,520 going back, you know, in entirely different parts of the 536 00:34:57,520 --> 00:35:00,080 world and from entirely different backgrounds, entirely 537 00:35:00,080 --> 00:35:03,720 different cultures, entirely different world views, religious 538 00:35:03,720 --> 00:35:07,160 and mystical traditions. And yet they're all describing 539 00:35:07,160 --> 00:35:11,280 multitudinous, giggling lightly beings that we would we would 540 00:35:11,280 --> 00:35:13,920 call elves, but they would they have other names for. 541 00:35:15,200 --> 00:35:19,000 Yeah, the reason why I ask. Too is I've talked with a few 542 00:35:19,000 --> 00:35:24,320 people, one guy never really looked into anything from you 543 00:35:24,320 --> 00:35:29,320 know, ancient Mexico or Central America and he said that he the 544 00:35:29,320 --> 00:35:32,640 first time he did DMT, he was seen all sorts of like Mayan 545 00:35:32,640 --> 00:35:36,800 symbolism and stuff like that. And I've heard another person 546 00:35:36,800 --> 00:35:39,280 similar experience but with like Egyptian stuff. 547 00:35:39,480 --> 00:35:44,120 And I was just curious if you thought that maybe when our 548 00:35:44,120 --> 00:35:49,200 consciousness evolves, whatever that archetype or culture 549 00:35:49,200 --> 00:35:52,960 currently is, is what's reflective in that experience in 550 00:35:52,960 --> 00:35:57,200 that moment? Or maybe that's where some of 551 00:35:57,200 --> 00:36:00,000 that culture comes from, is these altered states that then 552 00:36:00,000 --> 00:36:02,720 they bring into their culture and integrate it kind of a 553 00:36:02,720 --> 00:36:06,000 thing. Yeah, I mean for. 554 00:36:06,000 --> 00:36:07,840 Sure. I mean, if you look at the 555 00:36:07,840 --> 00:36:17,360 imagery of, you know, Southern American POT POT traditions, I 556 00:36:17,360 --> 00:36:21,280 mean a lot of their. You know their clothing. 557 00:36:21,280 --> 00:36:24,120 And their art, I mean, this is clearly comes from POT vision. 558 00:36:24,120 --> 00:36:33,840 So that that clearly happens. And I think the DMT experience 559 00:36:34,760 --> 00:36:39,560 to me doesn't it seems to transcend culture in many ways. 560 00:36:40,080 --> 00:36:43,320 It seems to seems to operate orthogonally to the current 561 00:36:43,320 --> 00:36:45,200 culture. Some would disagree on that, but 562 00:36:46,240 --> 00:36:49,200 I think it it feels more likely. And again, I'm, I'm just 563 00:36:49,200 --> 00:36:53,440 speculating that this is something that would be brought 564 00:36:53,440 --> 00:36:56,640 into a culture and would influence the culture and the 565 00:36:56,640 --> 00:37:00,360 kind of imagery that's left behind by certain cultures, 566 00:37:00,360 --> 00:37:04,840 rather than them producing the imagery and then seeing the same 567 00:37:04,840 --> 00:37:07,720 things in their, their vision. It makes sense in the opposite 568 00:37:07,720 --> 00:37:12,080 direction that if they're having visionary experiences and seeing 569 00:37:12,080 --> 00:37:15,840 certain types of imagery, that that would, that would form the 570 00:37:15,840 --> 00:37:18,120 basis, you know, perhaps of their, their religious 571 00:37:18,120 --> 00:37:20,920 traditions. I mean, certainly, you know, in 572 00:37:20,920 --> 00:37:25,600 in amongst the indigenous peoples of Amazonia, that is the 573 00:37:25,600 --> 00:37:29,160 entire basis of their religious mystical traditions and the the 574 00:37:29,160 --> 00:37:35,560 stories of the spirits comes largely from ingesting these 575 00:37:37,400 --> 00:37:42,120 powerful psychedelic drugs. You know, which came first? 576 00:37:43,000 --> 00:37:45,960 Were they somehow aware of these beings prior to when they 577 00:37:45,960 --> 00:37:48,960 developed the technologies in order to see them more clearly 578 00:37:50,240 --> 00:37:52,480 and gain access to them more readily? 579 00:37:53,360 --> 00:37:56,720 Or, you know, I, I imagine actually it's more of kind of 580 00:37:56,920 --> 00:37:59,400 these things operating in tandem in some way. 581 00:37:59,400 --> 00:38:02,640 I don't think it's as simple as, oh, they, they took a drug 582 00:38:02,640 --> 00:38:06,280 accidentally or something and saw visions and then decided, 583 00:38:06,320 --> 00:38:09,280 oh, these must be gods. I think it's, it's more like 584 00:38:10,200 --> 00:38:12,920 something deeper and stranger is going on. 585 00:38:12,920 --> 00:38:16,960 The perhaps as a as a modern Westerner, it's it's it's beyond 586 00:38:16,960 --> 00:38:20,800 my ability to comprehend. Interesting. 587 00:38:21,080 --> 00:38:22,480 Yeah. And you can look at even what 588 00:38:22,480 --> 00:38:25,000 you're doing, you know, with the building alien worlds. 589 00:38:25,000 --> 00:38:27,640 And, you know, from your standpoint, you have all this 590 00:38:27,640 --> 00:38:30,120 knowledge now. You're a neuroscientist, You 591 00:38:30,120 --> 00:38:32,680 understand how these compounds work and how they interact with 592 00:38:32,680 --> 00:38:35,440 your body and receptors and everything. 593 00:38:36,160 --> 00:38:39,200 And we're talking about aliens and future and technology. 594 00:38:39,200 --> 00:38:42,880 So it's kind of a different thing altogether. 595 00:38:42,880 --> 00:38:45,800 Now is where I don't could could you think somebody in the 596 00:38:45,800 --> 00:38:48,240 ancient world do you know, using these comments, I don't even 597 00:38:48,240 --> 00:38:49,920 think they could comprehend something like that. 598 00:38:49,920 --> 00:38:54,800 So I do think that culture does inform our idea of what's going 599 00:38:54,800 --> 00:38:57,640 on to some degree, yes. Yes. 600 00:38:57,680 --> 00:39:00,640 I mean, certainly our interpretation and then the 601 00:39:00,640 --> 00:39:05,520 implications of what this means, it absolutely has to be 602 00:39:06,960 --> 00:39:08,960 influenced by culture. I mean, you're right. 603 00:39:08,960 --> 00:39:17,040 They could never have imagined, you know, for example, you know, 604 00:39:17,040 --> 00:39:19,960 people will smoke DMT and say, oh, this is, this is clear 605 00:39:19,960 --> 00:39:22,320 evidence that we're living in some kind of simulation. 606 00:39:23,360 --> 00:39:26,320 That's, you know, some kind of computer program that's been 607 00:39:26,320 --> 00:39:28,040 encoded by some alien intelligence. 608 00:39:28,040 --> 00:39:31,400 And this is an idea actually that I, I develop in great 609 00:39:31,400 --> 00:39:34,960 detail in, in alien information theory in my first book. 610 00:39:34,960 --> 00:39:39,240 It's not a belief system I'd I'd adhere to in any way at all. 611 00:39:39,240 --> 00:39:43,600 By the way, as I've said 1000 times, but no one listens. 612 00:39:45,360 --> 00:39:49,360 But but of course, you know, Amazonian people's in 1000 years 613 00:39:49,360 --> 00:39:52,200 ago, whatever couldn't even imagine such a thing. 614 00:39:52,360 --> 00:39:56,920 Does that mean that we're approaching truth in some way or 615 00:39:56,920 --> 00:40:00,760 are we merely reaching for what appears to be the most 616 00:40:00,760 --> 00:40:07,000 appropriate cultural tool to explain this? 617 00:40:07,000 --> 00:40:11,320 You know, I think in the end. You know, I always say in the 618 00:40:11,320 --> 00:40:15,600 end the. The Amazonian. 619 00:40:15,600 --> 00:40:20,160 World view, I say Amazonian, South American, indigenous 620 00:40:20,160 --> 00:40:22,960 peoples world view here that we're they're interacting with 621 00:40:22,960 --> 00:40:25,440 the spirit world. And perhaps my interpretation 622 00:40:25,440 --> 00:40:29,400 that we're interacting with some kind of intelligent agent, some 623 00:40:29,400 --> 00:40:32,040 kind of discounted intelligence, the nature and origin of which I 624 00:40:32,040 --> 00:40:35,920 don't know anything about. I think ultimately, if you, if 625 00:40:35,920 --> 00:40:39,160 you, if you look, these things are basically the same. 626 00:40:39,160 --> 00:40:41,920 I'm describing the same thing from two different perspectives. 627 00:40:43,240 --> 00:40:47,200 Whereas if someone talks about a spirit, you know, what's a 628 00:40:47,200 --> 00:40:50,280 spirit, It's a discounted being. It's an intelligent being of 629 00:40:50,280 --> 00:40:53,800 some sort that occupy that doesn't occupy A carnate form. 630 00:40:53,800 --> 00:40:57,640 It's not embodied. It's a disembodied being of some 631 00:40:57,640 --> 00:41:03,480 sort, you know, a modern, my modern, less loaded, more 632 00:41:03,480 --> 00:41:06,960 neutral term for this and a discount intelligent agent. 633 00:41:07,600 --> 00:41:09,840 I'm, I'm describing the same thing really. 634 00:41:10,240 --> 00:41:12,560 I don't think I'm describing, I don't think I'm saying anything 635 00:41:12,560 --> 00:41:16,160 different. I'm simply using my modern kind 636 00:41:16,160 --> 00:41:20,480 of neuroscientific perspective to try and. 637 00:41:22,360 --> 00:41:24,480 To try and. Understand the nature, I guess 638 00:41:24,480 --> 00:41:27,720 of of these intelligences and and to try and convince people 639 00:41:28,280 --> 00:41:31,760 that it's worthwhile to actually take them seriously and that we 640 00:41:31,760 --> 00:41:35,320 we shouldn't be simply dismissing these beliefs of the 641 00:41:35,320 --> 00:41:41,800 so-called savage and uncivilised as being superstitions and 642 00:41:41,800 --> 00:41:44,960 nonsense or just hallucinations. And I think that's. 643 00:41:46,160 --> 00:41:49,120 That's really the aim of the. Book, I guess is, is not to tell 644 00:41:49,120 --> 00:41:52,600 people what DMT is or what DMT represents, but to convince 645 00:41:52,600 --> 00:41:57,360 people that that there is something extremely, extremely 646 00:41:57,560 --> 00:42:01,120 strange and and extremely difficult to explain with with 647 00:42:01,120 --> 00:42:03,920 with with DMT. I'm not sure if he answered the 648 00:42:03,920 --> 00:42:05,960 question no, no, that no. That was good. 649 00:42:05,960 --> 00:42:09,800 No, you're good. Rambling's also good sometimes 650 00:42:09,800 --> 00:42:11,520 too. It's, you know, you got to riff 651 00:42:11,520 --> 00:42:13,000 a little bit to get something out there. 652 00:42:13,000 --> 00:42:14,840 Riff a little bit. That's the word, not ramble. 653 00:42:14,920 --> 00:42:19,480 Ramble. So a common idea or like a way 654 00:42:19,480 --> 00:42:22,840 people try and parse out what's going on in these states, is 655 00:42:22,840 --> 00:42:28,200 this idea of a like a filter or some sort of perceptional filter 656 00:42:28,960 --> 00:42:33,040 when you're under, you know, any sort of psychedelic really, but 657 00:42:33,040 --> 00:42:38,160 more of the five HT 2A, you know, or tryptamines. 658 00:42:38,160 --> 00:42:43,360 But when you look at that model, can that is that useful or do 659 00:42:43,360 --> 00:42:46,600 you think it hinders progress? Like where do you currently 660 00:42:46,600 --> 00:42:49,640 stand on that idea of this this idea of a filter? 661 00:42:51,800 --> 00:42:53,600 I think it's. Useful. 662 00:42:54,040 --> 00:42:59,240 I mean, the idea of filter really can be traced, really 663 00:42:59,280 --> 00:43:01,240 should be credited to Aldous Huxley. 664 00:43:01,240 --> 00:43:06,520 I mean, he described this idea that that well, you know, 665 00:43:06,520 --> 00:43:09,040 psychedelics open the doors of perception, his most famous 666 00:43:09,040 --> 00:43:12,360 phrase, right? And he described this idea that 667 00:43:12,600 --> 00:43:15,200 that you have this reduced. So you call it a reducing valve 668 00:43:16,120 --> 00:43:20,480 that effectively filters out all but a measly trickle of 669 00:43:20,480 --> 00:43:22,240 information. That's important and useful 670 00:43:23,000 --> 00:43:28,280 survival. It's a it's broadly valid, I 671 00:43:28,280 --> 00:43:31,720 think. But Aldous Huxley was working in 672 00:43:31,720 --> 00:43:33,680 a time we didn't understand the newer mechanisms. 673 00:43:33,680 --> 00:43:37,080 We now kind of understand how that filter works and how it 674 00:43:37,080 --> 00:43:39,400 doesn't work. It's one thing to say, oh, the 675 00:43:39,400 --> 00:43:42,720 brain is a filter, but then you have to say, well, how does this 676 00:43:42,720 --> 00:43:48,080 filtering work and why? Why would psychedelics disrupt 677 00:43:48,080 --> 00:43:50,440 this filter? We kind of understand how they 678 00:43:50,440 --> 00:43:55,600 do now because we know that the, the, the world that your brain 679 00:43:55,600 --> 00:43:59,760 is constructing is this model and, and this model is 680 00:43:59,760 --> 00:44:04,200 constantly attempting to predict and filter out to extinguish 681 00:44:04,200 --> 00:44:07,680 sensory inputs. Sensory stimulation is 682 00:44:07,680 --> 00:44:10,640 constantly entering the brain. And that, and the role of this 683 00:44:10,640 --> 00:44:13,720 model of the brain does is basically try to predict what 684 00:44:13,720 --> 00:44:16,080 this sensory, these sensory inputs are going to be. 685 00:44:16,080 --> 00:44:19,160 And if the model is correct, the predictions are correct, then it 686 00:44:19,200 --> 00:44:23,440 it extinguishes, it cancels out. There's literally, you know, 687 00:44:23,480 --> 00:44:28,800 neural information coming down this cortical hierarchy towards 688 00:44:28,800 --> 00:44:31,880 the visual cortex, and it's literally cancelling out the 689 00:44:31,880 --> 00:44:33,680 information that's coming into the brain. 690 00:44:34,240 --> 00:44:36,920 If it gets it right, if it misses, it does make the wrong 691 00:44:36,920 --> 00:44:39,080 prediction, then that that information goes into the brain 692 00:44:39,080 --> 00:44:40,920 and must be processed. It's unpredicted. 693 00:44:40,920 --> 00:44:44,040 It's a prediction error. So the brain is constantly 694 00:44:44,040 --> 00:44:47,040 trying to make these predictions about sensory inputs. 695 00:44:47,040 --> 00:44:50,560 And that's how the filter works. It's like process, you can 696 00:44:50,560 --> 00:44:54,440 imagine trying to work out, you know, where's this information 697 00:44:54,440 --> 00:44:57,920 coming from and then cancelling it out because that's cheaper to 698 00:44:57,920 --> 00:45:03,160 do that rather than than to than to kind of process all sensory 699 00:45:03,160 --> 00:45:06,160 inputs, even sensory inputs that you already kind of know about. 700 00:45:06,160 --> 00:45:09,280 If your model is working, then you don't kind of need to know 701 00:45:10,480 --> 00:45:12,160 really. You don't need much sensory 702 00:45:12,160 --> 00:45:13,800 inputs. If your model of the world and 703 00:45:13,800 --> 00:45:19,160 what's going on in the world seems to be functioning, then 704 00:45:19,160 --> 00:45:21,200 you don't need much sensory input. 705 00:45:21,200 --> 00:45:22,760 And so that's the idea, that's the filter. 706 00:45:23,080 --> 00:45:26,280 Now when you bind, when psychedelics bind to the five HT 707 00:45:26,280 --> 00:45:28,480 2A receptor, they stimulate neurons. 708 00:45:28,480 --> 00:45:31,960 These are excitatory receptors. They stimulate neurons, they 709 00:45:31,960 --> 00:45:36,080 make them more excitable, they make them more likely to fire. 710 00:45:36,280 --> 00:45:40,240 And so you get this highly excitable cortex where 711 00:45:40,240 --> 00:45:42,920 information is flowing much more rapidly and more readily. 712 00:45:43,480 --> 00:45:46,520 So the model, this world model that's constructed by the cortex 713 00:45:46,520 --> 00:45:49,800 is disrupted. It becomes far less stable. 714 00:45:49,800 --> 00:45:53,960 It's nudged towards the chaotic realm, becomes much more 715 00:45:53,960 --> 00:45:56,920 complex. It becomes much more unstable, 716 00:45:56,920 --> 00:46:02,120 fluid, dynamic, a little bit more random, sort of entropic as 717 00:46:02,400 --> 00:46:06,920 Robin Harris would call it. And it becomes much worse making 718 00:46:06,920 --> 00:46:11,560 predictions, so the model stops functioning as a valid kind of 719 00:46:11,720 --> 00:46:16,640 predictor and which means more information makes it past these 720 00:46:17,600 --> 00:46:21,160 kind of inhibitory predictions that are coming down the 721 00:46:21,160 --> 00:46:23,360 cortical hierarchy. And so more information gets 722 00:46:23,440 --> 00:46:26,600 through. And that's so that is a, you've 723 00:46:26,600 --> 00:46:28,640 lost the filter. You know, the filter is this is 724 00:46:28,640 --> 00:46:30,520 this prediction system. So you, when you disrupt that 725 00:46:30,520 --> 00:46:32,640 prediction system, more information comes in. 726 00:46:32,720 --> 00:46:36,880 So it so yes, the the filter model works, but now we kind of 727 00:46:36,880 --> 00:46:40,960 understand at least to a certain extent, at least we have a good 728 00:46:40,960 --> 00:46:43,560 working model of how that filter works and indeed how 729 00:46:43,560 --> 00:46:45,000 psychedelics disrupt that filter. 730 00:46:46,000 --> 00:46:48,680 Yeah, I think. Maybe it was two or three times 731 00:46:48,680 --> 00:46:52,120 ago when you were on, we went in depth about kind of the 732 00:46:52,120 --> 00:46:56,200 hierarchy of the idea of the filter between like tryptamines 733 00:46:56,200 --> 00:46:58,400 versus tropanes and even like alcohol. 734 00:46:58,400 --> 00:47:00,840 People can hallucinate on alcohol, doesn't mean you're 735 00:47:00,840 --> 00:47:02,680 actually seeing anything important, right? 736 00:47:02,680 --> 00:47:06,800 So, and I think you pointed out too, 'cause I think we were also 737 00:47:06,800 --> 00:47:11,240 talking about salvia and the GABA opioid receptors and 738 00:47:11,240 --> 00:47:15,720 different things like that and how even those are different 739 00:47:15,720 --> 00:47:18,200 too, and they use different parts of the brain and stuff 740 00:47:18,200 --> 00:47:21,240 like that. So there's definitely a lot of 741 00:47:21,240 --> 00:47:23,080 weirdness there. I think if anybody's interested 742 00:47:23,080 --> 00:47:25,160 in that, we, like I said, we wouldn't, We riffed on that for 743 00:47:25,160 --> 00:47:27,520 a while, one episode a few times back. 744 00:47:27,520 --> 00:47:35,040 But if DMT experiences involve genuinely informative perception 745 00:47:35,040 --> 00:47:37,840 beyond personal symbolism, which kind of what we were just 746 00:47:37,840 --> 00:47:41,160 talking about, what kinds of experiments or cross checks 747 00:47:41,160 --> 00:47:45,560 could you or like? What would convince you in that 748 00:47:45,560 --> 00:47:46,680 regard? Or like, is there like an 749 00:47:46,680 --> 00:47:50,320 experiment or something that you could feel validated on? 750 00:47:50,320 --> 00:47:56,080 On that end of things, I think. So there are a number of 751 00:47:58,240 --> 00:48:02,320 experiments one can devise here. The classic one, which you might 752 00:48:02,320 --> 00:48:07,000 have spoken about before comes from a paper by a guy called 753 00:48:07,000 --> 00:48:12,720 Rodriguez back in 2005, maybe a long time ago. 754 00:48:12,800 --> 00:48:16,080 Whereas he suggested, you know, he said, look, if these if these 755 00:48:16,080 --> 00:48:19,640 are intelligent beings, what they're we're interacting with. 756 00:48:19,680 --> 00:48:21,120 I mean, that's really what we want to know. 757 00:48:22,320 --> 00:48:24,520 If you want to know, are we interacting with some kind of 758 00:48:24,520 --> 00:48:27,560 intelligence here? Is this, is this not just a 759 00:48:27,560 --> 00:48:30,880 projection, projection of my own mind, whatever that might mean? 760 00:48:31,440 --> 00:48:34,360 Or are we dealing with some kind of external intelligence that is 761 00:48:34,360 --> 00:48:38,200 non human? And if so, you know, how, how do 762 00:48:38,200 --> 00:48:41,400 we demonstrate that fact, that possibility? 763 00:48:43,480 --> 00:48:48,520 And he suggested this Rodriguez that, well, we give these beings 764 00:48:49,480 --> 00:48:52,680 mathematical problems to solve, right? 765 00:48:52,680 --> 00:48:57,760 We give them a large number and say, give me the unique prime 766 00:48:57,760 --> 00:49:01,880 factors of this large number. All numbers have a set of unique 767 00:49:01,880 --> 00:49:05,600 prime factors, but they're, they're very difficult, 768 00:49:05,600 --> 00:49:07,680 certainly with large numbers to calculate in your head. 769 00:49:07,680 --> 00:49:09,640 Well, they're impossible basically for a human to 770 00:49:09,640 --> 00:49:13,440 calculate, work out what these numbers are, this set of prime 771 00:49:13,440 --> 00:49:15,040 factors in your head of a large number. 772 00:49:15,280 --> 00:49:18,000 So you, you send someone into the DMT space with this large 773 00:49:18,000 --> 00:49:21,080 number, which is very easy to remember, you know, maybe a four 774 00:49:21,080 --> 00:49:24,560 digit number or something. And then you ask the entities, 775 00:49:24,560 --> 00:49:26,360 hey, there's this 4 digit number, what are the unique 776 00:49:26,360 --> 00:49:29,080 prime factors? And then the idea being that 777 00:49:29,080 --> 00:49:32,960 assuming they're cooperative, that they will go, ah, it's, 778 00:49:33,080 --> 00:49:38,000 it's, it's, it's this, you know, 7-7 and 13 and whatever. 779 00:49:40,760 --> 00:49:43,600 The issue with that of. Course is that there's this 780 00:49:43,600 --> 00:49:46,800 assumption that they're going to be cooperative. 781 00:49:47,680 --> 00:49:51,120 There's there's there's something a little bit there's a 782 00:49:51,920 --> 00:49:55,760 shade of arrogance implicit in the whole thing that we're going 783 00:49:55,760 --> 00:50:00,240 in there and saying, Hey, prove your prove your ontological 784 00:50:00,240 --> 00:50:01,960 status. We don't believe that you're 785 00:50:01,960 --> 00:50:03,680 real. Prove that you're real. 786 00:50:03,680 --> 00:50:09,240 And that and if, if and if they are some kind of intelligence 787 00:50:09,240 --> 00:50:14,120 that is orders of magnitude beyond the human, so far beyond 788 00:50:14,120 --> 00:50:16,200 the human that it's incomprehensible to the human, 789 00:50:16,200 --> 00:50:18,960 you know, they're going to think, oh, fuck off. 790 00:50:19,040 --> 00:50:22,240 You know, I mean, who are you exactly? 791 00:50:22,680 --> 00:50:25,320 And they're more likely to to kind of fuck with those, I would 792 00:50:25,320 --> 00:50:29,760 say. So I'm I'm a little bit and and 793 00:50:29,760 --> 00:50:33,400 there are other experiments that one one can one can imagine, you 794 00:50:33,400 --> 00:50:37,520 know, sending two different people into the DMT space at the 795 00:50:37,520 --> 00:50:41,640 same time and asking, you know, trying to look for at least 796 00:50:41,640 --> 00:50:45,960 correlations or parallels. David Dr. David Luke, do that. 797 00:50:46,200 --> 00:50:50,560 I think actually something maybe the Dreaming Jaguars. 798 00:50:50,560 --> 00:50:55,280 I remember them talking about something along those lines a 799 00:50:55,280 --> 00:50:59,120 while back about trying to connect in that space or getting 800 00:50:59,120 --> 00:51:01,240 data. I thought David Luke was doing 801 00:51:01,240 --> 00:51:03,280 something like that. He might. 802 00:51:03,280 --> 00:51:05,800 Be I'm not sure it's actually being done. 803 00:51:05,800 --> 00:51:08,080 I mean, we've, we've been talking about this kind of thing 804 00:51:08,080 --> 00:51:12,120 for a long time. It wouldn't be a necessary 805 00:51:12,120 --> 00:51:14,080 difficult thing to do. The experiment needs to be well 806 00:51:14,080 --> 00:51:16,720 designed. And the problem is, as David 807 00:51:16,720 --> 00:51:21,720 Luke will always tell you, is that that that if you send two 808 00:51:21,720 --> 00:51:24,480 people into the DMT space at the same time and get some kind of 809 00:51:24,480 --> 00:51:28,200 information share between them, that's basically it's, it's a 810 00:51:28,200 --> 00:51:30,800 test of telepathy with extra steps. 811 00:51:32,640 --> 00:51:35,640 So are they 2 extended? Stays at the same time. 812 00:51:35,640 --> 00:51:38,040 Is that something that could be done? 813 00:51:38,840 --> 00:51:39,760 Absolutely. Yeah. 814 00:51:39,760 --> 00:51:42,560 And again, that's also being being considered as well. 815 00:51:42,880 --> 00:51:45,360 But the problem is, is that how do you rule out simple 816 00:51:45,360 --> 00:51:48,840 telepathy? You know, I can, it's like if we 817 00:51:48,840 --> 00:51:52,720 did like a remote viewing test or something like that, you 818 00:51:52,720 --> 00:51:57,040 know, we both remote viewed or whatever, some location and some 819 00:51:57,120 --> 00:52:02,280 got some information back. You know, are we really going to 820 00:52:02,280 --> 00:52:05,320 the same place or is information is one person being successful 821 00:52:05,320 --> 00:52:07,200 and the other person is reading the other's mind? 822 00:52:08,360 --> 00:52:11,840 Do you know what I mean? So we how to how how do you rule 823 00:52:11,840 --> 00:52:15,560 out this just a simple direct connection between two people's 824 00:52:15,560 --> 00:52:17,280 minds? And there's much more evidence, 825 00:52:17,600 --> 00:52:20,040 you know, statistical evidence for telepathy. 826 00:52:20,040 --> 00:52:23,120 Now, you know, that's been accumulated over over 100 years 827 00:52:23,120 --> 00:52:26,160 or so. So that would be the first thing 828 00:52:26,160 --> 00:52:28,920 you would go to and say, OK, this is a type of telepathy. 829 00:52:28,920 --> 00:52:31,120 So how do we rule that out is the question here. 830 00:52:31,120 --> 00:52:33,680 How do we eliminate the possibility of simple telepathy? 831 00:52:34,120 --> 00:52:36,760 And there might be ways to do that, but again, it would 832 00:52:36,760 --> 00:52:40,920 require careful thought about the type of experiment and how 833 00:52:40,920 --> 00:52:46,040 that would work. My current thinking, having 834 00:52:46,040 --> 00:52:48,960 spoken, and I've spoken about this in other interviews, but 835 00:52:50,400 --> 00:52:54,840 spoken to people like Andres Gomez Emilsson, who you might 836 00:52:54,840 --> 00:52:58,200 know, he's a mathematician, he's very interested in DMT, 837 00:52:58,400 --> 00:52:59,920 probably. I think I've seen the world 838 00:53:00,000 --> 00:53:02,640 active. On Acts or Twitter, whatever, 839 00:53:02,720 --> 00:53:04,680 Oh, he's very active. On Acts, yeah. 840 00:53:06,160 --> 00:53:08,800 And he is, I would say, the world's leading kind of DMT 841 00:53:08,800 --> 00:53:11,960 phenomenologist. I think he understands the 842 00:53:11,960 --> 00:53:14,400 mathematical structure and the topological structure, the 843 00:53:14,400 --> 00:53:17,880 geometry of the DMT space better than almost anyone on the 844 00:53:17,880 --> 00:53:19,600 planet, I would guess, including myself. 845 00:53:21,080 --> 00:53:26,120 And and he describes. Entities. 846 00:53:26,120 --> 00:53:30,320 Performing not giving him information specifically, but 847 00:53:30,320 --> 00:53:35,920 performing mathematical feats, mathematical operations that a 848 00:53:35,920 --> 00:53:39,600 human brain can't perform. The simplest example, there are 849 00:53:39,600 --> 00:53:43,720 several that he gave me, but the simplest one to explain is the 850 00:53:43,720 --> 00:53:47,080 four colour theorem, which is a tiling theorem. 851 00:53:47,080 --> 00:53:53,080 So the if you have a A2 dimensional surface with lots 852 00:53:53,080 --> 00:53:59,200 of, you know, tessellating shapes, you can always colour 853 00:53:59,200 --> 00:54:01,960 every shape. With the different colours so. 854 00:54:01,960 --> 00:54:06,160 That No2 shapes of the same colour, but together with four 855 00:54:06,160 --> 00:54:09,120 colours. So it's like if you want to draw 856 00:54:09,120 --> 00:54:11,920 a world map, you don't want 2 colours, 2 countries with the 857 00:54:11,920 --> 00:54:14,600 same colour and you only need 4 colours to do that. 858 00:54:14,600 --> 00:54:17,560 Doesn't matter how complicated the pattern is, you can always 859 00:54:17,560 --> 00:54:20,880 colour it with four colours and no two sides will touch with the 860 00:54:20,880 --> 00:54:23,640 same colour. But it's a very difficult thing 861 00:54:23,640 --> 00:54:25,560 to do. It's a simple idea to 862 00:54:25,560 --> 00:54:30,320 understand, but with a very complex map, it's very difficult 863 00:54:30,320 --> 00:54:32,760 to colour it. Whereas he was described beings 864 00:54:32,760 --> 00:54:37,720 that were generating these maps like within a fraction of a 865 00:54:37,720 --> 00:54:42,200 second, like repeatedly they'd create this incredibly complex 866 00:54:42,200 --> 00:54:48,120 map, perfect for colours, delete it or what, whatever, and then 867 00:54:48,680 --> 00:54:50,200 paint it again with a different one. 868 00:54:50,200 --> 00:54:54,880 And again, it's like they. It's like they can't. 869 00:54:54,880 --> 00:54:58,800 Help but betray their intelligence. 870 00:55:00,240 --> 00:55:04,320 So I think I kind of like the idea that we don't go in there 871 00:55:05,760 --> 00:55:09,240 kind of probing them, you know, or asking them directly. 872 00:55:09,240 --> 00:55:11,320 We don't we don't require their cooperation. 873 00:55:11,480 --> 00:55:13,600 We simply go in there and observe them. 874 00:55:13,680 --> 00:55:18,200 People go in there who who are mathematically sophisticated. 875 00:55:18,200 --> 00:55:22,080 I mean, if I went in there and I saw them doing that, I would go, 876 00:55:22,080 --> 00:55:24,160 wow, that's amazing. And that would be it. 877 00:55:24,240 --> 00:55:26,920 And I would come out and say they were doing things that were 878 00:55:26,920 --> 00:55:31,960 incredible boring. But he can come out and say they 879 00:55:31,960 --> 00:55:36,000 were doing things that were exquisitely mathematically 880 00:55:36,000 --> 00:55:39,240 sophisticated. And I can tell you exactly what 881 00:55:39,240 --> 00:55:40,840 they were doing. They were solving the four 882 00:55:40,840 --> 00:55:43,200 colour theorem. They were solving this theorem. 883 00:55:43,200 --> 00:55:47,200 They were performing this minimization problem, you know, 884 00:55:47,200 --> 00:55:51,120 all this mathematical stuff that most people would would, they 885 00:55:51,120 --> 00:55:54,280 might recognise it as being fascinating and beautiful or 886 00:55:54,280 --> 00:55:57,360 weird. But being able to send someone 887 00:55:57,360 --> 00:56:01,760 in there that can actually tell you exactly why this, this is 888 00:56:01,760 --> 00:56:04,720 impossible. These human brain cannot do 889 00:56:04,720 --> 00:56:06,400 this. And if the human brain cannot do 890 00:56:06,400 --> 00:56:12,360 this, then how is it possible that I'm seeing it? 891 00:56:12,360 --> 00:56:14,600 Because we know the world is being constructed by the brain. 892 00:56:14,600 --> 00:56:17,760 That suggests that we're dealing with something external to the 893 00:56:17,760 --> 00:56:20,680 brain that is generating that imagery. 894 00:56:21,000 --> 00:56:23,960 That is, in my opinion, that is directing the imagery, that is 895 00:56:23,960 --> 00:56:26,360 directing the world model being constructed by your brain. 896 00:56:26,840 --> 00:56:29,520 But it is some kind of intelligence that is very far 897 00:56:29,520 --> 00:56:33,040 beyond the human. So my light shining through, you 898 00:56:33,040 --> 00:56:35,960 got this interesting effect. Oh, you're fine, You're trying. 899 00:56:35,960 --> 00:56:37,240 To avoid it, but I. Can't. 900 00:56:37,320 --> 00:56:41,360 No, no, you're fine. It's because your. 901 00:56:41,360 --> 00:56:46,560 Your explanations are so illuminating, but no, but so 902 00:56:46,560 --> 00:56:48,600 that I find that interesting in two parts. 903 00:56:48,600 --> 00:56:50,520 So like you could say it, you could go either way on this. 904 00:56:50,520 --> 00:56:53,640 I always think of that, that, you know, that little circle 905 00:56:53,640 --> 00:56:57,480 where they show all the psilocybin connections of the, 906 00:56:57,600 --> 00:56:59,760 you know, they show the connections happening in the 907 00:56:59,760 --> 00:57:02,080 brain on psilocybin versus not on psilocybin. 908 00:57:03,640 --> 00:57:07,120 Let's say that this does something, you know, DMT does 909 00:57:07,120 --> 00:57:09,480 something similar. Or going into those states, 910 00:57:10,040 --> 00:57:15,200 you're talking about this guy discovering or analyzing these 911 00:57:15,200 --> 00:57:18,120 mathematical feats. You know, maybe it's a tool. 912 00:57:18,120 --> 00:57:20,600 And if, if, if nothing else, let's say we are communicating 913 00:57:20,600 --> 00:57:23,720 with our own subconscious or something deep within ourselves, 914 00:57:24,200 --> 00:57:26,600 on one end, you could say, well, then that could be used as a 915 00:57:26,600 --> 00:57:32,000 tool maybe to discover, you know, deeper mathematical 916 00:57:32,000 --> 00:57:34,400 properties of the universe or whatever. 917 00:57:35,080 --> 00:57:37,720 And on the other end of things, maybe it's not, maybe these are 918 00:57:37,720 --> 00:57:40,160 external. You know, I think on both fronts 919 00:57:40,160 --> 00:57:44,120 it it opens up doors to discovery, which I think is 920 00:57:44,120 --> 00:57:46,960 exciting. Yeah, yeah, I agree. 921 00:57:46,960 --> 00:57:51,960 I mean, in some respects and for, for some people, they don't 922 00:57:51,960 --> 00:57:56,160 care whether it's real or what real even means. 923 00:57:56,160 --> 00:57:59,560 I mean, that's even that question is, is, is not a simple 924 00:57:59,560 --> 00:58:00,880 1. You know, what do we mean by 925 00:58:00,880 --> 00:58:04,720 real? You know, the, all experiences 926 00:58:04,720 --> 00:58:07,520 are real in some ways. They're all, they're all built 927 00:58:07,520 --> 00:58:09,600 from the same stuff. They're all built from these 928 00:58:09,600 --> 00:58:12,160 patterns of neural activity generated by the brain. 929 00:58:12,960 --> 00:58:16,080 So all experiences to some extent real, they all occur in 930 00:58:16,080 --> 00:58:19,480 consciousness. So, you know, does it matter, 931 00:58:19,760 --> 00:58:22,520 one might ask, whether we're dealing with something that's 932 00:58:22,960 --> 00:58:24,720 outside the brain or inside the brain. 933 00:58:24,720 --> 00:58:29,160 And ultimately we might find that it's kind of a meaningless 934 00:58:29,160 --> 00:58:31,240 question, you know, inside and outside. 935 00:58:31,360 --> 00:58:34,560 Ultimately you might find that, you know, if you look at a high 936 00:58:34,560 --> 00:58:37,200 enough perspective that actually we're talking about the same 937 00:58:37,200 --> 00:58:40,480 thing. So I'm, I'm very sympathetic for 938 00:58:41,080 --> 00:58:45,840 that position. In which case, sure, we just, we 939 00:58:45,840 --> 00:58:49,560 just say, OK, this seems to be potentially, as you say, a tool 940 00:58:49,560 --> 00:58:54,400 that could allow us to explore certainly highly unusual states 941 00:58:54,400 --> 00:58:57,040 of consciousness, but also highly unusual mathematical 942 00:58:57,040 --> 00:59:00,360 structures. I mean people who you know, you 943 00:59:00,360 --> 00:59:05,800 can imagine a topologist or something, or a geometer on 944 00:59:05,800 --> 00:59:09,240 algebraic. Topologist or whatever. 945 00:59:09,400 --> 00:59:12,520 Going into the DMT space and actually being able to 946 00:59:12,800 --> 00:59:18,560 experience structures that before he only understood as in 947 00:59:18,560 --> 00:59:23,040 the, in the purely abstract, it's impossible even doesn't 948 00:59:23,040 --> 00:59:26,800 matter how good you are as a mathematician to imagine a, you 949 00:59:26,800 --> 00:59:29,320 know, a nine dimensional manifold or whatever. 950 00:59:29,320 --> 00:59:31,960 I'm just making stuff up here. But you get the point, right? 951 00:59:31,960 --> 00:59:35,200 You have these high dimensional structures that are impossible 952 00:59:35,200 --> 00:59:38,800 to imagine or comprehend and being you go into the DMT state 953 00:59:38,800 --> 00:59:43,200 and you're confronted with them. And, and I think that's that in 954 00:59:43,200 --> 00:59:48,120 itself is is incredible and and certainly needs to be to be 955 00:59:48,120 --> 00:59:51,920 explored, even if even if. We decide that you. 956 00:59:52,240 --> 00:59:53,240 Know what? Certain people aren't 957 00:59:53,240 --> 00:59:56,120 particularly interested in this so-called the ontology of this 958 00:59:56,120 --> 00:59:57,560 thing. I mean that's a whole different 959 00:59:58,120 --> 01:00:01,600 area of exploration which is far more difficult I think to get 960 01:00:01,600 --> 01:00:04,560 our teeth into. My question is. 961 01:00:05,800 --> 01:00:09,720 Is there benefits other than like the old adage, like, oh, 962 01:00:09,720 --> 01:00:12,160 there's no such thing as kind of like a bad trip, you know, 963 01:00:12,160 --> 01:00:13,760 because you can learn something from it. 964 01:00:14,120 --> 01:00:18,360 But is there something going on you know, from the standpoint of 965 01:00:18,840 --> 01:00:24,000 something more to these nightmare like scenarios or 966 01:00:24,280 --> 01:00:28,560 positive scenarios? Yeah, I mean. 967 01:00:28,680 --> 01:00:31,320 This is a question for a therapist, really, or a 968 01:00:31,320 --> 01:00:36,200 psychologist. You know, I, I think I don't, I 969 01:00:36,200 --> 01:00:38,960 don't subscribe the idea that there's no such thing as a bad 970 01:00:38,960 --> 01:00:39,800 trick. I think there are. 971 01:00:39,800 --> 01:00:42,800 I mean, try and tell people, you know, in the book I described 972 01:00:43,680 --> 01:00:49,800 this, this guy, this Korean guy who was over 3 ayahuasca trips 973 01:00:49,800 --> 01:00:53,600 in the proven Amazon, you know, perfect setting, everything was, 974 01:00:53,760 --> 01:00:56,280 was absolutely perfect. And he was expecting to see 975 01:00:56,280 --> 01:01:00,040 mother ayahuasca and he was confronted with these vicious 976 01:01:00,400 --> 01:01:04,600 insectoid alien beings who tortured him and, and captured 977 01:01:04,600 --> 01:01:06,960 his soul. And you know, try telling him 978 01:01:06,960 --> 01:01:11,640 that it that wasn't a bad trip. You know there may be. 979 01:01:11,640 --> 01:01:12,880 Some. I'm not saying there isn't 980 01:01:12,880 --> 01:01:17,160 wasn't some deeper message here and that it wasn't pure purely 981 01:01:17,160 --> 01:01:19,760 malicious. You know, maybe they were trying 982 01:01:19,760 --> 01:01:24,880 to teach him something, but he certainly didn't come out of the 983 01:01:24,880 --> 01:01:28,200 experience with that. You know, it wasn't like a 984 01:01:28,200 --> 01:01:33,120 journey where he was, it wasn't like a the kind of the hero's 985 01:01:33,120 --> 01:01:36,440 journey where he, you know, descended to the underworld and 986 01:01:36,560 --> 01:01:39,040 had this horrible experiences. And then he reached a moment of 987 01:01:39,040 --> 01:01:41,960 enlightenment when he realised it's all illusion or whatever. 988 01:01:41,960 --> 01:01:46,560 And he came out and he came out, you know, a bigger man than when 989 01:01:46,560 --> 01:01:49,040 he went in. You know, for him, it was pure 990 01:01:49,040 --> 01:01:50,880 torture. I mean, he came out of it. 991 01:01:50,880 --> 01:01:53,120 He was horrified. And that's why he contacted me, 992 01:01:53,560 --> 01:01:56,840 because he was, he was terrified that they captured his soul and 993 01:01:56,840 --> 01:02:01,160 that when he died, he was going to be taken to back to that 994 01:02:01,160 --> 01:02:03,920 place, you know, eternally perhaps. 995 01:02:03,920 --> 01:02:06,520 I mean, this was a horrifying thought. 996 01:02:06,600 --> 01:02:10,840 I mean, many event people have entertained the idea of, you 997 01:02:10,840 --> 01:02:12,000 know, what happens after you die. 998 01:02:12,000 --> 01:02:14,680 What if you go to hell? You know, and but but having 999 01:02:14,880 --> 01:02:23,480 been there, and it must be a horrifying thought, the idea 1000 01:02:23,480 --> 01:02:25,520 that he, you know, he might be headed back there. 1001 01:02:25,520 --> 01:02:29,240 So, I mean, I did my best to assuage him and to convince him 1002 01:02:29,240 --> 01:02:33,280 that this wasn't the case and that there probably was some 1003 01:02:33,280 --> 01:02:37,440 deeper message and some lesson there that he hadn't found yet. 1004 01:02:37,840 --> 01:02:40,840 But at the same time, I wasn't going to say, oh, you need to 1005 01:02:40,840 --> 01:02:43,000 get back on the horse, my friend, and go back to the 1006 01:02:43,000 --> 01:02:45,920 Amazon and drink more Alaska because I might be setting him 1007 01:02:45,920 --> 01:02:50,280 up for, you know, even worse. So one has to tread carefully 1008 01:02:50,280 --> 01:02:52,680 with offering advice to people and saying there's no such thing 1009 01:02:52,680 --> 01:02:56,480 as bad trips because for some people, there really are such 1010 01:02:56,480 --> 01:02:59,400 things as bad trips. And people have, you know, it's 1011 01:02:59,400 --> 01:03:04,880 rare, but people do have sometimes long lasting negative 1012 01:03:04,880 --> 01:03:09,600 experiences. So I'm not averse to the idea 1013 01:03:09,600 --> 01:03:12,920 of, I don't think anyone in their right mind is averse to 1014 01:03:12,920 --> 01:03:15,360 the idea of eliminating, not eliminating necessarily, but 1015 01:03:15,360 --> 01:03:18,160 minimizing the possibility of bad trips and getting the set 1016 01:03:18,160 --> 01:03:21,520 and the setting right. I'm also not adverse to the idea 1017 01:03:21,520 --> 01:03:27,080 of, you know, taking MDMA prior to, you know, psilocybin for 1018 01:03:27,080 --> 01:03:29,440 certain people. You know, candy flipping. 1019 01:03:29,600 --> 01:03:32,400 Is it candy flipping or is that LSD and MDMA always hippie 1020 01:03:32,440 --> 01:03:35,440 flipping? That's hippie flipping. 1021 01:03:35,440 --> 01:03:36,960 OK, Yeah, that makes sense. Yeah. 1022 01:03:37,240 --> 01:03:40,200 Anyway, great combo by the. Way fabulous. 1023 01:03:40,200 --> 01:03:41,320 Great. Combo, right. 1024 01:03:41,640 --> 01:03:45,280 And, you know, that's been, I remember reading a paper just 1025 01:03:45,280 --> 01:03:48,320 few years ago where they, they, they tried this technique they, 1026 01:03:48,360 --> 01:03:51,280 they study it in a research setting and, and found that it, 1027 01:03:51,480 --> 01:03:54,760 you know, as we kind of understood anyway, but you know, 1028 01:03:54,760 --> 01:03:58,680 found that, yes, it reduces the, the occurrence of negative 1029 01:03:58,680 --> 01:04:00,920 experiences. And I'm not averse to this. 1030 01:04:00,920 --> 01:04:04,920 I, I, I kind of don't have much time for people who are always 1031 01:04:04,920 --> 01:04:07,360 going on about, oh, you need to face your shadow and stuff. 1032 01:04:07,360 --> 01:04:10,720 And that's fine if you want to face your shadow, my friend. 1033 01:04:11,200 --> 01:04:17,960 But some people just want to have a beautiful, mind 1034 01:04:17,960 --> 01:04:22,800 expanding, pleasant experience and that they shouldn't be 1035 01:04:22,800 --> 01:04:23,800 denied them. They shouldn't. 1036 01:04:23,800 --> 01:04:25,960 This idea that you have to go through bad trips. 1037 01:04:25,960 --> 01:04:29,280 I don't think it's it's, but they are. 1038 01:04:29,280 --> 01:04:31,480 Obviously it's unpredictable. You can never eliminate the 1039 01:04:31,480 --> 01:04:33,880 possibility entirely and one should know how to deal with 1040 01:04:33,880 --> 01:04:36,840 them, but. But yeah, is it? 1041 01:04:36,840 --> 01:04:40,160 A bad trip? Is it a learning trip? 1042 01:04:40,240 --> 01:04:42,120 I think you can frame it in both ways. 1043 01:04:43,040 --> 01:04:46,560 But yeah, that's as much as I can say I think about to that 1044 01:04:46,680 --> 01:04:48,360 anecdote. What I find interesting is I 1045 01:04:48,360 --> 01:04:53,360 wonder if that guy was scared of insects because so that's 1046 01:04:53,360 --> 01:04:55,960 actually not that. I've heard trip reports. 1047 01:04:55,960 --> 01:05:00,040 I know actually the late great Jerry Garcia and actually the 1048 01:05:00,040 --> 01:05:04,160 Grateful Dead got their name from ADMT experience. 1049 01:05:04,160 --> 01:05:07,920 But there's a anecdote where Jerry Garcia is doing this 1050 01:05:07,920 --> 01:05:12,200 interview and he's talking about smoking DMT and he talks about 1051 01:05:12,200 --> 01:05:17,360 our insectoid overlords and these mantis like beans. 1052 01:05:17,360 --> 01:05:19,760 And he, you know, go. It's, it's, it's actually kind 1053 01:05:19,760 --> 01:05:22,640 of a crazy interview. I recommend people go try and 1054 01:05:22,640 --> 01:05:24,280 find that on the Internet, if you can. 1055 01:05:24,280 --> 01:05:26,040 I'll try and find the link if I can, too. 1056 01:05:26,040 --> 01:05:29,160 It's I think it's all typed out. It's not like recorded or 1057 01:05:29,160 --> 01:05:32,240 anything. But yeah, I just wonder how much 1058 01:05:32,240 --> 01:05:35,120 fear of certain things also play into it too. 1059 01:05:35,600 --> 01:05:39,440 It's like somebody that's scared of an insect that maybe another 1060 01:05:39,440 --> 01:05:41,000 person isn't. They might have different 1061 01:05:41,000 --> 01:05:44,160 experiences. Yeah, I think. 1062 01:05:44,160 --> 01:05:47,560 You know, you know, if we are dealing with some kind of 1063 01:05:47,680 --> 01:05:52,880 intelligence, it wouldn't surprise me if they they take 1064 01:05:52,880 --> 01:05:58,040 some pleasure in, in in in for want of a better term, kind of 1065 01:05:58,040 --> 01:06:00,760 fucking with us a little bit. You know, it does perhaps 1066 01:06:00,760 --> 01:06:06,240 suggest that if you, if you do have deep seated issues with 1067 01:06:06,240 --> 01:06:11,840 certain things, whether it is insects or spiders or they might 1068 01:06:11,840 --> 01:06:14,400 take advantage of that or whether it's, you know, whether 1069 01:06:14,400 --> 01:06:16,360 it's your subconscious kind of trying to. 1070 01:06:17,360 --> 01:06:19,640 Yeah, I've heard. That too, I've heard people that 1071 01:06:19,640 --> 01:06:24,240 have like insecurities of some sort being that kind of like the 1072 01:06:24,240 --> 01:06:27,200 entities throwing that back at in their face kind of a thing or 1073 01:06:27,720 --> 01:06:31,720 like you said, kind of just messing with them or whatever, 1074 01:06:32,800 --> 01:06:38,920 which is, you know, kind of crazy, which I that that's 1075 01:06:38,920 --> 01:06:41,400 definitely part of the trickster element though, too, right? 1076 01:06:41,400 --> 01:06:43,880 You know, this idea that it's. I was just going to say yeah. 1077 01:06:44,080 --> 01:06:47,960 Yeah, EMT is Trixie. It's a Trixie molecule that you 1078 01:06:47,960 --> 01:06:55,040 should be very careful about what what you take from what 1079 01:06:55,040 --> 01:06:57,880 they, what they say, what they do or you know, the messages 1080 01:06:57,880 --> 01:07:00,240 that they give you. I think you, that you can be LED 1081 01:07:00,240 --> 01:07:05,440 down down the garden path again by these these beings. 1082 01:07:05,440 --> 01:07:09,560 And, and, and you know, I won't talk about specific examples 1083 01:07:09,560 --> 01:07:15,600 recently, but I think there are certain cases that have become 1084 01:07:15,880 --> 01:07:19,720 quite well known where people, I get the feeling that people 1085 01:07:19,720 --> 01:07:24,040 might be being LED down the garden path by, by entities. 1086 01:07:25,680 --> 01:07:26,760 Yeah, I'll say no more than that. 1087 01:07:27,000 --> 01:07:29,160 People might know what I'm referring to, others might not. 1088 01:07:31,360 --> 01:07:34,040 You don't. Maybe well. 1089 01:07:34,120 --> 01:07:37,000 Yeah, we'll, we'll get to some other stuff here in a minute. 1090 01:07:37,000 --> 01:07:39,000 I want to just finish. I have a few more questions that 1091 01:07:39,000 --> 01:07:43,240 I thought out before we get to this new segment I've been 1092 01:07:43,360 --> 01:07:47,000 doing. But so in the later chapters, 1093 01:07:47,000 --> 01:07:51,960 you suggest DMT isn't just, you know, generating hallucinations, 1094 01:07:52,200 --> 01:07:54,600 but it also might be tuning their consciousness into an 1095 01:07:54,600 --> 01:07:59,040 actual, you know, ontological domain. 1096 01:07:59,840 --> 01:08:03,720 From your perspective, both the neuroscientist and a theorist, 1097 01:08:04,080 --> 01:08:07,240 what would you count as a convincing evidence that these 1098 01:08:07,240 --> 01:08:11,680 realms are real and that the brain is in there, not just 1099 01:08:11,680 --> 01:08:13,880 brain generated illusions? I think we kind of touched on 1100 01:08:13,880 --> 01:08:16,800 this a little bit. But like, what is the best 1101 01:08:16,800 --> 01:08:21,439 evidence that you think you have for these realms being real, if 1102 01:08:21,439 --> 01:08:23,240 you will? Well. 1103 01:08:23,359 --> 01:08:26,920 I mean, you know, the, the, the kind of the second third of the 1104 01:08:26,920 --> 01:08:34,120 book is devoted to that question really is, is how do we, why 1105 01:08:34,120 --> 01:08:36,319 can't we just say their hallucinations? 1106 01:08:36,319 --> 01:08:39,760 Why can't we just say this is exotic dream imagery or 1107 01:08:39,800 --> 01:08:43,960 whatever? And I, and that's, that's really 1108 01:08:43,960 --> 01:08:50,479 been my approach is to, is to say, OK, these DMT visions, just 1109 01:08:50,479 --> 01:08:56,200 like all subjective experiences are constructed in some way by 1110 01:08:56,200 --> 01:08:58,479 the brain. This is your kind of your, your 1111 01:08:58,479 --> 01:09:04,399 foundational starting point. Then the question is, well, is 1112 01:09:04,399 --> 01:09:09,640 the brain constructing these entirely without any kind of 1113 01:09:10,120 --> 01:09:14,359 help with any kind of external sensory inputs? 1114 01:09:15,960 --> 01:09:18,720 Now, to answer that question, you need to distinguish between 1115 01:09:18,840 --> 01:09:22,600 the kinds of world models that your brain can construct and 1116 01:09:22,600 --> 01:09:26,000 those that it can't. And that requires an analysis of 1117 01:09:26,319 --> 01:09:30,200 how the world is built by the brain and its limitations. 1118 01:09:30,200 --> 01:09:33,160 What are the limitations and what evidence do we have from 1119 01:09:34,840 --> 01:09:37,040 subjective experience, from dream states, from 1120 01:09:37,040 --> 01:09:40,439 hallucinations? We know that the brain is, you 1121 01:09:40,439 --> 01:09:43,200 know, the brain evolved to construct a model of the world 1122 01:09:43,560 --> 01:09:49,040 as a model of the environment, and it has its limits. 1123 01:09:50,319 --> 01:09:55,000 You know, in the dream state, for example, the dream state 1124 01:09:55,000 --> 01:09:58,400 tends to be, for the most part, indistinguishable. 1125 01:09:58,480 --> 01:10:00,920 You know, studies have been showing this for 100 years, that 1126 01:10:00,920 --> 01:10:04,080 the dream state is generally continuous with waking. 1127 01:10:04,080 --> 01:10:07,560 The brain is using what it's learned about constructing the 1128 01:10:07,560 --> 01:10:11,720 world in the waking state to construct the world in the in 1129 01:10:11,720 --> 01:10:16,040 the dream states, people dream about dogs and cats. 1130 01:10:16,280 --> 01:10:18,440 They drink, dream about cows and horses. 1131 01:10:18,440 --> 01:10:21,640 If they work on a farm, if they like fishing, they might dream 1132 01:10:21,640 --> 01:10:26,040 about fishes. If they live in the Amazon 1133 01:10:26,040 --> 01:10:29,360 rainforest, they might dream of piranha and Anaconda and 1134 01:10:29,360 --> 01:10:33,080 Panther. So the the dream, the dream 1135 01:10:33,080 --> 01:10:35,960 state is a model. You know, this is the only world 1136 01:10:35,960 --> 01:10:38,440 your brain knows how to build. This is how I normally put it, 1137 01:10:39,040 --> 01:10:41,880 which is the, the world as a model of the environment. 1138 01:10:41,880 --> 01:10:43,840 It doesn't know, or shouldn't know in my opinion, how to 1139 01:10:43,840 --> 01:10:46,840 construct exquisitely complex, you know, staggering, 1140 01:10:46,840 --> 01:10:51,600 staggeringly complex alternate worlds that have no relationship 1141 01:10:51,600 --> 01:10:53,040 whatsoever to the normal waking world. 1142 01:10:53,040 --> 01:10:56,000 And that is what the DMT world represents. 1143 01:10:56,000 --> 01:10:59,920 It's a world that is, it's disjoint, I would say from the 1144 01:10:59,920 --> 01:11:04,280 normal waking world. It is not just random neural 1145 01:11:04,280 --> 01:11:09,440 firing. It is a world that is, you know, 1146 01:11:09,440 --> 01:11:16,600 exceedingly coherent, staggering narrative complexity. 1147 01:11:16,960 --> 01:11:20,560 It is a world that that doesn't bear any relationship to the 1148 01:11:20,560 --> 01:11:23,560 normal waking world. And to me that is a great 1149 01:11:23,560 --> 01:11:26,800 mystery. And I think that suggests in my 1150 01:11:26,800 --> 01:11:31,560 opinion that there is some directing of this world. 1151 01:11:31,560 --> 01:11:34,960 I don't think that you're seeing you're going to another space. 1152 01:11:34,960 --> 01:11:38,280 I don't think you're seeing another world as such or going 1153 01:11:38,280 --> 01:11:40,800 to another world. I think there is some kind of 1154 01:11:40,800 --> 01:11:43,800 intelligent agent that is directing what you see. 1155 01:11:44,120 --> 01:11:47,520 I don't know what that whether that intelligent agent is 1156 01:11:47,520 --> 01:11:53,360 singular or, or there's a multiplicity or you know what, 1157 01:11:53,360 --> 01:11:55,560 whether it could be faithfully represented or any kind of 1158 01:11:55,560 --> 01:11:59,000 visual form, I don't know. But I think it's directing the 1159 01:11:59,000 --> 01:12:01,280 visions. And there's, there's evidence 1160 01:12:01,280 --> 01:12:05,440 from that from a quite widespread effect which I 1161 01:12:05,440 --> 01:12:09,480 discussed in the book called often called lockout, which is 1162 01:12:09,480 --> 01:12:13,240 when the beings not only are able to direct the visions, but 1163 01:12:13,240 --> 01:12:16,560 are actually able to kind of direct entry into the space and 1164 01:12:16,560 --> 01:12:21,880 control entry into the space. So people who will use DMT often 1165 01:12:21,880 --> 01:12:26,240 for long periods have full breakthrough experiences every 1166 01:12:26,240 --> 01:12:29,640 time, you know, using it, you know, weekly or sometimes daily. 1167 01:12:30,600 --> 01:12:34,600 And then suddenly they get a message, you know, they get, you 1168 01:12:34,600 --> 01:12:40,200 know, a big flashing X that blasts into their brain and they 1169 01:12:40,200 --> 01:12:43,360 get some kind of entity wagging it's finger at them. 1170 01:12:43,360 --> 01:12:48,880 One person described getting punched by some gesture like 1171 01:12:48,880 --> 01:12:52,600 being and being instantaneously brought back to normal waking 1172 01:12:52,600 --> 01:12:55,880 consciousness. So this is to me a 1173 01:12:55,920 --> 01:12:59,440 pharmacological mystery. It's not tolerance. 1174 01:12:59,440 --> 01:13:02,160 Tolerance developed slowly and gradually over time. 1175 01:13:02,160 --> 01:13:07,680 It's not an off switch. It's so it it seems to be that 1176 01:13:07,880 --> 01:13:11,040 these. That the DMT. 1177 01:13:11,040 --> 01:13:14,520 State is being directed by a flow of information into the 1178 01:13:14,520 --> 01:13:19,880 brain when the brain is in this much more fluid and dynamic 1179 01:13:19,880 --> 01:13:26,600 state induced by DMT and these this intelligence, of course, if 1180 01:13:26,600 --> 01:13:29,040 they can control the flow of information into the brain, they 1181 01:13:29,040 --> 01:13:31,160 can also cut off that flow of information. 1182 01:13:31,760 --> 01:13:34,320 And that is what this lockout represents in my opinion. 1183 01:13:34,760 --> 01:13:38,120 Often it's people who use it too much, abuse it, one would say, 1184 01:13:38,120 --> 01:13:43,240 or aren't using it with good intention, but that doesn't, 1185 01:13:43,760 --> 01:13:46,040 that's not a tolerance effect, even though it's often described 1186 01:13:46,040 --> 01:13:48,720 as such. You know, the same batch of DMT, 1187 01:13:48,720 --> 01:13:52,960 the same vaporisation method, everything's the same. 1188 01:13:52,960 --> 01:13:57,120 Except one day they get a message that's saying no entry. 1189 01:13:57,120 --> 01:13:59,200 And sometimes this lasts for months. 1190 01:13:59,200 --> 01:14:02,480 You know, they, they, they, they try again a few, you know, a few 1191 01:14:02,480 --> 01:14:04,680 weeks later they're still locked out. 1192 01:14:05,360 --> 01:14:10,800 And then they have to kind of do some, some work and eventually 1193 01:14:10,800 --> 01:14:14,680 maybe they get, they get allowed back in the, the effects return. 1194 01:14:14,680 --> 01:14:18,840 But this to me is, is, you know, aside from this mathematical 1195 01:14:18,840 --> 01:14:25,280 operations that I was describing that Emil Andres, Emil Gomez 1196 01:14:25,280 --> 01:14:30,400 Emilsen was describing to me, this lockout effect is, is truly 1197 01:14:30,520 --> 01:14:34,920 fascinating because it, it, it really kind of backs up this 1198 01:14:34,920 --> 01:14:38,080 idea that that the DMT state is being directed. 1199 01:14:38,080 --> 01:14:40,640 The DMT state is like, I call it a directed world. 1200 01:14:40,640 --> 01:14:42,480 You don't breakthrough into the DMT world. 1201 01:14:42,480 --> 01:14:44,760 The DMT world breaks in through into you. 1202 01:14:44,760 --> 01:14:46,880 It's just this flow of information coming into the 1203 01:14:46,880 --> 01:14:48,480 brain, this directing the visions. 1204 01:14:48,840 --> 01:14:53,240 And, and if that is cut off, then you are denied entry, no 1205 01:14:53,240 --> 01:14:55,920 matter how much DMT you smoke. So that I think those. 1206 01:14:57,440 --> 01:14:59,800 Those things to. Me, you know, aside from the 1207 01:14:59,800 --> 01:15:04,120 broader properties of the DMT space, which I discuss at length 1208 01:15:04,160 --> 01:15:09,320 and you know, the, the, the, you know, the, the unlikely, you 1209 01:15:09,320 --> 01:15:12,520 know, how unlikely it is that the brain can construct these 1210 01:15:12,520 --> 01:15:16,200 worlds in the absence of some data, external data inputs. 1211 01:15:16,200 --> 01:15:22,000 I think these specific cases, I think really are good targets 1212 01:15:22,000 --> 01:15:24,600 for us to study. And I'd like to see a study of 1213 01:15:24,600 --> 01:15:26,880 lockout. I mean, very difficult to study 1214 01:15:26,880 --> 01:15:29,720 it, you know, in a lab because you can't, it's kind of 1215 01:15:29,720 --> 01:15:33,840 unpredictable unless you have someone who is currently locked 1216 01:15:33,840 --> 01:15:36,400 out and then bring them into the, into the research 1217 01:15:36,400 --> 01:15:38,680 laboratory and inject them with DMT and ask them about their 1218 01:15:38,680 --> 01:15:42,880 experiences. And if and if they have no 1219 01:15:42,880 --> 01:15:45,440 experience, then, well, this is, you know, with pure, you know, 1220 01:15:45,480 --> 01:15:49,080 IVDMT, if they, they're not getting any effects from the 1221 01:15:49,080 --> 01:15:50,640 drug. I think that would be very cool 1222 01:15:50,640 --> 01:15:55,360 to demonstrate to someone who had used DMT in the past, who'd 1223 01:15:55,360 --> 01:15:58,120 had many experiences in the past that were documented in some 1224 01:15:58,120 --> 01:15:59,600 ways. We knew that these people were 1225 01:15:59,600 --> 01:16:02,440 normally perfectly responsive to DMT. 1226 01:16:02,440 --> 01:16:05,000 We get an idea of, you know, their usage over time. 1227 01:16:05,000 --> 01:16:08,400 And then we bring them into the, into the research, the 1228 01:16:08,400 --> 01:16:11,440 institution or laboratory or whatever, inject them with, with 1229 01:16:11,440 --> 01:16:13,760 DMT. And then if they have no 1230 01:16:13,760 --> 01:16:17,080 response, you can even look at their neural activity. 1231 01:16:17,080 --> 01:16:19,400 I mean, that would be cool to, you know, put them in an MRI 1232 01:16:19,400 --> 01:16:22,080 machine and actually see, you know, what's going on in the 1233 01:16:22,080 --> 01:16:24,640 brain when someone is locked out. 1234 01:16:25,680 --> 01:16:29,680 What's different about the way that the information flows 1235 01:16:29,680 --> 01:16:31,840 through the brain? These kind of that would be a 1236 01:16:31,840 --> 01:16:33,520 really cool study to do if anyone. 1237 01:16:34,800 --> 01:16:36,200 Wants to do it, maybe we'll. Do it? 1238 01:16:36,240 --> 01:16:37,880 I don't know. Come on. 1239 01:16:37,880 --> 01:16:41,800 Guys get on it, guys and gals get out there. 1240 01:16:43,320 --> 01:16:46,720 I think it's chapter 15, the intelligence. 1241 01:16:46,720 --> 01:16:50,080 In the intelligence you flirt with the idea of a mind like 1242 01:16:50,080 --> 01:16:54,560 principle underlying reality. Do you think DMT is revealing 1243 01:16:54,560 --> 01:16:58,280 that consciousness is primary and matter emerges from it? 1244 01:16:58,520 --> 01:17:03,720 Or do you think that we'll still see a path for these experiences 1245 01:17:03,720 --> 01:17:07,360 from a bottom up materialist framework kind of a thing? 1246 01:17:08,480 --> 01:17:13,040 Well, I don't think we're. Going to get an answer, you 1247 01:17:13,040 --> 01:17:14,520 know, a solution. I don't think we're ever going 1248 01:17:14,520 --> 01:17:17,000 to derive consciousness in a bottom, bottom up fashion from 1249 01:17:17,000 --> 01:17:18,440 matter. I think consciousness is 1250 01:17:18,440 --> 01:17:20,640 fundamental. That doesn't mean that that 1251 01:17:21,080 --> 01:17:23,280 studying the brain and how psychedelics work in the brain 1252 01:17:23,280 --> 01:17:25,360 isn't useful because the brain clearly is. 1253 01:17:25,480 --> 01:17:28,200 You know, if consciousness is fundamental, the brain is, this 1254 01:17:28,760 --> 01:17:31,320 is a highly complex pattern of consciousness fundamental. 1255 01:17:31,320 --> 01:17:33,040 I mean, that's how really I, I, I see it. 1256 01:17:33,040 --> 01:17:36,680 I see the brain as a complex emergence pattern within 1257 01:17:36,680 --> 01:17:38,240 consciousness. I think consciousness is 1258 01:17:38,240 --> 01:17:44,560 absolutely fundamental. So what's the. 1259 01:17:44,880 --> 01:17:49,520 Yeah, Well, what do you what? So, so do you think what what do 1260 01:17:49,520 --> 01:17:51,400 you think's fundamental in the you? 1261 01:17:51,400 --> 01:17:54,960 So do you think that consciousness is primary or do 1262 01:17:54,960 --> 01:17:56,440 you think that matter is primary? 1263 01:17:56,440 --> 01:17:58,800 OK, I think that conscious. Is primary. 1264 01:17:58,800 --> 01:18:01,360 And I think the problem we've had over the last several 100 1265 01:18:01,360 --> 01:18:04,880 years is, is, is assuming matter to be primary and then basically 1266 01:18:04,880 --> 01:18:07,800 struggling for the next 400 years or whatever, since they 1267 01:18:07,800 --> 01:18:13,560 can't really probably earlier to, to try and derive 1268 01:18:13,560 --> 01:18:17,200 consciousness from matter. You know, with the taking that 1269 01:18:17,200 --> 01:18:20,840 as an axiom, the kind of the fundamental axiom that we've 1270 01:18:20,840 --> 01:18:25,280 been working on is that matter is fundamental, whatever matter 1271 01:18:25,280 --> 01:18:28,160 is. And then consciousness emerges 1272 01:18:28,240 --> 01:18:31,240 at certain high levels of organization of matter, certain 1273 01:18:31,520 --> 01:18:34,760 levels of complexity or reason, you get consciousness and it's 1274 01:18:34,760 --> 01:18:38,480 not worked so far. And I would my guess is that 1275 01:18:38,480 --> 01:18:40,840 it's not work because it doesn't, it's not going to work. 1276 01:18:40,840 --> 01:18:43,480 I think even in principle, the idea of deriving subjective 1277 01:18:43,480 --> 01:18:48,560 experience from from from matter, I think is is doomed to 1278 01:18:48,560 --> 01:18:52,560 fail. And more and more scientists now 1279 01:18:52,560 --> 01:18:58,200 it's not just kind of woo woo mystical types, but you know, 1280 01:18:58,200 --> 01:19:02,680 serious scientists, you know, Tanoni is, is kind of 1 1281 01:19:03,200 --> 01:19:09,640 Christoph Koch and others. Tegmark to an extent consider 1282 01:19:09,640 --> 01:19:13,200 consciousness to be fundamental and that yes, we need to work in 1283 01:19:13,200 --> 01:19:16,840 the opposite direction basically and work out, you know, how does 1284 01:19:16,840 --> 01:19:19,960 consciousness behave and how does consciousness complexify 1285 01:19:19,960 --> 01:19:22,600 and self organise to form these structures. 1286 01:19:22,600 --> 01:19:25,320 But fundamentally, it's all about, you know, everything's 1287 01:19:25,320 --> 01:19:28,200 subjective ultimately, I think, I think subjectivity, 1288 01:19:28,520 --> 01:19:31,800 consciousness, which means that's what we mean by 1289 01:19:31,800 --> 01:19:34,840 consciousness, right? It's subjective. 1290 01:19:35,200 --> 01:19:38,640 That subjective experience is consciousness. 1291 01:19:38,640 --> 01:19:42,560 And it can be, it can be very, you know, pure consciousness, 1292 01:19:42,560 --> 01:19:45,920 you know, the pure bright what, what light of pure awareness, 1293 01:19:45,920 --> 01:19:46,960 you know, that would be conscious. 1294 01:19:46,960 --> 01:19:51,120 Or it could be this extremely complex world that we exist in 1295 01:19:51,200 --> 01:19:53,280 now in a normal waking subjective world. 1296 01:19:53,280 --> 01:19:57,200 Or it could be the DMT, well, which is inordinately more 1297 01:19:57,200 --> 01:20:00,560 complex, but it's still an experience within consciousness. 1298 01:20:00,560 --> 01:20:03,920 So yes, that my answer is yes, I think consciousness is 1299 01:20:03,920 --> 01:20:07,080 fundamental. Awesome, I have. 1300 01:20:07,080 --> 01:20:09,920 One more question and then we'll get to Mike's mind. 1301 01:20:09,920 --> 01:20:13,400 Melters. You describe DMT as a future 1302 01:20:13,400 --> 01:20:17,280 technology of astonishment if humanity develops the extended 1303 01:20:17,280 --> 01:20:20,920 state or a reproducible DMT technology. 1304 01:20:21,440 --> 01:20:26,720 Do you see primarily as a scientific tool for mapping 1305 01:20:26,720 --> 01:20:29,320 hidden dimensions? We talked about like topography 1306 01:20:29,320 --> 01:20:33,600 and things like that, but do you think that it it will be more of 1307 01:20:33,600 --> 01:20:38,440 a scientific application or some sort of spiritual initiation 1308 01:20:38,440 --> 01:20:40,520 device? Like what do you think the 1309 01:20:40,520 --> 01:20:46,400 future holds for that? Well, both, I don't think. 1310 01:20:46,880 --> 01:20:49,440 I think that comes a point when the spiritual and the the 1311 01:20:49,440 --> 01:20:53,600 scientific start to merge. I don't think they are as as as 1312 01:20:53,600 --> 01:20:56,600 distant and disconnected as we once assumed. 1313 01:20:59,680 --> 01:21:01,960 You know if if if. Consciousness is absolutely 1314 01:21:01,960 --> 01:21:06,000 fundamental then. Then you know. 1315 01:21:06,000 --> 01:21:09,720 DMT is a tool for exploring consciousness and is a tool for 1316 01:21:09,720 --> 01:21:12,720 exploring. Other types of. 1317 01:21:12,720 --> 01:21:15,720 Consciousness and other types of consciousness is or other 1318 01:21:15,720 --> 01:21:19,040 perspectives or other beings that also exist within 1319 01:21:19,040 --> 01:21:22,240 consciousness. And that sounds very spiritual 1320 01:21:22,240 --> 01:21:24,800 to me. The idea of, of communicating 1321 01:21:24,800 --> 01:21:27,840 with normally invisible discount intelligent being, that feels 1322 01:21:27,840 --> 01:21:32,080 like a very spiritual thing. Whereas at the same time, you 1323 01:21:32,080 --> 01:21:34,640 know, I talk in very scientific terms and I, you know, I talk 1324 01:21:34,640 --> 01:21:40,200 about DMT and fusion, extended state and fusion technologies 1325 01:21:40,200 --> 01:21:44,760 and, you know, and, and, and neural activity and, you know, 1326 01:21:44,760 --> 01:21:47,760 pharmacological tool. This is all very scientific, and 1327 01:21:47,760 --> 01:21:50,680 yet it feels like the aim is ultimately. 1328 01:21:51,840 --> 01:21:56,320 Spiritual in some way. So I think the word spiritual 1329 01:21:56,760 --> 01:21:59,320 starts to lose its meaning in a way. 1330 01:22:00,600 --> 01:22:06,000 I guess I, I struggle to to give you a precise definition, you 1331 01:22:06,000 --> 01:22:09,960 know of what, what, what what, What do you mean by spiritual? 1332 01:22:12,280 --> 01:22:14,720 It doesn't seem to mean I guess something's. 1333 01:22:14,720 --> 01:22:17,800 Beyond, I mean, because like, I think a lot of people perceive 1334 01:22:17,800 --> 01:22:21,080 stuff that's spiritual. I mean, you could look at it as 1335 01:22:21,080 --> 01:22:23,440 just metaphysics, right? Just stuff that we haven't 1336 01:22:23,440 --> 01:22:27,120 really figured out yet. But there's some element that 1337 01:22:27,120 --> 01:22:32,200 feels spiritual or feels beyond, you know, reality, if you will. 1338 01:22:33,240 --> 01:22:35,920 Yeah, I mean, I guess you. Might say something that exists 1339 01:22:35,920 --> 01:22:42,600 beyond the physical. Which is. 1340 01:22:43,400 --> 01:22:45,400 You know, basically my fundamental perspective is that 1341 01:22:45,400 --> 01:22:48,360 the the, the physical emerges from ultimately from 1342 01:22:48,360 --> 01:22:51,520 consciousness. So, so yeah, it's it's kind of 1343 01:22:51,520 --> 01:22:55,920 tricky, but I think the idea of interacting with beings that are 1344 01:22:56,640 --> 01:23:01,640 non physical or that are normally hidden, you know, I 1345 01:23:01,640 --> 01:23:04,480 could, you know, 100 years ago I would be calling them spirits, I 1346 01:23:04,480 --> 01:23:07,280 guess. And that's obviously would be a 1347 01:23:07,280 --> 01:23:12,120 spiritual perspective. So yeah, I think both scientific 1348 01:23:12,120 --> 01:23:14,040 and spiritual. All right. 1349 01:23:14,480 --> 01:23:17,360 Are you ready to enter Mike's mind melters? 1350 01:23:17,920 --> 01:23:20,600 I'm. Not sure, but let's let's give 1351 01:23:20,600 --> 01:23:21,280 it a. Whirl. 1352 01:23:38,000 --> 01:23:40,720 All right, Andrew. I'm going to ask you 5 1353 01:23:40,720 --> 01:23:43,680 philosophical questions. Just please answer them the best 1354 01:23:43,680 --> 01:23:49,440 you can and we'll go from there. Number one, what is something 1355 01:23:49,440 --> 01:23:54,120 you believe in that you know is probably wrong or illogical, but 1356 01:23:54,120 --> 01:23:56,120 you are just not being honest with yourself? 1357 01:24:13,360 --> 01:24:16,600 Oh, I don't know. I don't know what is something I 1358 01:24:16,600 --> 01:24:21,480 believe in. That I think is probably. 1359 01:24:21,480 --> 01:24:23,160 Wrong. Well, I'm going to. 1360 01:24:23,360 --> 01:24:26,120 I'm going to give you the boring answer in that. 1361 01:24:28,360 --> 01:24:30,200 I would hope. That if. 1362 01:24:32,000 --> 01:24:34,000 If I believed in something. Which I thought was probably 1363 01:24:34,000 --> 01:24:36,080 wrong. I would stop believing in it, 1364 01:24:36,080 --> 01:24:40,240 but we both. Know that that's not I don't 1365 01:24:40,240 --> 01:24:50,940 know, I think. Generally I'm I'm very open to 1366 01:24:50,940 --> 01:24:58,180 beliefs, I'm very open to possibilities, so. 1367 01:25:02,100 --> 01:25:04,340 Yeah, I, yeah. I can't answer that question. 1368 01:25:04,340 --> 01:25:06,660 I can't think of anything. I can't think of anything that 1369 01:25:06,660 --> 01:25:08,720 I. I believe in that. 1370 01:25:08,720 --> 01:25:09,720 I think is probably. Wrong. 1371 01:25:09,720 --> 01:25:11,840 An example would be. Somebody that's maybe they're 1372 01:25:11,840 --> 01:25:14,880 like Christian, but they're like yeah, maybe this God thing, you 1373 01:25:14,880 --> 01:25:18,600 know, not not, you know, something along those lines, 1374 01:25:19,440 --> 01:25:21,160 right if. You were asking me about what 1375 01:25:21,160 --> 01:25:23,280 other people believe in that they know is probably wrong. 1376 01:25:23,280 --> 01:25:24,080 I can give. I'm not. 1377 01:25:24,120 --> 01:25:26,520 I can give you some really politically incorrect answers, 1378 01:25:26,520 --> 01:25:28,720 but I'm not going to because there are better hills to die 1379 01:25:28,720 --> 01:25:30,440 on. But. 1380 01:25:33,000 --> 01:25:34,560 Yeah, I try to. Avoid. 1381 01:25:34,800 --> 01:25:37,760 I try to avoid getting myself into those kind of belief 1382 01:25:37,760 --> 01:25:41,120 systems, but I'm there. I know there are a lot of people 1383 01:25:41,120 --> 01:25:45,040 in the world that certainly. Kind of believe. 1384 01:25:45,040 --> 01:25:48,120 Things the root of the question. Is actually just to be honest 1385 01:25:48,120 --> 01:25:51,040 with yourself about some sort of like hidden cognitive bias that 1386 01:25:51,040 --> 01:25:54,600 you have that maybe you aren't aware of, but we can move on. 1387 01:25:54,600 --> 01:25:57,360 That would mean you kind of gave me the your thoughts on it, 1388 01:25:57,360 --> 01:26:01,600 which is good enough for me #2 do you think there is an 1389 01:26:01,600 --> 01:26:04,840 objective purpose for humanity, and if So, what? 1390 01:26:08,720 --> 01:26:14,520 Yes and no. I think I subscribe to the idea. 1391 01:26:14,520 --> 01:26:18,680 I mean, really, this really comes from someone like Alan 1392 01:26:18,680 --> 01:26:22,800 Watts, you know, the idea that that reality is, is ultimately 1393 01:26:22,800 --> 01:26:30,400 play and, and that's the kind of the point of it rather than a, 1394 01:26:31,200 --> 01:26:35,320 some kind of grand aim. I, I, I don't kind of like that 1395 01:26:35,320 --> 01:26:40,440 idea necessarily that there is some ultimate purpose That's big 1396 01:26:40,440 --> 01:26:44,600 and important because I think, I think the idea that ultimately 1397 01:26:44,600 --> 01:26:48,920 it's all about, it's all one big drama. 1398 01:26:49,400 --> 01:26:52,800 Reality is, is a grand drama. And of course, what's got all of 1399 01:26:52,800 --> 01:26:57,040 this from from Hinduism really, you know, ancient Hindu ideas, 1400 01:26:58,800 --> 01:27:01,080 you know, Vedanta and Advaita and stuff. 1401 01:27:01,080 --> 01:27:03,520 And so I think, yeah, that that resonates with me. 1402 01:27:03,800 --> 01:27:07,880 I don't think, I don't think reality is serious. 1403 01:27:08,960 --> 01:27:12,160 And I think you get that message a lot on DMT. 1404 01:27:13,840 --> 01:27:19,240 If you take it too seriously, then you will often pay the 1405 01:27:19,240 --> 01:27:21,080 price and you will get mocked for it. 1406 01:27:21,440 --> 01:27:24,200 So yeah, that's my feeling. It's life. 1407 01:27:24,280 --> 01:27:30,560 Reality itself is 1 big cosmic drama, cosmic game, perhaps even 1408 01:27:30,560 --> 01:27:34,080 cosmic joke. Yeah, I think. 1409 01:27:34,080 --> 01:27:35,480 Yeah, that's a, that's a good answer. 1410 01:27:35,480 --> 01:27:38,880 I think the common out is usually we create our own 1411 01:27:38,960 --> 01:27:41,040 purpose or, or telos or whatever. 1412 01:27:41,040 --> 01:27:45,320 But yeah, to your point, I think that I like Alan Watts. 1413 01:27:45,320 --> 01:27:46,840 I I listen to Alan Watts a lot too. 1414 01:27:46,840 --> 01:27:48,720 I think that he offers a lot there. 1415 01:27:48,760 --> 01:27:54,800 So that's a good answer #3 do you think humans are special or 1416 01:27:54,800 --> 01:27:56,520 separate from the rest of nature? 1417 01:27:56,760 --> 01:28:00,480 If your answer is yes, please give your best example of why. 1418 01:28:05,280 --> 01:28:10,720 I mean, again, I think we're clearly, yes, we are clearly 1419 01:28:10,720 --> 01:28:14,720 special in some ways. I mean, this is, you know, 1420 01:28:14,720 --> 01:28:19,400 cognitively, technologically, we have, we have in many ways, we 1421 01:28:19,400 --> 01:28:22,840 are clearly different from other animals. 1422 01:28:24,240 --> 01:28:27,520 But at the same time, there are also animals that seem to be 1423 01:28:27,520 --> 01:28:31,360 much happier than us, Dolphins, for example, who are also very 1424 01:28:31,360 --> 01:28:35,920 intelligent, who also possess language and, and, and seem to, 1425 01:28:36,960 --> 01:28:39,360 to have a great time more so than we do. 1426 01:28:40,200 --> 01:28:45,000 I think our problem in many ways we're our specialness or 1427 01:28:45,000 --> 01:28:48,880 uniqueness comes with many problems, which again goes back 1428 01:28:48,880 --> 01:28:51,520 to the last question of taking ourselves too seriously and 1429 01:28:51,520 --> 01:28:55,640 taking life too seriously and treating it like some journey 1430 01:28:55,640 --> 01:28:58,080 with some really important goal at the end. 1431 01:28:58,520 --> 01:29:01,520 And that leads to all of the a lot of the suffering and the 1432 01:29:01,520 --> 01:29:05,640 grasping and the accumulation and all of that stuff. 1433 01:29:06,680 --> 01:29:09,760 So yes, in some ways we're special. 1434 01:29:09,760 --> 01:29:11,160 Is that the right word? I'm not sure. 1435 01:29:11,160 --> 01:29:13,680 But then other, I think other animals are also special in 1436 01:29:13,680 --> 01:29:16,080 their own way that, you know, they're not, it's a, it's a 1437 01:29:16,080 --> 01:29:17,840 rabbit. Hole, you'd be very hard 1438 01:29:17,840 --> 01:29:18,960 pressed. It's a rabbit hole. 1439 01:29:19,160 --> 01:29:21,520 You'd be very hard pressed to find something that there's no 1440 01:29:21,520 --> 01:29:23,840 proto version of what we're capable of. 1441 01:29:24,120 --> 01:29:27,480 I, I think for me, I tossed this is something, because this is 1442 01:29:27,480 --> 01:29:31,240 something I ask myself a lot. And I think that maybe recursion 1443 01:29:31,240 --> 01:29:34,320 or recursive tool making, you know, we make things that make 1444 01:29:34,320 --> 01:29:37,480 things where I mean, you might be able to make the argument 1445 01:29:37,480 --> 01:29:43,040 that maybe primates are making tools, you know, but then we're 1446 01:29:43,040 --> 01:29:47,280 so far removed from that initial phase that it's, it's very 1447 01:29:47,280 --> 01:29:49,960 different. Yes, I guess. 1448 01:29:49,960 --> 01:29:52,320 It it hinges on what you mean by special. 1449 01:29:52,600 --> 01:29:56,680 I mean unique, more advanced, more sophisticated, more 1450 01:29:56,680 --> 01:29:59,320 intelligent, all of these stuff definitely apply. 1451 01:29:59,480 --> 01:30:02,600 Special is an interesting word which you chose deliberately, I 1452 01:30:02,600 --> 01:30:06,280 know, but. These are that's. 1453 01:30:06,280 --> 01:30:12,720 Why these are the mind melters bro #4 What do you think happens 1454 01:30:12,720 --> 01:30:22,440 when we die? Oh, So what? 1455 01:30:22,440 --> 01:30:25,040 I don't think. I don't think that. 1456 01:30:26,400 --> 01:30:29,400 Necessarily. I don't know is the answer but 1457 01:30:30,040 --> 01:30:35,760 obviously but. I don't think we're going. 1458 01:30:35,760 --> 01:30:39,240 Necessarily, I don't describe to the idea that we're going to 1459 01:30:39,240 --> 01:30:42,440 take everything with us and take our identity, you know, who we 1460 01:30:42,440 --> 01:30:44,920 are, our name and our occupation and our interests and our 1461 01:30:44,920 --> 01:30:48,080 personality with us. The idea perhaps, that the 1462 01:30:48,600 --> 01:30:53,360 consciousness is in some way continuous, that nobody's ever 1463 01:30:53,360 --> 01:30:55,680 born, nobody ever dies. Again, this goes back to the 1464 01:30:55,680 --> 01:31:01,960 idea of consciousness being fundamental, is that there is no 1465 01:31:02,040 --> 01:31:05,160 such thing as birth and there is no such thing as death. 1466 01:31:05,160 --> 01:31:13,080 Ultimately. There's a great Zen, actually. 1467 01:31:20,240 --> 01:31:24,800 A great. Quote that I used in reality 1468 01:31:24,800 --> 01:31:25,480 switch. There we go. 1469 01:31:25,960 --> 01:31:30,280 Chance to plug where I said here we go. 1470 01:31:30,280 --> 01:31:33,520 When I took my first breath, my world was born with me. 1471 01:31:33,840 --> 01:31:36,720 When I die, my world dies with me. 1472 01:31:36,840 --> 01:31:40,200 In other words, I wasn't born into a world that was already 1473 01:31:40,200 --> 01:31:42,680 here before me. I bring my own world into 1474 01:31:42,680 --> 01:31:46,680 existence, live it out and take it with me when I die. 1475 01:31:48,080 --> 01:31:55,600 So suggest this, this idea of of of that you are, you have your 1476 01:31:55,600 --> 01:31:59,080 own world now when you die, you know, from your perspective, you 1477 01:31:59,080 --> 01:32:01,760 kind of. Have another world. 1478 01:32:01,760 --> 01:32:04,720 I don't know, you know, that this is a kind of a continuous 1479 01:32:04,720 --> 01:32:06,360 process. You're not born, you don't come 1480 01:32:06,360 --> 01:32:08,400 into the world. You kind of bring your world 1481 01:32:08,400 --> 01:32:10,680 with you. It's kind of pretty deep stuff. 1482 01:32:10,680 --> 01:32:15,200 But but yeah, that's that's kind of what I I don't think that 1483 01:32:15,200 --> 01:32:22,800 it's a, you know, when you die, you die, you know, that's it. 1484 01:32:23,200 --> 01:32:25,560 I don't think that's the case from other people's perspective. 1485 01:32:26,000 --> 01:32:29,680 Last question. For Mike's mind mounters, what 1486 01:32:29,680 --> 01:32:33,120 do you think is the greatest mystery of all time and why the. 1487 01:32:36,320 --> 01:32:38,360 Greatest mystery. Of all time. 1488 01:32:40,560 --> 01:32:45,080 Again, not a particularly imaginative example, but I guess 1489 01:32:46,440 --> 01:32:49,280 again, going back to Alan Watts, he had this, he often used to 1490 01:32:49,280 --> 01:32:52,400 talk about the idea of the existence is weird. 1491 01:32:53,520 --> 01:32:56,880 Just the fact that things exist is really odd. 1492 01:32:56,880 --> 01:33:00,920 It would have been much simpler if there was literally nothing. 1493 01:33:02,840 --> 01:33:06,240 Not just nothing as in, you know, quantum foam or, you know, 1494 01:33:06,240 --> 01:33:08,560 not Lawrence Krauss's idea of nothing. 1495 01:33:09,360 --> 01:33:13,600 But like, does anybody like that? 1496 01:33:13,600 --> 01:33:15,800 Idea. I've never met anybody that like 1497 01:33:15,800 --> 01:33:19,480 Lawrence's Krauss's idea of nothing, no. 1498 01:33:19,840 --> 01:33:23,800 No, but I mean, what? It's the best that he could do, 1499 01:33:23,800 --> 01:33:24,920 right? It's to go. 1500 01:33:24,920 --> 01:33:27,400 He called it nothing because, you know, a universe from 1501 01:33:27,400 --> 01:33:29,040 nothing is a great title for a book. 1502 01:33:29,760 --> 01:33:32,880 But I think anyone that was that was intellectually honest would 1503 01:33:32,880 --> 01:33:34,760 know that he's not talking about nothing here. 1504 01:33:35,000 --> 01:33:36,880 So yeah. So the idea of absolute, you 1505 01:33:37,280 --> 01:33:39,760 know, why? Why isn't that absolute? 1506 01:33:39,760 --> 01:33:40,960 And I've often wondered about this. 1507 01:33:40,960 --> 01:33:44,000 And when you, when you're when you're conscious and your brain 1508 01:33:44,000 --> 01:33:47,400 kind of locks into the idea, it sends a little shiver. 1509 01:33:47,400 --> 01:33:49,120 Like what? Absolute Nothing. 1510 01:33:49,120 --> 01:33:51,680 There's never been anything. Never will be in existence 1511 01:33:51,680 --> 01:33:53,560 itself. Is does not exist. 1512 01:33:53,560 --> 01:33:58,480 I mean that that is the simplest, purest state, but 1513 01:33:58,480 --> 01:34:02,240 that's not the state, clearly. So, yeah, the great mystery, you 1514 01:34:02,240 --> 01:34:04,360 know, why are what's this all about? 1515 01:34:04,360 --> 01:34:04,960 Why? Why? 1516 01:34:07,000 --> 01:34:09,080 What is this thing? What is reality? 1517 01:34:09,600 --> 01:34:12,400 I don't think we're even close to grasping that. 1518 01:34:12,400 --> 01:34:16,480 And I guess this is what the the Zen Buddhists do, you know, in 1519 01:34:16,480 --> 01:34:20,520 the mountains here in Japan, and they sit and face a wall and try 1520 01:34:20,520 --> 01:34:24,600 and kind of observe that directly. 1521 01:34:24,600 --> 01:34:26,520 Because I don't think you're going to reach an answer to that 1522 01:34:26,520 --> 01:34:31,840 question intellectually. You kind of have to sit for 20 1523 01:34:32,080 --> 01:34:35,480 years and hope that. It hits you. 1524 01:34:35,760 --> 01:34:39,600 It strikes you, you know, some personal, personal revelation, I 1525 01:34:39,600 --> 01:34:41,720 guess. Awesome. 1526 01:34:41,720 --> 01:34:43,400 Thank you for. Answering that, I know, I know 1527 01:34:43,400 --> 01:34:44,960 they're tough. I put you on the spot. 1528 01:34:45,160 --> 01:34:47,040 Nobody knows what the questions are going in. 1529 01:34:47,040 --> 01:34:49,640 It's not like I gave you the list and said we're going to 1530 01:34:49,640 --> 01:34:51,520 talk about this. But that's what makes them 1531 01:34:51,520 --> 01:34:53,640 tough. And I, you know, look, I, I 1532 01:34:53,640 --> 01:34:56,520 think part of those, why I created these questions is 1533 01:34:56,520 --> 01:35:00,240 number 1, to put somebody on the spot and #2 I think that it 1534 01:35:00,240 --> 01:35:03,920 confronts you with questions that we all kind of avoid 1535 01:35:04,240 --> 01:35:07,880 regularly, but that I think are essential to being a human 1536 01:35:07,880 --> 01:35:10,000 being. So. 1537 01:35:10,400 --> 01:35:12,120 But I appreciate you answering those. 1538 01:35:12,320 --> 01:35:16,920 Is there an ancient psychedelic tradition there in Japan of any 1539 01:35:16,920 --> 01:35:19,680 sort with like mushrooms or anything or? 1540 01:35:21,320 --> 01:35:23,800 Well, there's a modern. Psychedelic tradition for sure. 1541 01:35:24,280 --> 01:35:26,200 It's a good question. I mean, it's something I'd like 1542 01:35:26,200 --> 01:35:28,840 to actually study more seriously. 1543 01:35:30,200 --> 01:35:33,200 There are many species of psychedelic mushroom in Japan. 1544 01:35:33,680 --> 01:35:35,960 Whether there's a history of use is a good question. 1545 01:35:39,080 --> 01:35:42,640 The answer is I don't. Know, I'd like to know, yeah. 1546 01:35:43,240 --> 01:35:46,160 But certainly in the modern era, in this ayahuasca circles and 1547 01:35:46,160 --> 01:35:47,880 things like that, and there's certainly a psychedelic 1548 01:35:47,880 --> 01:35:52,800 subculture in Japan, is there? Naturally growing, I mean, 1549 01:35:52,800 --> 01:35:54,760 there's mushrooms that grow everywhere, but are there, what 1550 01:35:54,760 --> 01:35:57,240 species do you know, is there any species that grow around 1551 01:35:57,240 --> 01:36:01,280 there? I'm, I'm, I couldn't give you 1552 01:36:01,280 --> 01:36:04,440 the species by name, but but yeah, there are, there are, 1553 01:36:04,440 --> 01:36:09,320 well, I say many, I say a handful of mushrooms that grow, 1554 01:36:09,880 --> 01:36:13,600 you know, in, throughout, you know, from mainland Japan, 1555 01:36:13,600 --> 01:36:15,560 Honshu and, you know, down to Okinawa. 1556 01:36:15,560 --> 01:36:20,520 There's a species of mushroom that grows only in in Okinawa. 1557 01:36:22,840 --> 01:36:24,920 So yeah, I mean. There's, there's certainly lots 1558 01:36:24,920 --> 01:36:29,320 of psychedelics around in, you know, Acacia Confusa grows in 1559 01:36:29,320 --> 01:36:33,480 Okinawa, lots of it, and in neighboring Taiwan, actually. 1560 01:36:34,400 --> 01:36:37,640 But there's certainly plenty of it around. 1561 01:36:37,640 --> 01:36:44,880 But how, how much, how far back, I don't know, but that's 1562 01:36:44,880 --> 01:36:46,480 something I want, I'd like to research. 1563 01:36:46,800 --> 01:36:47,800 Yeah. And Asian and. 1564 01:36:47,800 --> 01:36:50,400 Theogenic traditions are kind of a mystery to me. 1565 01:36:50,400 --> 01:36:52,040 I don't really know. There's not really anybody 1566 01:36:52,040 --> 01:36:56,960 talking about them, at least to, you know, a popular standpoint. 1567 01:36:56,960 --> 01:37:00,920 Maybe it's esoteric or maybe you'll find some like you said, 1568 01:37:00,920 --> 01:37:05,040 some old monk or Buddhist or something that might have some 1569 01:37:05,040 --> 01:37:07,480 knowledge. But right that. 1570 01:37:07,480 --> 01:37:12,320 Would have to brush up on my kind of old old Japanese, which 1571 01:37:12,320 --> 01:37:14,880 is, I mean, modern Japanese is, is is tough enough. 1572 01:37:14,920 --> 01:37:17,200 But going back to the old books, certainly handwritten. 1573 01:37:17,200 --> 01:37:23,440 I mean, it's like. Have you heard about this new, 1574 01:37:23,920 --> 01:37:28,920 Not new, but I think the student found the psychedelic component 1575 01:37:28,920 --> 01:37:30,880 of Morning Glory. Are you familiar with this? 1576 01:37:30,880 --> 01:37:34,080 It's kind of going around. I can pull up the name. 1577 01:37:35,640 --> 01:37:40,280 Yeah, so I. Mean what he found was the 1578 01:37:40,280 --> 01:37:43,120 symbiotic fungus. Yeah, the that's right. 1579 01:37:43,120 --> 01:37:45,240 The fungus, yeah, yeah, but within the. 1580 01:37:45,320 --> 01:37:48,160 Seeds. Yeah, I mean this, this was. 1581 01:37:49,560 --> 01:37:50,600 The reason? It was kind. 1582 01:37:50,600 --> 01:37:54,400 Of a big result was because it was the same species that 1583 01:37:55,080 --> 01:37:59,480 Hoffman originally isolated LSA from. 1584 01:38:00,520 --> 01:38:04,680 But there are a number of morning glory species that with 1585 01:38:04,680 --> 01:38:08,000 symbiotic fungi that had been isolated before that produced 1586 01:38:08,000 --> 01:38:11,840 tryptamines. Sorry, produced these lysergic 1587 01:38:11,840 --> 01:38:13,360 acids. Hawaiian baby. 1588 01:38:13,440 --> 01:38:15,960 Woodrows, that kind of stuff. You're right. 1589 01:38:15,960 --> 01:38:18,840 Exactly. So it's not an entirely new, I 1590 01:38:18,840 --> 01:38:21,640 think we all we we knew for a long time or suspected that 1591 01:38:21,640 --> 01:38:24,480 there was some, that it wasn't the morning glory plant the 1592 01:38:24,480 --> 01:38:27,400 actual seeds themselves that were producing these LSA because 1593 01:38:27,400 --> 01:38:30,520 they're very, you know, they're complex molecular structures. 1594 01:38:30,640 --> 01:38:34,360 It is probably fungus as it's always the fungus. 1595 01:38:35,440 --> 01:38:37,080 It's always the fucking. Fungi, right? 1596 01:38:37,360 --> 01:38:38,360 Yeah. All right. 1597 01:38:38,360 --> 01:38:40,720 Last question, I promise we'll, we'll get you out of here. 1598 01:38:41,520 --> 01:38:44,880 I've been kind of following a little bit this I was during my 1599 01:38:44,880 --> 01:38:47,800 hiatus, I started a different channel, a philosophy channel, 1600 01:38:47,800 --> 01:38:51,160 but I've been following your interactions with it. 1601 01:38:51,160 --> 01:38:57,760 Was it Danny Goler and this idea of, you know, he smokes DMT and 1602 01:38:57,760 --> 01:39:01,400 then, you know, looks in the laser and sees some sort of code 1603 01:39:01,400 --> 01:39:04,560 and, you know, things that we're in a simulation or that's the 1604 01:39:04,680 --> 01:39:08,360 hypothesis that he's put forth. And you've had a little bit of a 1605 01:39:08,360 --> 01:39:11,320 back and forth with them. Where do you stand on all that? 1606 01:39:12,320 --> 01:39:15,040 Yeah, yeah. Where do I stand? 1607 01:39:15,440 --> 01:39:18,800 I stand there. It's minimally a very 1608 01:39:18,800 --> 01:39:24,080 interesting phenomenon in that it allows you to fairly reliably 1609 01:39:25,480 --> 01:39:30,640 isolate a particular aspect of the broader DMT phenomenology. 1610 01:39:30,640 --> 01:39:37,560 Minimally, it's, it's worth of study that that, but the this is 1611 01:39:37,560 --> 01:39:40,280 therefore this is a simulation and this is the fundamental 1612 01:39:40,280 --> 01:39:45,520 source code I don't buy again for reasons that I've discussed 1613 01:39:45,520 --> 01:39:47,960 at length, You know, in many places. 1614 01:39:47,960 --> 01:39:51,880 I've got an article in my sub stack why I, I don't subscribe 1615 01:39:51,880 --> 01:39:53,560 to that. And of course, why would I, I 1616 01:39:53,560 --> 01:39:58,200 mean, there's it's, it's you need to, there's a lot of work, 1617 01:39:58,200 --> 01:40:03,360 scientific work that needs to to to occur before you to the kind 1618 01:40:03,360 --> 01:40:06,000 of to bring this. Out of the realm of private 1619 01:40:06,000 --> 01:40:08,040 revelation. You see the code and you're 1620 01:40:08,040 --> 01:40:09,480 convinced this is the source code. 1621 01:40:09,880 --> 01:40:12,280 OK, great. Now you need to bring this 1622 01:40:12,280 --> 01:40:17,240 outside of private revelation and into actual scientific 1623 01:40:17,240 --> 01:40:20,760 observations and analysis. And is anybody looking to do 1624 01:40:20,760 --> 01:40:24,560 that? Well, I think Danny is. 1625 01:40:24,560 --> 01:40:29,440 Having a go. You know, when I was out in LA 1626 01:40:29,640 --> 01:40:32,880 just a couple of months ago, we had a long, a few long 1627 01:40:32,880 --> 01:40:36,400 conversations about this. There's a movie coming out, 1628 01:40:36,400 --> 01:40:39,840 documentary called The Discovery, I think next year, 1629 01:40:40,960 --> 01:40:43,920 which has got my conversations, my interviews and stuff, as well 1630 01:40:43,920 --> 01:40:47,840 as, you know, the whole thing. I think it's fascinating, but 1631 01:40:47,840 --> 01:40:52,560 I'm not certainly not ready to. Accept that he's stumbled. 1632 01:40:52,560 --> 01:40:54,120 Upon the source code. I mean, that's. 1633 01:40:54,120 --> 01:40:58,760 That's a huge thing to say and there are a number of issues 1634 01:40:58,760 --> 01:41:02,360 with that hypothesis in my opinion. 1635 01:41:02,440 --> 01:41:06,480 You know, in terms of the what the code looks like and you know 1636 01:41:06,480 --> 01:41:09,560 why there would be a code that was human readable as code if it 1637 01:41:09,560 --> 01:41:12,240 was a fundamental source code, why it would be running through 1638 01:41:12,240 --> 01:41:17,040 reality like the matrix. The unfortunate coincidence that 1639 01:41:17,240 --> 01:41:20,520 a laser light, when reflected off a surface, tends to produce 1640 01:41:20,520 --> 01:41:24,760 this this pattern of speckles, this interference pattern on the 1641 01:41:24,760 --> 01:41:28,520 retina, it's points of sensory inputs which around which 1642 01:41:28,600 --> 01:41:34,000 imagery can certainly be seeded, which could give the, you know, 1643 01:41:34,000 --> 01:41:38,280 the could act as like a sensory scaffold for complex imagery 1644 01:41:38,280 --> 01:41:42,200 generated by DMT. The fact that this this this 1645 01:41:42,200 --> 01:41:46,040 speckled pattern has a number of optical properties that make it 1646 01:41:46,040 --> 01:41:48,520 appear as if it occupies space behind the wall. 1647 01:41:49,000 --> 01:41:53,080 This is all without DMT. So all these things are kind of, 1648 01:41:53,440 --> 01:41:56,920 they make you think that maybe there's some interaction between 1649 01:41:56,920 --> 01:42:00,120 the optical properties of the laser and the DMT that's 1650 01:42:00,120 --> 01:42:03,680 generating this effect rather than you're seeing the source 1651 01:42:03,680 --> 01:42:06,960 code of reality and distinguishing between those is 1652 01:42:06,960 --> 01:42:09,160 no easy task, but that's what you need to do. 1653 01:42:09,760 --> 01:42:12,600 You know, I'm not, I'm accused of being a hater or dismissing 1654 01:42:12,600 --> 01:42:15,680 it or, you know, ruling it out. I'm not, I'm just, I'm just 1655 01:42:15,680 --> 01:42:18,600 saying, you know, as I do with everything, you, you, you go for 1656 01:42:18,600 --> 01:42:21,480 more mundane explanations first and then you try to rule them 1657 01:42:21,480 --> 01:42:24,760 out. And, and how you, once you've 1658 01:42:24,760 --> 01:42:27,320 ruled them out, then you start reaching for more exotic 1659 01:42:27,320 --> 01:42:30,000 explanations. And the idea that we've 1660 01:42:30,000 --> 01:42:33,920 discovered the source code of reality is, is about as exotic 1661 01:42:33,920 --> 01:42:37,680 an explanation as you get, and it doesn't get any grander than 1662 01:42:37,680 --> 01:42:39,400 that. So I can understand why people 1663 01:42:39,400 --> 01:42:42,040 are kind of latching onto this and going, Oh my God, this is 1664 01:42:42,080 --> 01:42:44,640 like most important discovery in the history of mankind. 1665 01:42:44,640 --> 01:42:47,560 And if it was true, then it would be. 1666 01:42:48,400 --> 01:42:52,960 But there's a long way to go from an observation under the 1667 01:42:52,960 --> 01:42:56,800 influence of DMT with this, with this laser, knowing what we know 1668 01:42:56,800 --> 01:42:59,920 about the optical effects and properties of lasers and other 1669 01:42:59,920 --> 01:43:03,600 things and, and, and reaching that grandest of conclusions. 1670 01:43:03,600 --> 01:43:06,280 So that's all I'm saying is just, and of course we know we 1671 01:43:06,280 --> 01:43:08,720 were earlier we were talking about the ideas of these 1672 01:43:08,720 --> 01:43:12,760 intelligences fucking with you. So what better way to fuck with 1673 01:43:12,760 --> 01:43:15,480 someone than to convince them that they're they're being shown 1674 01:43:15,480 --> 01:43:17,080 the ultimate source code of reality? 1675 01:43:19,640 --> 01:43:21,520 Yeah, I don't think people have. To be very careful. 1676 01:43:22,280 --> 01:43:25,280 People and I've talked to. People about this, but like even 1677 01:43:25,280 --> 01:43:28,760 the you know, you see something let's say you're having an 1678 01:43:28,760 --> 01:43:31,120 experience and you're watching TV. 1679 01:43:31,120 --> 01:43:34,080 If you then close your eyes, you're going to see that TV 1680 01:43:34,080 --> 01:43:38,720 there for a while and so forth with a lot of things, right. 1681 01:43:38,720 --> 01:43:42,720 So like I'm not saying that you were he was, but just the idea 1682 01:43:42,720 --> 01:43:44,280 of that's the way our brain works. 1683 01:43:44,280 --> 01:43:49,440 So it could be holding on to symbols or letters or whatever, 1684 01:43:49,720 --> 01:43:53,160 and then our brain could be kind of, you know, in that state, 1685 01:43:53,160 --> 01:43:57,560 putting things together that maybe are not actually there. 1686 01:43:57,560 --> 01:44:00,000 I don't know, you know. The brain is very. 1687 01:44:00,000 --> 01:44:02,720 Good at, it's great, good at constructing symbols. 1688 01:44:02,720 --> 01:44:07,000 I mean, that's we are very, we are a literary species, a 1689 01:44:07,000 --> 01:44:09,560 lexical species and our brain is very good. 1690 01:44:09,560 --> 01:44:12,520 You know, reading requires your brain to construct, you know, 1691 01:44:12,880 --> 01:44:17,080 high rate, a series of of, of very small, finely detailed 1692 01:44:17,200 --> 01:44:19,080 symbol. This is what reading is. 1693 01:44:19,960 --> 01:44:23,840 So your brain is very, very good at that, which is why lexical 1694 01:44:23,840 --> 01:44:27,880 hallucinations of text, of code, of mathematical symbols, of 1695 01:44:28,200 --> 01:44:32,760 musical notation, they occur in about, you know, I think it's 1696 01:44:32,760 --> 01:44:38,280 about 40% of cases of visual hallucinations in people with 1697 01:44:38,280 --> 01:44:41,000 various neuropsychological, you know, hallucinatory disorders. 1698 01:44:41,000 --> 01:44:43,800 In lots of people, seeing code and letters, it's one of the 1699 01:44:43,800 --> 01:44:45,920 most common forms of hallucination. 1700 01:44:46,360 --> 01:44:49,120 And seeing code under the influence of DM T is also 1701 01:44:49,120 --> 01:44:50,600 common. That goes back decades. 1702 01:44:50,920 --> 01:44:53,600 So how do we distinguish between that? 1703 01:44:53,600 --> 01:44:54,920 How do we say that? How do we? 1704 01:44:56,160 --> 01:44:58,440 Confirm this is not. Just a type of lexical 1705 01:44:58,440 --> 01:45:01,280 hallucination, you know, highly complex, fascinating form. 1706 01:45:01,280 --> 01:45:04,840 But you know, DMT does generate very complex and interesting 1707 01:45:04,840 --> 01:45:06,800 imagery. How do we distinguish between 1708 01:45:06,800 --> 01:45:10,120 that and? The code of. 1709 01:45:10,120 --> 01:45:14,520 Reality. Yeah, I mean, it sounds like. 1710 01:45:15,120 --> 01:45:18,280 There's a show called DEVS that was on for a while where they 1711 01:45:18,760 --> 01:45:22,280 figured out the algorithm for prediction of, of everything of 1712 01:45:22,280 --> 01:45:23,800 life. You know, it kind of reminds me 1713 01:45:23,800 --> 01:45:26,200 of that a little bit. But yeah, I mean, look, we're 1714 01:45:26,200 --> 01:45:28,720 human beings. We've got apophenia and 1715 01:45:28,720 --> 01:45:33,560 pareidolia and our mind likes to put things together and patterns 1716 01:45:33,560 --> 01:45:36,080 and pattern recognition, that's what we do, right? 1717 01:45:36,080 --> 01:45:39,640 So I'm interested in it. I'll see you know, what happens. 1718 01:45:39,640 --> 01:45:42,400 I'm looking forward to checking this documentary when it comes 1719 01:45:42,400 --> 01:45:44,400 out. And you know, I did read your 1720 01:45:44,400 --> 01:45:48,520 sub stack when you were having that back and forth and there's 1721 01:45:48,520 --> 01:45:49,800 a lot of interesting stuff there. 1722 01:45:49,800 --> 01:45:52,920 If nothing else, it's it's a cool thought experiment, right? 1723 01:45:52,920 --> 01:45:55,800 Or just a a way to look at this phenomenon? 1724 01:45:56,960 --> 01:45:58,000 Yeah, I think so. You. 1725 01:45:58,080 --> 01:46:00,200 Know minimally, it's fascinating, you know, that you 1726 01:46:00,200 --> 01:46:04,520 can, you can reliably, as I say, isolate this particular aspect 1727 01:46:04,520 --> 01:46:07,320 of, of DMT. That's cool. 1728 01:46:07,360 --> 01:46:09,040 And you know, that could be a very cool tool. 1729 01:46:09,040 --> 01:46:12,320 You know, if you can, you can imagine expanding this laser to 1730 01:46:12,320 --> 01:46:16,200 kind of replicate the optical pattern generated by the laser, 1731 01:46:16,200 --> 01:46:18,960 but on a screen or something that would be cool. 1732 01:46:18,960 --> 01:46:22,080 So you could, someone could view the screen with this very 1733 01:46:22,080 --> 01:46:26,440 specific pattern of of light that would allow them to see 1734 01:46:27,040 --> 01:46:30,160 code like imagery, you know, and explore the nature of that code. 1735 01:46:30,160 --> 01:46:32,680 I can see lots of cool things coming from it, but I'm 1736 01:46:32,680 --> 01:46:36,480 certainly not ready to to go to the the far most far out 1737 01:46:37,360 --> 01:46:42,320 conclusions just yet. Well, Andrew? 1738 01:46:42,640 --> 01:46:45,440 It's been a pleasure as always. Thank you so much. 1739 01:46:45,440 --> 01:46:49,560 Thank you for being interested in these topics and sharing your 1740 01:46:49,560 --> 01:46:52,200 knowledge and death by astonishment. 1741 01:46:52,200 --> 01:46:54,360 It's a great book. I highly recommend it. 1742 01:46:54,360 --> 01:46:57,880 If anybody's interested in the history or I should say the non 1743 01:46:58,120 --> 01:47:02,920 indigenous history of ayahuasca and DMT, please check it out 1744 01:47:02,920 --> 01:47:05,480 because there's a lot of great information and I consider 1745 01:47:05,480 --> 01:47:08,320 myself somebody that knows a lot about this topic and even I 1746 01:47:08,320 --> 01:47:11,880 learned a lot, especially the William Burrow stuff I thought 1747 01:47:11,880 --> 01:47:14,120 was super fascinating. I was unaware of all of that 1748 01:47:14,120 --> 01:47:15,680 pretty much. I mean, I had heard of Schultes 1749 01:47:16,000 --> 01:47:20,640 and you know, all that stuff. But yeah, there's there's a lot 1750 01:47:20,640 --> 01:47:25,080 of great information in there. I learned a lot and it's going 1751 01:47:25,080 --> 01:47:28,280 to be interesting to see where we go from here. 1752 01:47:28,280 --> 01:47:32,760 Is there anything you've got coming up or is it just back to 1753 01:47:32,760 --> 01:47:34,800 the grindstone writing another book? 1754 01:47:34,800 --> 01:47:38,360 What's your next move here? I've got something very big. 1755 01:47:38,360 --> 01:47:42,400 Coming up, but I'll say no more. And then it's back to the. 1756 01:47:42,400 --> 01:47:45,600 Grindstone for a new book All right, all right well, I. 1757 01:47:45,600 --> 01:47:48,760 Love both of those things. I'll I'll have to have you back 1758 01:47:48,880 --> 01:47:50,760 back on when one of those things pops. 1759 01:47:50,760 --> 01:47:52,880 I'll be paying attention as always. 1760 01:47:53,760 --> 01:47:55,560 But I really appreciate it for real. 1761 01:47:55,600 --> 01:47:59,760 And you're very generous with your time and you're an open 1762 01:47:59,760 --> 01:48:01,880 book, as they say. And I appreciate you being a 1763 01:48:01,880 --> 01:48:04,160 good sport about the Mike's Mind Melters. 1764 01:48:04,840 --> 01:48:07,760 And yeah, man, that's it. That's all I got. 1765 01:48:09,240 --> 01:48:14,480 All right, well. Thank you as always, and the way 1766 01:48:14,480 --> 01:48:17,680 we will end this is the way we end all of our mind escape 1767 01:48:17,680 --> 01:48:20,360 episodes, which is we love everybody. 1768 01:48:20,360 --> 01:48:22,800 Stay safe out there, and we'll catch you next time. 1769 01:48:23,160 --> 01:48:26,280 Peace. If you would like to support. 1770 01:48:26,280 --> 01:48:28,400 Mind escape. There's many ways you can do it, 1771 01:48:28,440 --> 01:48:31,120 but the best way to do it is to click the link tree link down 1772 01:48:31,120 --> 01:48:35,240 below. I have everything from merch to 1773 01:48:35,280 --> 01:48:39,840 our Patreon page, Our Patreon by the way, I archived a lot of the 1774 01:48:39,840 --> 01:48:42,200 Mind Escape 1.0 episodes on there. 1775 01:48:42,520 --> 01:48:45,680 There is still some available on our YouTube channel and our 1776 01:48:45,680 --> 01:48:49,400 Spotify and Apple podcast. However, like I said, if you're 1777 01:48:49,400 --> 01:48:52,200 looking for a specific older episode, it might be on our 1778 01:48:52,200 --> 01:48:56,040 Patreon, which has been archived and it's $2.00 a month and 1779 01:48:56,040 --> 01:48:58,960 there's also exclusive content on there as well that was never 1780 01:48:58,960 --> 01:49:02,720 released to any other platform. So please go check that out. 1781 01:49:02,720 --> 01:49:04,840 You can also check out our documentary that Maurice and I 1782 01:49:04,840 --> 01:49:08,760 made a few years ago called As Within So without from UFOs to 1783 01:49:08,760 --> 01:49:11,240 DMT, that is available on there as well. 1784 01:49:11,240 --> 01:49:14,280 There's also a director's cut. Please click the subscribe 1785 01:49:14,280 --> 01:49:16,960 button and follow us. And if you're listening on an 1786 01:49:16,960 --> 01:49:20,640 audio platform like Spotify, we do have video on Spotify as 1787 01:49:20,640 --> 01:49:22,720 well. And please leave us a nice 1788 01:49:22,720 --> 01:49:24,600 review. We would really appreciate that.