The message of the mushroom, by Terrence Mckenna

[Queso]

Yet reindeer remain reindeer.

 

Yet the human thinks about it's thoughts.

 

Evolving,

Orb

[Michaelangelica]

Google World Hearing Voices Day

and see what happens

 

http://www.asylumonline.net/

World Hearing Voices Day

and the 20th Anniversary of Asylum

September 14th 2006

 

It is estimated that worldwide, up to 4% of men, women and children hear voices, as part of a worldwide initiative,the Hearing Voices Network is holding a series of international, and national events to increase awareness of the voice hearing experience.

 

Is hearing voices an illness or a human variation that does not have to result in an illness?

 

Social presumptions about hearing voices are negative and are not based on the experience of voice hearers. These assumptions are stigmatising, isolating and therefore make people ill.

[ughaibu]

Orbsycli: Reindeer are partial to amanita muscara, if the effects of entheogens were sufficient to transform apes into humans, why have reindeer remained, absolutely, reindeer?

[Tarantism]

Orbsycli: Reindeer are partial to amanita muscara, if the effects of entheogens were sufficient to transform apes into humans, why have reindeer remained, absolutely, reindeer?

 

becuase we think about things other than our limited number of basic needs, especially on drugs! besides amanitas arent that good, hence their legality.

 

sorry, i know that was directed to orb, but i had an answer

[ughaibu]

In short, the quality of "becoming" human was innate to humans.

[Tarantism]

do you mean gaining unique consciouness? if you beileve what i do, theres plenty of life out in galaxy that meets or surpasses or intelligence levels. why limit the search to earth?

[ughaibu]

No, I mean that the use of hallucinogenic drugs hasn't had a great deal of effect on the social or spiritual evolution of reindeer. The human capacity to interpret experiences as "spiritual" appears to precede the religiously motivated consumption of drugs.

[Michaelangelica]

Orbsycli: Reindeer are partial to amanita muscara, if the effects of entheogens were sufficient to transform apes into humans, why have reindeer remained, absolutely, reindeer?

Actually they have evolved

They used to be Santa Claus. :rant:

[Queso]

Orbsycli: Reindeer are partial to amanita muscara, if the effects of entheogens were sufficient to transform apes into humans, why have reindeer remained, absolutely, reindeer?

 

Have you ever ate those mushrooms?

 

They make your thoughts loop

OVER AND OVER

it's absolutely the most menacing thing I've ever experienced.

 

You get stuck in the same time,

same thoughts

for hours, and you can't get out.

I hate it, and will never eat those mushrooms ever again.

 

They aren't psychedelic, like the psilocybe cubensis.

 

Psychedelics force intense thought.

[Queso]

Maybe if Reindeer ate some psychedelic mushrooms for thousands of years with a bigger brain they would stare at their reflection in a pond

 

and get the overwhelming desire to communicate :hihi:

 

This is only logic, folks.

[CraigD]

Tarantism clearly has thought long and deeply on the subjects of his rather long and deep post :hihi:, which, as with McKenna’s writing, I found intriguing. However, I must take issue with one of its claims (or perhaps statement of opinion):

these processes [waking consciousness, dreams and hallucinations] definitely arise at the quantom mechanical level.

While there is a large body of work suggesting a quantum mechanical basis for consciousness, I think it’s inaccurate to conclude that this work has shown such a connection “definitely”.

 

The best expression of the hypothesis that I’ve read is in Roger Penrose’s 1989 book ”The Emperor's New Mind: Concerning Computers, Minds and The Laws of Physics”. Although there’s been much speculation, both in support and opposition, over the past couple of decades, the hypothesis to date hasn’t been experimentally confirmed or refuted.

 

Designing an experiment to do so is a difficult task, for several reasons:

• Any quantity of nerve tissue, let alone ones thought of as “having consciousness”, such as a human brain, are far more difficult to experiment on than the photon, electrons, and occasionally larger, composite particles that are the usual domain of quantum physics
  
• The term ”consciousness” is difficult to define in a precise, formal way
  

So, while it’s not unreasonable to hold, as Penrose and his supporters do, that human consciousness is in some as-yet undefined way non-algorithmic – that is, that no digital computer program can be written to precisely emulate human behavior – it’s equally reasonable to hold, as his critics do, that it is a very complex mechanical phenomena – that is, that we are “meat computers”.

 

“Quantum consciousness” theories of good scientific quality, like Penrose’s, are currently of greater value as “cautionary advice” for artificial intelligence researchers than as predictive scientific theories. They warn us not to ignore the possibility that emulating a human being using any digital computer, such as our current von Neumann machines, may prove impossible. Some criticism of these theories, carried to their logical conclusions, warn us not to ignore the possibility that the term “consciousness”, as it is commonly and intuitively understood, may refer to something non-existent – that it is just a useful metaphor for a quality common to self-modeling information systems.

[CraigD]

Reindeer are partial to amanita muscara, if the effects of entheogens were sufficient to transform apes into humans, why have reindeer remained, absolutely, reindeer?

Since I think this is actually a serious question, here’s a serious answer:

The psychotropic drugs present in amanita muscaria mushrooms are not very similar to the tryptamines (eg: psilocybe mushrooms) that McKenna’s “stoned ape” hypothesis suggest were responsible for the emergence of “smart” hominids like humans.

 

The several pharmacologically active molecules in amanita are essentially toxins. They impair the ability of nerve cells to depolarize (send nerve impulses). In large doses, they can paralyze voluntary and involuntary muscles, including the heart, leading to injury or death. Though concentration of these compounds in the mushroom vary, the lethal dose for a human being is large, on the order of 100 grams, and given that doses as small as 1 gram tend to induce vomiting, unlikely to be consumed. I suspect this is also true for reindeer. (unlike horses, which lack the ability to vomit, reindeer and other ruminants are excellent regurgitators, routinely “chewing their food twice”)

 

The psilocybin from psilocybe mushrooms mimics the action of naturally produced nerotransmitters such as serotonin, effecting the synapses between nerve cells. Although it can dangerously impair ones balance, judgment, and even produce unconsciousness, it has effectively no lethal dose.

 

The subjective experience of using these different drugs differs substantially. Amanita is essentially “numbing” (there’s unconfirmed speculation that it was used by Viking warriors to induce “berserker rage”, though most anthropologists and historians believe alcohol, and possibly some kind of anesthetic, was involved), while psilocybin is characterized as producing a fixation on pattern. McKenna’s hypothesis depends on the apes getting stoned on a drug that emphasizes mental characteristics more common in human beings than in non-human primates, such as interest in patterns.

 

Ruminants do figure prominently in the “stoned ape” hypothesis: it’s supposed that our pre-human ancestors followed herds, to hunt them, and benefit from their protection from other predators. These ruminants may have consumed and excreted psilosybe spores, causing an unusual concentration of the mushrooms to grow from their dung, for our opportunistic, omnivorous ancestors to find and enjoy.

[Queso]

First off, I want to say congratulations. You guys bring forth excellent information.

 

Also, I find it hilarious this thread has a 2 star rating.

 

You guys are so silly.

[ughaibu]

CraigD:

How does McKenna view this in terms of time and place? Drugs considered to be entheogenic exist worldwide, availability and psychoactivity are the only qualifications required, (plenty of dangerously toxic drugs qualify).

What species of mushroom does he have in mind? I dont know of any psilocybin mushroom that fruits from dung.

Another problem is what ethologists describe as the ring of repugnance, animals tend to steer clear of their own dung, so I wouldn't expect hominids, during an association with herds, to be seeking food from the dung of those animals, unless those animals themselves were eating that dung, as in the case of horses.

[Queso]

One of the species he had in mind, like I said previously, is the psilocybe cubensis.

 

I actually had a photograph of a fairly large one sprouting from cow dung that I uploaded in the garden thread over a year ago.

 

They grow all over Florida.

[Queso]

And...hah

 

Animals don't steer clear from their own dung.

 

INFACT, Cows here, in florida, Eat the psilocybe cubensis that grow from their cow dung.

 

I have seen it with my own two eyes.

 

I've spent a lot of time in the cow fields here, other than the beach, it's one of the most interesting things to do.

 

Also, Monkeys love ****.

Even some humans like to be pooped on...

[ughaibu]

But had it grown through the pat or was the mycelium actually within the pat?