
The Drug of Choice for the Age of Kale - tsg
http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/09/12/the-ayahuasca-boom-in-the-u-s
======
steauengeglase
While I don't doubt the psychological benefits of ayahuasca (or any
hallucinogenic), the language of many of those advocating in the article set
off red flags. "Format your harddrive", reminds of Arch Oboler's "Society of
the Cosmos", something dreamed up by Evangelical hucksters who didn't see a
future in peddling Jesus so they turned to techno speak to wring out the
marks.

"We manifest abundance wherever we go," sounds even worse. That's the kind of
reason Dominionist give when trying to dodge their car taxes.

What did Hunter Thompson say about the seekers who tried to buy enlightenment
by the dose?

Instead the real benefit is trying to rationally understand their experience.
"Wait, was there a giant hand with my dad's watch on it's wrist crushing the
room? Damn, I didn't realize I was letting that take over my life."

Without that personal insight you are just dealing with pseudo-spiritual
abstractions.

~~~
oldmanjay
I feel like the sheer amount of bullshit surrounding these drugs leaves me
with a duty to take heavy doses of psychedelics and proudly learn nothing but
"boy that was fun"

~~~
fragola
Agreed on the bullshit. I think this might have something to do with me
growing up in a certain hippy town on the California coast, but I couldn't get
through this article without a lot of eye-rolling. OK, let's just put the
whole drug thing aside and call it a hobby. You can have a hobby without
having a pseudospiritual and vaguely appropriative justification for it.

Bodybuilders have a term that they use to describe the mythos that has evolved
in their subculture regarding steroids and supplements: Broscience. This is
the yuppie drug-dabbler equivalent.

~~~
stinkytaco
Offtopic, but unfortunately broscience has extended beyond pharmaceuticals to
training practice. This kind of thinking dominates the crossfit world with
terms like "muscle confusion" and "failure". It's sad because I got into
crossfit ten years ago because it was fun, something different every day kept
me coming back. I didn't want to be a Navy SEAL, just to keep active, but the
almost religious adherence to the training philosophy -- and the injuries
sustained by several people I knew -- drove me away. Now I find myself
sedentary and looking for something similar, but less pseudo-scientific.

~~~
fragola
I am similarly put off by yoga, which as practiced currently is not an
"ancient tradition" but a bizarre relic of 19th century Indian nationalism[0]

Some people find the woo motivating, but I find it to be a distraction. I want
my exercise regimen woo-free, thank you very much.

[0][http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/adamcurtis/entries/2989a78a-ee94-...](http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/adamcurtis/entries/2989a78a-ee94-385e-808f-c9c7c38d1cb7)

~~~
stinkytaco
I would actually argue that yoga is now sufficiently commercialized as to bear
little resemblance to anything "ancient" or "mystical". I can buy a book, get
some videos or take a class and hear nothing spiritual at all. (Side note:
Mark Lauren, in his fairly good _You Are Your Own Gym_ covers yoga a bit).
This isn't to say there's not lots of people selling the "spiritual
enlightenment" line.

I think all exercise programs tend to have a something to sell, because
otherwise how do you make money? It's an interesting balancing act, however.
Your doctor can tell you "get more exercise", but that's a pretty abstract
concept that requires planning, commitment and is by definition kind of
uncomfortable. So a whole industry has grown up around branding exercise. It
works, too. Some of it is better than others, but people, myself included, buy
it. We might buy it because we're gullible, we might buy it because it's
easier than coming up with our own plan or more interesting when executing it.

But the number of books that grace the shelves with words like "warrior",
"ultimate", "prescription", "philosophy", "enlightenment", "Spartan", "SEAL",
etc, etc, etc. is pretty staggering. But frankly, whatever works. Insurance
companies often incentivize gym memberships, but rarely do they pay for you to
regularly see a trainer, so whatever is safe that gets people exercising. I
complain, but it's not even in the same league of problematic as unregulated
administration of pharmaceuticals by spiritual leaders.

------
lwhalen
[http://www.theonion.com/article/ayahuasca-shaman-dreading-
an...](http://www.theonion.com/article/ayahuasca-shaman-dreading-another-week-
guiding-tec-52941)

~~~
hosh
Yup. A friend sent that a while ago. I sent it around to the folks who
regularly takes Ayahuasca. We were all cracking up. It was either written by
someone who took it at least once, or maybe just connected really well with
it.

I didn't know at the time it was such a thing in SV though.

------
apathy
The classical comparison that comes to mind is this:

LSD is like walking through the doors of perception.

DMT (as in ayahuasca) is like being shot out of a cannon.

I wonder if it has dawned on any of these "shamans" that a fistful of
risperidone might be useful for the freakouts? Antipsychotics exist for a
reason. Also, anyone on MAOIs is likely to have a very bad time, and people on
SSRIs may not notice a thing (other than barfing).

The whole enterprise seems very poorly thought out.

~~~
wavefunction
According to my friends and everything I've read on the subject, the cannon
effect is achieved when you smoke DMT.

Ayahuasca is DMT + MAOI inhibitors and is more like the usual experiences of
orally ingesting LSD, psilocybin or mescaline.

~~~
azernik
Plus fantastically uncomfortable physical side effects, and on the positive
side an experienced spotter to help you along.

~~~
monktastic1
Depends. If the MAOIs are extracted from the caapi, leaving out the other
alkaloids, even the uncomfortable physical side effects can be avoided.

~~~
Nursie
Ah but that's working around the 'plant spirit' and all that other stuff, you
won't have an 'authentic' or 'real' experience and the hipsterswill laugh at
you....

~~~
chillwaves
What's the point of the tone of your comment? Some people would find the
processed drug to lack the "authentic" experience of what is found in nature.
Doubt anyone really cares. Sounds more like a caricature to me.

~~~
Nursie
I'm sneering at people who make themselves sick unnecessarily by drinking
random plant-juice with a side-order of woo rather than a proper preparation
that would give the same effects without the discomfort or other risks, all in
the name of 'authenticity'.

------
yolesaber
I run an ayahuasca clinic in Upstate NY. I make all my own preparations and
tend to the ritual aspects as well as guide people on trips. I've been doing
this as my profession for several years now, feel free to ask any questions

~~~
Kroniker
Wow! That must be an insane profession. I have a few questions for you:
Firstly, how do you deal with the legal aspect of things? (If you can answer
that, if not, I understand)

Secondly, why take the potion instead of pure DMT? If that is the active
ingredient (along with an MAOI), I'd imagine just taking the pure compound to
be more efficacious. (And the trips last only 20 minutes or something- under
an hour)

Thirdly, say you have a chronic illness that requires constant management,
like type 1 diabetes or something. I've heard the potion takes 12 hours, or in
some extreme cases days, to work itself out of your system. Would that person
still be a candidate for the ritual, or would they need to go through it with
a medical professional on-site or something?

~~~
yolesaber
It's not as crazy as you might imagine - at least, compared to the lifestyles
my clients lead. I (unfortunately) do not live in a geodesic yurt in some
Catskill mountain grove, but in a modest rear house apartment in a town with
generally nothing going on. The ceremonies are all hosted at friends or
acquaintances houses who rent it to me.

The legality of it is something I am not worried about. The reagents to make
DMT are not illegal to possess, only DMT itself. I keep them all separated at
all times and I do not possess any baggies, scales, or any drug paraphernalia.
The drugs are created on-site by me a day before the trip - this is part of
the package I offer. Basically you come stay at a gorgeous (sometimes less so
but generally nice) home and relax, put your cell phone in an anti-static bag
in a safe and unwind before the next day. Sometimes I throw little parties
with my friends' bands, but thats at the discretion of the client (after all a
party is a good way to attract cops). If I do get caught, I would try my best
to use the case as a legal vehicle to change the scheduling of DMT and other
psychedelics.

With regards to potions + crystals (the 'pure' form of DMT), well, like other
business I offer various products and packages. The trips are different,
totally separate categories of mind-altering. Both options are available plus
other packages. There's a DMT + LSD two-night stay that I personally think is
the most fun (depends on my ability to procure that though, since I'm not
_that_ good at synthesis and LSD is legit the hardest drug to make) since they
get both the intense "next-level" DMT and then they can ride it out on some
low-dosage LSD where we paint, read, write, occasionally program (lots of
'hacker' clients), discuss, and whatever else the client wants to do. I get a
lot of couples who just want me to be there to administer the potion and then
be "on-call" in case they freak out but that's only happened once. I just
write on those days. Working on a fantasy novel.

I have friends who have chronic illnesses who swear by "recreational" drugs
such as LSD, DMT (both forms), and, of course, THC. They have good judgement
of their limits and I would say are more in touch with their body than able
bodied people, it's fascinating to hear them talk of their conception of their
physicality as compared to (this is a real quote) the finance bro who sees it
more "like a bunch of car parts that evolution glued together". People with
illnesses are attuned to their systems in a way that offers a unique
perspective to me. However, I have personally never administered a trip to
someone who wasn't able-bodied or otherwise 'healthy' \- not bc of my
preference, it's just been the clientele so far. We generally do not trip with
medical people on staff unless requests but that's never come up.

~~~
solotronics
I have heard second hand that this site works great
[http://pwoah7foa6au2pul.onion](http://pwoah7foa6au2pul.onion) (please use Tor
browser to access)

------
notliketherest
All of this "self exploration, cosmos consciousness, soul enlightenment"
justification for using these drugs sounds to me like the promises of profit
in Tim Ferris' 4 hour work week: 1) take drugs 2) ??? 3) Enlightenment. You
know that Mt Fuji analogy whereby a hiker hikes to the top of Mt Fuji for
enlightenment, choosing his path on the way? Well it seems to me like this
people are looking for a quick helicopter ride to the top. And having used
these drugs myself in the past, I was so stupid and naive to think that it
would impart the wisdom that decades of life should give you. Idk to me this
all seems like a bunch of bullshit.

~~~
empath75
Drug experiences are still experiences and like any experience, you can learn
something from them or waste them.

At the absolute least, a psychedelic experience should teach you a lesson
about the reliability of the senses and about how subjective our experience of
reality can be, which is a valuable lesson to learn, IMO, and no matter how
much you understand it intellectually, directly experiencing it is another
matter entirely.

~~~
notliketherest
You make a good point - the psychedelic experience can lead to a greater sense
of empathy in that you perceive the world not through the eyes of your ego but
as "all one" (over simplification). An increase in empathy is a good thing but
equating these drugs to a magic pill for self actualization is wrong.

~~~
posterboy
> world not through the eyes of your ego

in most cases, you don't see much of the world past you own eyes anymore, but
some "fantasy", which is why it is aptly called an hallucinogen. It messes
with your head and you have a hard time making sense of the world so you
revert to some basic notions of knowledge, that appear like an epiphany
because they are that basic. I don't think these are new found insights and
good luck if these facilities of your brain are damaged in the process. It is
called _acid_ for a reason.

Edit: A neat analogy would be fuzzing a production system. Not only that, it
is randomly deleting files and flipping bits of memory to see how robust the
system is. If your system is error free, the fuzzing is not a problem, but
every system has bugs.

------
ktRolster
Be careful. These quotes from the article are kind of worrying:

 _“Do you have doctors or anyone on hand who understands what’s happening on a
pharmacological level if something goes wrong?” There was a tense silence, and
then Little Owl replied, “We are healing on a vibrational level.”_

And:

 _I asked how she could tell it wasn’t something requiring immediate medical
intervention, and the [mediator] replied, “Intuition.”_

~~~
jomamaxx
Indeed. This is not a toy drug. This is heavy-duty.

I wonder if there is maybe something simple, medically, that can be done by a
'non pro' \- like - if there are specific and identifiable symptoms - 'take
this pill' which has a neutralizing or softening effect or something.
Hopefully something safe and natural. Maybe even something like 'drink
caffeine and eat something fatty' \- or whatever might work that's easy and
accessible.

~~~
Kroniker
As far as I know, you can get "chill pills", I think maybe benzodiazepines
will calm you down, but even in an ER they just make sure you're safe and let
your ride it out. Once that roller coaster starts it needs to run it's course.

Source: Burnout friend.

~~~
jomamaxx
I think for opioid overdose there is a medical intervention, but for these
psychedelic things ... I guess there isn't much to do.

But psychological risk is real. My friend did something similar in Brazil and
had 'fear' episodes for years.

------
trappedintime
The experience you will have is tremendously dependent on a few things: your
existing state of mind, the physical environment / location of the experience,
preparations (if any) made for the experience, and arguably most importantly
(IMHO), your intention or reason for seeking the experience.

If you go at it with the attitude that this is simply a reason to get high, or
to observe visual disturbances for the sheer sake of hallucinating, there's a
very good chance that will comprise your experience. Conversely, if you set an
intention of learning about yourself, life, death, existence, the universe,
etc., and approach it with regard, then there is a very good chance you will
have _that_ experience.

From what I have gathered observing myself and my friends, the latter can be
quite transformative to the self. It can encourage profound positive changes
in attitude and improve quality of life, increase spiritual awareness and
feelings of interconnectedness, greatly diminish or eliminate one's fear of
death, among other things. These feelings can last, sometimes for life, and it
can take months to fully integrate the lessons learned and information gained
after returning from the "journey". See the John's Hopkins study on psilocybin
for more information.

Preparation and intent simply cannot be understated when it comes to the use
of these substances. What the psychedelic enthusiasts refer to as 'set and
setting'.

~~~
thescribe
If the effect only manifests when you think about it correctly, is it a
placebo?

~~~
trappedintime
And this is precisely where trying to measure a unique experience with
microscopes and well-established materialist scientific theorems begins to
fail us. An experience, by the way, that many call the 'most important' of
their life. They describe it as 'noetic' in that it seems _more real_ than
ordinary consensus reality, and 'ineffible' in that it cannot be successfully
described, it must be experienced firsthand.

These aren't just the waxings of a hippie distracted at work, I can point you
to studies that demonstrate the repeatability of it all (i.e., 'most important
experience of life' claims, noetic properties, ineffable, etc.) _Many_ people
use these descriptors when regarding their respective psychedelic journeys.

In my opinion, the reason some people have awe-inspiring life-changing
experiences and some just see neat visuals or have the ominous 'bad trip' goes
back to my first comment. Set, setting, and intention are absolutely
everything with these substances. The stuff just seems to be of a higher
order, and it seems it gives you just what you deserve.

------
ap22213
Why does the plant produce DMT? Is it a poison? Are there other plants that
produce it?

I wonder about the evolutionary reasons for its emergence. Does the plant
influence the Human so that the Human protects and nurtures the plant? When
did Humans begin altering South America? 15,000 years ago? More than enough
time for the plant to adapt.

It's a strange feeling to ingest a hallucination producing organism. I
remember being 19 years old, in the 90s, being given mushrooms. I spent the
next several hours sitting at a tree stump feeling myself sink into it,
feeling merged with plants around me. I remember thinking a lot about the
juxtaposition of the natural with the concrete and brick and asphalt just a
few hundred meters away - and wanting to tear it all down. Now, decades later,
reading the woman's experience, I wonder if the fungi had somehow manipulated
me.

~~~
throwanem
Might want to spend some time thinking about that phrase "evolutionary
reasons". There's an assumption in there I'm not sure you've noticed.

~~~
ap22213
That's pretty cryptic... Ok, what do you mean? I'm dense.

~~~
salmon30salmon
I am not the OC, but I think he was going on about how you apparently
attributed a certain level of "reason" to evolution. His contention is that
evolution exists free of reason. I think you two are disagreeing on the term
reason.

You mean "reason" in the sense of "why" and he means reason in the sense of
"logical conditions". The why is an interesting question, what environmental
or other factors provided an advantage in a plant containing this chemical, or
was it a non-important side effect of some other change. It is interesting,
maybe not easily knowable.

Hope this clears it up. I may be wrong, but I get annoyed when I read comments
that are negative without an explanation, so I thought I would attempt to
shine some light.

~~~
throwanem
'Negative'? That seems a touch harsh, although possibly just because I find
myself on the pointy end.

~~~
salmon30salmon
Maybe less "negative" and more "non-constructive". It is a personal annoyance
of mine when a reply points out a flaw or misunderstanding, but does so behind
a veil of ambiguity. It completely passes up on a chance to educate the OP,
and instead leaves them feeling uncertain.

------
Nursie
So much pretension, so much bollocks...

Just drop some acid like a normal person, or take a harmaline cap and some dmt
later. No need for all this 'purging' and ceremony.

~~~
throwanem
I don't know that it is bad for novices to have some framework in which to
interpret and assimilate what is often a very intense experience. A reasonable
degree of nuance might suggest that, while there's perhaps quite a lot of
reason to blame people experienced enough to know better for making more
(less?) of it than it merits, there's no reason to blame people who lack that
experience for wanting, especially their first time, something a little more
special than just "oh, drop some acid like a normal person".

~~~
Nursie
Special? Fine, set and setting can be very important. But the nonsense about
picking the vines at a certain time of day, and the idea that we don't need
medical expertise on hand because we're special and....

It really winds me up. You're doing oral DMT, not magic...

------
wtbob
I wonder what the effects of chemically-induced pseudowisdom are. Real wisdom,
after all, is both physiological and mental, a product of experience as well
as of neurochemistry. What might be the ill-effects of feeling that one has
gained wisdom when in fact one has only altered one's brain chemistry?

~~~
StudyAnimal
Well, if real wisdom requires experience then the harm you are talking about
is probably slightly less harmful than the pseudo-wisdom one feels when
reading another persons experience in a book. After all reading a book doesn't
give us an experience, its all "just" chemistry too..

~~~
wtbob
> After all reading a book doesn't give us an experience, its all "just"
> chemistry too..

I'd disagree there. It's less experience than actually doing something, but
more than just getting a chemical flow across the brain. Reading is a weak
sort of experience, no?

~~~
StudyAnimal
I was being toungue and cheek. Of course reading a book is an experience, as
is taking drugs. And its not just chemical , you might go to the park and have
an adventure between two blades of grass or something. Its not like people
just drop a tab, close their eyes and lie in bed. I would say in order of
strength of experience I would say something like: [Big Adventure without
drugs] > [Small adventure with drugs] > [Reading] > [Dreaming]

------
sverige
I tripped once years ago on an extract of morning glory seeds that a genius
friend of my sister concocted. (Essentially lysergic acid amide, plus maybe
some other alkaloids, look it up if you're that interested.)

There was no preparation as far as set and setting. Basically I was a chronic
drug-using teenager who was trying something new. Took the stuff before a
concert and began tripping during the opening act. Had a great time. Saw some
weird shit. Blacked out for a while as usual because I was also smoking a lot
of pot and drinking beer for hydration.

Somehow reconnected with the people I went with and got a ride home, with some
intervening adventures on the way. Lay down in bed to sleep and that's when it
got weird. Hard to describe and kind of boring if you weren't there ( _but you
might have been! ;-)_ )

Woke up the next morning still tripping balls. Couldn't stop it, got kind of
scared. Called people and said shit I don't remember and that they still won't
repeat.

Finally stopped tripping later that day, and was exhausted for another day.
Found out later from the genius that the dose was roughly equivalent to
350-500 mcg of LSD (i.e., a lot).

Read The Yage Letters shortly after that. Haven't tripped since. Occasionally
consider it since I've done a lot more reading and work in the 37 years since
that experience, but now it's a hipster thing so it's embarrassing to admit. I
mean, the New Yorker is writing articles about it. You don't even have to dig
through a few different grungy bookstores to find a copy of the Beat take on
it from the '50s.

So, probably never yage / ayahuasca, but maybe someday a tab of acid. Or maybe
not. I'm a lot more self-aware and enlightened than I was at 17, but I think
that's mostly because I've lived another 37 years and survived all the trouble
along the path, not because I tripped once.

P.S. People had these exact same kinds of conversations on this topic 35 years
ago.

------
Hydraulix989
I'm a SV entrepreneur who is pretty well-connected with the community here
(only mentioning this for the sake of credibility).

Maybe it's because I missed Burning Man this year, but I haven't heard of
anybody doing this outside of articles on Tech Crunch that say people are (let
alone normal hallucinogens).

Marijuana or Adderall, sure (Meadow and Eaze are doing well here); maybe even
the /r/nootropics stack, but not hallucinogenic substances.

I know people who have experimented with shrooms, but they don't consider them
a "drug of choice," let alone a productivity enhancer by any means. In fact,
one of my acquaintances ended up going off the deep end when he started taking
LSD. It was a really sad story.

------
makeset
A friend of mine participated in an ayahuasca ceremony, and he said that it
completely changed him, from a person who wanted to try ayahuasca to a person
who would never do it again.

------
bduerst
Has anyone here actually tried ayahuasca and can share their experience?

~~~
unfunco
I have, not in Peru but at home. I've tried DMT roughly 300 times,
pharmahuasca (N,N-DMT in an enteric capsule, inside a larger capsule of
synthetic monoamine oxidase inhibitor) and ayahuasca, and the usual others
(I've tried everything I could find from Pihkal and Tihkal). I eventually
became too afraid of DMT (I had mistakenly bought 5-MeO-DMT and was using the
same dosage and that wasn't pleasant, and now I'm too anxious to "blast-off"
because of the pace) and wanted something slower, so I turned to Ayahuasca.

It's a difficult feeling to describe (three Ayahuasca sessions at home so
far.) – it's similar to N,N-DMT but whilst DMT feels like chapter-skipping,
Ayahuasca feels like things are being played at 1x – If you have specific
questions I will try to answer them.

~~~
vernie
You still think of it as "trying" after 300 doses?

~~~
unfunco
I was lucky enough to breakthrough on my first dose, and the only times I
haven't broken through have been down to choice (to feel what lower doses felt
like) – I invested in better equipment
([http://imgur.com/vjvKzQB](http://imgur.com/vjvKzQB) – from one of my posts
in the /r/DMT channel in reddit) after the first few breakthroughs, it was the
most interesting, terrifying, and beautiful thing that has ever happened to
me, and I wanted to keep doing it to try and work out just what it was, there
have been moments where I have lay in awe completely convinced I am witnessing
everything happening everywhere in the universe, there have been times where
I've been convinced I am solely responsible for the destruction of the
universe, that my consciousness was the last thing left, there have been so
many other strange experiences, I could never control them, I had to just sit
back and feel everything, so it was always trying, I doubt that it's possible
to master the effects, and most I know from various communities on the subject
tend to ease off at around the same number of times that I did, as a chemical,
it's absolutely non-addictive, all psychedelics I tend to find as self-
regulating.

------
gerbilly
Why is this community so uncomfortable around 'woo'?

Some of my ideas:

Woo multiplies entities beyond necessity.

Woo uses imagery (goddesses, grandmotherss, spirits, 'energy') that we find
aesthetically displeasing?

Woo has an anything goes feel to it (whatever is true for you...)

But perhaps we should look at our own woo before criticizing others too much
for theirs, after all the world of business is full of it's own sort of woo
(synergize our two platforms to leverage our cloud based infrastructure going
forward...)

To me when someone speaks woo, it's a sign that the person may be on to
something that can't yet be expressed.

This can happen to techies, for example during that interval when you feel
that you have solved a problem you have been working on, but can't quite
express it clearly yet.

But woo is so open ended, that this is only true for the best cases. Often
it's just nonsense, but so are scientific abstracts and press releases
sometimes.

------
Kazamai
Short circuiting your brain is not the path to spirituality, therapy or
enlightenment.

~~~
metaphorm
is that what you think it is? have you ever taken a psychedelic drug?

~~~
dwaltrip
Or perhaps more importantly, surveyed the unfortunately scant literature to
understand how they work as well as any potential for harm.

~~~
Hydraulix989
Regardless, you MIGHT get some non-mainstream academic agreement that there is
the potential for therapeutic benefits; but not "Enlightenment" or anything
spiritual.

Although, it seems to me that the burden of providing such literature is on
you, not OP (no, erowid.com doesn't count).

~~~
metaphorm
erowid is a fine source for experiential reports and technical information on
the botany and/or pharmacology of the substances involved.

let me ask you a question: is nothing true unless a credentialed academic
writes a peer reviewed journal published paper about it?

------
6stringmerc
In years of observation, I have no doubt that if the compound has some
interesting properties, it will be exploited, outcry / moralizing will ensue,
and legislation will be passed to criminialise any use. All it really takes is
one precious snowflake to do something hurtful to themselves or others to
kick-off a motivated response. Well, at least computer duster inhalants are
still widely available (/sarcasm).

~~~
Synaesthesia
>legislation will be passed to criminialise any use

DMT was banned ages ago.

------
zizzles
In my eyes the VERY FACT that psychedelics like N,N-Dimethyltryptamine (DMT)
even exist in the FIRST place (and take you on the experiences that they take
you) can NOT be some sort of coincidence. I am not suggesting that they are
some special all-knowing tool, but the sheer potency of DMT and the other-
worldly-dimension-changing-states-of-mind that it yields when consumed can not
be shrugged off as just another recreational drug or "you're just high bro",
at least not to me.

We have consciousness. We see. We feel... but existence remains a mystery. No
one on Earth can properly put into words what THIS is. It's unexplainable, at
least to me. You can perhaps say "we are in the Milky Way" or "we are located
in the Universe" or "we are existing" but these are just vague primitive
monkey explanations.

Substances like DMT can shed light on these questions from a different vantage
point.

~~~
rconti
I'm confused. It cannot be a coincidence that substances exist on this earth
that alter our consciousness? Why not? There are all kinds of substances found
naturally that can change the way you feel, change the way your body acts,
kill you, make you hallucinate, whatever.

Is it proof that there has to be a purpose behind them?

I forgot what the term is, but is this not like the fallacy of believing there
must be a creator, because there is this wonderful planet for us to
experience? But if we were not here to experience it, we would not know it was
missing.

~~~
stevetrewick
Possibly the argument from personal incredulity?[0] Or maybe the Anthropic
Principle? [1] Little column A, little column B?

[0]
[http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Argument_from_incredulity#Perso...](http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Argument_from_incredulity#Personal_incredulity)

[1]
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthropic_principle](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthropic_principle)

~~~
rconti
Anthropic principle, yes, thank you!

