Magic mushrooms

Post Reply
User avatar
DRSB
Posts: 5591
Joined: Wed Jul 07, 2010 12:07 pm
Location: Switzerland
Contact:

Magic mushrooms

Post by DRSB » Fri Oct 20, 2017 4:47 am

Apparently, Human Evolution Is The Result Of Apes Eating Magic Mushrooms

We know that Homo sapiens (modern humans) evolved from Homo erectus, but what was it precisely that launched that evolutionary process? Scientists have long debated over this question. But one author developed a particularly unique and fascinating theory. He called it the “Stoned Ape Hypothesis.”

This controversial theory was developed by none other than the late Terence McKenna, one of the world’s most prominent champions of psychedelic drugs, who describes the transition of Homo erectus into Homo sapiens, essentially, as a series of magic mushrooms trips so significant that it launched us into our present state of consciousness.
https://herb.co/2017/10/16/humans-evolu ... e-mckenna/

User avatar
Animavore
Nasty Hombre
Posts: 39234
Joined: Sun Mar 01, 2009 11:26 am
Location: Ire Land.
Contact:

Re: Magic mushrooms

Post by Animavore » Fri Oct 20, 2017 4:54 am

Lamarkian evolution was debunked with Darwin.
Libertarianism: The belief that out of all the terrible things governments can do, helping people is the absolute worst.

User avatar
DRSB
Posts: 5591
Joined: Wed Jul 07, 2010 12:07 pm
Location: Switzerland
Contact:

Re: Magic mushrooms

Post by DRSB » Fri Oct 20, 2017 4:55 am

Well, well, some theories are worth revisiting.

User avatar
Svartalf
Offensive Grail Keeper
Posts: 40340
Joined: Wed Feb 24, 2010 12:42 pm
Location: Paris France
Contact:

Re: Magic mushrooms

Post by Svartalf » Fri Oct 20, 2017 9:26 am

Terence McKenna eh... that's old news and he's dead but his theories about psychedelic plants were always interesting.
I oughtto read Food of the Gods.
Embrace the Darkness, it needs a hug

PC stands for "Patronizing Cocksucker" Randy Ping

User avatar
Pappa
Non-Practicing Anarchist
Non-Practicing Anarchist
Posts: 56484
Joined: Wed Feb 18, 2009 10:42 am
About me: I am sacrificing a turnip as I type.
Location: Le sud du Pays de Galles.
Contact:

Re: Magic mushrooms

Post by Pappa » Fri Oct 20, 2017 10:03 am

McKenna mostly spouted unsubstantiated nonsense.

Svartalf, I've got a spare copy of Food of the Gods if you want it.

User avatar
Svartalf
Offensive Grail Keeper
Posts: 40340
Joined: Wed Feb 24, 2010 12:42 pm
Location: Paris France
Contact:

Re: Magic mushrooms

Post by Svartalf » Fri Oct 20, 2017 10:34 am

If it's a spare and you won't miss it, I'd be glad of the opportunity...

and seriously, without even going to David Icke levels, if you want undadulterated unsubstantiated nonsense, just try Graham Hancock...the sign and the seal was Baigent etc (Holy Blood, Holy Grail) class balderdash, and Fingerprints of the Gods proves definitely that Erich von Daniken is not dead, or got reincarnated...
Embrace the Darkness, it needs a hug

PC stands for "Patronizing Cocksucker" Randy Ping

User avatar
Rum
Absent Minded Processor
Posts: 37285
Joined: Wed Mar 11, 2009 9:25 pm
Location: South of the border..though not down Mexico way..
Contact:

Re: Magic mushrooms

Post by Rum » Fri Oct 20, 2017 11:03 am

Even if it is impossible for psychedelics to actually spark evolutionary development there is a lot of evidence that they create 'unnatural' connections between parts of the brain that don't normally 'speak' to each other. It is conceivable, at least that such a process kick started some form of consciousness hitherto not experienced by primitive hominids.

I know that I experienced other forms of consciousness - ones I could never begin to describe while smashed out of my gourd. I brought at least some of that back with me to the 'real world'.

User avatar
DRSB
Posts: 5591
Joined: Wed Jul 07, 2010 12:07 pm
Location: Switzerland
Contact:

Re: Magic mushrooms

Post by DRSB » Fri Oct 20, 2017 2:25 pm

This too happened as a result of mushrooms:
Wikipedia:
The Dancing Plague (or Dance Epidemic) of 1518 was a case of dancing mania that occurred in Strasbourg, Alsace (then part of the Holy Roman Empire) in July 1518. Around 400 people took to dancing for days without rest, and, over the period of about one month, some of those affected died of heart attack, stroke, or exhaustion.
People were hungry, ate anything they could lay their hands on, got hold of some mushrooms probably.

User avatar
Pappa
Non-Practicing Anarchist
Non-Practicing Anarchist
Posts: 56484
Joined: Wed Feb 18, 2009 10:42 am
About me: I am sacrificing a turnip as I type.
Location: Le sud du Pays de Galles.
Contact:

Re: Magic mushrooms

Post by Pappa » Fri Oct 20, 2017 2:26 pm

Rum wrote:Even if it is impossible for psychedelics to actually spark evolutionary development there is a lot of evidence that they create 'unnatural' connections between parts of the brain that don't normally 'speak' to each other. It is conceivable, at least that such a process kick started some form of consciousness hitherto not experienced by primitive hominids.

I know that I experienced other forms of consciousness - ones I could never begin to describe while smashed out of my gourd. I brought at least some of that back with me to the 'real world'.
It's conceivable, but ultimately unprovable if it happened to us.

User avatar
DRSB
Posts: 5591
Joined: Wed Jul 07, 2010 12:07 pm
Location: Switzerland
Contact:

Re: Magic mushrooms

Post by DRSB » Fri Oct 20, 2017 2:36 pm

Pappa wrote:
Rum wrote:Even if it is impossible for psychedelics to actually spark evolutionary development there is a lot of evidence that they create 'unnatural' connections between parts of the brain that don't normally 'speak' to each other. It is conceivable, at least that such a process kick started some form of consciousness hitherto not experienced by primitive hominids.

I know that I experienced other forms of consciousness - ones I could never begin to describe while smashed out of my gourd. I brought at least some of that back with me to the 'real world'.
It's conceivable, but ultimately unprovable if it happened to us.
I wonder how anything worth proving about consciousness can be proven at all!

User avatar
L'Emmerdeur
Posts: 5700
Joined: Wed Apr 06, 2011 11:04 pm
About me: Yuh wust nightmaya!
Contact:

Re: Magic mushrooms

Post by L'Emmerdeur » Fri Oct 20, 2017 2:55 pm

DRSB wrote:This too happened as a result of mushrooms:
Wikipedia:
The Dancing Plague (or Dance Epidemic) of 1518 was a case of dancing mania that occurred in Strasbourg, Alsace (then part of the Holy Roman Empire) in July 1518. Around 400 people took to dancing for days without rest, and, over the period of about one month, some of those affected died of heart attack, stroke, or exhaustion.
People were hungry, ate anything they could lay their hands on, got hold of some mushrooms probably.
Your source doesn't mention psychedelic mushrooms. Do you have another? A number of years ago I spent some time researching the phenomenon and to my knowledge, as with tarantism generally, there is no one recognized causal factor.

User avatar
DRSB
Posts: 5591
Joined: Wed Jul 07, 2010 12:07 pm
Location: Switzerland
Contact:

Re: Magic mushrooms

Post by DRSB » Fri Oct 20, 2017 2:57 pm

L'Emmerdeur wrote:
DRSB wrote:This too happened as a result of mushrooms:
Wikipedia:
The Dancing Plague (or Dance Epidemic) of 1518 was a case of dancing mania that occurred in Strasbourg, Alsace (then part of the Holy Roman Empire) in July 1518. Around 400 people took to dancing for days without rest, and, over the period of about one month, some of those affected died of heart attack, stroke, or exhaustion.
People were hungry, ate anything they could lay their hands on, got hold of some mushrooms probably.
Your source doesn't mention psychedelic mushrooms. Do you have another? A number of years ago I spent some time researching the phenomenon and to my knowledge, as with tarantism generally, there is no one recognized causal factor.
Wikipedia mentions mushrooms.
Modern theories include food-poisoning caused by the toxic and psychoactive chemical products of ergot fungi, which grows commonly on grains in the wheat family (such as rye). Ergotamine is the main psychoactive product of ergot fungi; it is structurally related to the recreational drug lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD-25), and is the substance from which LSD-25 was originally synthesized. The same fungus has also been implicated in other major historical anomalies, including the Salem witch trials. Waller speculates that the dancing was "stress-induced psychosis" on a mass level, since the region where the people danced was riddled with starvation and disease, and the inhabitants tended to be superstitious. Seven other cases of dancing plague were reported in the same region during the medieval era. [5]

User avatar
L'Emmerdeur
Posts: 5700
Joined: Wed Apr 06, 2011 11:04 pm
About me: Yuh wust nightmaya!
Contact:

Re: Magic mushrooms

Post by L'Emmerdeur » Fri Oct 20, 2017 3:15 pm

Ergot is a fungus (genus Claviceps), but it does not produce mushrooms. It deforms grain somewhat and causes it to change color, but does not form large fruiting bodies (mushrooms being the fruiting bodies of certain varieties of fungus).

Image
Deformed grains, called 'spurs,' colonized by Claviceps (source).

In any event, ergotism is only one of the hypothesized causes of tarantism, and there is no solid evidence supporting it over other hypotheses.

User avatar
Brian Peacock
Tipping cows since 1946
Posts: 37953
Joined: Thu Mar 05, 2009 11:44 am
About me: Ablate me:
Location: Location: Location:
Contact:

Re: Magic mushrooms

Post by Brian Peacock » Fri Oct 20, 2017 3:58 pm

Rum wrote:Even if it is impossible for psychedelics to actually spark evolutionary development there is a lot of evidence that they create 'unnatural' connections between parts of the brain that don't normally 'speak' to each other. It is conceivable, at least that such a process kick started some form of consciousness hitherto not experienced by primitive hominids.

I know that I experienced other forms of consciousness - ones I could never begin to describe while smashed out of my gourd. I brought at least some of that back with me to the 'real world'.
Wiithout an explanation for how those 'unnatural connections between parts of the brain that don't normally speak to each other' might be inheritable and persist across generations it remains in the realms of a good idea for a story.

As for 'other forms of consciousness', I think we use language like that to bridge the gap between indescribable experiences and the so-called 'real world', but it's not an 'other' kind of consciousness in the discrete and unique sense the words imply, just the disruption and dissolution of normal cognitive process brought on by induced changes in brain chemistry. To this extent, a trip is a functionally impoverished, inferior, or compromised state of cognition when compared to our everyday experience.
Rationalia relies on voluntary donations. There is no obligation of course, but if you value this place and want to see it continue please consider making a small donation towards the forum's running costs.
Details on how to do that can be found here.

.

"It isn't necessary to imagine the world ending in fire or ice.
There are two other possibilities: one is paperwork, and the other is nostalgia."

Frank Zappa

"This is how humanity ends; bickering over the irrelevant."
Clinton Huxley » 21 Jun 2012 » 14:10:36 GMT
.

User avatar
Rum
Absent Minded Processor
Posts: 37285
Joined: Wed Mar 11, 2009 9:25 pm
Location: South of the border..though not down Mexico way..
Contact:

Re: Magic mushrooms

Post by Rum » Fri Oct 20, 2017 4:37 pm

Brian Peacock wrote:
Rum wrote:Even if it is impossible for psychedelics to actually spark evolutionary development there is a lot of evidence that they create 'unnatural' connections between parts of the brain that don't normally 'speak' to each other. It is conceivable, at least that such a process kick started some form of consciousness hitherto not experienced by primitive hominids.

I know that I experienced other forms of consciousness - ones I could never begin to describe while smashed out of my gourd. I brought at least some of that back with me to the 'real world'.
Wiithout an explanation for how those 'unnatural connections between parts of the brain that don't normally speak to each other' might be inheritable and persist across generations it remains in the realms of a good idea for a story.

As for 'other forms of consciousness', I think we use language like that to bridge the gap between indescribable experiences and the so-called 'real world', but it's not an 'other' kind of consciousness in the discrete and unique sense the words imply, just the disruption and dissolution of normal cognitive process brought on by induced changes in brain chemistry. To this extent, a trip is a functionally impoverishedd, inferior, or compromised state of cognition when compared to our everyday experience.
I don't see how you can use value judgments about various forms of consciousness as above. Altered consciousness as experienced with LSD and similar substances are I will accept 'disabling' in the sense that one can't generally function properly in terms of survival, work and purposeful activity. But some of the experiences I had were without doubt and expansion of my mental function in some way - making new connections, conceptually, cognitively and even emotionally now and again.

It is conceivable that cave men tripping out on ergot or mushrooms could have had experiences that led them to new ways of conceptualising the world around them.

How of course that could affect them at the level of DNA is another matter.

Post Reply

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 13 guests