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entityexperiment said:
I don't mean to relentless try to put down all ideas...I guess I'm anaylitical(sp?) by nature.

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Ekstaza said:
I once thought of Terence McKenna as some sort of revolutionary thinker and pioneer of psychedelia, but the more I read in that book the more he just seems like he's lost it. I find a lot of the things he says very kooky and off the wall.

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Yo Mama said:
Number one, does it occur naturally in a plant or an animal? Because nature has use-tested these compounds over millions and millions of years. Something that came out of the laboratory four or five years ago--who knows? So it should be a product of the natural world.

Number two, does it have a history of human usage? Mushrooms do. Mescaline does. LSD doesn't. Ecstacy doesn't.

And number three, and most important, it should have some affinity to brain chemistry. It shouldn't be just like landing on the moon; it should be related to what is driving ordinary consciousness. This last criteria is the most narrow, because mescaline won't get through that. LSD won't get through that......."

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Precisely

I took some liberties with paragraphs... sorry 

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Slipknot420 said:

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Ekstaza said:
I once thought of Terence McKenna as some sort of revolutionary thinker and pioneer of psychedelia, but the more I read in that book the more he just seems like he's lost it. I find a lot of the things he says very kooky and off the wall.

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personally i gotta agree with you

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I don't recall hearing Mckenna say he denounces LSD but I can see how he preferred the tryptamines over all else..

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Trip said:
interesting stuff ekstaza, and yes dmt can be extracted. its  a chemical in dozens of plants in south america from barks to grass and is used by them for spiritual rituals. go to erowid and look up ayahuasca.

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Rick Strassman (DMT the spirit molecule) says it is in almost every living thing to some extent. Our own bodies manufacture it! Some plants and animals like certain toads (esp. in S. America like you said) manufacture a lot more of the stuff). I think it is SO fascinating.  I have been trying to read everything I can get my hands on about dmt since I read that book. 

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entityexperiment said:
That does make sense.  But I find it hard to believe he couldn't see hallucinations on lsd.

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Also, in regards to the comment about it being safe because it comes from "nature".  There are plants that would kill you in less then 5 minutes, poisonous berries, etc.  Just because something has been in nature for millions of years, doesn't make it safe.  Also, hasn't lsd now been used by millions of people since it's discovery?  Of course, it can't compete with how long mushrooms and dmt containing plants have been around...but it has been around for some time now. But I wonder, what is an acceptable time for something to be considered "safe"?

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I think that what McKenna is getting at is that humans (and other life forms) have been USING these psychoactive plants purposefully for thousands of years. Some people propose that anything you can eat, that grows- is poisonous to some degree- (there is a book called pharma kopoea that says this- excellent book btw). Some more than others obviously. Humans traditionally pass on knowledge about these plants from generation to generation, it's how we all survived. One of McKenna's biggest issues was that we are going to lose the knowlege of most of the plants in the rainforest within 30 years since all the indigenous ppls are leaving for "city life". So sad....