Sparks, DMT, Strassman, Strieber and Entities

[RedClover]

Greetings fellow listeners, and Gene and David.

Normally I would never want to plug Strieber's show, but his March 3rd 2007 Episode is an interview with Dr. Rick Strassman about DMT entity contact. Which, I thought at least, was fairly interesting. At anyrate, in terms of the Jim Sparks episode that just aired here on the Paracast, I was reminded of when Sparks was talking about this kind of noise/pressure/something that built up in his head before the encounter. Strassman and Strieber also mention this same issue. There were other similarities as well. I'm not talking about time travel or crazy technology or anything of that sort. What I mean are similarities in terms of the physiological set before an encounter.

To get to the point, I was wondering what any of you here on the Paracast forums thought about the endogenous chemical DMT (N,N-dimethyltryptamine) and entity contact. There's lots of info but if you're unfamiliar with the subject, Strieber's interview with Strassman is a good place to start. The website where you can find this March 3, 2007 interview is at

science, UFOs, alien abductions, crop circles, prophecy, reincarnation, environment | dreamland radio | unknowncountry

On a bizarre side note, extreme stress and fear is one, (and there are many) of the mechanisms by which the body produces larger amounts of DMT. Would it be possible that if "beings" needed to communicate through DMT, then the easiest way to do so would be through generating extreme fear? I know there are lots of 'what ifs' and holes in that statement, but I think it's worth contemplating none the less. Thanks for your time, and I look forward to your responses.

-RedClover

 

[CapnG]

Sounds utterly preposterous. I've heard some weak justifications for drug use but this takes the cake. They're called hallucinogens for a reason.

 

[The Hawk]

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I think that DMT can open some sort of rift to other realities through one's own mind. But much, much more research should be done. It should be studied around the world in depth. The small amount of study that has been done is promising. There are many common threads to users experiences; even when the experiencers are told nothing about the drug. Modern peoples need to get their heads out of the sand when it comes to halucinagens. The world isn't black and white when it comes to drugs, there are shades of grey and even colors. Especially with something like DMT which is a natural chemical in the brain just like mescaline.

 

[Aaron LeClair]

What's that Joe Rogan show called? It on satelite? I noticed cussing, so it can't be regular. Anyway, I might check it out.

I got all Hick's stuff memorized

I'm surprised Whitley is dealing with this stuff however. He should know drugs and aliens are a no no in trying to validate the abduction experience. Not sure what context he's dealing with this in though.

 

[CapnG]

I don't buy any of this.

Caveat: I don't do drugs, I've never done drugs, I never plan to do drugs, I therefore lack firsthand experience. I did however go to an art college and roomed with nine different guys over three years, so I've had plenty of opportunity to observe people ON drugs. It ain't pretty but it is occaisionally amusing.

I don't believe psychedelic drugs are a "gateway" to a "higher conciousness". They're hallucinogens. That's all there is to it, the person is hallucinating. I don't care how vivid the images they see are, they're artifical, forced, in short- fake. The desperate attempts of the concious mind to make sense of the chemicaly-induced gibberish swilling around in the physical brain. The shaman who eats the magic mushrooms and then goes to the sacred cave to commune with the gods isn't really communing with anything, except maybe the dirt floor of the cave as he lies there twitching and drooling.

And this DMT stuff. So okay, the brain produces it naturally durning sleep and at the moment of death. Hmmm... anyone ever think that just maybe there's a reason for that? Rather there's a reason the brain DOESN'T produce it during concious thought? I'm routinely amazed that people are willing to play the chemical version of russian roulette with their grey matter in pursuit of false visions and imaginary "enlightenment". Spare me.

 

[Aaron LeClair]

I know for a fact booze alters reality. I've seen many ugly women turn into hotties!

 

[The Hawk]

It's not black and white. Human mystical experiences ARE in the mind. The Buddah reaching for the unity mind is having an experience of chemicals and brain patterns. And people can abuse ANYTHING in life. Some drugs fall to abuse more than others and I have negativity toward use of them by their nature but still not black and white.

I used to think the same way till I realized how absolutely ignorant we humans are about just what hallucinogens do, how they work, why the experiences can be so vivid and how important they have been to spurring human creativity throughout the ages.
Many great physicists, inventors, musicians took hallucinogens on a regular basis. Riddle me this?

WHY DOES IT MATTER IF THEY ARE FAKED EXPERIENCES?

To a degree it doesn't.. Human life is an amalgam of perception.
We are all just brain patterns, our emotions are the release of drugs.
Many of us find creativity from dreaming and other such things. Even the James Randis of the world find value in reading a good book or seeing a movie. Hallucinogens are the same road just much more personal and potent.
I agree drugged up people nomatter what the drug can be pretty annoying.
That's why I don't think people should do any drug often and with something like DMT you have to be prepared, it's not a casual drug in any since.

 

[David Biedny]

I don't buy any of this.

Caveat: I don't do drugs, I've never done drugs, I never plan to do drugs, I therefore lack firsthand experience. I did however go to an art college and roomed with nine different guys over three years, so I've had plenty of opportunity to observe people ON drugs. It ain't pretty but it is occaisionally amusing.

I don't believe psychedelic drugs are a "gateway" to a "higher conciousness". They're hallucinogens. That's all there is to it, the person is hallucinating. I don't care how vivid the images they see are, they're artifical, forced, in short- fake. The desperate attempts of the concious mind to make sense of the chemicaly-induced gibberish swilling around in the physical brain. The shaman who eats the magic mushrooms and then goes to the sacred cave to commune with the gods isn't really communing with anything, except maybe the dirt floor of the cave as he lies there twitching and drooling.

And this DMT stuff. So okay, the brain produces it naturally durning sleep and at the moment of death. Hmmm... anyone ever think that just maybe there's a reason for that? Rather there's a reason the brain DOESN'T produce it during concious thought? I'm routinely amazed that people are willing to play the chemical version of russian roulette with their grey matter in pursuit of false visions and imaginary "enlightenment". Spare me.

Drink coffee? Tea? Wine? Beer? Eat chocolate? Sugar?

All DRUGS.

Your doctor gives you a prescription for a painkiller or antibiotics, you go to the DRUG store and give them your money. They give you your DRUGS and you take them until they're done.

The human brain is an electrochemical computer, and has specific receptors that only accept the molecular bonding chains of specific DRUGS. That same brain produces DRUGS which keep you alert and alive.

Without DRUGS, you'd be dead in a shallow heartbeat.

Now, as to the issue of hallucinogens, they do indeed take the perception to a specific place that it otherwise foreign to normal experience. In NO WAY does this mean that the state of altered awareness is negative, it's what the person DOES with the altered state that makes it productive or destructive.

False visions and "enlightenment" are very often achieved without the use of external chemical assistance, and can be more destructive than any DRUG-induced condition (insert RELIGIOUS FUNDAMENTALISM here).

I'm not trying to say that ANYONE or EVERYONE should use DRUGS (as in, those ILLEGAL DRUGS, as in, the ones our government doesn't tax or control directly), but this whole simplistic notion that DRUGS ARE BAD™ reminds me of that

that set the DRUGS ARE BAD™ state of mind so prevalent in the 80s. Yeah, they did a world of good, those fine SOBER citizens who were our surrogate parents in those wonderful years, that magical time that future historians will no doubt see as the beginning of the fall of the American Empire™.

dB

 

[CapnG]

Done with the soap box, David?

First off, thanks for pointing out the patently obvious fact that humans are chemical machines. And in red too, very nice.

Second, this notion that "all drugs are created equal" is both irresponsible and insane. A vial of crack does not equal a cup of coffee. It doesn't equal a drum of coffee. The fact one is socially acceptable and the other not isn't relevant either (fact is, coffee would be illegal if you just discovered it today). The matter is an issue of POTENCY, not legality or approval.

Third, I said I considered the potentials false and risky. At no time did I ever say "Drugs are bad, mmmmkay". The fact of the matter is however some drugs ARE bad and I'm getting pretty tired of the pat answer "Not if you use them responsibly". Take a good look around you and see how "responsible" human beings are.

Now, Hawk, the reason it matters is because anything which is fake is intrinsically valuless. Head down to a dollar store and buy some cheap chinese piece of crap and count the minutes til it breaks. Fake insights, while more complex, fall under the same catagory of criteria in my opinion.

Consider this: Say I mix up some lemonade drink mix (powdered type, akin to kool aid or Country Time, you know the stuff). I drink it and the tastebuds on my tongue send a message to my brain and it registers "Mmm... lemonade!" Except it's NOT lemonade. It's a carefully formulated simulation of lemonade. It has no nutritional value, no vitamin C, hell it's mostly sugar. So, on the one hand, my brain is telling me it's lemonade while I am simultaneously aware it is not.

Now, you may be saying "So what? It's close enough." Well, that may be good enough for some people but not for me. I'm not interested in fake enlightment nor am I interested in excuses for the pursuit of same. I believe GENUINE insights require GENUINE effort. If you could just snort your way to greater understanding human history could be written on the back of playing card.

Lastly, crap all over the 80s political aspects if you must David but it was when I grew up and it was an awesome time to be a kid. Best toys and tv shows EVER.

 

[David Biedny]

Done with the soap box, David?

First off, thanks for pointing out the patently obvious fact that humans are chemical machines. And in red too, very nice.

Second, this notion that "all drugs are created equal" is both irresponsible and insane. A vial of crack does not equal a cup of coffee. It doesn't equal a drum of coffee. The fact one is socially acceptable and the other not isn't relevant either (fact is, coffee would be illegal if you just discovered it today). The matter is an issue of POTENCY, not legality or approval.

Third, I said I considered the potentials false and risky. At no time did I ever say "Drugs are bad, mmmmkay". The fact of the matter is however some drugs ARE bad and I'm getting pretty tired of the pat answer "Not if you use them responsibly". Take a good look around you and see how "responsible" human beings are.

Now, Hawk, the reason it matters is because anything which is fake is intrinsically valuless. Head down to a dollar store and buy some cheap chinese piece of crap and count the minutes til it breaks. Fake insights, while more complex, fall under the same catagory of criteria in my opinion.

Consider this: Say I mix up some lemonade drink mix (powdered type, akin to kool aid or Country Time, you know the stuff). I drink it and the tastebuds on my tongue send a message to my brain and it registers "Mmm... lemonade!" Except it's NOT lemonade. It's a carefully formulated simulation of lemonade. It has no nutritional value, no vitamin C, hell it's mostly sugar. So, on the one hand, my brain is telling me it's lemonade while I am simultaneously aware it is not.

Now, you may be saying "So what? It's close enough." Well, that may be good enough for some people but not for me. I'm not interested in fake enlightment nor am I interested in excuses for the pursuit of same. I believe GENUINE insights require GENUINE effort. If you could just snort your way to greater understanding human history could be written on the back of playing card.

Lastly, crap all over the 80s political aspects if you must David but it was when I grew up and it was an awesome time to be a kid. Best toys and tv shows EVER.

Well, I don't mean to be obnoxious, but this forum is indeed my (and Gene's) soapbox, it's a sandbox where my friends come and play and have conversations and maybe even learn a tidbit or two. So no, I'm not done with the soapbox, as long as The Paracast is around, I'll be playing with all kinds of soaps here - saponification is a fascinating process, and it just so happens that I'm a bit of a soap fetishist (I adore olive oil base soaps, I have a pearberry bar that is sublime)... talk about DRUGS.

Anyway, I understand your point about potency, but it's really more than that - toxicity is another interesting gauge, and by that measure, the sanctification of that popular DRUG alcohol is abhorrent to me, as it is a much more damaging substance than, say, THC. Sugar is likely to kill a LOT more folks than cocaine (a drug which, btw, I detest, but then again, the real problem is when it's cooked down to it's base elements, instead of it's natural leaf form (there's the potency issue again)). It's all about point of view, the societal context, and useless insecurities and fears.

I'll type it again, "fake enlightenment" does not require chemical assistance, it's about the effort involved in arriving at the conclusions sought by the experiencer. Take drugs away out the equation, and much of the better music of the last 80 or so years vanishes into thin air. The Beatles dropped tabs and came up with Rubber Soul and Revolver, so I'm really happy that they liked the feelings drugs gave them and were able to translate their experiences and visions into that precious music they brought to life. Hell, I'd light the pipe for John and Paul if that would let them write another Eleanor Rigby.

As far as your lemonade example, I'm in absolute agreement, there's no substitute for the real thing. Of course, we have to mention Robert Anton Wilson and Reality Tunnels, the whole notion of "reality" is a bit dynamic and subjective. The mystic who has a deeply religious experience after eating ayahuasca, the ancients who used the substances that they derived from plants, who are we to judge them? Without their work in deriving chemicals from nature, would we have the range of useful pharmaceuticals we enjoy today? When folks suffering from severe manic depression are fed a single dose of MDMA and are essentially cured, is that a bad thing?

I grew up in the sixties, and not only were the toys cooler, they were better made and more original than the crap of the eighties. Next you'll be extolling the virtues of that screechy nightmare called eighties music... Oy Vey Oy Vey!

dB

 

[CapnG]

Well, I don't mean to be obnoxious, but this forum is indeed my (and Gene's) soapbox.

You're right, I should have said pulpit. Yes, the irony is intentional.

Take drugs away from the equation, and a lot of the better music of the last 80 or so years vanishes into thin air, so when the Beatles dropped those tabs and came up with Rubber Soul and Revolver, I'm really, really happy that they liked the feelings those drugs gave them and were able to translate their experiences and visions into that precious music they made. Hell, I'd light the pipe for John and Paul if that would help them write another Eleanor Rigby.

I've heard many similar comments form many pro-drug adovactes and it always makes me sad. What you're basically saying is that all artists are incapable of creative thought and it is only by the grace of their drug use that any work of note is produced. What a horrible thing to say.

Of course, we have to mention Robert Anton Wilson and Reality Tunnels, the whole notion of "reality" is a bit dynamic and subjective.

I have a problem with this line of thinking because it basically says that some lunatic in a psyche ward who thinks the trees are talking to him has a valid viewpoint. He's not experiencing a more "subtle" version of reality than the rest of us, he's deranged, possibly even suffering from physical brain damage or abnormality. You have to draw a line in the sand somewhere otherwise discussion becomes pointless since anything goes.

The mystic who has a deeply religious experience after eating ayahuasca, the ancients who used the substances that they derived from plants, who are we to judge them?

Who are we? Rational people with the benefits of modern scientific research and technology, perhaps? We can hook Talks-with-Ghosts up to an MRI if you like and chart the utterly predictable responses to his brain chemistry. Nothing mystical is happening, his brain is just talking to itself.

Without their work in deriving chemicals from nature, would we have the range of useful pharmaceuticals we enjoy today? When folks suffering from severe manic depression are fed a single dose of MDMA and are essentially cured, is that a bad thing?

Wouldn't that have happened anyway? Aren't most scientific discoveries based on theories derived from accidental or coincidental events?

I grew up in the sixties, and not only were the toys cooler, they were better made and more original than the crap of the eighties. Next you'll be extolling the virtues of that screechy nightmare called eighties music.

I'm not gonna argue over this, David, since our respective biases are obvious and resolute.

But we can dance if you want to, we can leave your friends behind...

 

[Aaron LeClair]

Ban Capn please. Safety Dance is stuck in my head now..... Ugh.

 

[CapnG]

Ban Capn please. Safety Dance is stuck in my head now..... Ugh.

MUAHAHAHAAAAAAAA!!

 

[RedClover]

Oh my, well I certainly didn't want to upset anyone about the particular issues of drug use.

What is particularly interesting about DMT is that it is endogenous(your body makes it, you are currently in possession of a schedule 1 drug, and it is being produced currently during your regular day to day activities), and frankly no one to my knowledge knows what on earth it's doing there. I believe it's presence was first detected in the 1930's and then in the 70's it was conceived as a possible "schizotoxin". Urine from schizophrenics,(quite the blanket term by the way) showed an increase in DMT immediately after an episode, in comparison to the normal amount that is usually present. However, I don't know what became of that research. The greatest reason why it probably wasn't studied and I'm just speculating here, is because the U.S. government declared it illegal and all research on psychedelics was severely cut off. In fact one of the other side notes to the Strassman/University of New Mexico research was that it was the first Government approved study using hallucinogens in decades.

At anyrate, it could be entirely devoid of anything to do with UFO's, that's absolutely possible. They might be wholly separate issues. However, I do find it interesting that it has a fairly good track record with regard to "entity" contact. And no, most other hallucinogens do not regularly introduce users with other "beings". It's absolutely possible to do, but DMT by far seems to produce this sensation with much more regularity.

So, is it all in the user's head? Completely possible. That's the mainstream rational, and there's good reason to believe so. But I wouldn't be so quick to judge. There seems to be something strange going on here that we have yet to completely understand. It would be a grave error to assume that psychology or neuroscience has figured out just how consciousness works. Hallucinogens in particular are miraculously odd. We know it has something to do with the way the brain dreams but other than that, not too much. Or I should rather say that funding is scarce and there's not much money to be made. Plus it's quite a taboo in the West. Personally I would like to see if there is any connections between DMT and temporal lobe epilepsy, but I'm just a layman. Once again, thank you for your comments.

-RedClover

 

[CapnG]

The reason I err on the side of the prosaic, apart from my innate skepticism has a lot to do with the research of Dr. Michael Persinger (actually, you might want to get him on the show, throw down the skeptical guantlet). Persinger's research in brief deals with using various frequencies of EMP to stimulate areas of the brain and chart the results. So far, he's been able to closely approximate conditions which are reported during things like angelic visitations, alien abductions and most recently psychedlic episodes. What he was discussing in a lecture of his I watched recently was that they had found that during these "episodes" the brain is literally talking to itself and that it can easily be nudged into these states given a set block of stimuli, although the results vaired by individual of course. Along with the pleasure and logic centers, he concludes that there is a "God center" in the brain, an area hardwired for "spiritual" events.

Here's the problem: Does that mean god built into us a "reciever" that can be accessed or does it mean all spiritual events are merely natural delusions generated by this "god center" going into overdrive? My needle leans more towards the latter and I found the correlation to psychedelics interesting.

The idea of "entity contact" in his studies is a common theme and routinely occurs with his subjects. I can't recall which but he figures it's either the left brain talking to the right brain or the subconcious imposing itself onto the concious mind (possibly both). In either case, the "other" is simply yourself, just a part of yourself you don't recognize because it's presence is absent in ordinary waking life. This isn't really a radical concept, after all when you ask yourself a question, who exactly are you talking to? Or when you can't get to sleep because your mind is racing and you just wish your brain would shut up, how are you suddenly seperate from your brain? In the end it's all just you.

So, when it comes to hallucinogens in general and DMT specifically I just don't buy it. If a "contact event" happens to someone during their waking hours, unbidden, under conditions of complete sobriety, I'm naturally going to give that alot more slack out of the gate in terms of believability over one that occurs while under the influence. Maybe DMT acts as a mental "clutch" shifting over from concious to subconcious? Take some while you're awake and presto, pop the clutch! Now you've got an "encounter"... except it's still just you... and you.

Hawk said it's not just black and white. I couldn't disagree more, it absolutely is, it's positively binary. The experience is either genuine or it's not. My question is if the input is false, how can the output be true?

 

[The Hawk]

Well my main reason for saying not black and white is that drugs are not just flat evil or flat good. No object is innately evil it's what you do with it. Some things like heroin I suspect it would be very hard to get something positive out of but whatever it's people's right IMO.

When I said not black and white, I did also mean that it's not just true or false. Many people I included believe that higher the realms of heaven/spirit realms, the higher consciousness the more things become subjective and influenced by thought. There are parts of this reality that we live in even that are effected by thought.
Masaru Emoto:
Michio Kaku:

Or even if you don't buy into their work..
Look at quantum mechanics a particle is effected by you looking at it. It can literally be in two states at once until you look at it. I think there's a lot of bull in societies when it comes to the idea of affecting things with the mind. I think in general humans confuse themselves into believing that they can have an effect on things with their thoughts. Regardless of the bull there's proof that SOME of that of it is definitely real.

My point, is that if one perceives through drugs another realm it wont' be all real or all fake but a mixture and everything in between.
And the higher one goes into an altered state the more subjectively perceived that world is. Sometimes that means more control sometimes not. Like the difference between a bland normal dream and a lucid dream or astral projection.

I think I've clarified that point, I don't care if you take what I say or not there's plenty of reason to be skeptical.

I'll end my speak in this topic by reiterating this point:
Movies, books, games, music etc. AND halucinagens can all be complete fiction and still have a LOT of worth to the human experience.

 

[Aaron LeClair]

I see Sparks is coming back the 18th. Should be interesting.

 

[The Hawk]

Cool, I'm looking forward to that.

Gene and David, if either of you read this..
IMO you should ask him about having his friend he met during abduction on with him for the interview or a family member.

 

[David Biedny]

CapnG,

I'm perplexed at your comments, I've never said - or even implied - that "all artists are incapable of creative thought and it is only by the grace of their drug use that any work of note is produced". That's an extremist position, and one I don't agree with - I'm all for individual freedom, the ability to do whatever one wants to one's own body, without interference from government operatives who toast the day's pot busts with big glasses of wine and whisky. That's Hypocrisy with a capital H, and I'm not cool with it. I can make my own decisions about what's good or bad for me, no need for the God-fearing fundamentalists to tell me how to get into their talking-monkey God's graces.

As far as reality tunnels, again, you're taking some extreme stance and trying to imply that I've stated that I support that position. The person in the psycho ward is probably cracked, but then again, maybe they're Prot from K-PAX. If you're gonna tell me that the powers that currently run the country, the most powerful people in the world, are actually sane, I say screw that definition of sanity. The Preznit thinks that God is talking to him, and that Jesus the Magikal Jew will love him even if he starts a nuclear holocaust. Holy Bat Guano. It's back to POV - I'll take the insanity of Secular Humanism over this other crap any day of the week.

Now let's get to your comment about scientific discovery:

Aren't most scientific discoveries based on theories derived from accidental or coincidental events?

Most? I don't think so, perhaps some, maybe even many, but a majority of scientific discoveries are the product of the scientific method, which is anything but accidental or random.

The human brain is something we understand precious little about, so don't get so high on the idea that our science is absolute. The amount of knowledge we have about our own brains is really minimal, much less an understanding of why we appear to not use the majority of said brain. I suspect that our evolution is pretty frikkin far from being over; based on the way people seem to treat each other and the state of the species in general, I'd say we're not even at the halfway point. Who knows, perhaps the secrets of the Universe are there for all to see, in a fungus that grows on the smelly stuff that plops out of a cow's ass. I'd like to believe that THE CREATOR™ has an awesomely wicked sense of humor, and that would be proof positive.

Here, have a nice cup of tea and think about it. I'll put on a sweet Duran Duran record, and we can talk about how the draconian drug laws of the eighties have been such a resounding success for the precious little children, the ones who will one day wax poetic about the wonders of real cheese food™, instead of that soy and lecithin-based mess they'll be stuffing into their pieholes in twenty years, when all the cows are dead.

dB

 

[interestedINitall]

What a fun (and very telling) exchange! David, a quick peek at the U2 thread should offer amazing clarity.

On a different note, I'm looking forward to the March 18th show. It'll be fascinating to hear if Sparks can turn it around. His last appearance was less than stellar.