DMT is a little bit like being punched
in the back of the head by God. Uh and
and you know, we now have some data to
kind of underscore that that particular
phrase. The astonishing about DMT
entities, they're so bloody reliable and
instantaneous. 70 80% of people can rock
up to the pipe and boom, they're going
to have an entity encounter and probably
will change their ontology. Right?
That's that's impressive. Like just for
reliability and repeatability.
>> Dr. David Luke is the world's first and
only professor of exceptional experience
at the University of Greenwich. Out of
body experiences, telepathy, DMT entity
encounters, mystical states, the
experiences mainstream science either
ignores or pathizes. David visited
people's homes while they smoked DMT,
cataloged the entities that appear with
startling reliability. Over 90%
encounter entities. Something
neurochemistry or materialist
psychedelic or consciousness theories
simply cannot account for. This is the
podcast of the totally inexplicable. The
telepathy tapes. Out of body
experiences, Iaska plant spirits. We
have got it all. At the giant shoulder,
we're singularly focused on tackling
these ultra bizarre questions with real
scientific rigor. So, please show us
some support and subscribe. Thank you so
much. I probably overexperimented with
with DMT a zillion years ago. Uh, and in
the end, like the entities were like,
"No, they literally said, "No, not you
again. You've seen enough. Booger off.
Don't come back." And I was like, "Hey
guys, come on. It's just getting
interesting." And then the next trip,
all I got was just geometric patterns.
>> How does the phenomenology of a jester
punching you in the back of the head
just stop the trip? Psychology
overriding the neurochemistry. What the
hell is going on? as if genuinely the
DMT entities is going, "Nah, you know,
your name's not in the list. You're not
coming in." I did kind of like then
forcibly barge my way back in there and
had a really terrifying entity encounter
which put me off doing it again. It was
just like, "No, you should not be here."
It's equally interesting that people,
some people like just seem to be immune
to DMT. Like I've I've seen people smoke
like pipes and pipes and pipes of it and
like nothing. Nada, squat, diddly. You
know, not everybody gets elves.
Somewhere between, say, 5 and 25% of
people get elves.
>> Do you think there's anything to the
telepathy tapes?
>> Oh, that's an interesting question. I
mean, I
Dr. David Luke, what is your official
work title?
I'm professor of exceptional experience
at the University of Greenwich.
>> Yeah. When I read this, I was like,
exceptional experience. I have no idea
what that is. So, what explain what
exceptional experience is.
>> So, it's a kind of umbrella catch all
for all kinds of what we might call
anomalous or anomalistic or
transpersonal or paranormal or spiritual
kinds of experiences. uh they don't fit
under the usual kind of category
anywhere else within psychology other
than perhaps as delusion or
psychopathology.
So, you know, it would include things
like out of body experiences, near-death
experiences, experiences of telepathy,
psychedelic experiences, mystical
experience, uh uh entity encounters and
and so on.
So what's the most important context for
the listener to understand how you
become a professor of exceptional
experience? Because I didn't have an
exceptional experience module in
college. You know, I studied
neuroscience and I was too busy doing
boring neuroimunology. Important but but
boring. And and I would have loved an
exceptional experience class. So like
what like what are the stepping stones
that lead you to that kind of um
research focus?
>> So yeah first of all you probably take
up study of some usual mainstream sub
subject like psychology uh and then as
you progress you commit career suicide
or even double career suicide like I did
by uh studying parasychology and and
psychedelics.
uh and then if you manage to survive
that for a couple of decades and you get
to become promoted to a professor, you
can give yourself whatever title you
like. And uh so I think I'm actually the
first uh professor of exceptional
experience mostly for kind of stamina uh
in in pursuing the kind of the weird and
unusual. Uh, I would say,
>> did they not let you name it anything
else like like paranormal or
parasychology or like would you have
called it something that has a bit more
of a taboo title if you were allowed
that's more descriptive because
exceptional when someone reads that
they're like I don't really know what
that means.
>> Yeah, I mean that's for a good reason. I
wouldn't want to just confine myself to
the title parasychology. I'd be happy to
use that. I I don't have any problems
with the taboos around it. But uh I
think my area just is broader. So
parasychology is is mostly concerned
with the kind of more nuts and bolts
like the the the bio psycho mechanics
perhaps of uh sigh experiences primarily
you know telepathy, clairvoyance,
psychokinesis
uh etc. uh and and kind of strays into
some of these other areas but uh you
know it doesn't really incorporate some
of the kind of more transpersonal
elements like spiritual experiences and
mystical experiences and also I wanted
to also include the anomalistic element
too. So yeah, exceptional experience
seems to be the the broadest most
neutral umbrella. Uh and then I can also
toss in kind of interesting neurode
divergent experiences as well which we
can also call anomalous. So yeah, it's
it's quite broad but also quite niche
because there's no one else really doing
it. So
>> yeah, it's so cool. Like I cannot
imagine a more interesting area of
research. As you say, you can dip your
toes in all of these strange phenomena
that we don't really have great answers
for and you know, materialist
consciousness theories just do not have
explanations for. And you know, this
conversation, I could bring this in 20
different directions that I think each
would be like equally fascinating to me
because so many threads on the podcast
are touching on these sort of anomalous
consciousness experience and trying to
explain them and trying to understand
them and tease them apart and understand
them from a firsthand subjective
experience, understand them from a
neuroscience lens. So, I just think it's
all so so interesting. But maybe where
we'll start is your DMT field
experiment. This is something that I
think is really cool. Talk to me about
what you did.
>> So, uh, yeah, we're interested in in DMT
phenomena um, and the experience of
that, but also kind of looking at some
of the kind of coming towards that
experimentally as well. And, uh, we
didn't have a particularly big budget to
do expensive lab work, you know,
administering DMT, uh, which, you know,
needs substantial funding or the
facilities at our university. Uh and
also we wanted to uh kind of mind the
the kind of uh environmental
potential of it as well in in going
around to people's houses whilst they
were taking DMT and then getting them in
their naturalistic environment. Uh uh so
it's it's kind of uh less oppressive in
in some ways than than doing it in a
laboratory. You know, people perhaps
feel more uh natural and relaxed in
their home environment. So, chose a
naturalistic field study which I think
still gives as useful and relevant uh
data as an experimental lab study but
maybe with a little less control but a
little more authenticity. Uh and so
that's what we set out to do.
>> But what was the what was the research
goal? What part of the DMT experience
were you interested in?
>> So we wanted to look at a lot of
different things and we're still kind of
writing up some of that research. It's
it's it's like an ongoing endeavor. Um
so initially al the phenomenology the
the kind of lived experience but under
you know uh with a kind of a a specific
sample of people who are experienced
psychonauts uh there wasn't much good
contained phenomenology the DMT
experience at that point you know a lot
of it was kind of being stripped from
Eowid or Reddit or whatever and people
analyzing these kind of online uh
databases if you like so we wanted to
have a kind of kind of tamed and
discrete sample of experience
psychonauts. Uh and so we, you know,
interviewed everyone immediately after
their experience to kind of mind the
phenomenology of it. Uh and then we also
had a bunch of psychometric measures to
to look at to see how they relate to the
experience. Uh and some outcome measures
as well of people's descriptions of the
alt state, the mystical experience and
so on. Uh and then also some
experimental elements too. Uh so for
about half the participants we did a
pre-cognition experiment to see if they
could uh kind of access information from
the future under control conditions and
we had like you know control condition
experimental condition and also a shared
visionary experience experiment as well.
So, uh people
having DMT as a pair with the intention
of having a shared experience but
without any prior conversation uh
between those two people and then being
separated immediately afterwards and
interviewed about their experience uh
and then using that to compare it to
trips of people on their own under the
same kind of uh circumstances. Uh and
then we had to go through this very
lengthy procedure of getting independent
judges to rate all those different trip
reports and try and try try and match
them together uh to see if if if people
under blind conditions could
independently discern which trips uh
were coincidental.
So which is quite we probably haven't
heard much about that but uh still yet
to publish that and but all of it really
fascinating and and and illuminating but
always leading to more questions than
answers really.
>> I mean I have I have about 700 questions
from that. How you you know I speak to
scientists every week and one of the
overlapping themes is is clearly that
there's lack of funding and it's hard to
do research. So how the hell did you get
funding to figure out if people can see
the future, predict the future or do you
know do we have any reason to believe
that people can in any way access
information from the future?
Uh so on the funding point there there
was uh it was generously funded by a
private philanthropist but it was a
relatively uh inexpensive bit of
research um in in that we didn't need
you know expensive laboratory facilities
etc etc or you know home office license
which is very expensive to administer
DMT. So it was it was relatively
economical as a project. Uh and we also
collected a hell of a lot of data which
we're still kind of chewing through. Um
but as to you know why why precognition
why shared visionary experiences
certainly the shared visionary
experiences is something that people
tend to report uh experientially you
know in in kind of group psychedelic
experiences uh and there as yet been no
systematic research done on that. So
this is the kind of first study on that.
Uh whereas precognition you know we have
a legacy of of research of precognition
and other site phenomena going back now
144 years since the start of the society
for psychical research in 1882.
Uh and you know if you most people
aren't necessarily very aware of that
body of science but it you know has
produced you know numerous
well-controlled experimental studies uh
which if you look at the scope of them
with like meta analyses you find kind of
these very positive trends very small
effect sizes but highly significant when
you stack all the studies together. So
you know the question is do people have
these kind of experiences of genuinely
transcending time and space under the
influence of psychedelics like DMT as
most indigenous shamans who use these
psychedelics will profess to. You know
that's kind of like the purpose of of of
shamanism in many ways is to go into an
old state and transcend time and space
and bring back useful information for
your community. So there's an ancient
legacy of uh utilizing psychedelics for
this and yet very very little controlled
experimental research. So just wanting
to try and understand uh and honor these
more kind of shamanic elements of the
psychedelic experience in in a
scientific way. Extremely cool. Wow.
Would would you have maybe one example
on hand of that 144 years of research
that you think is particularly
inexplicable and weird and just the
listener might go what how the hell do I
not know that?
Uh I mean there's a there's a big body
of research out there although it's
quite obscure because it's it's you know
struggled to get published in mainstream
journals uh for sociological reasons.
you know the the the politics and
sociology of science is as interesting
as the science in a way but for instance
you know some of the the really
compelling stuff uh I mean a lot of it
comes through kind of techniques of old
states like uh dream research which I'm
also conducting or perhaps through
Gansfeld techniques when you put people
in a kind of mild hypnotic uh kind of uh
state um but uh some of this research
also kind of tries to bypass the
cognitive process processes as well. So
there's this a great body of research on
what's called presentiment where you
just look at people's physiological
responses. Uh and then you know if you
show them an image they'll have a
particular phys physiological response
to that. So if you show someone an
erotic or violent image there will be a
physiological arousal which you can
easily detect but that's a response to
the image. Uh and then that what they
did unlike the usual research is they
looked at the baseline of what happens
before people see either a calming image
or an erotic or arousing image. Uh and
uh there was this tendency quite
reliable and relatively robust of this
kind of a a like a pre-sponse. So like
uh you know in a in a moment before
seeing an image people would uh have a
kind of physiological reaction usually
smaller uh but still significant and
it's kind of time symmetrical around the
point at which they see the image. Uh so
if you if you don't necessarily trust
the stuff coming out of people's mouths
you know about what they say about what
they they can uh experience about the
future. um we have this uh you know data
which which kind of goes speaks directly
to the body as well. I want to share a
really embarrassing story. So I was
working with this company to build a
really awesome science product and we
were using AI to summarize the entirety
of the available literature and a
hallucination crept its way into the
work. It was presented to me
confidently. It sort of fit the
narrative and everything just seemed
right about it. But of course, as you
might guess, it was a complete
fabrication. It actually cost me
thousands of dollars, completely blew up
in my face, and has made me terrified of
hallucinations. And honestly, it's
changed the way I think about AI and
science. That is why for every Giant
Shoulder episode, I use long-term
sponsor of the channel Consensus.
Consensus searches 220 million
peer-reviewed papers first, then uses AI
to synthesize the results. Every claim
links to a real verifiable study. It's
the difference between asking an AI to
remember science from memory, which is
where hallucinations creep in, and
actually get it to verify from first
principles that that is actually what
was said. I'm personally obsessed with
the deep search function because it
presents consensus across the whole
literature, not just one confidently
stated perspective. Where studies agree,
where they conflict, where the gaps are,
even how the research has evolved over
time. It flags studies for this episode
that I just simply would not have found
without it. Lately, they introduced an
MCP integration with Claude and this has
exploded my research workflow. It
basically means the two systems can talk
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to try it out. Now, back to the episode.
And what exactly do you think that that
could be signal for? Just so we're
clear. like what do you think that
result indicates or or possibly what
like what does that open up as an avenue
where you're like that's weird or
interesting?
>> Uh I think for me well it speaks to
probably the the low-level potentially
constant
uh you know uh unconscious
uh reception of kind of information
beyond space and time.
uh in that we are all kind of
potentially latently psychic. Uh but
we're just not aware of it most of the
time. And probably for good reason
because, you know, it's it's hard enough
just to kind of focus on the present and
not drift into the past or the future,
you know, in and mental mind wandering
and just dealing with the the vast glut
of information that we're bombarded with
all the time without having to contend
with kind of low-level psychic
information that would probably be
overwhelming in a in a kind of huxlean
kind of way of, you know, you think of
the of the brain as like a reducing
valve. Uh but if you turn off that
reducing valve, you get overwhelmed with
the kind of the vastness of the infinite
information available in the universe as
a model you know uh and and so you know
the brain's function is to to just kind
of drip feed us this kind of like low
res kind of uh taste of reality really.
uh but we we may be kind of being
certainly and constantly informed about
information from beyond our usual
concept of space and time as well. So
would I be right in saying that this is
what you're indicating is sort of an
idealist framework for consciousness
where consciousness is a fundamental
property of the universe rather than a
materialist framework which says our
brain is the generator of consciousness.
instead it's a signal receiver of
consciousness that is picking up some
sort of universal frequency, whatever
analogy you want to use. There's a bunch
of them. Um, and that's sort of how we
can explain our own conscious
experiences and what our brains allow us
to do.
>> I mean, maybe I mean I I don't know. I
think the jury's out on the on the mind
body problem uh you know the hard
problem of consciousness and you know no
one uh perspective on that particular
problem is is satisfactory as yet and it
could be like something idealist is
happening or pans psychic or dualist or
you know physicalist I I mean I I'm just
agnostic on it you know in a recent
review of all the various leading
theories of uh consciousness
uh you know, of which you could just
pick say the the the most prominent 300.
You know, there's no agreement in any
way, shape, or form. Like, we basically
just haven't got a clue. But, you know,
that might be one interpretation. But,
you know, parasychologists are are are a
mix of of different perspectives. You
know there's there's physicist
parasychologists as well trying to
explain this and understand it from a
position of physics and and you know
biologicalism
materialist perspectives some idealists
not so many some dualist you know
pansyists you get the lot and and nobody
we really haven't really got any firm
answers I would say
>> that's interesting to me because maybe I
was ignorant to that I was kind of
assuming that telepathy and
parasychology and these sort of
phenomena are only existing sort of
within a pansychist idealist framework
that materialism was just in congruent
with that with those set of ideas. But
you do actually get materialist
scientists that fully, you know, believe
that telepathy is happening, but it's a
physical signal that is being
transmitted um between brains,
biologies, whatever. Um and there's a
there's a materialist explanation for
it.
>> Yeah. although they may kind of may be
leaning into more kind of quantum
explanations. But what I would say is
that what it what it invites is that we
can't really have a uh theory of
consciousness or the mind body problem
without
at least you know including this psychic
phenomena which you know I think a lot
of uh reductive materialists and
physicalists have have just chosen to
ignore it because it it does pose some
kind of immediate problems for just
having that kind of assumption that
brain produces consciousness and and you
know it may be that we have a
physicalist explanation we're happy with
ultimately but it I think it really has
to incorporate this phenomena as well
into any explanatory model and anything
that tries to ignore it is just you know
it's it it's just a bit myopic like uh
we we have to look at the anomalies to
test our rules really and that's where
we always find fertile ground in in
identifying that our models are probably
wrong.
>> I 100% agree. I'm gonna struggle in this
podcast not to go down rabbit holes
because everything is so interesting.
But let's I want to try to go back to
the DMT experiment. Literally, there's
just a thousand threads that come from
every sentence you say where I'm like,
"Oh, that no. Okay, on top on top." So,
how many people in this field study
experience what people call a DMT
entity?
>> Uh, I mean, increasingly there's, you
know, there's a handful of people doing
it, uh, usually as a bit of a kind of of
sideshow. Um I I say one of the kind of
main researchers in this area is is my
dear colleague Chris Timberman I was
with at the weekend uh at breaking
convention conference and uh he's
probably done some of the most concerted
work in this area by you know doing
brain imaging both fMRI and EEG uh
simultaneous to people's entity
encounter experiences with DMT and even
DMTX like extended DMT experiences uh
and that's starting to produce some
really interesting findings uh which can
lead to more questions than answers.
Hopefully, you'll get Chris on the show.
You can ask him about that. But and not
wanting to uh gazump his his his own, he
did find like a a shift in in brain
activity when people have DMT entity
encounters. So, normally uh in the DMT
experience, it's it's you know, high
entropy,
you know, a lot of kind of uh internal
uh chaos if you like in in the brain. uh
and then at those points when people are
having a DMT entity, there's more
coherence in the brain. So there's a
there's a shift in the brain activity uh
during those entity encounters.
Unfortunately in that research and I
think this might be the next step and we
hope to pursue this is that we don't
know which came first is it like uh yes
the have a moment of bro coherence and
therefore they see an entity in in the
chaos of of the you know the mental
landscape or do they have an entity
encounter and that leads to the brain to
to to become more coherent. So he needs
some more kind of fine grained uh timing
I think to kind of like maybe unpack
that a little bit more. But there's
making some advances and I think Chris
is really pioneering a lot of the work
in this direction.
>> For sure. I've been in contact with with
Chris a few times. So, I really hope to
have him on the podcast very soon
because I've I've spoken to Andrew
Gallamore and Andelas Gumas Emerson, a
lot of the leading DMT experts and it
just fascinates me completely and and
and stumps my previously held
materialist beliefs because it doesn't
doesn't provide any explanation. Um when
you when you talk to these people, when
you do these um phenomenological
interviews post experience,
post DMT trip, what kind of words do
they use to describe these these entity
encounters? What what what modalities do
they invoke? Like what what kind of
things what kind of concepts do they
talk about?
>> I mean there's usually quite a few
exploitives and it's quite superlative
language. uh you know the these are kind
of quite intense experiences even even
to seasoned psychonauts you know it's
like uh it's almost like the first time
every time in a way uh in that it's it's
profound uh but it's so most often we
found you know as a trend for instance
and we got very high entity encounter
reports in our study you know like Chris
is talking you know somewhere between
about 40 and and 60% in the studies he's
done we got like 90% of our participants
but these were more kind of seasoned
psychonauts and also the naturalistic
environment that might have been
contributo
uh and uh you know but the majority of
people we found about 85% considered
them to be real right so that they uh
obviously this is when they come back I
think they all probably feel it's real
at the time in the experience uh but in
the in the kind of evaluation afterwards
so like the people are treating them as
a a a genuine other with some kind of
sentience. Um and and that's usually how
it's experienced and that's probably the
most astonishing thing about it really.
Um I'm going to sidestep here because
you know this there was some brilliant
survey work came out of Johns Hopkins
University with Roland Griffith and his
team before he passed. uh and they you
know they did a survey of of nearly a
couple of thousand people had had DMT
entity encounters with high doses and
they looked at their prior spiritual
orientation and then afterwards and of
those people are atheist before you know
less than half of them remained atheist
afterwards. So that really gives you a
bit of a sense of how intense these
experiences can be if a 10-minute
psychedelic trip can reorientate your
whole spiritual framework from atheism
to non-theism. Uh and therefore, you
know, I think it very much uh earns the
adage, one of our participants said, you
know, like DMT is a little bit like
being punched in the back of the head by
God. uh and and we now have some data to
kind of underscore that that particular
phrase. I think
>> fascinating. You know, one of the
characteristics that's frequently
brought up is the consistency of these
trip reports and like why would there be
consistency, right? If you're following
Robin Carard Harris's entropic brain
hypothesis model, there's extra noise
being inserted into these um you know
layer five pyramidal neurons. you're
getting extra excitability, more
disorder.
Why would that cause consistency in the
hallucinations? Why would that, you
know, if if it's just sort of increasing
noise, at least in my view, it doesn't
seem like you would get this. 85% of
people report sort of a similar type
thing. And then you have all these
archetypal images that people seem to
seem to see like the the great serpent
or the or the the mother or you know the
the mantis. Like how do you explain this
or how have you how have you how do you
think about this? Because in my mind,
neurochemistry
um pharmarmacology just kind of runs
into a wall here in explaining why
people would see this consistency in
structure and form and often these
crystalline figures, symmetrical,
multiffold structures seem common like
that. It doesn't seem to me like
neurochemistry and pharmarmacology
explain that. But I'm curious with all
of your, you know, work and experience
like how do you think about what's
happening in these moments?
Well, yeah, I start off by saying
there's probably like uh multiple
eeologies and factors to consider,
right? Uh so some of it, you know, we
you can never get away from cultural
influences for one thing. You can't have
a culturally unmediated experience, you
know, or an unculturally mediated
experience if you like. Uh so we are we
are the kind of product of of our
environments and everything we've ever
seen and experienced could be kind of
seeping in and and priming the kind of
experience we have. Uh so it's a bit
hard to get beyond that and yet I don't
think it still reliably accounts for
some of the consistencies we see. So
myself and Andrew Kmore tried exploring
that particularly and so we went back to
the very first DMT trip reports from
Steven Zara in the 1950s and sure enough
embedded in there in these obscure
Hungarian psychiatric journals there
were accounts of people encountering
little people you know dwarves uh uh and
so like it's hard to imagine that that
was the seed of these later oh you get
elves everybody does memes right um and
it seems that there's as good a kind of
consideration that there is just
something inherent about the experience
which leads to the encounter of of
little people but we can't ever get away
from the the cultural influencing
>> I agree
>> and
>> you know there was this kind of uh urban
legend mythological experiment which
never happened which came out of
Berkeley in the 1970s that had given to
Inuits right and supposedly they they
saw jaguars and snakes would have been a
brilliant experiment pre- internet if
that could have happened, but it didn't
happen. It was just an urban myth. Uh,
but that's the kind of thing you'd have
had to do. Uh, and it's almost
impossible now in the internet age to to
to to know that we are having
experiences which aren't culturally
mediated. So, it's quite hard to
establish that first of all. Uh and then
you have you know Robin's uh take on it
is that yeah we're having this kind of
like uh highly kind of chaotic uh
sensory experience or internal
experience uh through stimulation of of
neurotransmitters
uh and that leads to kind of more kind
of informationational noise and then in
a kind of apetheic or paradelic way you
we then literally in Robin's case we
quite literally see uh you know patterns
in in in the chaos in the noise. Now
that explanation goes some way, but it
doesn't account necessarily for the
consistency
or necessarily even that we do that that
actually happens. So, you know, we found
that even people with aphantasia
have no visual mental imagery still get
DMT entities. Uh, and so it's not being
visually driven. It's not being driven
by mental imagery, visual mental
imagery, because they really genuinely
don't have any as far as we can tell.
You can do kind of cognitive behavioral
measures on them and you know that their
pupils don't dilate uh in response to
imagery of light like everyone else
does, you know, so that it seems like
they genuinely have no visual mental
imagery. that it's not it's not a kind
of visual driver if it is uh if it's
kind of like picking out patterns in the
chaos. Uh it must be happening on a
conceptual level or somewhere else. But
you know we need to kind of explore that
further and unpack it. Um but again why
the consistency you know why why why
jesters why octopoids why giant
preymances doing operations on your
brain upgrading you or you emotions you
know those ones are kind of really
specific
>> uh uh and it you know so trying to
trying to tease apart how much of this
is like dimethyl tryptoines uh and how
much of it is like kind of core coming
directly from the experience itself. Uh
uh that's hard to tease apart.
>> I I I share exactly what you just said.
You know, I I I I there's absolutely
shared deep subconscious cultural
priming and I do think that can actually
go quite a far away in explaining some
of the strange phenomena that you see
like the DMT laser experiment. um you
know that sort of I I sort of would
believe that that is very front-loaded
with expectation and priming and I think
that that can provide quite a lot of
explanation there. Um, but I just don't
understand why. Yeah. This mantis
operating you on a surgical table. I
talked to someone yesterday who had that
experience. Like that's like, you know
what I mean? Like that really challenges
sort of everything I learned in college
and kind of everything I've learned
since college even. You know what I
mean? And I'm like not really sure what
to make of that. Like do do you have any
like I know more work needs to be done.
Like how do you think about that? Do you
have any sort of framework, any sort of
model for even remotely what might be an
explanation or like a direction of an
explanation or like a you know, you've
thought about this and you've worked in
these spaces longer than most. Like you
must have some sort of inkling on what
the hell might be happening there and
you can you can speculate all you we're
on a podcast, man. You're not going to
be held to it.
>> No, no worries. I mean, I I'll take the
uh the Robert Anton Wilson oath here
probably, and that is anybody who says
they think they know what's going on is
probably full of [ __ ] Uh so like I mean
I really don't have a clue, but I do
kind of look to the data and try and
understand it. And that data comes to me
initially from you know 25 years ago uh
and around about that time of witnessing
people naively having encounters with
with praying mantis entities you know on
their first ISOCA trip or their first
DMT trip and and them not being in any
way remotely
uh consciously knowledgeable of of that
being some kind of thing you know and
it's like it's just kind of observing
these kinds of experiences uh and then
you know you go oh you got the mantids
and they're like what do you mean it's
like you mean other people have these
experiences like well I've heard a few
stories you know and they're like
horrified uh uh so we're actually just
launched uh last week the first survey
on manted entity encounters just to try
and collect some more data on this to
see if there are any commonalities
uh and this is an interesting one I
think the manted one because it doesn't
just happen with DMT but it does happen
a lot with DMT I mean we got about 14%
of our DMT uh experience in our study
had insecttoid encounters, right? But
this is also something you hear from
people who who've never taken
psychedelics. Uh and I've come across,
you know, just randomly people I've chat
to friends and things who've had
experiences in childhood of having giant
praying mantises, you know, encounters
or praying mantises living in their in
their heads uh and telling them things,
you know, and and these are just like
these are from the voices of children,
you know, not from like adults smashing
loads of DMT having watched too many
YouTube videos, right? So I think
there's some interesting uh phenomena to
explore there you know both and we can
then compare well how did DMT ones
compare to non DMT ones and so on. So I
I always look to the data I'm I'm always
a bit short on explanations because you
know uh yeah uh beliefs are are are
prisons aren't they? You know our
convictions make makers convicts. I I
try to be as a agnostic as possible and
and look to the data. I mean, you
literally study anomalies, right? So,
like, you wouldn't have a job. Like,
it's anomalous for a reason that we
don't have an answer for these things.
I'd love to
>> I'll explain your way out of the job if
I'm not careful.
>> Exactly. The the cultural I'd love to
see some cross-cultural comparisons on,
you know, putting that cultural um
hypothesis to test, you know. So, like
I'm in Malaysia at the moment and I'm
walking around and I've seen some crazy
ass praying mantis here. massive ones.
Like really crazy looking insects that
are like bigger than anything I've ever
like. I grew up in Ireland. I'm from
Dublin.
>> Like seven foot.
>> Yeah. Mass. Well, not quite seven foot,
but
>> that's okay. There was no DN.
>> I was on the psychoactive substance of
caffeine only. And that's not known to
create seven foot mantis. But so like I
could kind of get that people from
Southeast Asia that have grown up with
these crazy insects and stuff might
experience that. But like there aren't
mantis to my knowledge or maybe there's
extremely few mantis in Ireland or like
Ireland and the UK may like I don't
think there are mantis. So like why
would we have that cultural priming you
know like why growing up in these
countries like
>> we're not watching enough mantis may
maybe you are mantis documentaries and
stuff to have that cultural priming. Um,
like what what you know what I mean?
Like maybe from countries where they're
really common like that that's somewhat
of an explanation, but like I'm curious,
are mantis DMT experiences more common
in Malaysia than they are in the West
where you don't have mantis? Do you do
you know of any cross-cultural
comparisons like this?
>> I mean, this research hasn't been done.
And then also it'd be it'd be somewhat
confounded is like because I'm not sure
you know what the prevalence of DMT
consumption is in in Malaysia might not
be as
>> limited by yeah probably Americans and
Europeans but it is a super curious
question. Yeah I mean I never saw
mantids growing up in in the UK right
and certainly not in Ireland. Uh and
that's you know it's a really
interesting question. Uh, I mean there
are some things about mantids in that,
you know, they do have this they're kind
of almost the most humanoid of insects,
but there's still that's, you know,
okay, so if you're going to think of an
insect and it's kind of a bit humanoid
and you mash them together, it might
come out looking like a prey mantis,
right? Because they kind of stand up and
they got these arms. But in any case,
but why why insects in in the first
place there are and but I would love to
see more of this cross-cultural kind of
research not at least because you know
so like perhaps like our oldest living
ancestors are the the sand bushmen of
the Kalahari. Uh and and for instance
you know they worship the pray mantis as
as a deity. you know, these were hadn't
changed their way of life as hunter
gatherers for hundreds of thousands of
years until recently when they were
kicked off their line for diamond
mining, prospecting, and whatnot. But so
they have a very very ancient tradition
and they venerate the prey mantis uh and
like so you know maybe it's this kind of
deep atistic
uh archetypal kind of presence in maybe
it's a collective unconscious thing you
know so even as kind of you know white
Europeans without any manes anywhere are
tapping into this this kind of perhaps
ancient uh relationship
uh with some kind of you know atistic
morphic force or something. I don't
know. I mean, I literally don't know.
>> Yeah.
>> But I think we need to take every and
every possible angle on this and and and
you know, just try and make some sense
out of it rather than just ignoring it.
>> I've spent years trying to make a daily
routine of meditation, but probably for
a different reason than most. If you've
been following the giant yoga for a
while, you know that I'm fascinated by
this question of altered states of
consciousness. I've interviewed top
scientists who study psychedelics,
sensory deprivation, lucid dreaming, and
they all say a similar thing that these
kinds of states of consciousness can be
achieved by trained meditation. Now,
while I've always been skeptical of this
claim, it's just been repeated again and
again by the top scientists, people who
I really trust. So, I had to try this
myself. But the problem that I've always
had is that when I do meditation, it's
very hard to stay consistent when I
don't know if I'm improving, making any
progress, or if anything is happening at
all. That's where Muse comes in. It's a
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using it to achieve deeper and more
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benefit of making you ridiculously
handsome. This has been verified by
multiple sources. Muse measures brain
activity, heart rate, and blood oxygen
in real time and gives you live audio
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wave state. When your mind wanders, you
hear it. When you drop into deep focus,
the soundsscape changes. There's over
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world's largest EEG data set, over a
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I finally have a dashboard that I can
see my progress. I can actually see I'm
improving. And this has such a good
feedback cycle for actually doing it
every single day because I know that
that graph is going up. I'm getting
better. I'm going towards something.
Now, the device is definitely not for
everybody, but at least personally for
me, it has turned meditation from this
uncertainty of not really knowing if
anything is happening to an actual
structured plan that I can see something
improving. And that has massively
improved my own motivation to do it. And
just how cool would it be to have an
altered anomalous state of consciousness
and catch your brain in real time and
see what's happening? I mean, that idea
is so cool to me. Use the link in the
description for a special discount. Now,
back to the episode. How reliable do you
think people are in relaying their own
phenomenology while on DMT? So, I did I
did descriptive experience sampling for
10 weeks and did like got these beeps
and was trying to describe my experience
and I actually did one sampling day on
LSD. Now, I didn't actually release this
in the final test because I was just
completely and utterly useless at it. It
was impossible. So, like I would be
tripping and then the beep would go off
and I'd be trying to write it down. I'd
be like trying to maintain the
experience in my mind and I'd be riding
it down and they'd be like, "Oh, my
plant looks like an octopus. Oh, what
was my experience? What was I right?"
And like impossible. Like it was just
Now, that's obviously distinct from DMT
because you're not tripping when you're
trying to recount the experience. But it
means that there's this translation
going on sort of when you're trying to
translate DMT phenomenology into sober
phenomenology. And it's it's almost like
you sort of learn Korean for 10 minutes
and then you're trying to and then you
forget Korean, but you're trying to pull
the Korean characters out. Like I'm
curious like how reliable do you think
people's phenomenology reports are on
DMT? Like what what sort of unique
difficulties come up when when they're
doing that? Because it seems like words
sort of fail describing these
experiences.
Yeah, I mean fantastic. There's a few
things here in that, you know, just the
very act of of trying to communicate
your experience whilst you're having the
experience kind of pulls you out of the
experience. Like so, uh, in in Chris's
study and in ours, you know, we had
this, uh, we did these kind of
microphenomenological time markers, not
with all of participants, just with
some. And that is just every minute you
would say, okay, Evan, you know, how
intense on a scale of 1 to 10, how
intense is your experience right now?
you know, and and and sometimes people
are can are capable of doing that.
Sometimes they don't. You know, for the
first minute or two, most people they
didn't respond at all. Uh or they would
just like laugh hysterically or say 11,
you know, and uh
ignored. Uh and in my own experience
doing that in Chris's lab, you know, uh
I remember hearing the question and then
I heard this little voice go nine. And I
was like, oh, that must be me. you know,
but it, you know, everyone reports it
kind of pulls you out of the experience
a little bit. Um, who was I can't
remember the name, I forgotten the name
of the the fantastic, very English
plumby psychedelic rack on. And, uh, he
had a habit of just talking endlessly.
Uh, and so Liry and his chums, they all
kind of devised to shut him up by giving
him DMT whilst in the middle of telling
a story. And sure enough, it it it it
kind of silenced him for a full 10
minutes, but then he kind of came back
afterwards and just carried on where it
finished off 10 minutes previously. But
he did say like trying to give him a
running commentary was like being whilst
being fired out the uh the barrel of a
an atomic cannon with neon bzantine
barreling, you know, was like it just
became impossible to give a a running
commentary. So, and they did try that,
you know, they had this thing called the
experiential typewriter uh in the 60s on
these early DMT trips with with Metsner
and Liry and uh that they had to then,
you know, uh they had these kind of very
basic buttons which would record a
sentiment or or or a kind of experience
or something. But yeah, it was it was
completely flawed. You know, it just it
didn't really amount to anything. they
abandoned that quite quickly because in
the depth of the DMT experience that you
know that it's you really are either in
it or you're kind of you're trying to
pull somebody out of it by communicating
with them. Uh but as it levels out it
gets easier. So you know on our
precognition experiment we we we triled
it. So we waited till they reported
they're at about a three or four on the
intensity and then we would say to them
okay now we want you to try and
visualize the future target like having
pre discussed all this with them before
they took the DNT and people were able
to then uh you know like direct their
attention and and visualize whatever it
is was coming to their mind's eye and
then report back on it afterwards. Uh uh
and we actually got some interesting
results. But um yeah, those first
moments of DMT come up. It's like you're
not going to get anything out of anybody
really of any value. The other one was
we had one of our participants actually
said he invited us back to do another
session with him. It says it's like,
"Okay, I really want you guys to come
and do it with me again because I I've
I've been practicing and I can now give
a running commentary while I'm on DMT
with my experience and communicate with
the entities." And we're like,
"Fantastic. Let's do it." And uh yeah,
what came out was hilarious. We were
like, "Okay, big moment. We'll even
record it." And he was just like,
"Fuckly
say." And we were like, "Yeah, well
done."
the running commentary.
>> So, he clearly hadn't verified the
quality of his running commentary with a
second party in that. He was just in his
room screaming [ __ ] to himself. It's
like, I'm so good at this. I am this is
so perfect.
>> Yeah, he definitely so funny.
>> I don't think people even realize how
difficult phenomenology is not on an
intense psychedelic, though. It's like
really hard to even articulate your
experience when you're stone cold sober.
So like I respect so much that you did
this research cuz it's I just it's so
hard to do on a psychedelic. I did one
on cannabis as well and it was equally
just kind of really difficult. I think
it was easier on cannabis and I figured
out a few more things than than on acid,
but like I I would still kind of throw
them away. Like I think I would need to
do 10 1-hour sessions and then maybe the
sixth session might have one one sample
remotely resembling something that isn't
gibberish. It's just so hard. I am
>> pioneering research.
>> I would love to do more. I'd love to
fund more and I'd love to be involved in
I think find it so interesting and I'm
glad you brought up aphantasia as well.
I'm super interested in like being a
part of the first aphantasia psychedelic
study because I think that needs to like
a real proper rigorous psychedelics and
aphantasia study needs to be done. I
find it so fascinating. I've spoken to
almost all the leading aphantasia
researchers in the world now. I just
think it's so cool. Um yeah, I have this
whole like my sister discovered she has
aphantasia at the age of 31. So it's
just been this really interesting thread
on the podcast.
>> Um
>> I would like to ask you a question. And
I'd be interested to hear what the Carl
Pearson and and Kio and what the others
what do what do they make of of
psychedelic experiences uh and
aphantasia because as far as I can tell
the majority I I suspect do not have any
visual mental imagery even with
psychedelics and then there are these
odd cases of people with aphantasia who
do get some visual mental imagery when
tripping. So from speaking to people
like Adam Zmen and Alfredo Spana,
they're actually not too surprised to
hear that psychedelics could induce
visual imagery because aphantasia really
seems to be about voluntarily generating
that imagery. So you can still kind of
get this spontaneous stream or some
people can get this spontaneous stream.
So like in the what aphantasia seems to
be related to is like the frontal cortex
orchestrating this top down voluntary
control and starting the process of okay
let's generate the image. So that's the
voluntary component and it you know
Alfredo seems seems to think that it's
issues in the connectivity between
frontal cortex and V1 and the fusoform
imagery node that is probably at the
heart of aphantasia. But if the
psychedelics are basically conjuring up
these mental imagery in a nonvoluntary
way, they seemed pretty okay with the
idea that people with aphantasia could
experience mental imagery. Like a lot of
people with aphantasia dream visually.
The surveys have different results, but
Adam Zmon said over 50%. Um, so it seems
like it's the voluntary component that's
that seems a crucial part of Advantasia,
which is why the psychedelics one is
seems so interesting, but it's work they
all want to do and can't get the money
for. You know, that's pretty much the
answer that I've gotten from all of
them.
>> Yeah, I've been planning to do one of
these studies for years now, but yeah,
I'll get around we'll get around to it,
but somebody will do one sooner enough.
But, uh, it's super interesting
question. And my bet it would be that
those people who you know the half of
aphantasics who get visual mental
imagery in dreams at least sometimes
might be the ones more susceptible to
some visual imagery the psychedelics but
let's see.
>> Yes.
>> How did you
>> It's always the anomalies which which
kind of throw up some really interesting
questions about our just our assumptions
about you know consciousness. Uh you
know that there like this the weirder
stuff points the way
>> for sure. How do you classify a entity
in these interviews? So if someone kind
of gives this sort of vague terminology
and maybe doesn't use the word entity or
you know like you said 85% 90% of people
um classify their experience as like
encountering an entity, but did you have
like a definition written down that like
with bo with a box around it that said
like this is what an entity is and this
is sort of what we're defining it as?
because I could see that also being very
difficult.
>> Yeah, of course. So, I mean, so first of
all, we just kind of clean just get them
to tell us about their experience in as
as much detail as possible and then we
kind of go back and and just uh you
know, dig into what they said uh and and
just attempt to kind of clarify. You
know, sometimes it's kind of clearly
explicit, but if it wasn't explicit or
they didn't say would say and you know,
were there any Yeah. whether did you
have any encounters and if so can you
describe those? Uh so kind of lading the
interview but initially just trying to
get down a kind of clean kind of
delivery of of what happened from start
to finish in as much detail as possible
and then we also had kind of surveys you
know psychometric measures and questions
as well so they they would complete uh
uh and and then ultimately you know we
got the 90% just by you know that's
based on the transcripts of of what they
said. uh I think it even is like 95% if
you include sense presence as well. So
like for about 90% they had a what they
felt was a clear encounter uh usually
visual you know and then there's like a
few would be like there was the kind of
the sense of of another being there uh
which wasn't us hopefully and um whereas
the guys with Eric Fantasia there were
two you know there was there was no
visual component but there was entities
there like the one of them was like this
he you know he said he was on this kind
of like train ride and he was kind was
zooping around on the train and there's
all these little people and they were
like, "Yeah, man. We're going for a
ride. Woohoo." Like this. And he was
like, "Yeah, just there with the boys."
He called them the boys and it was like,
"Yeah, they were just like little, you
know, like elves." It's like, "Oh my
god, there were like elves. Of course
there were elves." Uh, and it was like
and so like how did you encounter these
experiences? Did you did you see them?
It's like, "No, I didn't I didn't see
anything, but I just I just kind of
knew, you know, I I knew I was on this
train ride with these elves. I just you
know so like I don't know how that even
comes about but there was a kind of
apprehension of that experience of that
knowledge in the absence of any scene
anything seen this is what I was curious
you know can someone have a visual
entity experience and a gustatory entity
experience can you have a tactile entity
experience you know like we we're very
vision dominated people but there are
people that in their imagery profile
like aphantasia are not imagery
dominated and they might be emotionally
dominated. Like can you have a purely
emotionally driven entity experience and
I have no idea what that sentence means
but maybe to somebody else they do you
know what I mean? Maybe to someone else
they do and that makes complete sense
and they don't understand what we mean
by visual entity experience. So they're
like obvious the emotion one is the only
one where it could be like you're the
one that's hallucinating and like my
emotions were real and you know like
who's to say one is more salient than
another. It's just that the different
modalities that people recruit into
these experiences but you like visual
seems like the dominant one right but
were were there other modalities
recruited into these experiences? I
think there was some element of
senesthesia or you know other kind of
multiensory accounts but not you not not
predominantly you know like DMT is is
typically a very visual
sensed experience you know uh often like
even the body kind of disappears as well
you know there's like there's you know
it's like it's not even an embodied
experience and but it kind of is and it
isn't sometimes it's like like the
body's disappeared But you may have a
sense of like I've got a body but it's
not my body or whatever it is. Sometimes
people felt they were the entities as
well. Uh but you you don't see a lot of
that kind of uh different sensory
modality. I mean people together high
emotions you know like kind of feelings
of kind of deep profound bliss and awe
and love and and you know that kind of
thing. Uh but it would be great to see
more kind of in-depth studies exploring
these different sense modalities with
other people you know people with you
know non-neurotypical as well you know
people with senesthesia or or the
visually congenity blind or whatever it
might be uh to to probe this in a bit
more detail because yeah super
interesting question but yeah DMT
primarily a visual driver I would say
visual mental imagery anyway
>> when people said they entered 85% they
entered said the entities were real. Did
you ask them what they meant by real?
This I think this is a really
interesting like question and avenue as
well like what exactly does real mean?
>> Yeah. Yeah. What the hell does real
mean? I mean just shorthand for uh I
think we asked a bunch of different
questions like uh I'd have to look back
at this. It's been a long time and it it
needs exuming. But things like you know
do you believe they were uh sentient uh
self-existing
uh in in that space? that they continue
to exist. Do you think they continue to
exist even after the DMT has has gone?
Where do they exist? So, we asked, you
know, we kind of landed a whole bunch of
different questions about that, but I
can't and I can't remember what the the
key uh phrase would have been, but you
know, like they that they have some
independent sentient existence. That's
the kind of like crux of it when we say
real. What the hell does real mean? I
have no idea. But, you know, are they
independently sentient?
Had anyone said that they had met any of
these entities previously? Like they
recognized it and was like, "Oh, there's
there's Jim." Like we had a great
encounter two months ago, you know. Was
there is there any continuity of these
entities through time?
>> Good old Jim. Well, no, actually I mean
we tried to uh frame them in a way
actually. So we bracketed it. So we we
we said like please don't talk about
previous experiences.
just want this this core one experience
and we'd actually try and prevent them
if they did start comparing it to other
trips. So, we wanted to just like frame
it as this singular experience. So, we
didn't really even look at that in
particular. But, yeah, for sure people
do report uh having those kinds of
repeat occurrences. What's his name? The
the comed the American comedian. I've
now forgotten his name. Uh Shane Shane
Mouse, is it? No. What's his name? you
know, his purple woman uh experiencing
this
>> his little account of it which has been
animated and it's on YouTube of him
encountering this purple woman on DMT
repeatedly which is brilliant and
hilariously funny not least because then
and I'm going to spoil it for you. His
friend takes DMT for the first time and
he comes out of it going but halfway
through the trip he's like Shane Shane
there's a there's a purple woman in here
says she's looking for you. It's like
what the mind blown go.
Uh so yeah, sometimes they leak into
other people's trips apparently. But uh
so people do have some recurring
encounters as well, but I wouldn't say I
wouldn't say that I think I'd say more
often. I think they they it tends to be
like pretty different every time. Uh but
that might be just my own kind of
experience and bias. Uh again, needs
more research. There's just a million
questions here and just not enough money
because they're all so interesting. Um,
have you heard of DMT blocking? I like I
assume you have, but this is another
thing that just makes absolutely no
sense to me. So, I was speaking to um
Adam Butler yesterday who's written this
Butler's guide to DMT and has over
hundreds of DMT trips and he has this
really amazing story where he really
brought himself out of the pits of
despair and suicidality through DMT use,
which is, you know, sort of not an
uncommon thing to hear that people
really can just completely rescue their
mental health. And he he he kind of told
this story which was funny and weird at
the same time where he was starting to
feel about a bit cocky and a bit ego
about his DMT. He was like, "Oh, I'm
becoming famous about the as the DMT
person and like I'm, you know, he's
getting a bit of an ego about it and
he's like, "Oh, I'm the DMT guy. Let's
go. Let's take a big hit here." And he
describes just being blocked like being
punched in the face by a jester. And the
experience just over done. I mean, first
off, like that makes that makes no
sense. Like that whatever
neurochemistry, pharmarmacology,
receptor binding, like again, I'm trying
to think about it in these really
pharmacological terms like there is
still signal cascade pathways happening
in the brain. How does the phenomenology
of a jester punching you in the back of
a head just stop the trip? And so that's
weird. But then he talks about for the
next few months he was blocked and he
couldn't enter the DMT world and he
would he would sit there and take really
big doses like he would just take a lot
of the drug and he knew his doses
because he'd done it a hundred times
hundreds of times and he would just take
a big hit and he would experience
nothing like zero
>> and I'm like is that possible? Does that
make sense? That doesn't make sense. Is
it possible? But then this isn't a this
isn't a lone experience. Like again,
Galamore said that this is something
that that that happens to people. But
>> that doesn't make sense, does it? Like
how can how can you take the drug and it
does not do anything because you're
blocked because of the ego because the
what what sense does that make?
>> No, it is super interestingly and like
so what's happening here is psychology
overriding the neurochemistry. What the
hell is going on? Is it genuinely the
DMT entities going, "Nah, you know, your
name's not on the list. You're not
coming in."
>> Like, and I've had that experience, too.
Like, I I I probably overexperimented
with with DMT a zillion years ago. Uh,
and in the end, like the entities were
like, "No, they literally said, "No, not
you again. You've seen enough.
Booger off. Don't come back." And I was
like, "Hey guys, come on. It's just
getting interesting." And then the next
trip all I got was just geometric
patterns, right? You know, it's like,
"Oh, what's going on?" It's like just
like in kind of Yeah. in the waiting
room or whatever you want to call it. Uh
and then uh I did kind of like then
forcibly barge my way back in there and
had a really terrifying entity encounter
which put me off doing it again. It was
just like, "No, you should not be here."
And it just was really terrifying. So,
uh like who knows? Uh but you know it's
equally interesting that people some
people like just seem to be immune to
DMT like I've I've seen people to smoke
like pipes and pipes and pipes of it and
like nothing nada squat diddly you know
>> uh uh and you know you could put that
down to kind of neurochemistry serotonin
receptors whatever but like uh for
somebody to have the experience and then
to be told no you're not coming back in
and then they don't get anything after
that that is curious.
Uh but you know, could it be their own
psychological drivers? Perhaps for a
good reason. Maybe maybe they have been
taking too much DMT. Maybe it's like
just inflating their ego or it's like
maybe we should stop and integrate our
experiences a little bit or just learn
the lessons or do the service or
whatever it is or be grateful that
you've got over your depression uh and
and start living in this world a bit. I
don't know. But like there may be
something of value in that
which may or may not require us to to uh
buy into the idea of entities or not. It
could be our own kind of unconscious
drives and psychology. Either way, like
it's like the old adage, isn't it? You
when you get the message, you hang up
the phone.
I mean, it's it's just a weird feature.
It'd be kind of great if like cocaine or
heroin had this feature, right? That
they just the drug kind of cut the
person off. Like not today, buddy. You
know, like we like, you know, these
really harmful addictive drugs that
people, you know, really cause
themselves a lot of harm. It would be
great if they had their own sort of
self-regulating function that kicked
people out of the drug experience at
some point.
Like that's not been reported in any
other substance, has it? That that
>> Well, I don't even know how to describe
it. That you're blocked out of the the
subjective experience of the drug. I
mean, okay, people build tolerances, you
know, like uh I know
>> ketamine addicts in my time who like
they still can ketamine, but they don't
get the khole and they long for it, but
they can't get there anymore.
But I don't know if know they got a
specific message like no, you can't come
back. It's just it's just through kind
of total tolerance that it it it no
longer gives them the experience they
seek. But like that is is something I
think pretty unique to DMT uh in that
there's something communicated uh and
the experiences cease to take you back
where you want it to go to.
Do you think there's anything to the
endogenous DMT
space? That's a a very broad way of
categorizing that. the the different
ways that people think they can trigger
their own endogenous DMT to have
psychedelic states like in 9day silent
retreats or dark rooms or these sort of
meditative states. Do you think there's
any good research or evidence that what
they're doing there is actually
triggering some endogenous DMT?
>> Not at the minute. Uh and this this is
like an age old question actually. You
know, this is something that's been
bouncing around for decades. uh you know
certainly since Rick Strathman suggested
that indogenous DMT could account for
you know mystical experiences,
near-death experiences, pretty much
everything really you know sleep
paralysis you name it alien abduction I
mean it could be part of the explanation
of of many different experiences
uh indirectly you know so our work
through Pascal Michael uh did his PhD
project with me he looked at in in fine
greet detail you know the phenomenality
of near-death experience ES and and DMT
trip reports from our discrete group and
yeah there are a lot of overlaps and on
paper if you fill in the near-death
experience scale and DMT re experiences
score highly on that but if you look at
in in detail there are some mismatches
right uh which suggests that if DMT is
involved in a near-death experience um
it's like only part of of the equation
right not least because there's a whole
bunch of other incredible
quantities of of neurochemical cocktails
going on at the point of death, but also
because for instance, you don't get any
intense geometric patterns in near-death
experiences. Uh you don't get kind of
giant prey mantises, you know, they're
usually kind of humans or angels or dead
relatives or something. Uh you don't get
raped by crocodiles usually and mind you
that only ever happened in Strasma's
experiment as far as we know and so on.
And so there's these kind of matches and
mismatches between them. So um but we
what we really need is is good like
biomarker data which could be done. Um
and you know I I think we must have the
technology by now to to take blood
samples or preferably saliva or urine
something less invasive and and just
measure like levels of DMT after say two
days in a dark retreat or a week in a
dark retreat. you know, you could look
at it you like in a kind of dosing scale
and uh that research hasn't been done.
you know DMT research anyway is
massively underfunded but this would
like it I'd love to see more work done
on endogenous DMT and and what you know
what factors mediate it like potential
techniques of all states pranayyama yoga
whatever it is meditation
uh because that could be super
illuminating on the nature of the
relationship between indogenous
psychedelics and and uh non-druginduced
spiritual experiences
>> right I spoke to David Nichols about
this you know legendary psych
psychedelic researcher and he's quite
skeptical because he did like you know
the he did the chemistry on basically
like the how much the pineal gland would
have to create to have a psychedelic
dose and how much enzyme is available
and he's just like we're I think orders
of magnitude away from the sort of doses
that we would have for a proper
psychedelic experience to my
understanding and the he just I don't
think he said by by pure like pineal
gland neurochemistry you're just not
getting to that kind of dose so There
could be something else happening that
we haven't mapped that we don't
understand. But um it seems this sort of
increase in pineal gland production is
just not going to get you anywhere close
to what experiences people report in
terms of the intensity at these
meditations and trips. But I agree
there's just so many questions here.
It's it seems almost hard to rank order
like the thousand things that you could
do. Um and there seems to be just
tremendous benefit. Um, do you have a
particular experiment in mind that you
really want to run that like what's on
the absolute top of your list to run if
you had the money and ethical clearing
tomorrow?
Well, I've actually just put in for some
funding for a project to
follow on from what Chris is doing and
and look at uh uh you know brain
activity in in a bit more of a fine
detailed timing kind of way temporally
in terms of try and discern which comes
first the entity or the brain coherence
you know like just to pursue that a
little bit closer. uh that would be one
just tiny little step you know that's
the thing with science you have to do
like really ask very very small
questions incrementally and and get
slightly vague answers which you then
need to kind of then test again and so
on so you know science progresses really
slowly uh but that would be one such
study I think that would be uh fun fun
to do and super interesting uh yeah and
also I've got somebody lined up to do
that but um yeah I have I have I've kind
of like slightly stepped back from from
the DMTNC question. I mean, I'm not not
interested in it. It's just like it's
really hard to get at
>> uh you know and and I think but what has
happened in the kind of 20 years of
being interested in this question or
more actually longer is that we we do
now have some halfdecent phenomenology.
You know, we have some sense of
prevalences. You know, we've got at
least three halfdecent kind of data sets
uh showing that actually okay, not
everybody gets elves. somewhere between
say five and 25% of people get elves and
that okay well that's useful like
Terrence McCarron wasn't always right uh
but like it there's still a lot of elves
kicking about out there great now what
do we do with that I don't know um
so there are a lot of interesting
questions to ask at the minute we're
just we're we're taking a bit of a
tangent and looking at um manted
encounters uh as like one really weird
kind of DMT encounter that also happens
to people not on DMT and I think that is
that is of interest like there's
something potentially to be learned
there. Uh and I'm not sure what but
let's find out. Yeah. In Adam's story
yesterday he said that his
most resonant DNT experience of hundreds
was on the table being operated by these
mantids which again just what the hell.
But like and then his future self
appeared to him and basically gave him
this like you know long story short was
like you're doing okay buddy like
diagnos like the diagnostics is good
like it was it was like they were he was
getting a full a full checkup and like
you know that everything looked good
everything checked up okay and for some
reason him just hearing that from some
other thing that he knew in that moment
to be his future self, but he couldn't.
He said he didn't see his future self.
It wasn't, you know, him with a longer
beard or like aged and more wrinkles or
like it was just some other presence
that he somehow in some abstract way
knew to be himself from the future was
just telling them, you know, you're
doing okay, buddy. Keep going. But he
was being operated on mantids when that
was happening.
>> I'm assuming there was some DMT involved
in the making of that particular
documentary. But uh I mean that's great.
like maybe we can have like uh manted
coaches, you know, for like self-help uh
in the future. Maybe I mean this is one
of the the kind of multitudinous
theories that did get banded around that
that people like genuinely attach some
some measure of robustness to is like
that at least you know existentially
that like of maybe we're communicating
with our future selves like in some way
and like if we can transcend time and
space and that that's something that
something filters through occasionally
in these stories. Um, I mean, I don't
know. One of the things we're doing in
this survey is actually asking people to
to to first of all say what they believe
the mantids are based on their
experiences and also say uh report on
anything back that the mantids have said
about who they are as well. And that's
going to be super interesting to see
like how wild and weird that is and
whether or not there's any commonalities
uh as well. But of course, like the the
manted meme is also loose, so you you
can't really put too much store by it.
Anyway, I think I actually shared
something like a week ago that might be
related to you that I didn't know where
Andrew Gallammore was was reposting
something like we're looking for people
that had mantis experiences and I
reposted that to try and get it out. So,
that's funny that that links back to you
because I didn't I didn't actually know
that.
>> Yeah, thanks for that. Do you think that
there's anything to um correlations
between like positive mental health
outcomes and particular entity
encounters? Like do you think there
might be something to the idea that you
know one encounter over another might
actually lead to a positive trajectory
in life where others might be deemed
negative or like that's the kind of
thing that if that was actually the case
that would be too weird to me. like that
just that doesn't like it seems that
that would be just purely subjective and
purely related to the individual in that
moment. But would do you think that's
plausible that that it could be that you
know there's specific archetypal
entities and they could actually have
some predictable you know year after
trip to year after trip sort of effect
from that encounter.
I mean I think it's a really super
interesting question and I think it's
like you know one we need to kind of
probably explore like and it sounds
frivolous but I think it's actually
interesting you know like we got to the
point thankfully with the psychedelic
renaissance of of like looking at
mystical experiences you know so for the
first time in what many decades the
nword the mystical experience was no
longer something that was deemed as kind
of pathological or demonic you know and
then kind of started coming into science
as as something potentially linked to
better mental health. And so in some
psychedelic assisted psychotherapy
research particularly that coming from
the states you see the use of the
mystical experience questionnaire as a
scale and when it is used uh it's one of
the most robust and reliable predictors
of clinical outcomes like above and
beyond the intensity of the experience
the dosage you know if it like
considering how more mystical your
experience is the better are your
clinical outcomes. So I think it that
also kind of shows the the way that well
yes let's explore these other
experiences and this is something I've
been trying to kind of champion a bit
recently is that we should look at all
other exceptional experiences as well.
So we just did a a kind of fairly brief
survey just asked people about other
kinds of exceptional experiences induced
by psychedelics not just classic
mystical unitive experience like
telepathy out of body experiences all
the rest of it entity encounters. uh and
this wasn't with the clinical
population. So we just looked at kind of
well-being and yeah we found that the
vast majority of people said those
experiences of exceptional nature with
psychedelics were uh part of their their
increase in in well-being, right? Uh and
the number one index of well-being we
found shift was people's sense of uh
purpose and meaning in life, right?
which is also the number one thing that
people who are depressed say they wish
they could regain. You know, the one
thing about their depression they wish
they could recover is their sense of
purpose and meaning in life. So, I think
yeah, maybe having an entity encounter
boosts that sense of purpose and
meaning. Maybe having some kind of
significant uh extradimensional other
telling you, you know, you've got this,
everything's going to be okay. You just
got to find your way. Might be better
than just, you know, having like like I
don't know, some random geometry going
going on. Uh
yeah, it' be an interesting question.
Does your geometry being sentient help
with your political outcomes? I mean,
why not? Let's find out. So wild.
>> Do you think it's so wild? Do do you
think there's anything to the telepathy
tapes?
>> Oh, that's an interesting question. I
mean, I
uh I mean there's there's definitely
something to it and I'm not sure what
that is, right? I mean, it's an
extraordinary uh case and and phenomena.
Uh it's it's uh challenging from a to
kind of look at it evidentially
scientifically to some extent because
um for one thing you know and my limited
understanding of it you know you there's
always their parental figure in the room
that you know is how to what extent has
non-verbal cues been being kind of
eradicated you know a lot of it's on
tape rather than on video and so you
know it's not being run as a controlled
experiment.
I think there's some phenomena there
that definitely deserves further
explanation. Whether or not this is kind
of robust evidence for telepathy in in
non-verbal autistic uh people, I'm not
sure, but I think it's it's it's hugely
interesting and suggestive uh at the
very least. Uh and uh if there can be
ways of devising better controlled
experiments without compromising
uh the participants you know
significantly i.e. you know, they need
to have their parent in the room or
they'll freak out kind of thing. That's
part of the problem. Uh then then uh
great, let's see that. But um uh I I
think yeah, I think all these things are
worthwhile exploring. You know, in
principle, I don't see anything wrong
with it. I think I think what differs in
in this kind of research from a lot of
the other kind of telepathic research in
parasychology over the last 144 years is
that the the results are incredibly
uh high. you know they're getting like
100% success rate sometimes with these
with these cases which which isn't like
how we ordinarily uh see uh sigh as
functioning you know when we get it
working it's usually just like somewhat
above like significance it's like very
small effect sizes it's a bit erratic
it's not very robust it's a bit fuzzy
you know uh um but yeah they are a
special group so maybe they have some
special abilities um in these explor
growing some more I'd say as ever. Do
you think does it not seem like if there
really was um something interesting in
that direction that someone would have
thrown a couple of billion at it even a
couple of million that like cuz it just
seems like such an extraordinary ability
with such extraordinary claims that why
hasn't a scientist applied for that
grant and just done this in the most
rigorous
you know foolproof methodological maybe
nothing is foolproof but you you know
like you you blind it as much as you can
and you really create some good studies
around this. It it really seems like
that would have been done if there was
anything interesting in that direction.
I think I think you know sometimes the
stories are more interesting than the
actual science and I think like most
people want stories right and uh
scientists want science we want really
hard science we want to know for sure
but you know that became like more
popular than the Joe Rogan as a podcast
for a while like telepathy tapes and
like same with with Danny Gola you know
with his DMT laser experiment it's not
an experiment he's primed everybody to
have the experience he could have made
that into an experiment he could have
gone okay I'm not going to tell you what
you're expected to see and I'm not going
to sit there with you and and talk you
through the whole process until you see
what you're meant to see. You know, it
could have like could have ran it in a
more blind way. Uh and we might have
some interesting data, right? But like
now, okay, for the hundred odd people
who have seen the the Matrix and Danny's
Laser Quest, like uh we can't be sure
that it wasn't just because of priming.
>> So, you know, that could have been done
as an experiment, an actual experiment.
Uh but now all we have is like great
we've got this kind of weird story which
we can't do either way because we can't
now guarantee anybody's not already been
primed to see the the code. So like
Yeah. Yeah. So
>> for people unfamiliar with the DMT laser
experiment, could you just kind of lay
out what exactly is happening there in
terms like what like what's the what's
the experiment quote unquote that
they're doing and what are the claims
being made around it? So Danny uh my
limited understanding of it is basically
found that if you put a is it 50 Hz
frequency laser red light uh and you
kind of angle it bouncing off the wall
and then on a smalish doses of DMT if
you were to stare at the kind of uh
refracted laser light you will if you
look hard enough and deep enough see
some code and you know if we were
actually running an experiment I
wouldn't tell you what that is but it
turns out it's is a bit like kind of
cross between kind of Hebrew and uh
Japanese huracana katakana uh letters
kind of trinkling, you know, like moving
through space in a pixelated way. Much
like in the the film The Matrix, it
turns out, you know, uh and so like and
then so people some people have seen
that, a lot of people haven't, you know,
a lot of people have tried. I've tried,
you know, I didn't see anything. Other
people have tried very hard and and
didn't get anything. So like, and that's
interesting. So we can't actually now do
any experiments
to to kind of blindly produ reproduce
those effects but we could look at say
suggestability like you know is is there
something different about people who see
the code against those who don't you
know uh we might find out something else
but you know we don't know what the
nature of the code is. What what seems
sort of absurd to me is that, you know,
I think it's a fine claim to say that
the combination of DMT and laser like
the optical properties of laser
defraction at an angle creates this sort
of strange visual phenomena that we
can't really explain. That's kind of
mildly interesting and sort of weird and
we anomalous, right? We just it gets
interesting. Why is it like that? No one
really knows. But then why the hell is
it immediately the code to the
simulation and prove that we're in proof
that we're in the Matrix? It's like that
jump. I'm just like, wait, wait, wait.
Where where did we get where did we get
to that? Like we just said that there
was some characters that people are
seeing and they're not even really
seeing the same characters and some
people aren't seeing any characters. But
why is that the code to the Matrix all
of a sudden? Like that seems like a bit
of a leap. Maybe that needs some
explanation.
>> Yeah, we haven't even got to that bit.
Like for for sure there's some like uh
few assumptions at work here.
>> So you said you did it and didn't see
anything.
>> No, I mean it's not I didn't see
anything. I was like I could just about
make out things starting to pixelate a
little bit but it was like this is like
you really
you know like trying my hardest. And it
was the fact that I was having to really
try and it was like how much of my own
kind of uh imaginal overlay am I kind of
forcing onto this perception to to kind
of cram it into this like into what it's
meant to be. Uh but no, I didn't it was
it was not easy. It didn't come simply
and I wasn't going oh wow that's the
Matrix.
>> But uh you know like
but there's something interesting at
work as ever. Do you think that there
has been good work done on telepathy?
Like is is there a good study that you
know obviously doesn't prove it as a
phenomena but has good you know
scientific methodology has employed like
a good method and it does show something
weird that is inexplicable like what is
there an example you can give of like
sigh that is like you just look at and
you're like wow that's that's weird. I
mean the the Gansfeld research I would
say like as a body of research is is
some of the most uh widely conducted and
well controlled you know and and it
started out uh in the 70s and you know
it's primarily as a telepathy kind of
experiment you know you have like a
sender in one room and somebody in a
kind of sound attenuated room in a
Gansfeld state who's the receiver uh and
uh so like it started off in a very
analog way and then there was this whole
kind of criticism from skeptics and then
eventually there was this kind of joint
communicate and they set out the kind of
protocol for a rigorously controlled
experiment which then was kind of
replicated repeatedly after that and you
know the results of like
with increasing like uh quality control
over the years it's now been refined to
the point where I think the data coming
out of it is is pretty robust and you're
still getting effects like you know
you're getting like 30% 32% hit rate as
opposed to 25% by chance but it's still
like pretty consistent and it's kind of
plateaued. Uh so like as a body of work
and that's the nature of science is like
not any one experiment is enough to to
kind of for the veracity of you know any
kind of claims I don't think but a body
of work a collection of work does stand
a better chance of of doing that. Um,
for me personally that there's always
the the problem with telepathy that it
might actually just be precognition
anyway. Uh, like we can't really be sure
of the source of this uh information or
where it's coming from necessarily. Uh,
and so, you know, and there's also the
extra risk of of some kind of sensory
leakage between two people in in in the
same kind of window of time. So if you
run pre-cognition experiments which uh
if you you know like the the information
only comes from the future and it's
that's controlled it can't be telepathy
it can't be clairvoyance uh and it can't
be sensory leakage and so we can only
know for sure that it's probably
pre-cognition or some really weird quirk
of probability which we're happy to
disregard because everything in science
is based on on on probability right you
know even the the existence of the hix
boson on that could be it looks like
some kind of exotic psychokinesis
experiment to parasychology
and actually we find even better results
uh in in things like the global
consciousness project you know they got
like a I think they got a five sigma
statistic figure for the higs boson um
in the in the global consciousness
project they got like a six sigma
improbable kind of like statistical
outcome uh uh and cost like a fraction
of the price of running the expos but
like to parasychologist is you get a
bunch of physicists together and go,
"Okay, we're speculating on the possible
existence of this thing. There's some
kind of theoretical underpinning uh and
we're going to base the the existence of
that thing uh on like you know extremely
improbable statistics then and we accept
it on that basis then you know why don't
we do that for side phenomena as well?"
Oh, because oh because you know this is
physics and we're real scientists and
and that's parasychology and we don't
believe that exists you know. Yes.
Um, it is a funny point. I've thought
about this often that like if you read
like a latest book on like quantum
physics, like it makes no sense as well.
Like with it's ultra ridiculous and
preposterous in possibly even more ways
than the Gansfeld experiment and te
telepathy and, you know, the strangest
anomalous consciousness experiences. But
I guess the universe can be weird, but
we can't. I don't know. Like the
>> But you're right. You're right to draw
the comparison that that that the claims
physicists are making. You know, like I
saw there was a tweet that was going
around that was that was being retweeted
because everyone was like, "Oh, it it
was like the what's his name? Mi Mitchi
um one of the big physicists was like,
you know, now I think gravity is just
like um leaking from a parallel
dimension, something along the lines of
that." And everyone is like, "Fantastic.
I'm going to adjust accordingly."
There's load loads of people. I guess
that's sorted then. It's like just the
most absolute non ridiculous sentence
that means nothing to absolutely
everyone. Um but yeah, because it's a
physics person doing it. H they're
allowed to do it. You know, they're
allowed to invent the 13th dimension in
string theory and that's allowed. But
it's a good point. It's funny. I don't
know why we hold the universe to
different standards that we hold
ourselves.
>> Absolutely agree. Uh and I think it, you
know, a lot of it comes again to the
sociology of of science as much as
anything. It's like, you know, um, all
disciplines basically have physics envy
because physics is like the backdrop,
you know, that's like the ultimate backs
stop hard science. It doesn't get any
harder than physics. And in fact, but
then when it get to that hard physics,
it gets all really squishy and weird and
like doesn't, you know, there's so much
we don't explain and and yet that's
still heralded as as as the the kind of
the ground of all reason ultimately. and
all of the scientists have to to kind of
have their dawn their hats and and and
and uh show due deference to to physics.
So when you know psych parasychologist
you aren't even psychologists you know
they're like you're not quite
psychologist come along and say well you
know we have all this really weird
phenomena goes on in the human mind it's
like well no no no we can't possibly
have that happen. Uh so there is there
is like this kind of gatekeeping I think
that goes on. Uh, and I think I think
they're starting to break down because I
think privately publicly people are are
resistant to engage with like
parasychology and cy phenomena because
it's like a threat to their careers,
right? Really, because there are a
handful of very vocal biferous
gatekeepers who say you can't believe in
that and be a scientist. Uh, you know,
but science isn't about beliefs, you
know, there should be no room for
beliefs in science. Uh, science is a
method, right? And and it should be as
agnostic as possible. uh and and like
seek out any I a priority assumptions uh
and acknowledge them and and try and
eliminate them. Uh not go this is what
scientists are meant to believe and if
you look even research that area you're
going to get outcast as a pseudo science
you know that's that's just that's not
that's not real science.
>> Do you think there is there any
exceptional experience that's more
anomalous than DMT entities? Like what's
the holy grail of an anomalous
exceptional experiences? Is there
anything weirder than DMT entities?
>> I mean, they're pretty weird. I mean, I
I think I think thing I think what's
astonishing about DMT entities is
they're so bloody reliable and
instantaneous, you know? is like
literally, you know, I don't know, 70
80% of people can rock up to the pipe
and boom, they're going to have an
entity encounter which if they do it
properly, which may or may and probably
will change their ontology, right? That
that's impressive like just for
reliability and repeatability. Uh but
you know, the the universe is a super
weird weird place and and as are our
minds. Uh I I think there I mean that
I've had a few exper ones when you're
not on drugs uh that then really like if
you got the drugs as an excuse that's
kind of okay. Well, but it was you can
always go oh it was just your brain
chemistry and leave it at that and not
you know investigate too much deeply.
But it's when you're having these
experiences without DMT that's when it
gets really interesting. Um and uh yeah
I think there's many examples of that.
Have you studied Iawaska and you know
plant spirits, forest spirits? These
sort of are they I don't know if they're
the same thing as DNT entities. They're
a different type of DMT entity that's
reliable under IASA when you take a DMT
with a monoamine oxidase inhibitor and
you allow the trip to go longer and they
experience these these entities that are
plant and forest like. Have you have you
studied these at all? I mean yeah and
then it not systematically um but of
course you and you get again you get a
lot of overlap and you get some
differences as well and like it's like
it's then a matter of well teasing apart
okay so what is the the cosmological
differences here you know and we can't
necessarily say that oh it's just all
down to cultural influences because if
you do with this group of indigenous
people you may start to see these kind
of phenomena uh like you I get jaguars
and snakes or whatever. Uh, and go,
well, there you go. That's just kind of
purely a cultural influence. But it's
like, well, but if you speak to them,
you take their perspective. It's like,
well, of course you got jaguars and
snakes because they were the kind of
beings we were we were evoking, you
know, through our through our ritual
structure and our kind of ongoing
relationship with them. Uh, so, you
know, you can't just assume it's it's
cultural either, but there do tend to be
kind of differences. I think you can you
can get uh like most the same kind of
entity encounters, but like the the
specifics of it may differ. So, you're
going to get more jaguars and snakes
perhaps with Iawaska uh and maybe less
kind of rapy reptilians or whatever. I
don't know. But, um yeah, so there are
there are going to be some differences
for sure. And and they often like more
organic I would say but like when I say
organic it's often like hyper
technologized organic you know like kind
of uh organic mechanic like they're like
uh so you know some of these kind of
like Pablo and stuff would talk about
like like seeing kind of sentient kind
of machinery like kind of UFOs but that
they were sentient and and uh so like uh
it's like this kind hyper
techchnologized organic kind of
visionary uh experiences which which
don't fit easily in you know our nicely
distinct categories uh of
>> we have living matter here and we have
mechanical stuff here and it's like
that's all mashed together so and that
you can also get that on DMT2
so like you know I think there I think
there's a great deal of overlap and and
I think the context and and the use uh
may give it more of these kind of iconic
flavors of, you know, Jaguars and things
like that.
>> And do those technological um
hallucinations, trip reports, do they
occur in non-technical societies? Like,
are we talking Amazonian Peruvian tribes
here that are also seeing technological
experiences even though these aren't
technological societies?
Well, that's a bit hard to say, isn't
it? Because for one thing, nobody's kind
of taken the time to interview like
hordes of shapibbo shamans about their
their experiences in the same kind of
way or whatever it is. But and also they
are kind of somewhat technology now, you
know, they're familiar with with with
planes and cars and all and telephones
and all that kind of stuff. So that is
that they're not just living isolated in
some cave, you know, and and no concept
of technology. So these aren't really
the kind of questions you can fruitfully
ask anyway I would say but you know if
you look to some of the first accounts
like like amaringos which go back to 70s
say that there's like you know there is
seeing kind of like UFOs sentient
sentient machinery and stuff like that.
Uh, so
like yeah, I would say that that that
that kind of stuff is probably in there,
but not with any kind of certainty of
saying they were seeing mechanical
technological stuff before they knew
about technology,
>> right?
>> But my guess is if like if I see that
crazy stuff uh in an Iwaska trip, I'm
pretty sure they do too, you know?
>> Yeah. Yeah, it's like you if if
the you know shared cultural priming is
affecting these trip reports in the way
that we think we are, you'd at least
expect
tribes that you know they don't have
complete lack of exposure to technology
but they aren't working on their laptops
12 hours a day. You know that they
aren't doing all the things that in the
west they are doing. So you you would
expect to see some differences surely.
You know, we are glued to our devices
and technology 24/7 and they know
technology exists and maybe engage in it
infrequently, but you know, you would
have to expect that that impinges on the
experience in terms of frequency and in
terms of intensity. And it's just so
much more work needs to be done. We need
more money. We need more billionaire
philanthropists going to the Brazilian
rainforest and doing Iaska and then
giving people like you billions of
dollars. If there's anyone listening,
>> Yeah. Yeah. Send. That's probably one of
the greatest one of the biggest funding
sources is it people doing IASKA or like
big you know billionaire psychedelic
trips and then donating a bunch of
money.
>> Yeah, it does occasionally happen. Uh
and there is a history of that for sure.
Yeah, it's all all many many super
interesting questions. I will say one
thing I remember back uh over 20 years
ago now there was uh one of the first
psychedelic conferences we put on the
UK. I think it was Eric Davis who was
talking about people uh indigenous
shamans in in the Amazon like not just
using like jaguars as their power
animals but in their kind of intershanic
sorcery battles they were invoking like
uh you know US helicopter gunships to
kind of like to to visualize to fire
their their kind of magic missiles at
their their enemies and stuff. So like
it's like they're not averse to kind of
weaving in technology and it's not just
because oh I have to live in the Amazon
jungle, you know, I'm I'm this all has
to be certified organic. No, it's like
they'll just kind of call in whatever is
is suitable and appropriate. You know,
it's it's shamanism is is pragmatic if
nothing else. Uh and and therefore it
doesn't really have any limits on what
it it brings into its purview. I would
say
>> what is an inter shamanic battle
>> like I mean that dude trying to put a
hex on me and I'm just going to zap him
with magic missiles.
>> You said that sentence like that was
just common like that was like you know
when you're engaging in your inter
shimonic sorcery hex battles like
actually no I I don't actually know what
that means at all as a sentence really.
Oh, well I mean you probably should
because I mean this is like this is one
of the things we've just completed a
survey on this actually and that's like
people's encounters of black magic and
sorcery uh who take psychics
particularly amongst like people
drinking iawaska in in various iawaska
groups and and it's actually fairly
prevalent. I think we had about a
quarter of people felt like they'd had
some kind of uh uh black magic sorcery
psychic attack which you know actually
that's actually quite surprising because
if you look at some of the earlier
earlier anthropology coming out from
like the 1970s like Marlene Dokin Dios
she found that like the vast majority of
people consulted Iawaskeros before the
waves of kind of tourism uh for like uh
either to remove hexes or to send curses
uh or primarily for love magic and only
a small proportion went for any kind of
healing. Uh so like you know that that
like Amazonians
use was primarily involved in spiritual
warfare prior to you know rich gringo
turning up wanting spiritual
enlightenment to boost the KPIs on their
latest tech app with some insight.
No, no, no. That's not what they were
doing.
>> God, it's a it's a Swiss army life of
features this Iaza has, right?
Everything from love to to hex's to Wow.
Oh, so interesting. So so fascinating.
You're such an interesting man. I mean,
such a such a really are. It's so fun to
talk to. I mean, all of these threads
can be pulled on in so many different
directions and they all open up 10 more
questions they want to ask. It's this
has been so much fun and I'm so glad
that the profession and title of
professor of exceptional experience
exists and I'm so glad it does. How how
do you think to finish? I'm I'm curious
on one final question. How do you think
your views on consciousness have shifted
in the last few decades of studying
these anomalous consciousness
experiences? like do you have would you
say a stable ontology now of how you
think this works? Do you have are you
completely open to everything? Do you
even lean in a particular direction? I'm
kind of just curious how someone with
your experience
maybe both firsthand and theoretically
thinks about this stuff.
>> Yeah, me too. I'd love to know what I
think about this stuff. Yeah. Um yeah, I
guess I kind of I guess I always started
off curious and then you know a bit of
psychology education made me very
reductive and physicalist and then uh I
kind of went beyond that and went full
nihilist uh and then ended up swinging
around that nihilism led me to
agnosticism and like just like like a
kind of more positive fertile and porous
kind of nihilism, you know, not
believing in anything and then have like
pretty much uh temporarily adopted every
other possible
uh reality tunnel I can find in some way
or another at various points and so I
don't really know you know and I think
it's useful to to to have a uh I mean
obviously look we we we don't deal with
uncertainty very well but we there are
no certainties so it's like uh it's that
kind of fertile doubt isn't it like the
appleia uh of of not knowing is is a
good place to sit uh and it also
prevents us from jumping to too many
conclusions
uh prematurely as well. So I do try and
be agnostic but you know in my dayto-day
life uh you know I can very much sit in
a kind of reductive neurosentric
perspective and that's really useful for
kind of piecing together some bits of
the jigsaw puzzle. Uh but in my
day-to-day life, I'm a kind of like uh
you know, neopagan, shamanically
informed lazy mystic probably, right?
And just like everything's
interconnected and uh uh
live in a magical reality. Uh and yet I
can be like super rational scientist as
well. So it's like it's like we can be
all of it, right? But and and still not
have a clue. Uh and that but at least
that's my position. Um so that's about
as best
>> I can totally understand how both
perspectives h lend their you know um
value in different ways in different
lenses like in your scientific work you
might need a particular lens in your you
know spiritual meaning whatever it might
be a different lens and it's nice to
flexibly sort of have both and that's
completely fine I think everyone does
that in in different ways and different
capacities but if I if you were like
forced to be like, is consciousness a
property of biological systems or is
consciousness a property of the
universe? Which way do you lean?
>> Um,
which way do I lean?
I mean,
>> it could even be 51% 49.
>> Yeah. Uh, yeah, it would definitely be
leaning
not in the physicalist direction, you
know. I I I what I do like is I'm going
to take the the John Lily like oath here
and that is whatever I believe to be
true is true within certain parameters
and those parameters need to be tested
experimentally and experientially and
when those parameters are found they
just turn out to be more beliefs to be
transcended in the problems of the mind
there are no limits uh but what you
believe is true is true so that's that's
my working hypothesis is
that's a beautifully evasive answer.
>> It's been such a pleasure.
>> This has been so much fun. Really,
really so much fun. A great
conversation. Really, really enjoyed it.
Thank you so much for your time. I'm I
I'm sure we'll have I hope we have many
more of these. It such a pleasure. Your
work is awesome. I look forward to
seeing what you put out, what your
research goes. The the the further
analysis of these DMT studies, I'm
excited to read. But such a pleasure to
chat to I think this has been so much
fun.
>> Thank you very much, Evan. It has been
fun. Take care.
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