The Psychedelic Apocalypticism of Terence McKenna
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- Опубликовано: 26 июл 2024
- Celebrating the flawed genius of Terence McKenna (and debunking the Stoned Ape Theory along the way).
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~TABLE OF CONTENTS~
0:00 Introduction
6:55 1. Times I Got High
17:59 2. The Mushroom Goes North
45:10 3. The Stoned Ape Theory
1:15:40 4. 2012 and Beyond the Infinite
1:35:58 Conclusion / Credits
~REFERENCES~
[1] The Joe Rogan Experience 1615
[2] Gerber K, Flores IG, Ruiz AC, Ali I, Ginsberg NL, Schenberg EE. Ethical Concerns about Psilocybin Intellectual Property. ACS Pharmacol Transl Sci. 2021 Jan 1;4(2):573-577. doi: 10.1021/acsptsci.0c00171. PMID: 33860186; PMCID: PMC8033603.
[3] Terence McKenna. True Hallucinations: Being An Account of the Author’s Extraordinary Adventures in the Devil’s Paradise (1993). HarperCollins Publishers
[4] Terence McKenna. The Archaic Revival (1991). HarperOne Publishing
[5] mycoGeeky. “Dennis McKenna Tells All About His Early Years ! The MycoGeeky Podcast” (Uploaded 2023). RUclips • Dennis McKenna Tells A...
[6] Terence McKenna. Food of the Gods: The Search for the Original Tree of Knowledge (1992). Bantam New Age Books
[7] “Terence McKenna: The Stone Ape Hypothesis (8/22/92)” (2023). Voices of Esalen www.esalen.org/podcasts/teren...
[8] Cavanna, F., Muller, S., de la Fuente, L.A. et al. Microdosing with psilocybin mushrooms: a double-blind placebo-controlled study. Transl Psychiatry 12, 307 (2022). doi.org/10.1038/s41398-022-02...
[9] Madsen MK, Fisher PM, Burmester D, Dyssegaard A, Stenbæk DS, Kristiansen S, Johansen SS, Lehel S, Linnet K, Svarer C, Erritzoe D, Ozenne B, Knudsen GM. Psychedelic effects of psilocybin correlate with serotonin 2A receptor occupancy and plasma psilocin levels. Neuropsychopharmacology. 2019 Jun;44(7):1328-1334. doi: 10.1038/s41386-019-0324-9. Epub 2019 Jan 26.
[10] Michael B. Cosmopolous. Bronze Age Eleusis and the Origins of the Eleusinian Mysteries (2015). Cambridge University Press, Page 19-22
[11] “Terence McKenna’s Last Trip” (May 2000). www.wired.com/2000/05/mckenna/
[12] Wisdom For Life. “Terence McKenna’s Last Interview” (Uploaded 2018). RUclips • Terence McKenna 's Fin...
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CORRECTION: Psychotria viridis is the ingredient of ayahuasca that contains DMT, not banisteriopsis caapi.
🎉
😅😅😅😅😅😅😅😅😅😅😅😅😅😅😮😅
These Checkmate Lincolnite episodes are getting weirder with every one.
Cant wait for the next one.
Grant to Meade, 1864: "Gord, duuude, we'll outflank Lee's trenches at Petersburg METAPHYSICALLY........These Spencer-equipped dragon cavalry are some kick-ass shit".
@@user-gp2nc2lx5q "Send in the machine-elf brigade!"
Remember when th WFG exorcising Klause from Johnny Reb was peak weirdness? The trip just keeps tripping man...
@@ArakDBlade "that's his NAME?!!"
after having watched this, i believe terrence shouldve written a dope ass novel rather than trying to make serious hypotheses
He would have been an amazing sci fi writer. He also probably wouldn’t have been nearly as influential though.
@@AtunSheiFilms
While I agree, I think that would have sentenced him to being a second rate Phillip K Dick... or a first rate Robert Anton Wilson... As broken clock gurus go, TMK is a gem. I feel sorry for kids today, trying to piece together weird ontologies out of the broken ramblings of Brett and Eric Weinstein and whoever was on Joe Rogan last week.
@@Blashswanski RAW certainly stole a lot from McKenna. And PKD for that matter.
@@EphemeralTao I think it's more accurate to say there was cross-pollination between all these guys. I'd add Timothy Leary to the mix and a host of other lesser-known underground writers and thinkers.
@@heressomestuffifound Nah, RAW was quite open about lifting a bunch of stuff from McKenna (and Leary) and quotes from him quite a lot.
Atun shei doing shrooms in the Pennsylvania woods while dressed as a pilgrim is the most "yeah that tracks" I've ever said about a youtber
"PAPIST HEATHEN! That be no ordinary Puritan! That be The Witchfinder General Of The Colony Of Massachusetts Bay!"
I thought he was referring to Gettysburg there
@@scottwright752 That's what Billy Yank and Johnny Reb are for.
As a Pennsylvanian, this checks out as a local activity. Atun Shei is really getting the local experience
Everyone knows you for Checkmate and Witchfinder, that much is undeniable. But my favorites from you have been the weird ones out of left field. The Hotel, Metamorphosis of Prime Intellect, and this. I’m glad you’re comfortable enough to jump high out of the potential rut often and give us some real gems.
I genuinely appreciate his perspectives on these somewhat niche cultural facets, and hope he'll keep doing them! Even if 40 years passed, he'd still most certainly keep my interest with this weird stuff :P
Yeah, I am genuinely surprised he came out with such a long video so soon after the epic finale of the Checkmate series.
So, arya ever going to book a room at the Blackburn Inn and Conference Center just to live in a haunted hotel?
@@MatthewTheWanderer I largely finished editing Checkmate in early May. I was researching and writing this one during the month or so that the composer and VFX artist were putting the final touches on the finale :)
Oh and also, I’m glad you like the out of pocket stuff! I enjoy making it.
TLDR: "Atun-Shei had to take shrooms to understand Terence McKenna"
I'd imagine most people would
@@JonPITBZNyeah like that's the whole point of McKenna
You have to take shrooms to understand shrooms. Psychedelics are a limit experience
@@Hasshodovery well put
There's an older man that lives in my apartment. He has a lot of chronic terminal health issues and in all honesty is actively dying. He said he did a 6 mg mushroom trip over the weekend and was able to find a profound sense of peace through it
I had done them after a pretty bad diagnosis. I confronted a lot of my issues and found some peace in it.
I think that kind of ties into the whole thing, psychedelics are very often cognitively damaging they have the ability to convince people they have experienced some profound connection with a greater power and many maintain that feeling after takeing it.
thing is if someone is dieing, or has life impedeing PTSD thats actively useful in provideing quality of life.
does not however mean its a good idea for most people.
Just do MDMA or something
Hey I studied this stuff for a few years while I was in college and in case anyone is wondering there is ample evidence of the physically damaging effects of MDMA as it acts basically like meth in realizing such huge amounts of serotonin quickly. It doesn't mean it can't be done safely, but if your being careful around traditional psychedelics (which can cause psychotic breaks, but don't appear to cause psychical damage) than you should avoid MDMA which does cause physical brain damage based on actual data, and can still cause psychotic breaks.@@therideneverends1697
@therideneverends1697 the active ingredient in certain fungi has actually been repeatedly proven in studies to be the opposite of "cognitively damaging", increasing neuroplasticity, healing emotional trauma to brain pathways and curing depression and ptsd. It can aid with a range of issues from mental health disturbance to simply boosting creativity.
@@therideneverends1697 I'm gonna add onto the comment above me since they didn't mention the MDMA you mentioned at the end, but you can't pull 1 drug out of a category and attribute its features to everything else in that category (especially when that 1 drug fits within an entirely separate major subcategory of said larger category). MDMA is neurotoxic. Psilocybin and LSD, among many other psychedelics have not shown to be, and while MDMA is neurotoxic, if you take advantage of harm reduction practices, such as testing your MDMA to make sure it's what you think it is and isn't cut with anything, taking the appropriate supplements before, during, and after your doses, and spacing your doses out 3-6 months has shown effective to completely negate any neurotoxic effects (actually that last one does it on its own, provided you actually have MDMA, supplements can help keep you safe on consistent dosing on the lower end of that 3-6 month timespan, probably lower than that, but I recommend being safe and staying within that timespan at minimum)
A feature length documentary not a single person asked for, yet we are all delighted to see? Never stop doing what you do, Andy :)
One Step Beyond, Fitzcarraldo, that amazing jacket and mushrooms, I feel like Alice down the rabbit hole!! Major heat wave great to sit in front of the fan & watch this.
Best thing I've seen this week!
Plants and fungi everywhere: "You bite me, I'll mess you up! I'll change your heartbeat! I'll burn your tongue! I'll make your teeth tingle! I'll make you blush and sweat! I'll make your skin incredibly sensitive! I'll stop you feeling anything above the neck! I'll make you taste rectangles and hear magenta! I'll mess with your whole nervous system until you don't know what's even REAL!"
This one species of ape, every wretched time: "Cool! Can I grow you at home?"
No wonder we’ve been enslaved by catkind
Always wished I could successfully grow them at home. I've grown ordinary mushrooms 🍄 but, er, never pretty red ones!!
What does it say about sapience that our favorite activity throughout history has been numbing, intensifying, slowing, quickening, and modifying our own consciousness whenever possible?
elephants dig up fermented roots for alcohol, lemurs chew on poisonous centipedes for a buzz, there was a flock of geese that got addicted to opiates grazing a poppy field, they all had to be detoxed at a animal hospital
@@noah4822 Aug. 19, 2004, AP: When state Fish and Wildlife agents recently found a black bear passed out on the lawn of Baker Lake Resort, there were some clues scattered nearby - dozens of empty cans of Rainier Beer.
The bear apparently got into campers’ coolers and used his claws and teeth to puncture the cans. And not just any cans.
“He drank the Rainier and wouldn’t drink the Busch beer,” said Lisa Broxson, bookkeeper at the campground and cabins resort east of Mount Baker.
Fish and Wildlife enforcement Sgt. Bill Heinck said the bear did try one can of Busch, but ignored the rest. The beast then consumed about 36 cans of Rainier.
A wildlife agent tried to chase the bear from the campground but the animal just climbed a tree to sleep it off for another four hours. Agents finally herded the bear away, but it returned the next morning.
I think as a mythological sceptic, you’d love the novel “Foucault’s Pendulum” by Umberto Eco (the Ur-Fascism guy). It goes deep into the esoteric and the realm of ceremony, building up an all-encompassing theory of the sacred and profane throughout history, before unceremoniously tearing it down to reveal the post-modern lie hidden within.
I loved it 10/10.
Duuuuuuuuuuude read "The Illuminated Trilogy" by Robert Shea and Robert Anton Wilson. It's amazing. They were basically 2 hippies who worked for Playboy Magazine and kept a file of letters by conspiracy crackpots as inspiration for their SF novel.
I believe they were friends with Terrence McKenna too.
@@johannesdecorte434 I wouldn't be surprised if they weren't. The companion books I'd recommend are the Principia Discordia, and the Book of the Subgenius. Both classics, both very well known, and both worth the read.
Foucault's Pendulum is brilliant. There's never not a moment where I cross paths with conspiracy theories and not think about it.
@@johannesdecorte434 The Illuminatus! Trilogy is probably the best vaccine I've ever gotten against ever falling for full on conspiracy theories.
Wow. Every night for the past year or so I search RUclips for "terence mckenna" and fall asleep to one of his lectures. Last night I made my usual search and this video came up. This is the first video of yours I've ever seen. I'm in my late 30s now and have all but given up psychedelics but there's just something about his voice and thought process that keeps me coming back. Over the years I've given a lot of thought to his theories and musings and have come to pretty much the same conclusions that you did. Especially the one at the end about the transcendental object at the end of time, the eschaton, being death itself. Death sure is transcendental after all. What a wonderfully thought out video man, great job. I feel like you're the only person in the 21st century that has talked about Terence as a historical figure and summed up his life in this way. Extremely well done sir, thank you.
We plants are happy plants
Atun Shei may be about many things that seem like something you may not be intrested in, like American history, the Civil War, and other stuff, but it's all very, very good stuff I deeply recommend for you to try out. Atun Shei, cloud cuckoo country, shammy, and Noah Caldwell Gervais are the best RUclipsrs on the platform currently.
From a young person to an older person, I want you to know that the algorithms on RUclips have been designed with more and more effiency to divide you away from intelligently made content (like this) and towards circular dumb content that doesn't say anything new or make you think, and it hurts all of us no matter who we are. Ever since the advent of AI and the alt right's misinformation campaigns it's only gotten harder. Doesn't matter who you are or where you live, all of us are feeling the effects of it
Id reccomend to hold on to atun shei and check out his stuff, and see his channels and subscriptions tab to see the other kinds of channels he reccomends, since the algorithm itself very rarely recommends them anymore
Holy crap are you me?! -> "Every night for the past year or so I search RUclips for "terence mckenna" and fall asleep to one of his lectures." . I check almost daily to see if Danit Friedman has uploaded another video.
@@r34ct4 haha yep same! And I'm positive there's more of us out there :)
Eerily similar … lately I’ve been listening to random tm lectures with and without added background music and its hypnotic in its own way and I doze off as well
"I've met and spoken to entities that were not human." Yeah, a lot of people have done that here. Most pubs do welcome dogs, and the dogs often snuggle up to other customers, who then talk to them. It's cool.
I’ve told annoying flys to go f$&k themselves. Another transcendent experience
*Glendower:* I can call the spirits from the vasty deep.
*Hotspur:* Why, so can I, or so can any man; but will they come, when you do call for them?
- William Shakespeare, King Henry IV, Part 1
I had a couple friends trip sit me on a hike (nothing physically strenuous) and they wouldn't believe me that a spirit was watching us. Imagine their shock when they saw a mountain lion watching us from behind a tree.
@@Sableagle my original comment about saying the f-word to annoying flys got removed. Sorry RUclips far be it from me to cuss in the comment section of a video about drugs
I talk to my cats all the time.
54:50 Charles Darwin wasnt a social darwinist. He offered a descriptive model where those who fit the environment survive. Not necessarily at all those who survive a battle royale. His famous galapagos finches dont survive by killing each other nor by stealing from each other, but by having beaks useful for cracking nuts. There isnt a need to further conflate the two separate ideas more than social darwinists already have.
Correct, the beliefs came to be before the term Darwinism was even coined, from what I’ve gathered.
He was in fact horrified by the concept, as it came about in his life time, and while he wrote extensively against them, he was sadly unsuccessful, and these horrific corruptions of his ideas were able to take hold and justify the many crimes of the 19th and 20th centuries, despite his his own beliefs and his attempts to fight them
Calling Darwin a darwinist is like calling jesus a Christian. It just logically does not follow 😂🤷♂️
This is the second time a Bread Tuber has misinterpreted Darwin in a YT video, and it's kind of annoying.
"fittest" means something quite different in Darwin than, say, Nietzsche.
Excited to see my favorite living weirdo talk about my favorite dead weirdo!
“The Mushroom won’t talk to you if you’re sweating whisky ginger “ is sage advice.
“There’s a time and place for everything.” Oaks words echoed.
🍄
I worked in a bookstore and spent the morning of December 22, 2012 putting 50% off stickers on the Mayan 2012 Apocalypse books.
I had an ex boyfriend who EXCLUSIVELY smoked weed in his old hand-me-down D.A.R.E hoodie. Said it was his way of sticking it to the man.
I miss him
So many people did this, like my bro! xD
A wholesome, simple man. Love that.
That’s cute 🥹
So, why don't you holler at him? if you miss him, y'all get back together.
@billcook7285 yeah I'm sure that thought never crossed their mind before this comment
I love the use of Philip Glass’s Opera, Akhnaten, as the background music. It's like flying through the night sky towards the Milky Way and it fits the theme psychedelic transcendence well.
Hugely enjoying this. However at 55 min you use a common misunderstanding of the term ‘survival of the fittest.’ It does not mean the largest or most fearsome. In this context the fittest individual is the one best adapted to the surrounding environment and their place in it.
E.g better camouflaged, better at collecting pollen or better at working as part of a cooperative group.
Remember, natural selection can only select for or against a trait if it has an effect on passing on the organism’s genes.
Username checks out.
I was mainly referring to the common understanding of the term but yes, you are absolutely right.
Fascinating story, well told@@AtunSheiFilms
So like how Otodus megalodon was outcompeted by the Great white shark due to the medium sized baleen whales like cetotheres going extinct and replaced with dolphins and porpoises the great white was better at hunting despite the fact Otodus megalodon would've destroyed a great white shark in a fight?
That’s not entirely true. Evolution selects the organism that is most fit for survival. Traits get passed on that are irrelevant or redundant. Traits even get pass on when that make survival harder. None of that matters if the organism is itself is the most fit for survival.
Yup. Darwin's theory was only meant to describe the physical attributes and evolutionary mechanisms that species experience in order to adapt to their environment. Anything else being extrapolated from that to anything social related is Herbert Spencer's pseudoscientific Social Darwinist dribble.
by the way the neanderthal was much more intelligent than must people give them credit
Nuh huh they dumb-dumb me smart-smart. Closed case
My daughter is dating a neanderthal
“It is 2024 and history, much less the world hasn’t ended”
Well someone clearly hasn’t been reading enough of Francis Fukuyama
Fukuyama was so wrong it is almost hilarious to read his political/economic theory. He never considered that the human ego and thirst for power can’t be tamed by stable upbringing or commodity. Even more naive than the most sheltered bookish Marxists I know.
@@warweasel2832 actually people are really disingenuous for the haven't read his actual words, he was hardly arguing the triumph of the western neoliberal system and the cessation of societal development was a good thing. he was arguably just describing 'capitalist realism' which is very apt about 2024
Yeah wdym, OBVIOUSLY history ended in the year 2000. Everything afterward was all a dream.
@@randomchannel-px6ho While you're sort of right, it's hard to deny that his work is part of neoliberal apologia.
This is the most psudointellectual comment I’ve ever read. Like “hey guys I know who came up with the end of history thing!! I know the guys name!” Like bro you are not smart and also Fukuyama has largely disowned that theory
"Stoned Ape Theory" is a misnomer. It's more like "Stoned Ape Vague Hypothesis" as it is completely unfalsifiable.
I had such a fascination with psychedelics after my first serious experiences. I'm lucky enough to be the kind of person who can hold on tight to their sanity during even the craziest trips (even during ego death, to some extent), and I found it endlessly enjoyable picking apart the changes in my psychology and senses. It was like looking into my brain's code, which I'm sure is what scares most people.
Buuut, there's definitely a limit to their usefulness. They helped me realize that cigarettes and booze were disgusting and unhealthy when I was in the middle of addiction. They highlighted areas in my life that I absolutely needed to improve upon. And yet, they didn't DO these for me. They just indicated their importance. At some point, I realized that psychedelics were amazing at highlighting and recontextualizing problems and ideas, but you still need to act upon those changes in your everyday life.
There are plenty of people who are already great at doing that, but I was never the type of person who did great with "doing," even if I've always been a planner and a thinker.
And as a side note, I also used to believe that anyone could benefit from psychedelics, but after a friend had such a bad breakdown that they called the cops under the psychotic notion that my friend and I were going to rape and kill him, I've reevaluated my stance a bit. We were playing Smash Bros and talking about college, so this wasn't a scenario of bad settings and trip sitters. He just couldn't take the reins and ended up getting lost in his neurotic thoughts.
I like your usage of the term bio-prospecting, I had never heard it before.
People are very aware of prospecting in the conventional sense (mining) and the effects it can have (environmental, social, economic, etc...) on local populations, the positives and the much more daunting negatives.
But it's good to show that open lithium mines of Spanish gold sickness aren't the only kinds out there. Prospecting for psycchodelic fungi and plants can destroy local communities, as you very much show in this video, but also historically has fueled a great deal of colonialism (and plenty of other fuckery).
I had never heard that term before, either, but it makes sense. A lot of modern medicines originally came from substances found in plants, many of which were discovered in rain forests. That's one reason some people find the destruction of rain forests so upsetting, because we could be missing out on new undiscovered medications and cures. So, bio-prospecting can be a good thing, if done carefully and respectfully.
This is why I vow to stay away from the bufo alvarius toad. I went to the Sonoran desert and didn’t see a single one there. Their population is really sad.
A very great video uploaded in the middle of psilocybe subaeruginosa season. Excellent work and excellent timing
I feel it necessary as a sort of PSA to remind everyone:
DO NOT USE PSYCHEDELICS IF CURRENTLY TAKING LITHIUM. This can cause SEIZURES and other harmful effects!
It is strongly advised that one avoid use of psychedelic substances while experiencing severe depression, anxiety, or other negative emotional states, or if one has a genetic predisposition towards schizophrenia.
It is highly recommended that one test any substance to ensure its quality and safety before ingesting it. It is also recommended that there be at least one trusted and reasonably sober person present to watch over one if they do decide to take such a substance.
Exactly why I've avoided them. With how I'm neurodivergent, I don't want to open a door that can't be closed. 😕
100% agree. And I'm saying this as someone who kinda thinks psychedelics cured my depression. I don't really recommend anybody take them tbh. I've seen too many ppl have bad trips or get lost in the sauce. Also while I think I've definitely had insights and breakthroughs while on acid, but a lot of those profound feelings are fool's gold. I remember watching 2001 and having a cool realization about structure of the film that probably wouldn't have had sober. However, every time I've ever tried to journal on acid I just wrote utter nonsense lol. I think the boring truth is that whatever you're looking in these chemicals is already inside you. They just lower your inhibitions and shuffle your neural pathways. Treat them like prescription drugs. Do actual research from authoritative sources. Anecdotal experiences and non academic resources can also be helpful and even save a life, but take them with a whole salt shaker lol
Thanks for the warning. Am currently taking lithium, but was also mildly interested in taking these just to see what the shining world of the gods might have been for my ancestors.
This is a poor warning. The correct warning is as follows: all classes of psychedelics, in normal use, without exception, will gradually damage the brain, and with continued use, you will diminish in your powers of analytical thought until you are no longer recognizable. This has nothing to do with set and setting, or with any predisposition to schitzophrenia, rather, it is a product of the action of the drugs themselves.
@@MrGksarathy I'm glad you got this information *now* and didn't have to learn it the hard way!
In the 90s I would upload McKenna speeches from audiotape to websites, eventually almost all of them. It's been a while though and I think you did a superb job articulating his strengths and weaknesses, just perfect in many ways with some wonderful turns of phrase. One role Terence occupied in those days was be an intellectual Pop-pops like a kindly professor indulging his acolytes with forbidden jars of wonder. ("Don't listen to me, eat a shroom"). He also spoke of the "toxic nature of ideology" saying it's not like there are good ideologies and bad ones - they generally need to be dissolved at their brittle old foundations and psychedelics and the internet do that job. Perhaps like mushrooms themselves he was better decomposing and deconstructing rather than building theories as if an edifice upon an invisible landscape.
"NO. HUMANS NEED FANTASY TO BE HUMAN. TO BE THE PLACE WHERE THE FALLING ANGEL MEETS THE RISING APE."-Death, the Hogfather
GNU Terry Pratchett, may his name and words live on.
@@jon-paulfilkins7820 as long as someone knows to write GNU Terry Pratchett, I know there are still humans in this world.
@@alexandermarquardt597 There is a few of us, but we do feel outnumbered from time to time. ;)
If you where a teenager in the 90's Terence was everywhere.
Not here, in post-communist Europe...
@@martinsriber7760 what was in post-communist europe xd
@@woocashP Economic turmoil and a lot of alcoholics and criminals (at least in 90s Poland)
@@Glownyszef było to pytanie retoryczne
@@woocashP No it wasn't. His answer was better than whatever you failed to imply.
The Philip Glass in the background was such a nice touch! *chef’s kiss *
I was wondering who that was. I thought I had heard some of it before.
I am not really found of Glass in large doses. To repetitive. Background or in small amounts is OK.
The thing that people get wrong about 'survival of the fittest' is that fittest does not mean strongest.
Darwin mentioned survival of the fittest a couple of times and everybody still pariots that quote today. Darwin emphasized that it was in corporation that allowed society to advanced.
It's more of a rationalization for inactivity of the thinker, most ideologies are excuses for inactivity if you examine them. I.e. not serious thinking but theological apologism
Scatology if you will.
Survival of the fittest is a sort of rationalization why it's okay to destroy the rainforest by yuppies feeling bad about it.
@@JKavanagh-tq8rp survival of the fittest is not an ideology its a simple description of the principle underlying evolution. i have no idea what the fuck you are talking about
@@ic5889its not even that. If that was the main evolutionary principle that dictated life then explain how you're here.
Who are the fittest?
Amazing video. I knew basically none of this but found it very fascinating. Essentially it feels like Terrence was right along the same lines as countless others, not that different than say even Graham Hancock. Starting with a conclusion and then finding anything to meet that conclusion. With that said I certainly appreciate Terrence's sensibilities and motivations far more than many others.
As a an atheist former Christian (like so many of us out there) I certainly can appreciate trying to find an alternative objective "truth" out there to rival that of the western patriarchal Christian world that many of us dislike so much in so many ways (now at least). Though I think essentially it's applying the same mindset and tactics as that same world just in the inverse.
I always go back to Francis Bacon:
"If a man will begin with certainties, he shall end with doubts, but if he will be content to begin with doubts he shall end in certainties."
Likewise despite my innate skepticism to psychedelics (and everything) I tried to watch this with an open mind and was glad to see you apply your same sort of rational application you do in other forms to this. I certainly could understand how having such dramatic experiences might convince someone. Though in the end it's really not all that different than the religious experiences people have. Even myself as a Christian I believed 100% I experienced the supernatural at bare minimum twice during my life before leaving the faith. Of course now I realize and understand the massive body of data pointing to how horrendous human perception is at a measure of nearly anything. My wife, before we met, went through a period of great stress and had hallucinations, very real and vivid (of blood being all over hands when she worked as someone who cleaned hospital rooms, but in this case there was none). She was on no drugs. Then when she got prescribed waaay too many drugs like anti-psychotics (good ole 90s and early 2000s and kicking out drugs like candy) she got even worse.
Likewise she also experienced things she thought was supernatural. Now like me we both think different. Our world views dictated what we expected combined with fragile human perception and mental states.
Now I can imagine throwing psychedelics on that fire would probably crank all these 100 fold. Though there may be some metaphysical or supernatural connection or reality out there the reality is we have no reliable data or evidence of such and in this day and age we would expect to see quite a bit of it.
In this case I think Terrence might have been right partially like you expand on. With the advent of technology and the internet it has indeed expanded our perceptions in ways. I think in an age where so many people have literal cameras in their pocket and are trained to record anything interesting. The fact we have no reliable recordings of miracles or God (or deities in general) stands as the absolute strongest evidence that none exist. We would expect tons of reliable data at this point. These same capabilities have helped us reveal a world of Karens, of police brutality, of countless injustices and human behaviors. Yet not a single piece of reliable data for the supernatural tied or not tied to any religion at all.
That's pretty massive when you think of it and I think will lead further and further to the shifting away of the Christianized Western world view and sort of to some of Terrance's aspirational predictions that go with that. Until now and what the internet and related technologies provided this was just not possible. Also yeah there's a pessimistic side of me that looks to stormfront and the internet allowing those nuts to circle the wagons and unite and fight stronger for themselves. Though in a lot of ways these feel like a real last gasp, that surge before the death cry, much like that of the Lost Cause.
I spent years on a Civil War forum where nearly every week or two someone new one come out spouting Lost Cause mythos. Myself and others would challenge it with data, quotes, and references. Now we have years of your videos and countless others repeating the real historical material over and over. In the end progress is inevitable and two steps forward is often followed by one step back, but to put it as my 2nd great granduncle Miles Ledford Langley put it in the 1868 Arkansas Constitutional Convention
"Progress is an unchangeable law of nature. This is an age of improvement. Reform is the order of the day. We are passing through a crisis unparalleled in the history of the world. We have just struggled through a gigantic war, and are inaugurating a new era in the history of our' national policy. We must reconstruct the government of our country on radical principles-universal freedom, impartial suffrage, and equal rights. We must be governed by natural justice and scientific principles. Scientific truth must be our guide in ethics, in religion, in politics, in social life, and in legal matters."
He was imprisoned, shot, and beat in Arkansas during the Civil War for being a southern abolitionist preacher and then in this convention he was laughed at (by both parties) for arguing for women's suffrage and rights here.
In that time someone so ahead of their time and era in progressive thought had to seem to be arguing impossibilities. Sure it took about 50 years but it did in fact become a reality. You can't fully stop progress IMHO.
My coworker has been hounding me about Terrence Mckenna for the past 2 weeks. It's all he talks about recently. Then you go and drop this.
I CAN'T ESCPAE THE MUSHROOM MAN
Edit: accidentally typed Howard instead of Mckenna
"Terrance howard" did we watch the same video?
Different charlatan sir
That Hamilton Morris quote at the start really sums up my experience with McKenna. I accidentally picked Food of the Gods off a library shelf when I was 14, and I've recommended it a thousand times since not because of its rigorous science but its ethical mindset. It gets at personal and cultural evolution we can undertake.
Minor correction: at 21:00 you say ayahuasca is made of B. caapi, containing high amounts of DMT. Ayahuasca contains DMT from other plants, but B caapi contains harmala alkaloids, not high amounts of DMT. Not sure if its a mix up or just ambiguously worded. Love the work!
Isn’t the active ingredient (dmt) in the chacruna plant while the ayahuasca vine (the Banisteriopsis caapi) allows that active ingredient to be metabolized in humans?
@Juliein.wonderland almost. The ayahuasca vine contains harmala alkaloids which prevent DMT being metabolised, so it can act without getting broken down.
Here I am; wallowing in selfpity, after my girlfriend of 6 years broke up with me - and Atun-Shei Films drops a feature length distraction. Thank you good sir; I sure need it!
Gl buddy
The devil sing to women for they can be easy musha ringa doodle da
Eat well, start swimming a few times a week for your cardio, do power yoga, and eventually cycle on some weights in the week. Fuck her! You don't need her. What's important is that you MOVE FORWARD.
Assigning psychedelic experiences to entities outside of ourselves lessens the experience for me. In the same way that a supernatural creator is a less impressive, and I would say less spiritual, than scientific cosmological hypotheses.
Acknowledging that the "I" is merely a drop in an ocean of mind, where seemingly discrete entities can not only be communed with, but present themselves in ways that confound expectation... that is where the magic lies for me.
I think thats the healthier way to process it.
You don't like the Machine Elves?
/s
I understand the way you feel. I never had a clue that the entity experience was part of psilocybin, it just happened to me while alone under the moon. I can see some of them as actually being parts of myself that were unexamined, forgotten or unsuspected. But I've had (like a lot of people) what seemed to be downloads of extremely complex information that I couldn't trace back to my own thoughts or obessions. But I can't prove it nor wish too. It can hurt the psychedelic community when people come out as zealots preaching in the streets about their newfound enlightenment given to them by hyperdimensional beings. It comes off as obnoxious and puts them right there in the same category of other zealots. I did the same thing myself for awhile until I realized what a huge miscalculation I was making. If these entities are just part of ourselves I'm totally fine with that and we have a whole lot of self reflection to do!
@crono3339 "downloads of extremely complex information that I couldn't trace"
Nope.
You were just really high on a psychedelic.
There's no truth to making up bullshit. Just accept it was a drug. You were on drugs.
It's OK to have fun on drugs and NOT take the hallucinations seriously.
None of it was real. You were high. End of story. No need to prove anything. You never would be able to: because it wasn't true.
There are no magical entities. They're not "part of you," they're your hallucinations. Nothing more.
I think it’s the same thing kinda ? I personally don’t see the difference with how you are describing it. Either way they would still be there and so would we. It’s just opening us up to it like you said in your second paragraph. ..also I would say any view of a “creator” is spiritual, cuz there’s no real evidence, but I think maybe I know how you mean that , either way I believe in something spiritual, and Terrance is a total legend and genius
I was gonna reenact Gettysburg
But I got high
oooooooooo
I was gonna get on my horse and go
But i got high
Now I missed the fun, and I know why
Because I got high, because I got high, because I got high
Good. Gettysburg shouldn’t be reenacted.
Really looking forward to watching this!
The Sledgehammer is with us!! Love your channel, Sir.
Nice to see you here!
Video: "They took mushrooms and saw visions, and these visions felt so real they kept believing in them once the effects of the mushrooms ended."
My Neuroscientist Friend: "This feels like they are giving themselves psychosis"
Dennis McKenna: "In hindsight, that was psychosis"
My Neuroscientist Friend: "Well it's good they realized, eventually"
Our society causes psychosis. The biggest benefit of mushrooms is pulling the individual out of ego out of the psychosis of society and inducing laughter.
@@mathewerven9This isn't the defense of drugs you may think...
@@mathewerven9You’ve never experienced psychosis then lol
@@calebmatty5060 Ha! Lol! To be alive right now is to experience psychosis.
At least someone out here has a sense of humor!
One of the many things that I love about your videos is that you always take such care and thought about the music in them, it's never just generic royalty free lofi or the like. Another fascinating video Andy, keep up the good work.
I just have to shout out the use of Akhenaten by Phillip glass, I play that shit every time a supervisor gets fired. The guys call it the sacrifice music.
OPEN ARE THE DOUBLE DOORS OF THE HORIZON
UNLOCKED ARE ITS BOLTS
Terrence himself never really took the Time wave to seriously. But it wasn't about the end of the world, it was about the increase of novelty over time. I think post 2012 earth has seen a noticable increase in novelty.
This one is real close to home man, I immensely appreciate your content and find myself recommending it to people frequently.
that's one big mushroom
or
mushroom kingdom here we come
DYNAMITE! DYNAMITE!
It's a giant mushroom! Maybe it's friendly!
@@dragoninthewest1 okay that's a good one
As a professional level Psychonaut who engages in ayahuasca ceremony for 25 years now from a mystical syncretic lineage its an interesting video to me. However possessing decades of experience and education from indigenous sources I can tell you that you have barely scratched the surface. Some lineages have centuries of experience. The main illusion to dispel is that there is separation between spirituality and science, the skeptic and the visionary. Thanks and blessings!
In fact in the 40 odd years since Terrance took that journey Psychdelic culture has advanced steadily:ruclips.net/video/9kXXYfKWGM0/видео.htmlsi=aUrjQg0JHib4rqeW
I've been reading through a whole bunch of comments, and this one hits the nail on the head for me. I've never tried ayahuasca but I've done a lot of DMT and the biggest takeaway I consistently got was that tribal human beings are not at all naive. Over and over again this was hammered home to me by the tryptamine experiences. Aristotle closed a door that Plato tried to open for us, and we are still living with the hubris of that in the west.
i opened it up to watch later, just to check it out. was immediately sucked in by the extremely well written script, fantastic delivery, and just your approach to the whole thing. so refreshing to hear an open-minded, but sober (and also not toooo sober) perspective. fantastic stuff as always.
Glad to see you still making bangers after retiring your most popular show. I'm interested in seeing where you go from here and if you keep putting out stuff like this you'll be just fine!
Came for the Checkmate, Lincolnites - stayed for the magic mushrooms
Me and my roomate, as well SWIM and SWIH who have extensive histories with moderate to large doses of psilocybin were quite amazed by how well this video's structure resembles a trip.
God, the more I learn about Atun Shei the more I love him
I have basically only watched the intro but this is just so cool: it is like my worlds colliding. I am one of those guys who has heard EVERYTHING he ever recorded (literally, I have been searching for something new for many years) many times, but I'm also a history nerd who loves your channel. I did not expect these beams to cross.
"why dont you back that up with a source"
Terence McKenna: "it came to me in a dream"
You know the video is gonna be a banger when you have absolutely no idea what the title is talking about...
I've noticed that psychedelic themes have appeared in your content in the past and am thrilled that you've now delved fully into this topic!
Thank you, Esoterica, for sharing this video with me 😁
The music, the story telling, the special effects. Well done, sir.
Drugs being an influence on Andy's style makes In the Wildwood make so much more sense
Thank you for a thoroughly engaging & well made essay.
The quality of your content is impressive.
I really love seeing this more freeform and earnest side of you and your material. Especially the trip report section. I've known people like you who are still totally sober materialists who also got a lot of perspective and love of life from psychedelic experiences, but you truly have a way of communicating it leaps and bounds better than they could. Bravo, sir. Looking forward to seeing more of this side of ya, should you so choose.
"Doesn't it reek of cope" No, it reeks of accurate understanding
Akhenaten is a great sound track choice for a psychedelic video
If there was some sort of award for best RUclips video of the year, this one would be a strong contender for me.
I really appreciate that at the “2012 and beyond” part, the shots look as if the “trip” is beginning. Great work as always.
Well, this is my evening sorted.
Goes good with popcorn
I don’t like the way that suit is looking at me …
Never in a million years would I expect Atun-Shei to reference Atari Teenage Riot in a video about big brain mushroom man but here we are.
Amazing video. “2012 and Beyond the Infinite” is a transcendental experience.
This was one of your best videos.
A true masterpiece.
From the epic end of the Johnny Reb saga... to Terence McKenna. How can you make me love this bloody channel even more? THIS is how. 😍
Honestly i like these types of videos you do. This, metamorphosis of prime intellect, getting drunk and talking about vikings are some of my favorite of yours.
I think the video did a great job dispelling the psychedelic dogma theorized by mckenna without undermining the intuition behind his ideas.
The problem with intuition is its manifestation into reality, as rationalizing the abstract yields great potential to be wrong. This was one of mckenna’s biggest pitfalls that was best described in his experience with true hallucinations.
Many of his ideas are accurate on a poetic level, meaning the perceptions are accurate but the conclusions drawn are not. This is a fundamental issue one faces when using psychedelics; returning with gained insight and formatting it into language.
I think mckenna was a master of using language as poetry to describe his insights, and did a great job bringing wisdom out of the mental realm. The big problem was his hubris in chasing various red herring, and with that we are left with several meticulously crafted ideas founded on initial misconception. I have no doubt mckenna deeply believed in his ideas.
... Did he just admit to tripping on mushrooms dressed as Civil War soldier near Gettysburg? Because that rules lol
I see our favorite homosexual liberal has climbed forth, eager to present us with content.
You spend a lot of time thinking about gay guys and the filthy, nasty things they do. I'm sure you could find one who would be happy to do those things to you if you'd just be honest about what you want.
*Second Coming of Hippie Jesus
Huh, I more thought he was bi.
@@Anonie324I was saying it jokingly, he is married to a woman after all
@@MistahMan69wait he's married?
What an absolutely wonderful video I have experienced. Very well done, Sir. I will reference back to this as I contemplate what steps are next in my art series.
It's so good, I am rewatching it immediately.
Absolutely great work. Especially the engaging cinematography as always in your videos.
Over time I’ve realized psychological reality and intellectual reality are intrinsically connected. I just dislike how Terrence tried to make the psychological truth he experienced with mushrooms, to be forced to fit within an intellectual framework, when sometimes things are only true in one of those ways.
As someone materialistically hidebound, I still found plenty to take away from the video. While the communion with the great mushroom demiurge may elude me, the concept of the internet as a great species-wide hallucinatory dreamscape is something to chew over. At the very least, we can cast the resurgent growth of fascism as a kind of malignant Bad Trip we're all having, warmed over historical memories rising from cyberspace like the head of a hydra we all thought vanquished.
This is a trip back into my 20's and 30's. Thanks for the conversation.
so glad to have found your channel. you make some of the best stuff on this site. thanks for the great video!
Honestly, I won't be brash and say its your Magnum Opus, but this is a really engaging video. Delving into our expierence of reality itself.
Great work! - and I'm only at the damn beginning. Well done.
Ooooh that piece from Akhnaten there in the beginning gave me chills
You are an amazing sage. You are one of 2-3 people who I will watch every video you make, even if it hadn't interested me before. Thanks for being such an incredible edutainer!
Videos like this are why I’m so glad to be following you. Well done
The One Step Beyond intro is amazing!
It's a shame, I am incapable of experiencing all these crazy things, took a bunch (my friend called nearly a "heroic dose") of these mushroom chocolates and only ended up with a stomach and headache. No change to perception.
Depending on the temperature that your friend baked the chocolates at, they may have burned the psilocybin out of the mushrooms. It can't survive above temperatures of around 200 degrees F.
@@AtunSheiFilms Or it could be they're just largely insensitive to psychedelics. I personally know people who require far higher doses than others to achieve the same effect, including myself. It just depends on individual brain chemistry.
Prescription anti-depressants can also have a supressive effect on the psychoactivity of these drugs, requiring larger doses in order to even reach threshhold effects.
For me personally, I've never experienced "seeing G-D" or "understanding the mysteries of the universe", regardless of the dose I took; only a sort of "sparkly high". The few times I've even come anywhere close to that required combining psychedelics (LSD or psilocybin) with cannabis, which has a potentiating, synergistic effect. Even then, it was always clear to me throughout the trip that my experiences were entirely internal, purely psychological and physiological and not any sort of outside influence (supernatural or extraterrestrial), and in some ways bore a strong resemblance to migraine aura.
Mind you, I am also profoundly neurodivergent, and people I know who have had similarly reduced reactions to psychedelics have also been neurodivergent; but I don't know enough about the mechanisms involved to say if that may be related or not.
@@AtunSheiFilmsallegedly
Basically, you aren't superior enough to ascend to our level, pleb.
Terence McKenna AND Akhnaten by Phillip Glass? My two greatest loves, together at last.
Great video! Takes me back to my Joe Rogan Experience phase a decade ago. It was a simpler time..
What a fascinating coincidence: I just watched a video debunking Terence McKenna's Stoned Ape Theory yesterday, and I wasn't even searching for it yesterday or today. This one will surely be more informative (since it's much longer) and more entertaining!
dude just cant stop dropping bangers
Magnificent. Wonderful. Fantastic. These weird educational essays are amazing! You also just keep improving your already prodigious skills!
Dude until you lose your own mother you will never understand what its like. I totally see everything he is talking about under that lense because i lost mine. Had some really profound things going on in my mind. And the real taboo in America is not drugs its death.
Ah yes Terence McKenna, Big Bird made flesh.
I can't unhear it now
I love the breadth of topics on this channel. Really refreshing.
Of all the mysteries of psychedelics, here's an answer which may help:
It is a consistent phenomenon that whatever emotions a person may experience, awe is consistently one of them. This, combined with the hallucinations, can account for some of the profound spiritual, magical experiences which people tend to report.
This is not to discount or diminish anybody's experiences. It is simply a lens through which it can be presented to skeptical people and those of us who prefer rational explanations. Ultimately, interpreting a trip is like interpreting literature, like the Bible, and is highly dependent on individual lived experience.
This video ought to get him on the Joe Rogan show for sure...😅
oh damn, I just looked up my favourite terance meme
" take it easy dude, buy take it"
thanks atun shei!
Fan, tastic video. I love it. I knew everything you told me besides your own story and als o enjoyed that as well. But it was nice seeing a video you about it as well! Great editing, great storytelling and good samples of him talking
Thank you for this absolutely informed yet informative unbiased “this is , not necessarily yours” approach to this subject
My favorite historian is now covering a different topic that i... um... have had some experience in.
I feel seen.
I ran into McKenna’s work looking for sources on a research paper about potential use of hallucinogenic plants in early modern and late medieval folk magic. The paper quickly became about how wacky Terence himself was
Out of curiousity, if you still remember, what psychoactive plants or fungi were available to europeans at the time (Im assuming youre talking specific to europe because the term medievil isnt really used as a historical marker for other regions, if that is an incorrect assumption let me know, but Id still be curious about the information from the paper). I know rye was a common cereal grain, so ergot (and thereby ergotism) would have been around, but the only other plant I can think of that produces hallucinogenic compounds from the region are some species of acacia bushes which produce DMT. However, that wouldn't have been active orally without eating massive quantities unless consumed with another plant that could inhibit the first pass metabolism of the DMT, which seems unlikely to have happened.
@@hoenheim94 Psilocybin-containing fungi have existed on just about every inhabited continent in the world. In the northern hemisphere, muscimol-containing fungus such as Amanita muscaria is also widespread. Various other substances, including harmaline, atropine, scopolamine, ephedrine, DMT, and opium were also commonly used, and we have both historical and archeological evidence going back millennia. While most these would likely not have had the same kind kind of psychoactive effects individually, we do know that many of them were used in various combinations, where they can have synergistic effects. And yes peoples in ancient Europe and central Asia did use understand the use of potentiating combinations of drugs like DMT in order to enhance these effects; which, again, we know from archaeological evidence like pottery (as grave goods) and hair samples.
The plants that were used in early modern and late medieval magic and sorcery were atropa belladonna, datura stramonium, henbane, scopolia and mandrake.
Ironic that you call him "wacky" though considering his phenomenological hermeneutic approach and general exegesis of particular hallucinogenic plants and fungi at the archetypal level were his most accurate and self-testable assertions or models. And those same archetypes were the literal etiological cause of the witchery and malcefium seen in the Late Medieval and Early Modern periods.
@@hoenheim94 Na it was more about solanaceous nightshades and sorcery. The hallucinogens of Medieval Europe and even colonial times were not mysticomimetic psychedelics, but rather nightshade deliriants like belladonna, datura, etc. That's seemingly why the West has 'traditions' of witchcraft but not shamanism.
this is the greatest advertisement for shrooms i've ever seen