From: Rick Knight (rknight@platinum.com)
Date: Thu Jul 17 1997 - 11:01:05 MDT
The question was posed:
>Besides, isn't (sic) savannahs (or coastal areas if you believe in
the aquatic ape theory) very poor in natural psychedelics? How would
>McKenna explain that?
>
Guru George responded:
He goes into this question in the book. Again, I can't
remember the details, I'm sorry - it's a while since I read the book.
Rick elaborates:
McKenna is out there but after reading him, hearing him and observing
him, he's definitely onto something. That being that our pre-human
ancestors came down from the trees, likely for environmental reasons,
into the savannahs where the plains roaming herd were depositing their
faces all over the place. The tropical variety of psychedlelic
mushroom is very brightly colored (red cap with white spots---Alice
was quite taken with them).
In low consumption, senses are heightened, visual accuity increases
and you can hear and taste everything much more profoundly (personal
experience attests to this). These doses would've increased the early
hominid's hunting success since even night vision is increased. A
little higher dose and your libido is ready to rock and roll,
increasing the possibility for conception for the otherwise
survival-centric apes. The wacky-tabacky dose (5 grams I understand)
puts you into shamanic realms where you have the opportunity to
connect with the other (the overtly pragmatic reader requiring
empirical evidence may substitute "other" for unique
chemically-induced hallucination).
McKenna makes a few quite notable suggestions: that psylocibin was an
evolutionary agent in hominid advancement. He also promotes a
measurable wave in novelty occurring for our species that is fast
approaching it's apex. He is like a cross between Leary and Huxley,
very glib, very well read, very eccentric and hangin' very chummy with
some of the big boys like Rupert Sheldrake (whose theories on
morphogenic fields are quite intriguing as well). I dropped
Sheldrake's name just in case a few of you were going into
metaphysical tilt (heaven forbid I get flamed for bringing up what
someone would perceive as Enquirer-caliber material <G>).
I hope this information prompts two conversations: the role of
psychedelics in advancing consciousness (because I feel it has
advanced mine) and the seemingly exponential increase in novelty in
modern times.
Rick
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