From: Alonzo Davis (alonzo@mca.edu)
Date: Wed Nov 27 1996 - 07:25:28 MST
Crosby_M wrote:
>
> From: Lyle Burkhead[SMTP:LYBRHED@delphi.com]
> Wednesday, November 27, 1996 2:19 AM:
> <So we arrive back at the Great Filter problem. The dinosaurs lived on
> earth for millions of years, but never evolved into tool-using creatures.
> Why?
> Terence McKenna has suggested that when our ancestors discovered
> psychedelic mushrooms, that stimulated them to start thinking, talking, and
> using tools. That was when they broke through the filter and started
> making progress. Without mushrooms, we could have been stuck in an
> evolutionary cul de sac for eons, like the dinosaurs.>
>
> I don't doubt that mushrooms and other natural nootropics helped; but, they
> were would have been freely available to other creatures at the time.
> However, I have heard that these mushrooms thrive in cow dung, and humans
> certainly learned how to herd cows so that they might have had a monopoly
> of the best mushroom supplies. Some species of insects, however, herd other
> insects, and also use fungi as foodstuffs, or make honey (and perhaps other
> psychotropic elixirs we are yet unaware of). Why wouldn't having these
> similar 'self-owned' resources, and the cyberorganization that cultivating
> them brings, have raised their consciousness as well? Anyway, I suspect
> that any _Great Filter_ would likely be a complex mix of factors, rather
> than having one 'magical' ingredient. No matter how self-directed a
> creature becomes, it is still part of some larger system of resources and
> restraints, and must adapt to that as well.
>
> Mark
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