Dennis McKenna on Art Bell (March 2001)

is Dennis McKenna, Dr. Dennis McKenna, the brother of Terrence McKenna, the late Terrence McKenna,

who was on this program many times, was a good friend. Terrence, God bless him, is gone now, and

I'm so sorry. He was such a great man, he was such a great mind, but you're about to have a

strange journey yourself, because his brother Dennis, he almost, frankly, he sounds like

a clone, but I'll let you decide for yourself. Last hour, we talked with Richard C. Hoagland.

We've got a link up on the website right now to the John Glenn statement made on Frasier,

or at least a sort of a little part of it. You can see that little part right now by going

to my website at www.artbell.com. Everybody's taking a look at that one. NBC posted it, put

it up there, it's actual video with the audio, and only a partial statement. And then, just

to sort of wrap that up, Ann, in Albuquerque, New Mexico, writes, Hey Art, is it possible

that Richard C. could be the Antichrist? Yeah, I thought about that. Sure, it's possible.

Dennis McKenna, who sent me the following bio on himself, I'm going to try and read this,

no guarantees. For the last 25 years, Dennis McKenna has pursued the interdisciplinary study

of ethnopharmacology and plant hallucinogens. His co-author, he is co-author, of course, with

his brother Terrence of The Invisible Landscape, Mind Hallucinogens, and the I Ching. Seabury

Press, 1975, Citadel Press, 91. A philosophical and metaphysical exploration of the ontological

implications of psychedelic drugs, which resulted from the two brothers' early investigations

of the Amazonian hallucinogens in 1971. He received his doctorate in 1984 from the University of

British Columbia. His doctoral research focused on anthropopharmological investigations of the

botany chemistry and pharmacology of Ahuza and Ukubi, two orally active, I believe it's

tryptamine-based hallucinogens used by indigenous peoples of the Northwest Amazon. Following the

completion of his doctorate, Dr. McKenna received postdoctoral research fellowships in the laboratory

of Clinical Pharmacology, National Institute of Mental Health, and the Department of Neurology,

Stanford University School of Medicine. In 1990, he joined Shaman Pharma, uh, he joined Shaman,

uh, Dennis? Yes. He joined Shaman what? Pharmaceuticals. Pharmaceuticals. Oh,

pharmaceuticals as director of? Ethnopharmacology. Thank you. You're going to help me right through

this. Uh, then went, uh, back to Minnesota, I guess, in 1993 to join the Aveda Corporation? Right.

Manufacturer of a natural cosmetics, uh, product as senior research pharmacologist.

Pharmacognosist. You want to read the rest of this? No. Uh, he currently works as a scientific

consultant, uh, to clients in the, uh, herbal, nutritional, and, uh, pharmaceutical industries,

together with two colleagues in the natural products industry. He incorporated the non-profit

Institute for Natural Products Research, or INPR, in October of 98 to promote research and scientific

education with respect to botanical medicines and other natural medicines. He is currently a

senior lecturer, uh, at the Center for Spirituality and Healing, that's interesting, in the Academic

Health Center at the University of Minnesota. Dr. McKenna serves on the advisory board of the

American Botanical Council and on the editorial board of Dennis? Phytomedicine. Thank you.

International Journal of? Phytotherapy and phytopharmacology. Wonderful.

Founding board member and vice president of the Hefner, right? Hefner? Hefter. Okay. Hefter.

Not to be confused with Hefner. I understand. Okay. A non-profit scientific organization dedicated to the

investigation of therapeutic, uh, applications for psychedelic plants and compounds. He's also

served as board member and research advisor to Botanical Dimensions, a non-profit organization

dedicated to the investigation of ethno-medically significant plants. He was a primary organizer and

key scientific collaborator for the WASCA project, an international biomedical study of WASCA, a psychoactive

drink used in ritual context by indigenous peoples and syncretic religious groups in Brazil. He has

conducted extensive ethnobotanical field work in the Peruvian, Colombian, and Brazilian Amazon. He has

served as invited speaker at numerous scientific congresses, seminars, and symposia. Dr. McKenna's

author or co-author of over 35 scientific papers in peer-reviewed journals. His publications have

appeared in the Journal of? Ethnopharmacology, European Journal of Pharmacology, Brain Research, Journal of

Neuroscience, Journal of Neurochemistry, Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease, Economic Botany, and

elsewhere. My god almighty, Dennis. Welcome to the program. Thank you, Art. It's great to be here.

And thank you for the help. Am I on the air? Of course you're on the air. All right. Yes, you're on the

air. Uh, and you're, it's, it's like listening to Terrence to hear your voice. I was so shocked when I

called you and we talked on the phone. I was just, I was, I just sat there kind of blown away. Just blown

away. Yes. Well, everyone says we sound the same, especially on the telephone. Oh, and here on the air,

believe me, you sound the same. Now, when you and I talked on the phone, putting all of this simply,

you said that you were more into the science of drugs while your brother Terrence was,

my words, probably more hand to mouth. Well, yeah, I mean, we sort of have a division of labor,

I guess you could call it. Uh, he was more interested in the philosophical and metaphysical

side. And I was more interested in what you might call the nuts and bolts side, although. So in

other words, when you would probably, there was a lot of overlap of those two things. So for example,

when you would discover a new drug, you'd say, here, take this Terrence. Uh, not exactly.

Or Terrence said, Hey, what you got there? I'll take that. I just got curious about how these things

work. And, uh, uh, uh, you know, those of your listeners that are familiar with our experiences in

the Amazon, uh, and have read the invisible landscape will know that we came up against, uh,

uh, a number of things, uh, down there that it's very hard for science to explain. No, I'm actually,

you know what? I have never really heard the story of what happened in the Amazon.

Well, I don't know if we can go into it here. It's kind of a long story. Well, maybe the high

points. Well, um, those of you who've read the hallucinations, um, will be familiar with it. I would

like to say our, before we, uh, before we get into that, I'd like to say that, um, I, um, I very much

appreciate it has come. It's been a rough couple of years here. I know, horrible actually. And I very

much appreciate the support that came from many of your listeners to thank so many people. But

while we were struggling with Terrence's illness and, and his family, um, you know, we always knew

that we weren't alone, that, uh, that many people never love Terrence so much. And we could feel that

support. Terrence had a brain tumor for those who don't know. And, um, you know, Dennis, I,

I interviewed Terrence very much toward the end. Right. And his philosophic, he was, he was so good

with it. His, his philosophical, uh, approach to the possibility that he might die was incredible.

I had him on the air and he talked about it. He talked about it. And, and why did he have it

together? Yes, he had it together. He had it together. And as he said in a couple of interviews,

uh, uh, you know, if the use of these plants and, uh, and working with these, um, shamanic states

doesn't prepare you for what lies beyond, I don't know what does. And, uh, and I think that's true. I

think that, you know, a lot of his experiences in life, uh, you know, led up to that. So there were

no real surprises. And, uh, you know, in the latter stages, uh, he was, I think he was very much

ready to take control of the, to take him where it, where it would. And, but I did want to, to,

you know, express my, my gross snares that were, uh, you know, part of that struggle.

Well, I had, I had turns on many times and the audience knew him as one of their own.

So it could not have been any other way. That's, that's right. He was, he, uh, he was absolutely,

uh, Dennis, a remarkable, one of the most remarkable men I've ever had the pleasure to know. So

I guess that's pretty good as remembrances go, one of the most remarkable people I've ever known. God,

what a, what a, what a mind he had. Yes, he had a great mind and he was a remarkable person. And,

uh, in ways that, you know, the world is a poorer place without him. And, uh, I, I'm very lucky to

have had, you know, to have grown up with him. I mean, he was obviously a great influence on,

on me and on many people. Well, anyway, the two of you did go to the Amazon and

he never really talked a lot about that. We, we touched on it, but he never really talked a lot

about the nuts and bolts of what, what actually went on down there. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Well, um, uh, I,

I guess how to, how to get into this story, you know, we both. Okay. Why did you go down? What,

what made you go down there? Well, we both grew up in the sixties, of course. And the, I guess you could

say we were hippies during the, you know, that period of foment in the United States of Haight-Ashbury in 67

and Terence's liver. And so we were interested, we were phased of, but the one that experienced,

uh, uh, at that time was one that, uh, and that is DMT for dimethyltryptamine. Back in the sixties,

it used to be called the businessman's trip. In duration, the way that DMT is, is normally

taken pure smoke, the free base. And when you do that, it produces a very rapid. Terence had a quote

about that experience, uh, that he used to say, he compared it. I'm trying to remember what he

compared it to, uh, but he had a, he had a roller coaster ride, or perhaps a rocket ship. No. Well,

something about, uh, yeah, a rocket ship ride, but, uh, he, he said it was probably the closest thing

to heaven on earth or something fairly significant like that. Well, I don't know if it's exactly heaven

on earth because it couldn't, it can be quite terrifying. I mean, it's, it's very overwhelming,

uh, you know, in that form. And it's also hard to pull anything out of it. Uh, it's such a, uh,

such a profound, uh, that you come back, not really able to finish much. I mean, about all you

can say is my God, that was part of our motivation. That was at least the, uh, the, uh, the exoteric,

uh, motivation for going to the Amazon, because we had heard paper by an ethnobotanist, Ari Schultes,

about a, uh, and a very obscure hallucinogen used by the Witoto, uh, in the Northwest Amazon. This was

called Ukue in their language. And it was a, uh, DMT containing tree. Um, but what was unusual about

it and what's unusual about the pharmacology of DMT to a certain extent is that DMT is not orally

active. It is, if you eat it. You have to smoke it. You have to smoke it in the synthetic form

because it's inactivated by enzymes in your gut and in your liver called monoamine oxidase. So it's

going to go straight from the lungs to the, uh, bloodstream. Right. Or somehow bypass that system.

Now, in the case of, uh, ayahuasca, which is the other beverage, the psychoactive beverage that forms

the linchpin of, uh, Amazonian shamanism, and has been sort of my preoccupation, they get around this

by combining two plants. They combine the leaves, which they call chacruna, with which they call,

um, the beverage itself is called ayahuasca. The bark contains compounds, uh, which are monoamine

oxidase inhibitors combined with the leaves, uh, which contain DMT that protects the DMT from

degradation by this monoamine oxidase enzyme system. So now you can drink it. So now it becomes

orally active. It becomes a very different extreme 10 minutes. It lasts worse. Oh my. And the,

but the intensity is less. So, you know, it's like the slowed down. It's like you're seeing it at normal

speed. And when you smoke it, you're seeing it on the fast forward. Then as I have no frame of reference

to know what this, uh, what, what, what this combination of drugs is like, uh, is it like LSD?

Is it, uh, a lesser, uh, experience? No, I wouldn't say it's a lesser experience. It's a different

experience, uh, than LSD. If you, if you compare intensity levels. Uh, it, again, it's always related

to dose. I mean, ayahuasca can be extremely intense. It's similar to, uh, mushrooms and

it's similar chemically and pharmacologically to mushrooms because that is also, I mean,

psilocybin and DMT are mescaline in the same chemical family. Um, do you have mescaline is

in a different chemical family? Okay. Uh, DMT and psilocybin are, are called, are,

and, and their ilk are in another class called phenethylamine. So it's actually,

but ayahuasca is unique. In fact, you can't really say it's, it's somewhat like LSD. Yes.

It's somewhat like mushrooms. Yes. But it's really its own. And there's no language to describe

the difference from LSD or from some other experience that somebody out there might relate to. Well,

I think you could say LSD, at least in my past experience has been, excuse me, tends to be

more of a personal thing, more, um, psychoanalytic, more, uh, in a sense about you and about your,

you know, your psychology, whatever problems you may have, that sort of thing. Ayahuasca can be that way,

but I think there are more transpersonal elements, more archetypical elements. It's, it's much like

dreaming. And, uh, it's like dreaming while you're awake in the sense that you experience many

archetypal people do use it for self-examination and, and, uh, and psychotherapy, but incorporate,

it seems to be, I guess, more of a direct pipeline to the collective unconscious. Many of what now,

that's something Tarrant said about it. Right. That's something Tarrant said about it. All right.

Dennis, Dennis, uh, doctor, we're at the bottom of the hour. Should I call you doctor or Dennis or

both? Uh, Dennis is fine. Dennis is fine. All right. Stay right there, Dennis. We're at the

bottom of the hour. I'm Art Bell, and this is Coast to Coast AM. And don't do any of this. If you want

to listen, that's fine, but nobody's encouraging you to do any drugs. Stay natural. You'll be happy.

My guest is Dennis McKenna, Dr. Dennis McKenna, the brother of the late Terrence McKenna was on the

show many times with me. And, uh, we've had many discussions on this program about drugs,

and we're going to touch on many of them tonight. And none of this discussion should be interpreted

by anybody out there as an indication that you should go out and do it. This is an examination

of what some of this is all about. That's all. Drugs are part of our life. They're very much part

of our life. Whether the over-the-counter type, the type you get at the store where it says drugs,

or the guy down the street, you know, drugs are part of our society. Actually,

a very large part of our society. So dare we talk about them? Absolutely. Once again, Dr. Dennis McKenna.

Dennis, um, welcome back. Thank you. How much of the, um, the experience of the, uh, the pharmaceutical,

the drugs themselves, uh, crossed into a sort of a metaphysical search? How, how, how much of a part

of, uh, all of this was that? Well, I think in, at that time in our lives, it was very much bound up

with a metaphysical search. Uh, you know, we were so impressed with the effects of synthetic DMT,

and so, uh, sort of frustrated with the, uh, with the rapidity of the, uh, for going to the Amazon

to look for this orally active, this very obscure orally active form. Uh, as it turned out, Ukuhi, uh,

which I returned to the Amazon 10 years later and, and did part of my doctoral work, turned out not to

be that interesting. But in the, in these things, we, uh, encountered the, uh, eventually ayahuasca.

And those are the, I'm, I'm somewhat curious. I would, well, I'm sorry, as you go down, as you go

to the Amazon and there, there are you, Terrence and yourself are in the Amazon, you're going to

some natives, uh, way out in the middle of nowhere. How do you begin to ask them? Well, you know,

what, what plants take us to the plants? We want to have this experience. How do you approach them?

Uh, well, we were very naive at the time. Uh, we didn't really know. We had read a few papers

from Schulte's work from the Botanical Museum leaflets that reported this for the first time.

We just, you know, we were 20 years old, 20 and 24 years old respectively. I mean, we figured,

you know, the world was our oyster and, and we could just go down there and get to it.

And as it turned out, that wasn't so far wrong. And there, there wasn't amusing. And when we were

on the way to La Charrera, which is the ancestral home of the Witoto and most widely, most widely used,

even though now it's, it's pretty much a dying cultural tradition, but there was a Colombian

anthropologist at one of the villages that we passed through, Dr. Collier. And he,

uh, because it was a, it was a shaman knew. And if we chance to ask, uh, a shaman, he would probably

kill us for even mentioning it. Really? They told you that? Well, he told us that,

but he was a little, uh, paranoid himself. So as it turned out, it wasn't. I actually went back in 1981

as a graduate student at that point. And I went to Peru to, and that is sort of the new, so I went there

and interviewed many people elections. And what I found was that, uh, you know, it's, it's a kind of a,

it's, it's a disappearing tradition among these people who have been, you know, very much of like,

well, I remember my grandfather knew something about this or, you know, my father knew something

I can try and make it. Of course, they didn't speak English or even Spanish. We were working

through translators, but that was, uh, a shaman in, in this group. Well, in, uh, in 1971, when we went

down, we weren't really there that long. We went down in January of 71 and came out around the end of

April. That's about a while. Right. And in, in, uh, 81, when I went to Peru, uh, it wasn't, uh,

a puk or a keo the whole time. I was, I was traveling all over because I was also investigating

ayahuasca. Uh, I was there about five and a half months. Oh, no, that's, that's quite a while.

Yeah. Uh, did you actually live out with the natives for a while? Uh, part of the time,

part of the time. But when you, when you are, uh, when you're working with ayahuasca, ayahuasca

in the Amazon, among the mestizo populations phenomenon, there, there are still in, you know,

up the rivers that are using it, but it's sort of, it's become amalgamated into mestizo folk medicine.

So it's really on the outskirts of cities like Iquitos and Pucallpa. How much longer will,

what will all of this even be there? In other words, you're, you're saying it's being assimilated.

It's disappearing in another 10 or 20 or 50 years. Would you not be able to make that trip,

uh, with the same results? It would be difficult. It would, I mean, a lot of these indigenous tribes

are definitely in a state of cultural, uh, decline. They've been, they've been impacted

by so many factors and dislocation and, and loss of, uh, of their cultures. But in mestizo folk medicine,

where ayahuasca is, is commonly used, and it's kind of the, you know, at the center of a whole

pharmacopoeia of medicinal plants that these people use, you know, I, I think that tradition

is going to survive, especially now that there's so much interest from American tourists. I mean,

this whole in which I don't know for a good thing. Um, but it's in a sense, it's been a shot in the

arm to the traditional people. Um, you mean there are people that virtually they're drug tourists.

They go down there just people that go down to have these experiences, usually with ayahuasca. Um,

um, um, the, the problem is that there's also, you know, anytime, uh, there's a revival, there's also

a lot of charlatans. It's, it's not easy to get to the people that really know what they're doing,

but you can easily find anybody on the street corners of Iquitos who'd be willing to sell you,

you know, something that they call ayahuasca. You couldn't really be sure that that's what it is,

but, uh, yeah. So, you know, it's a mix, it's a mixed bag, but I think, you know, one of the

positive things about it is that these, some of these people are sincere and they are rediscovering

their, their own traditions. I mean, I don't think ayahuasca is going to go away very, so that it may

be spreading and that, you know, again, that has negative and positive aspects about it.

Let's talk a little bit about it. I would like to say, I, I appreciate that you are at the end of

the hour. I'm not on this program to advocate that anyone should use any of these things. Um,

I think that they should be investigated. I, I, you know, I disagree with the whole strategy of the

war on drugs. I think that's very short-sighted. And I think that people should have, uh, you know,

personal choice to form relationships with plants, which is basically what this is about.

And when I say, I have a lot of trouble with the war on drugs, uh, particularly the way it's being

orchestrated, uh, uh, disproportionately, um, with regard to marijuana, for example. Well, it, it doesn't

for, I mean, it simply doesn't work. I think the thing to do, you know, a better approach is to

enable people to make informed choices. And, uh, uh, you know, when I say reform relationships with

plants, I use that term deliberately because I think when you choose to use a drug, uh, of any sort,

you're choosing to have a relationship. And, uh, you know, just as you should be careful in, in choosing

your friends and choosing the people you want to hang out with, you should be careful and make

informed choices in terms of the substances you, you know, you put into your body and particularly

with the psychic setting that Leary talked about.

is so important for the effects.

And that is why shamanism is really the model.

These people have been working with these substances for thousands of years.

And if we're going to develop models, whether psychotherapeutic or shamanic or whatever,

but you need to, in order to use these substances in a way that has benefits,

and I believe they can be used safely and they can be beneficial,

but the context is so important.

And this is the problem, that in this culture we lack that context,

we lack that traditional context.

Are there laws against these drugs now in America?

Which drugs?

Well, DMT.

DMT is a controlled substance, definitely.

All right.

When it comes to plants that contain DMT, of which many, many do,

because DMT is a very simple compound and it's very widespread in nature,

the situation is much murkier.

It's not clear.

In fact, the plants themselves, as far as anyone knows, are not illegal.

But then they contain a controlled substance, DMT.

Our own brain contains DMT.

So this is creating some legal conundrums right now.

How can you ban all plants containing DMT without essentially criminalizing all of nature?

You know, DMT has been detected in over 150,

and that's only because somebody's bothered.

Personal belief is it's probably found in thousands, if not tens of thousands.

Doctor, quick question for you.

Hallucigens, the entire family, as a whole, are they addictive, physically addictive, in your opinion?

No.

No, they're not physically addictive.

They don't work on that part of the brain that leads to addiction,

which substances like cocaine, for instance, different neuropharmacology,

and they work on the parts of the brain that have to do with our pleasures and craving.

If anything, the hallucinogens are anti-addictive or you're certainly, you know...

Some people would take it and say, I'm not doing that again.

Exactly. You sort of have to get your courage up to keep doing that.

So, yeah, they're definitely not addictive in the physiological sense or the psychological sense.

Are there diminishing returns as one continues to use it?

Again, I think that depends on the substance that one is using,

and it depends on the context in which you use it.

If you use it for recreational purposes or without any real intent,

I mean, in taking ayahuasca, they always emphasize that it's important to have an intent,

then I think after a while, you have no framework in which to understand it.

On the other hand, if you're working in a context,

whether it's something that you create,

a experiential context for learning,

or whether it's a more traditional, shamanic instance like ayahuasca,

if you instant or anything like that, it's like any other discipline.

And to be involved with ayahuasca, it's a discipline.

And people should...

Back to the war on drugs for just a second.

Do you delineate in your own mind the difference between the hallucinogens and cocaine?

For example, we've got, my God, over 2 million people in jail in America right now

for various drug violations, very few of them, no doubt,

relating to DMT or any other class of hallucinogens.

Some, but the majority, cocaine and heroin and that sort of class of drugs.

Right, right.

Well, again, you know, where I think a differentiation could be made

that might be useful and might actually help clarify some of the issues on the war on drugs

are to make a distinction between plants and compounds.

If you look at the way coca is used in Peru among the indigenous peoples

or even opium, you know, as a plant, it's much less harmful.

Yeah, they chew it.

Much more difficult to become addicted or abused.

And I think if the drug warriors were to say,

we'll make a distinction between plants and drugs,

we will focus on substances that are extracted, purified, or synthesized,

plants we're not so interested in.

90% of the drug problem would go away if they would just, you know, say,

you know, we're not going, I mean, for, I mean, primarily cannabis

would drop out of the debate.

Sure.

Oh, right away.

Well, it's an herb, and we're not that concerned with it.

Well, what would happen if they brought coca plants, raw coca plants,

to America and began selling them on the street or in a store,

you know, as they are sold in South America and used and chewed?

Would it be an instant hit, or would it be sort of, hey, what's the big deal?

It would be, hey, what's the big deal?

I don't think most people would bother with it because, you know, coca traditionally used,

you know, is about as harmful.

You know, there have been studies that show that coca, you know, among the people in Crescent,

it also supplies minerals and vitamins that they don't ordinarily get in their diet.

I mean, chewing coca leaves is, you know, it's about as bad a habit as drinking coffee.

I was going to say, is it like coffee?

Yeah, it's somewhat like that, you know, all mild.

So then you think for the purposes of settling this damned war, this godforsaken war,

we could delineate between plants and purified substances from plants?

Well, I think that that would, yes, I think that that would be a step in the right direction.

And if the government were to say, we're going to focus our efforts on people that are extracting

or synthesizing or making these pure substances,

which are much more easily abused and inherently more dangerous because they're more potent.

I think that that would be a step in the right direction.

I don't expect it to happen because I personally, you know, I don't, I don't think personally

that the war on drugs is particularly about protecting people from drugs.

For the case, then all the focus would be on tobacco, you know, which is an herb,

people a year in this country, as opposed to kill maybe 20,000 people a year.

Absolutely. All right.

So, you know, here we are at the top of the hour already.

Time really flies.

We can find out.

So, Dr. McKenna, hold on.

We'll get back to you after the news at the top of the hour.

We're talking about drugs, all kinds of drugs with Dr. Dennis McKenna.

I'm Art Bell.

We're talking about drugs, we're talking about plants, and we're talking about drugs, and we're talking about the drug war, and we're talking about all kinds of strange things and interesting things.

So, I suggest you stay right where you are, because we have only just begun.

Once again, here is Dr. Dennis McKenna.

Dennis, welcome back.

Thank you.

I have a question for you that you cannot, you certainly don't have to answer.

You can consider it and not answer it.

I spoke with Dr. Timothy Leary before he passed away, briefly, and I had set up an interview, and, of course, there wasn't enough life left, and we never made it.

Uh-huh.

Although he was very comfortable to the very end.

He had a big cylinder next to him.

It's a long story.

Anyway, when I interviewed Terrence, I asked Terrence something that I had heard about Dr. Leary, and that was that out there somewhere, buried or secreted away in a place that might still be found, it is said, and has been said for years, there are 20,000 hits of Blue Sandos, LSD.

Uh-huh.

And Terrence chuckled a little and didn't exactly say he knew where they were, but he didn't say he didn't know where they were.

He didn't know where they were.

You don't think he knew?

Of course not.

Well.

I think that's an urban myth.

An urban legend?

You really think so?

I do.

You don't think Timothy socked him away somewhere, huh?

Well, I don't know.

Maybe he did.

Maybe he did, right.

I hope they won't be much good.

Well, that's true, isn't it?

All right, so urban legend.

Okay.

Somebody writes, and I've got this screen I can look at, this computer screen, and people can send what's called a fast blast mass question.

Somebody writes and says, would you ask Dr. McKenna, please, if the spraying of defolion in South America, which we are doing now, due to the whole drug war thing,

is it affecting these plants in the areas that you talked about?

Well, it's, yes.

It's certainly, I mean, it's affecting everything in the areas that we're talking about.

I actually, Dr. Mark Plotkin, who is an ethnobotanist that many of you may know about, he's very well known as the author of Apprentice, among other things.

But he is working down there with his nonprofit group called the Amazon Conservation Team.

And he has been doing quite a bit of work in Southern Columbia and has seen firsthand the impact of this defoliation.

It's not only, I mean, the problem is that it's very hard to target the defoliant only on the coca fields.

It also drifts over and the villages where the people live.

And anyone can go down there and it's tremendous.

I mean, skin diseases and, you know, it's definitely impacting those people.

And it's, you know, it's outrageous.

It basically amounts to international United States, in my opinion.

There's got to be a better way to deal with this problem than toxifying the environment.

Again, that's a war against the plants.

It's not a war against the people that are extracting and purifying.

Well, yeah, it's an attempt to exterminate the plants, which is in itself a bad idea.

But the problem is it also impacts, I mean, these plants are growing where these people live.

And, you know, they also grow their crops in the same or adjacent fields.

So it gets in their food supply.

It gets on the people themselves directly.

This is just one of the consequences of this misguided policy.

All right.

A little about DMT and drugs like it.

I played a song just for fun, you know, before you came on, Journey to the Center of the Mind.

And at one part of that song it says, but be careful, referring to the journey, you might not come back.

Now, with LSD, there were some people that essentially didn't come back.

Right.

And I've always wondered, and I'd like your opinion,

do you think that these are people who were predisposed to psychological difficulties in the first place,

or that the ingestion of whatever drug we're talking about here was the primary cause of extended difficulties?

No, I think that in most cases, the incidences of people who, quote, unquote, don't come back are extremely low, for one thing.

And I think that in most cases, you can say that the logical problems and that the drugs, the LSD or whatever,

was basically a catalyst, that they were psychosis.

The problem, of course, is that these are the very people on the street level that are most likely to do something like that.

Well, again, this comes back to the whole issue.

Number one, psychedelics are not for everyone, and number two, you have to pay attention to set and setting.

The context is so important because, again, you know, in the shamanic context, in the use of ayahuasca, for example, in Peru,

you know, yes, people do get into psychological difficulties.

They can have panic reactions or anxiety.

Many people often, you know, become convinced that they are either dying or that they are not going to come back.

But the shaman, a bag of tricks, essentially, and is able to apply some of those tricks to very simple things,

such as singing one of these icaros, one of these magical songs, or blowing tobacco smoke over the person or otherwise.

That's why it's very, you know, generally, it helps if there's a person in the case, in the end,

that they sort of watching over them, or this group of persons.

That's one of the dangers with not all shaman are that experienced.

Some, and some you can't always try.

If you do this in a situation where you feel are looking after you and not just stare.

And that's the thing.

I mean, I think in the context of our society, if these psychedelics, which I really have to place them in a category apart from all of these other substances,

which are more recreational, but the psychedelics are more of a spiritual or experience.

But I think if these things are ever going to be used, you know, in our culture, we have to develop some kind of models of context.

It may not be traditional shamanism.

We can't really integrate that into our culture.

But we can take some of the elements and combine it with elements of psychotherapy, for example.

Well, let's try this angle.

Doctor, what would you say would be the psychological or metaphysical benefits or gains that a person might reasonably expect to take away from the experience?

It's hard to say because the experience is as individual as the person, and a lot of it depends on what your expectations are.

Again, getting back to this issue of intent, you know, some people may take it, and in the case of ayahuasca,

it's generally emphasized that it's important to have an expectation, to express an intent.

People may take it to have insights about their relationships, for example.

Psychological problems, you know, maybe depression, sleep, physical illnesses.

People take ayahuasca, you know, to have insights about.

Other people may take it to solve problems, you know, things that they're working on, intellectual things.

So then it allows intense physical self-examination or intellectual self-examination?

It allows for both, yes, physical and inflammation.

I think that ayahuasca is unique.

Ducinogens are unique among that group.

It's just more than other ducinogens.

There's a lot of cross-mental and physical that goes on.

Maybe you could comment on this for me.

There are many scientists investigating near-death experiences.

Very, very interesting things produced by near-death experiences, associations with white light, relatives that have passed away,

examination of one's own life, you know, flashing by you, that sort of thing.

Is there a relationship of the pharmacology that occurs in the brain between any of these drugs and what might occur during a near-death experience, do you suppose?

Yes, I think there probably is.

I think that these two territories interface with each other or share a common border.

I mean, it is known, for example, that DMT and its close relative, 5-methoxy-DMT, are both neurochemicals.

They both occur in the normal human brain.

We're not sure what their functions are.

People have suggested, my colleague, Jace Calloway, a scientist in Finland, who has worked on these issues,

suggests that maybe endogenous, that is internally occurring DMT, has to do with the modulation of...

And he's come up with a very plausible and testable theory that could show that maybe this is the physiological function of DMT,

shown that in states of extreme stress, and I think we can put death in that category,

the levels of DMT in your circulation, in your spinal fluid, for example, and presumably in your brain, are elevated markedly.

So it's possible that in the state, you know, it doesn't reduce it to a DMT experience.

I think a DMT is probably an element of, and probably of the process of being born as well.

Wow.

That was a better question than I thought it was.

That's really interesting.

So then one might...

I believe one of your guests was Rick Darsely, or was that another...

It may have been another host.

Oh, he is a researcher, a colleague of mine and others in this field,

and he was one of the first some FDA-approved on DMT at the University of New Mexico.

He was using synthetic DMT, administering it by injection.

But he has recently written a book on his research called DMT, the spirit molecule,

and it's very interesting.

He has some very interesting and provocative things to say in that book about the possible functions of DMT.

For example, he suggests that at the 49th day of conception,

which is in many traditions thought to be the moment that the soul, that the pineal gland,

which is the source of one source, the primary source of these endogenous tryptamines,

synthesis of DMT, I think people with an interest in DMT is quite interesting.

I'm just in the middle of it.

Well, that's fascinating.

On the 49th day, when some say the soul is inculcated,

there is a definite spike in the DMT produced in the brain?

That's right.

Wow.

This is what he says.

I haven't seen the paper for it.

Oh, my.

That really is very provocative.

No, it's not unreasonable to expect that at death something similar may go on.

Generally, you know, in state psychological stress,

to think that that may trigger the release of DMT,

which is actually released into the circulation as much as in the brain.

Besides the brain, the other organ in the body that synthesizes DMT is the adrenal glands,

which are very much involved with this.

Again, a question that you are fully, you're just welcome to not answer it,

but while you've certainly concentrated on the science side of all this,

it's hard to believe that back through the 60s and through the trips to the Amazon

and all the time you spent with Terrence that you would not have,

that you stayed a pure academic, that you would not have experienced all of this.

So can we get that out of the way?

Well, yes, I have, and I think that's clear to everybody that knows our work.

Yes, I mean, I have approached it from a scientific standpoint,

but, you know, you can't, you know, you can't become a lens grinder or a telescope maker

without occasionally looking through the technology.

So was the experience for you, would you describe it in as profound a manner as Terrence did,

or was it for you a different experience?

Experience.

Well, DMT, we'll stick to DMT, yeah, sure.

Well, yeah, it was pretty profound.

I mean, it is one of the most reliably profound experiences in the smoked form

because it is so overwhelming, deforms.

It's sometimes extremely profound and sometimes not so profound.

And again, you know, it sort of depends on the circumstance.

You know, sometimes you leg up and sometimes you don't, you know, in these orally active forms.

But generally, I prefer, I think that the orally active forms are probably the meant for man to take DMT.

It probably should have been inundated by one of these MAO inhibitors.

Well, you know what, that's a really good question all by itself.

Or compatible with physiology.

Doctor, that's a good question all by itself.

Did, do you think that God or nature, however you want to phrase it, intended for man to make use of these plants and substances as has been done?

Or do you think it was intended that way?

After all, they are here.

Well, exactly.

They are here.

I'm a little uncomfortable with the idea that nature intended it.

I think that, you know, we are part of nature and we have always had a relationship with plants.

I mean, I think that is the context in which you have to understand, you know, the use of all of these psychoactive plants.

It's part of a much vaster web of interaction that we have with the plant kingdom.

You know, all of these herbal medicines that people are interested in.

You know, the whole interest in natural healing and medicinal plants and so on is really an attempt, I think, on the part of an alienated act to nature to literally rediscover a psychoactive plant.

Somebody, I don't think that, you know, there is somebody out there directing things.

I mean, it's not like nature is conscious or God, that in the process of evolving on this planet as part of the biosphere, we have co-evolved with these plants and with these substances.

On the other hand, there were the Ten Commandments and he didn't tell us not to take them.

He didn't tell us not to take them.

No.

Doctor, hold on.

We're at the bottom of the hour.

We'll be right back from the high desert.

I'm Art Bell.

My guest is Dr. Dennis McKenna.

Now to Dr. Dennis McKenna and we were talking about plants and the fact that they were here and I said, well, no commandments against interacting with the plants or as you pointed out earlier, having a relationship with them.

We have, it's been a co-evolution.

The plants have been here probably before the walking things, but we're both here and they're here to be used or looked at or admired

or perhaps chewed on or I don't know.

What is, what do you think is intended for human beings and plants?

Well, again, you keep using this word intention.

I don't think anybody is running the show.

I think that this is sort of an organic process that's going forward, you know, evolutionarily.

The thing you have to understand about plants, they're very different.

It seems like an obvious statement.

One of the ways and the way that they interact with the world and experience the world is very different than we do.

One famous botanist made the statements that plants.

have substituted biosynthesis for behavior now what he meant by that is

that because they can photosynthesize they don't they make their own food and

as a result they don't have they don't have to go foraging for food because they

can make it from sunlight and carbon dioxide and water one of the

consequences of that is that they make a vast variety of chemical compounds they

are virtuoso chemists and in the same way that animals interact with their

environment through behavior through the famous fly flee or fight reaction these

sorts of things plants interact with their environment through chemistry and they

communicate with other organisms in their environment bacteria in the soil

fungi in the soil other plants insect feed on them and human beings through

these chemical messengers through these molecular messengers and the molecular

messenger organisms on many levels so make chemical messengers that resemble our

own neurotransmitters it's interesting for us for this particular topic because then

you're talking about plants that literally talk you know they don't say you know

when you ingest them their neurotransmitter interesting results and I think in a you

know in some sense you you know you're seeing the world kind of the way they play

mediated co-evolution between and all or the concept that I think needs to be

explored chemical ecology which is basically this is the territory we're in

here the way that chemical systems are used to mediate relationships between no it's a

two-way street you know we'd largely value plants if you think about it or the

chemical compounds they contain whether they be nutrients or you know cellulose

which are fibers that go into textiles years you know or medicinal compounds that

we may use or yes these more neuroactive type compounds or as you said in the

beginning nutrition and again then I proffer the word intended because whether

it's a plant or an animal these are all things that co-evolved with us and even the biblical

scholars will say that the plants and the animals were put here for our use now you

you can take that or not but it been intended does seem like a reasonable word to me well if

it's intended I guess the question is by whom was it intended well we can have a

conversation about that if you want right I mean is is it you know is it to God that's

you know running the show or is it is it you know dome-headed beams in

geosynchronous orbit or or is it Gaia I mean I'm more comfortable with the Gaia

notion that the whole biosphere is in some sense an organism you can think of the yes you

know the entire biosphere I mean it's really a mega or can organism or a super organism and

justi all of the processes of the cell between say then what's going on in the nucleus and what's going

on in the cytoplasm and on the membrane that's all controlled and coordinated through chemical

messengers that are shot laid back and forth from the membrane to the cytoplasm to the nucleus and

and so on the same thing is going on in the biosphere permeated with chemical messengers

absolutely many of them are made by plants and and plants are very good at it I mean they use these

molecular relationships with all sorts of organisms in the environment well that makes a war sex for

example insects are probably the primary example okay plants depend on insects for their pollination

in many cases and the insects of course get benefits from the plant in the form of nectar and pollen which

they collect as food sources so it's a symbiosis this notion of a symbiotic relationship study between plants and insects

not so extensively studied between plants and humans but that's the that's the key term I think that you have

to from that angle what we're looking at here is a plant human symbiosis and impacts on us so then a war

on plants is really screwing with mother nature well it's a really misguided idea I mean what gives us we're

only one species in the biosphere what gives us the right to you know decree that some other species because

it happens to be a plant that produces a chemical that you know our society has not been able to come to

terms with do we then have the tree that uh plant should be exterminated from the face of the earth I

don't think so I mean if we were talking about an ethnic group of humans this wouldn't be tolerant okay

then instead of uh the bearing in mind the fact that we cannot come to terms with it instead of going to

war against it how do we come to terms with it how do we come to terms with it well for one thing again going

back to making a distinction between plants and chemicals I think that's part of the part of the

thing uh you know and you say okay if you want to grow marijuana in your backyard if you want to grow

mushrooms if you want to grow opium even you know we don't care whatever you do as a gardener is not of

concern to us we're going to focus on the the drugs where there have to be infestration and distribution

and you have to have you know that's one aspect of it and then the other aspect of it is simply

education I think you have to give people the tools to make informed choices about number one

whether to use drugs number two if the answer to number one is yes I want to use drugs the second

question is which drugs are you going to use how are you going to use them you know and this is the

problem with the war on drugs and the whole uh the whole dialogue is category called drugs you know

that all things are put into well there are drugs many different types of drugs and it seems that the

drug warriors of scary bugaboo called drugs but of course they don't include in that you know the

drugs that they happen to favor which are you know tobacco alcohol these things are also drugs

sure they're there so I think we have to have a more subject and we have garing people and and try to

give them you know the tools to make informed decisions it all comes down to education and it's

like saying well you know you don't have to use drugs to have a full life and and to have a completely

fulfilled life you know if you make that choice fine if you do choose all about which relationships

you form with these substances and the circumstances under which you use them it's no different than

forming relationships with Andrew Wilde said all this years ago in his book the natural mind I mean

nobody you know nobody listened then nobody's listening now but that is the solution you know

though I mean you know nobody wants their kids to go out and get messed up with the thing is uh you know if

if you promulgate what is essentially misinformation I mean let's not put too far to find a point on it

let's call it lies kids are not stupid they're going to find out and then you know they will disregard

what you know you lied about marijuana so you must be lying about heroin and saying that for years and

they've been saying that for years yeah nothing why not have a reasonable uh debate I know I know I know

nothing uh through the years has made me angrier than the lies that are told about marijuana because

of course they then cause the young people to uh just go right on up the chain and before you know it

uh uh cops put them in the back of a car with with crack cocaine and off they go part of the system in

jail yes that's right I mean the the laws that are designed to control the drug problem are having a worse

impact than the problem itself I think Jimmy Carter said this if that's the case then we need to rethink

this whole dialogue and uh in terms of the psychedelics I think that you know they do need

to be used in a ritual context or in a fairly structured context and and the use of guides or

more experienced people who can kind of uh structure the experience much as it goes on in shamanism and

shamanism is really the model I don't think we can you know I don't think we can reproduce it but I

think we can take a few pages from that book and try and implement it and I can envision you know in a

more rational society there would be a place or there would be a center where one could go

and have these experiences and it would be legal and it would be uh you know it would be beneficial

to people we are not now that rational nor are we even close uh how far in the future if you can

just sort of stand back and observe uh our progression socially how far in the future do you envision

something like this might be a reality well it's hard to say I mean it's it's it's really it's really

very hard to say because I don't see I mean I think that the people as almost always the people

are way out in front of their government on this issue you know most people feel that marijuana that

medical marijuana for example should be available to people that need it the people that have diseases

problems that I think most people feel that rather than being put in jail people should be given access

to treatments option there have been propositions passed in California to this effect and a couple

of other states so the people have a much more reasonable approach to the problem than the government

does uh the problem with the problem is the government vested interest in keeping things the way

they are well for example you mentioned Jimmy Carter yeah a lot of people thought that when Jimmy

Carter became president uh there'd probably be a move to legalize marijuana well lo and behold

didn't happen it didn't happen then people thought well next time we get a democrat in office it'll

happen then lo and behold didn't happen right because again I think this is a this is a function

of the fact that it's very hard for politicians to come out on this issue uh you know even if they

do feel that it's misguided anytime you make a statement that is uh you know in the least perceived as

being pro I know uh problem and and politicians as a group are not a particularly brave brave bunch of

people I mean their decisions are based on uh you know what they think is going to get them reelected

and there is such a vocal uh anti-drug majority or minority actually I think it is a minority but

they're very vocal and so you know uh if you say well maybe maybe we should take a different approach

then immediately uh they're pounced upon well and no rational conversation is possible doctor I lived in a

state where there was a rational moment I lived in Alaska when the uh Alaskan Supreme Court struck down

the laws against marijuana and it became legal to have to grow your own plants and to have I think I

can't remember an ounce or two for your own personal use and that uh that was it was a great success for

a while in Alaska but then all of a sudden from Washington DC they came rushing in and all conversation

stopped the drug war was in full force and Alaska reversed it all mm-hmm so well again this is this is sort of

the irony uh you know the current administration and the uh uh you know the position of the conservatives

uh traditionally is get government off people's back and what I actually think they mean is get the

government off corporations back you know put uh I mean when it comes to what we do in our bedrooms

or what we put in our bodies or how we handle our reproductive choices the you know these regimes are

very uh you know very much totalitarian they want to control that kind of behavior they think it's very

much their business and uh you know this is where the conflict is I take it you would consider yourself

politically a libertarian I'm not no I'm not a libertarian I mean I I about the only thing I agree

with with the libertarian agenda is the notion that these substances should be regulated in the same way

no I think government has a uh you know I'm basically a liberal I guess I think government should be

concentrating on helping people and uh you know making people's lives better if you pay taxes

why not get some benefit from it uh I mean what bothers me is that my taxes go for you know the war in

Colombia uh which is not being talked about in the media and is the war uh you know or the missile defense

system you know this completely absurd technological boondoggle that most of the experts say will never

work I mean these are the things that I would rather not uh well I agree with you completely uh although

you're certainly your view uh with regard to these substances is very libertarian and uh and you say

otherwise you're a liberal which would uh which mean that it would generally mean to a lot of people

that you want government involved in your life in a lot of areas but not in my personal life I don't

want them telling me you know I want them to be concerned with the public health aspects of drug of

drug use and all of these other things but I don't really want them to smoke this herb or if you drink

this plant you're going to jail and I think have them uh giving intelligent level of support right you

know I would very much like to allow some of the audience uh after the break to ask you questions if

you're up for that uh sure are you okay good um stay right there then my guest is Dr Dennis McKenna the

brother of the late Terrence McKenna who appeared on the show many many times and they're both obviously

brilliant minds I'm Art Bell and this is Coast to Coast AM screaming through the night like a freight train

glad to have you along as a passenger sit down stick around

Dennis McKenna that's got to bring back some memories for you I suppose huh absolutely you were there and

just about at that time what was you know socially do you think doctor that uh it was the right direction

at the wrong time how do you mean well I mean the whole 60s thing the whole San Francisco scene the

whole oh the whole national scene frankly the it was a moving toward a gentler um more aware

social time for the young people but then sort of the war got in the way and then we started the war

on drugs and war and war and war but right for a while there we were headed in a bit of a different

direction weren't we well we were headed in a bit of a different direction and yes I think that the war in

Vietnam had a lot to do with derailing it but I think that also just sort of the disillusion

the disillusion happened in the American dream that probably started with the assassination of Kennedy

if not before I mean I think that really impacted a lot of people in my generation uh you know I can

remember when that happened and both uh Terrence and myself after that happened there was little

you could do except just stare at the elevation that's right you know a lot of people of our

generation thought that you know was the sign of some needed change and when he was when I think I

think it was kind of a message that no nothing is really going to change I mean you know however he

flawed he may have been as a as a man I think he symbolized the change for a lot of people and I

think when that went away from the the process of deepening cynicism that that and and then and then

we sort of moved toward as the decades went by it seems like we moved from where we were in the 60s

and where we were headed to a more materialistic society and we kind of replaced what went on with

the 60s with materialism uh anyway listen um I I'm I want to ask you a question that's a sensitive

question and about Terrence and it was actually a question that I asked Terrence and I guess I

would like to ask you many many people said uh brain tumor why should we not believe that it's possible

that some of the substances and chemicals and things that Terrence did uh contributed to that may have been a

main contributor to that brain tumor right I'm sure you've thought about it well I have thought about

it and um the answer is that there's simply no evidence for psychedelics or cannabis caused brain

tumors uh there would be a lot more brain tumors that kind of thing than there are brain tumors that

particularly the kind that he had is an actually an extremely rare form of cancer um only 20 000 cases a

year personally think it must be more than that but as cancers go this one is rare and uh you know

there's just there's simply no evidence there's no correlation between your intake of marijuana say

and brain tumors in fact that has been done that shows that cannabis uh you know tetrahydrocannabinol may

inhibit recently for my brother this can say that I mean another person who maybe never touches any of these

things may get a brain tumor and you may say well you know it's because they uh led a bad life or

something sure I mean I I just don't it just doesn't hold up all right before we just before going to the

phone lines here uh Scott in Sonora California asks a question that may not even be relevant or you may

know what he's talking about but he says please ask dr mckenna if he remembers what he was experiencing

when he said that quote he didn't want to be a giant insect end quote at the experiment at la career

is la churrera la churrera okay right right so it rings a bell huh yeah absolutely so you didn't want

to be a giant insect uh what what was that all about well it's hard to explain that without sort of going

into the whole uh narrative of what got us to go to la churrera at the first place which which we

started talking about at the top of the program but then we sort of got derailed into other subjects but

i guess to put it in a nutshell uh a lot of the ideas and concerns that we were at la churrera in in

these had to do with the notion of insect metamorphosis and in and you know insects undergo

uh several stages of metamorphosis like a butterfly a caterpillar turning into a butterfly is the

classic example and we had some notions uh whether correct or not at least time they seemed for tryptamines

and the beta carbolines in this plant environment had to do with the kind of uh an actual metamorphosis

in humans and that you know and that was what the basis of that was about i wasn't so sure i wanted

to undergo this metamorphosis and i was convinced that i was about to i bet you saw the fly didn't you

uh actually i've never seen it oh you haven't seen it i haven't seen it just as well i just put it on my

list um obviously you're not exactly an anti-drug poster child and um nor was your brother your brother

was a brilliant brilliant man you're a brilliant brilliant man and a lot of people who are fighting

this drug war uh i don't think like hearing you speak because you're obviously brilliant and somehow

you've you know the brain cells have stayed uh uh in in place um throughout whatever it is you have done

as was the case with terrence so far all right first time caller line you're on the air with uh dr dennis

mckenna hi hi art i'm laura and i'm a phd candidate in a washington dc area university and i'm doing

the first ethnographic life history narrative based research study with near-death experiencers

oh so i'm getting some very interesting findings which i'd like to talk to you about more at some

other time now you guys kept talking while i was making after i made the notes i wanted to make

because i had a chance to spend some time with parents and polenke and i had a couple comments

for that i wanted from dennis but a question you just raised about the brain tumor and the drug use

yes raised the issue for me of remember the miami guy who had the strange heart attack and the bizarre

little sort of twist in his oh yes and and the native americans who pointed out that you know from where

their point of view that's called an energy attack just i'm not to sound too paranoid i just wanted to

throw that in as another question that might be asked and in the uh i have a wonderful quote from

terrence about an experience of dennis's that your insect thing made me want to read but let me hold

off because maybe we don't have time um but i'm loving hearing from dennis and i love spending time

with terrence read all their work i think the research that they have done and the personal accounts that

they have shared are not simply valuable but extremely brave to stand out on the edge they're

standing out on and there's tremendous resistance as terrence said culture is not your friend in

certain i would agree with that and i wanted to raise this the reason i was there is i got a

scholarship that year that fellow from texas gave some scholarships and i got to go to polenke and spend

this 10 days having this wonderful ethnobotanical field seminar with an incredible group of people

including the shogun's and terrence and because i realized that there were analogs between near-death

experience narratives and i'm a near-death experiencer as was my mother which you know fueled my

interest well you obviously heard the comments earlier with respect to dmt well no oh you did both

the light related experiences related to ayahuasca with now a lot is in the research near-death studies

research about ketamine which i know the least about um but i went there because that woman who was

involved in iboga research ibogaine deborah masch dr deborah masch dr deborah nash was going to be

there and um there is this analog between ndes and that experience in the life review that's very

very obvious i also wanted to say you hadn't mentioned scompistora nor i think ketamine and i'd

like to hear what you have to say about them the other thing i found that was bizarre that didn't

come up in clinical nde model shaped research this is work i'm continuing now that i did two years work

of field research on for my ma now it's continuing as my um is that there was this major inexplicably high

incidence of narratives where it was clear there was that you could take a batch of these change a few

characteristics hand them to alien encounter researchers like john mack or near-death experience

researchers and each of those groups would go near-death experience or alien encounter and and

because so many of my informants came up with so many of my informants and the only other research

that's come up in in that high incidence is pmh atwater who like me her methodology involves more

person-centered informant generated narrative so you get data you wouldn't get i would never have

thought to mention a strange experience that i had one connected maybe with the one that dennis and

parents had in true hallucinations which i'd love to hear him talk about all right listen we're way

short on time yeah so i'd like to know what you know what does he make of this overlap and the fact

that we're trying to model experiences we may not know as much about as we think think we know okay well

what well oh a lot of things have been touched on i i think that this notion i mean this this business

of the aliens and encounters with the aliens in in experiences the near-death experiences and also in

psychedelics um what do i make of it i'm not sure what to make of it on on one hand i mean the rational

reductionist part of me says you know it's got to be part of the self i mean certainly with psychedelics he

I think, you know, I mean, no matter how other it seems to be, ultimately, these things are coming from some part of the self.

It may not be a part that you know very much.

I mean, that's the reductionist model.

The other, you know, it's possible to look at it another way.

Maybe what we mean by other dimensions, I'm not sure.

Maybe some other level of etheric vibration.

You know, who knows?

I mean, more familiar, more people on your program know more about this than I do.

I just feel like all bets are off in a sense that particularly when we're trying to understand the mind and what the capabilities of the mind are and how it interfaces with reality, we can't really make any assumptions.

Well, our nation's best physicists are talking about multiple dimensions.

Well, exactly.

Who is to say that there is not a path and a door opened?

Comment briefly, if you would, on ketamine.

Ketamine is being called the NDE drug.

Well, my own experience with ketamine is extremely limited.

I've only taken it one time in my life and I didn't find it.

It wasn't pleasant for me.

It was interesting.

It was sort of in a sense that it seemed to be a state of sensory deprivation, isolation from the body.

Wow.

Sort of like, you know, how in states of sensory deprivation, you start to confabulate, you start to feel that empty space.

Yes.

Thoughts.

Yes, of course.

And ketamine was like that for me.

Beyond that, I don't know.

It may be the NDE for that would be something like five, but it's actually an order of magnitude more potent or somewhat similar, although as so much on five methoxy DMT.

But yet, it's just that the few times I have encountered it, you do seem to go to a place with near-death experience.

That's amazing.

All right.

Wildcard line, you're on the air with Dr. Dennis McKenna.

Good morning.

Good morning, Art.

Good morning, Dennis.

I'm having a flashback.

I bet.

I was a runaway flower child in 1964, became an electric acid test flower child, Ken Kesey style.

I wound up in 1967 living on a hippie houseboat, three boats down from Allen, one of eight of people.

I have, over the years, I mean, in those days, I was a teenager in my early 20s.

A teenager in my early 20s, I used lots and lots of psychedelics of all kinds, inoxic acid, mescaline, DMT, and DET, which I'm sure, Dennis, you know what DET is.

The point I'm trying to make is a successful person, I don't have brain tumors, and I'm sorry, but involved in those sorts of things.

Things went on to, I think, is very, very small.

I think there's greater.

The next one was the B-methamphetamine wave.

Which came with the materialism wave, by the way.

Well, exactly, Art.

That's right.

That's precisely it.

The first wave was the consciousness wave.

We're tripping or smoking pot.

We're talking about things like Tarkovsky, worlds in collision, earth in upheaval, things like that.

You know, the Urantia book, metaphysics, the early days.

It's got a bad rap, and I think that the war on drugs has turned into a very politicized power trip that the establishment uses to control people.

It's convenient for them.

It gives excuses to have larger police forces and larger military and bigger prisons and, you know, to spend the public money in ways that we...

Well, have either one of you considered the fact that, what do we care about?

What reports do we get?

We get reports on new housing starts, on national productivity, on all of these things that relate to how productive people are in turning out material things.

And I think some of these drugs are considered to be anti-productivity.

And I bet that's at the core of a lot of this war.

That's just me.

Well, I think you're right, because they saw that too many of the hippie types were going back to the nature, wanting to become Native Americans, and were renouncing the NTPs.

I did that for a while when I was young.

Went off into big...

Exactly.

When you could have been in a factory doing something or another, doctor.

Turning out useful widgets, right?

Absolutely.

Well, your caller makes a couple of interesting points that I'd like to comment on.

One is this notion that, you know, the wider cultural perception is that if you use psychedelics, you have to be somehow drooling in the corner or somehow dysfunctional.

And most people, in fact, in which these things have played a role, they are high-functioning, creative people, often on the cutting edge of whatever their field is.

I mean, the whole computer and net revolution was largely spearheaded by people who were involved with psychedelics.

You know, it doesn't...

You know, again, in a very, very small number of cases, some people do run into problems.

Something went wrong, sure.

Most people do.

No, he was right.

In the great majority of cases, these people are now productive citizens.

All right.

We've got a break here.

We'll be right back.

Dr. Dennis McKenna is my guest.

I'm Art Bell, and this is Coast to Coast AF.

Again, Dr. Dennis McKenna.

And welcome back, doctor.

Thank you.

All right.

Gee, so many people want to talk to you, so let us continue, I guess.

East of the Rockies, you're on the air with Dr. McKenna.

Good morning.

Good morning, Art.

How are you and the doctor today?

Just fine.

Where are you?

I am an Indiana PA.

Okay.

I actually have two quick questions, if you don't mind.

Not at all.

My first is you spoke of legalization of marijuana and the war on drugs.

I wonder if the doctor, in your mind, do you differentiate between marijuana and peyote

and those which would be considered synthesized, like LSD, in terms of legalization or just simply

level of deviance?

Level of deviance?

I don't know.

There's no nice way to put that, I guess.

Well, no.

I mean, if you've been listening to the previous conversation, we were making a distinction between

planners saying that LSD, for example, should be persecuted and peyote shouldn't be.

I mean, I think we have to find a context in which, particularly with the psychedelics, in

which these things can be used in a way that is for people.

But people shouldn't be denied access to these experiences if they feel that they should have

them.

I'm not sure what you do about the war on drugs.

That's just one example that, you know, it has to do with the fact that you form relationships

with, and it's much easier in a way if you have a relationship with a, I think you have

a much, have a good relationship with that particular entity.

If you grow it, if you nurture it and in return, it provides you with a visionary experience.

I mean, that is a true symbiosis.

And that's what we're talking about.

It's harder to have that kind of relationship with something that may come in a gelatin capsule

or in the case of LSD on a, on a window pane.

I mean, I know that people do use LSD in a, in a creative way.

This whole issue about how do we, if people are going to have relationships with drugs,

how do we foster, spend mutually beneficial relationships rather than destruct some drugs

because of the way they work, because of their, in a sense, I mean, good.

Because I think it's much, you know, they lend themselves to a more positive type of relationship

because they do open the way.

Pardon me if either of these were mentioned before.

I didn't catch the whole program.

But not too long ago, I was watching TV and I saw something on the CIA admittance of using

psychedelics and things like LSD in the 50s for, I guess you'd call it quasi-mind control,

more just a...

All right.

Caller, hold it right there.

Hey, that's great because that's exactly where I was going, doctor.

The government had a relationship with LSD for a while.

Right.

And I guess not such a good one in view of what they did.

Right.

Well, these drugs don't particularly have moral qualities in the sense that, you know,

if you're a bad person, just taking the psychedelic is not going to make you a good person.

You know, it's a two-sided, you know, it's a two-way street as in any relationship.

It depends on what you bring to it.

You know, just because the CIA used LSD in their experiments didn't, I mean, it didn't

turn them into saints, obviously.

No, it didn't.

You know, so these things are morally ambiguous in a certain sense.

They can, and you see this again in the traditional context where ayahuasca is used, for example,

in mestizo, in mestizo society in South America.

How to use ayahuasca is not necessarily somebody you can trust or somebody you want to trust.

There is a whole, they use the...

Speaking of evil practitioners, was Terrence or yourself ever approached by anybody in government?

You mean because of our involvement in these things?

Yes.

Well, not since, not for a long time.

Not since 1969, actually.

69, huh?

Right, right.

But, I mean, were you approached, not so much because of your use or as a result of your use,

but perhaps to help the government in some way with their proposed use?

No, not really.

Not really.

I mean, I worked, I did a postdoc in the laboratory at National Institutes of Mental Health.

I was there for two years, and I was working on a synthetic at the time,

but I was basically working on using radioactively labeled serotonin receptors in the mouse brain.

But I think it's interesting that, you know, I was able to, went there, I worked there,

never any problems.

And this is actually, this speaks to one of the issues.

People who are interested in psychedelics, in doing research on psychedelics,

often say that the government will not allow us to do that.

That really isn't true anymore.

That has changed the fellow I mentioned who just wrote the book called DMT, The Spirit Molecule.

He was really the pioneer, and for a lot of this, he was a qualified psychiatrist,

and a period of people saying, you can't do this work.

So he decided, well, I'll give DMT.

I gave you the Hefter board member of .org.

A bunch of scientists, neuroscientists, psychiatrists, ethnopharmacologists,

people like that, who want to do legitimate research with psychedelics

to try to find out, well, basically, not only how they work,

but how they might be used to help people.

Well, what about applications in mental illness?

Well, exactly.

These sorts of things.

I mean, in one sense, you almost have to go the medical model.

I don't say that they should always be used to treat people who are sick.

They can also benefit people who don't really have illnesses,

but who might just want to learn from the experience.

But if you're trying to work through these academic, government, and research,

there's something that these things can treat.

And, in fact, there are.

You know, the focus right now is on things like obsessive, for example.

Post-traumatic stress is another big one.

Alcoholism.

Potentially, psychedelics could be used in therapies.

And who knows where it ends?

I don't know how many of you saw Andy Weil on 60 Minutes the other night.

I didn't see.

But he actually came out and admitted LSD cured his allergies.

You know, so who knows?

Who knows, indeed.

Yeah.

I mean, he had an experience where he had been very allergic to cats all of his life,

couldn't get near them.

One day, he was on LSD, and a cat crawled into his lap and claimed that he never had one since.

Isn't that interesting?

So that's rather remarkable, I think.

Very remarkable.

Wes, for the Rockies, you're on the air with Dr. McKenna.

Hello.

Good morning, gentlemen.

Good morning.

Where are you?

This is Gary from Earthquake Seattle.

Okay.

Everything is going smoother up here, fortunately.

Good.

Glad to hear it.

Yeah.

Dennis, I was one of those people who had very many good thoughts about your brother.

Thank you.

Yes, we do.

We need more like him.

Yes.

It might have been a bit premature.

It could be some of us.

They take you inward and they take you upward, and they lead you to nothing but more profound.

I don't think fear is really the model, but I do think they should be.

An earlier caller said, for example, that, well, they can be a lot of fun.

That's something Terrence might have said.

They're not always fun.

I completely agree with that.

You know, the two experiences, I think, if we had it in our power to give people another

to help us make a psychic breakthrough, I think the two...

Well, in the right context, I think it could.

I mean, I think it could.

Get back to this, what an earlier caller said about how, you know, the perception is that

if you take psychedelics, you have to be dysfunctional, or the larger society thinks it drives you

crazy, or it makes you feeble-minded or something.

You know, in the course of working, I worked with my colleagues on what we call the WASCA project.

We did a biomedical study of WASCA, which is the Portuguese ayahuasca, and WASCA is used

in Brazil by several, one of which is called the UDV, the Uniao de Vegetal, and ayahuasca

is their sacrament.

And what was most amazing to me in the process of doing this study, I mean, we had to hang

around with these samples, and we spent contact with this group in the summer of 1993 when

we were doing this study.

But what was remarkable was experiencing this society.

They're a very close-knit community.

In lectures, I refer to them as psychedelic Mormons.

In the sense that Mormons also place a great deal of emphasis on, you know, being productive

members of their community, having a close-knit community, being creative, being successful

in business, not, in other words, being a drag on the society, but being, trying to help

society.

And these people were much that way.

I mean, they had incidents of domestic violence, for example, than is common in Brazilian society.

No alcoholism, no drug abuse.

Most of the people were successful.

They were doctors, lawyers, even politicians.

You know, so I was just in high-functioning, most of them were.

And, you know, their kids seemed healthy and intelligent, their families seemed stable, you

know, and a lot of it, of course, had to do with the community that they were involved

with.

I mean, it was a very, very close-knit community.

But I think a lot of it also had to do with the fact that they call it their sacrament.

You know, every two, at a minimum, they would take it in large groups.

And I think they learned from that.

And it helped.

I mean, you know, there were aspects of the UDV that I would not, I mean, I personally,

you know, I would not join a cult.

To join a cult, I...

That might be the one.

Caller, anything else quickly?

I just believe our government, as you said earlier, I think, our government fears these

substances.

The psychedelics.

Psychedelics.

Right.

I believe they lead to far too much contemplation and deep thinking, and the government is afraid

of it.

But the caller's got a point here.

I think not so much with the so-called drugs of abuse, but with the psychedelics, the fear,

the problem is that they make you have funny ideas.

And funny ideas is a threat to the established order.

Well, yeah, they're viewed as anti-productivity.

Well, anti-productivity, or they just don't want people thinking too much.

I mean, that's a more sinister aspect of the drug war that does concern me a lot, in that,

you know, in some ways, the drug war is not about protecting people from harmful substances.

It's about controlling states of mind.

It's about saying certain states of mind, certain territories are just off limits, and people

should not be allowed these types of experiences.

You know, within the next few years, this is almost certain to happen, and it's going to

be interesting to see what happens.

But within the next few years, probably through biofeedback or similar types of technology,

direct neural stimulation, it'll be possible to use drugs by using some kind of electromagnetic

mechanism.

How is the government going to react to that happen?

I don't know.

That's fascinating.

Well, by passing laws.

By passing laws.

Yeah, that's right.

I always ask, Dr.

Which, of course, will stop the problem.

That's right.

Can you stick around one more hour?

Can I stick around another hour?

That's it.

I've got only one more hour of the show.

Well, I'm getting a little bit, I'm running a little bit out of steam, but let's go another

half hour and see how it goes.

You've got it.

Four in the morning here.

Oh, that's right.

I've got it.

All right, doctors, stay right there.

We'll be right back.

This is Coast to Coast AM from the high desert.