Joe Rogan Experience #477 — Dennis McKenna & Joshua Wickerham Transcript

Transcript

0:00 and just press the music let's just go right with music That's right. So that means transforming people's lives It's hard to get eucalyptus. I would say 10 years ago, 15 years ago, if you approached the average person on the street and you said, ayahuasca, they'd look at you like you had a speech impediment or something. I think that's a good thing, ultimately.

2:34 What? They're interested in ayahuasca. We're working in countries where ayahuasca has been used for hundreds of years traditionally. I mean, I'm completely joking around, but what I was saying when I was, I mean, it's still, they fight a tooth and claw. an enhanced awareness of the, you know, connection between ayahuasca, you know, that's the message it delivers to many people. And unexpectedly,

6:57 and communicate our ideas Ayahuasca allows you to see what you're doing. When mushrooms are so damn easy to grow, you could, I mean, anyone can essentially get a hold how to cook up a good batch. but they just don't seem to carry that same, and we have to really re-understand our relationship to nature. We have to realize And what's disturbing to me is that we're all part of this circle of the converted.

11:23 and then, you know, the day before you're like, holy shit, I've got to deal with this. It's almost like we have this thing where it has to be completely overwhelming, And we're in the middle of an ecological crisis. We're destroying everything we get our greasy little hands on. to change is because governments are realizing there's a lot of money to be made. Taxation,

13:51 I think, you know, I think ayahuasca tourism is a beautiful way. where ayahuasca before was kind of, you know, it was under the stewardship of indigenous people But I think, you know, hopefully we can to nature, potentially the paradigms that are emerging in ayahuasca tourism or these ayahuasca-centered spiritual communities in the States, potentially this may transform

16:58 That's the problem. We've got to become wise, and when we couple that with our ingenuity and our cleverness, then we'll be on the way toward saving the planet, saving ourselves. And I think once that catches root, once people grasp that concept and understand the incredible pressure alleviating This is how I interface with reality. You can't reject it all.

19:30 Oh, this is good. It's hard to sort out what's worth preserving and what needs to be dispensed with. because materialism is the real driving force behind constant innovation. You don't need to improve the laptop. Yes. But you can also change hearts and minds with those tools. Like, for example, you know, this live streaming symposium that we're involved with,

22:26 Right. P-S-Y-M-P-O-S-I-U-M. What is it? Why does it look like you have a movement disorder or something. What is it? What's going on here? Yeah. which is these guys, these young fellows out in Amherst I had an ex-girlfriend who moved out there when I was in high school, and I used to go out there and visit her. and then you have this strange place.

25:34 but with no music. Not as much you know, from a technical point of view, I'm not a filmmaker. and where the state-of-the-art research is on that. Yeah, the change hearts and minds is an interesting cliche because we've heard it so many times. that was the my first experience like oh my god there's a wolf like this is this is a totally Be prepared for that.

28:25 The message is there. is there any more powerful influences on cognitive thought than a psychedelic drug? And, you know, we evolved in an environment of incredible chemical diversity. They fight through chemistry. complex brains enough to utilize these things and our you know in the course of evolution we and the conversation is, of we are all one.

33:08 no one ever imagined that we'd have at our fingertips, what we do now really matters, does. I think there's another thing that we need to put into perspective is the relatively short drug-free society nor would you want one you know it doesn't exist so this right this idea And I think that's one of the reasons why marijuana, besides the financial reason,

35:51 the numbers of people who die by prescription drugs, It's resetting this strange propaganda. this one is benign and beneficial i've said that i think that in the future when people look back drugs. And, you know, our brains run on neurotransmitters and whether they're endogenously So, you know, I mean, by any measure, these internal chemicals are drugs.

38:14 And the most recent work showing that DMT And there was so much resistance to that idea that this mystical chemical is actually produced by the third eye. progress that's a step but that's the the the resistance to the idea was very fascinating to me Well, they knew quite a bit, right? I mean, obviously it's not lost. You know, it's becoming more accessible. And that's partly the effect of the internet and partly the effect of a lot of very smart people obsessing over this and sharing what they're finding out. So again, this is, I think, part of the general raising of consciousness in this area that's going on now. Amber Lyon, she was a reporter for CNN

41:35 seven long ayahuasca trips, completely changes her life, goes on a year-round journey, year-long It's starting this sort of like undeniable tide, this shifting, this undeniable shifting. as a psychedelic plant experience. And it takes discipline. Or try a fast. I mean, there up about the fact they're on a plant-based diet. There's a consciousness in plants that is undeniable and I think very misunderstood or non-understood.

44:29 I mean, the whole thing is death. know we're eating it that deer head right there not the alien no not the alien behind it. No, not the alien. That motherfucker. He's hunting you. And in fact, speaking of that and speaking of your hunting experience, you know the author Michael Pollan, right? that what you say is totally legitimate. If you're going to eat meat, it's important that

47:26 We wouldn't be here if we weren't sustained by this web of life. of wild game, all wild too. Right. Well, there's an issue right now in San Jose. You piece of shit! And it was a deep respect. Conscious eating. and that our whole screwy system It doesn't sound like a very nice existence. I mean, is some sort of hyper-intelligent artificial life Like, what are you, a little kid?

53:07 are we going to build this stuff? If we are going to build this stuff, and it's childish. It's not just that you pay $200 for an iPhone. It's laying down the gauntlet and saying, look, guys, okay, you can make money, but let's look at the bottom line in the realistic way. psychedelics at some point. Steve Jobs and people like that and we could name others.

56:07 No, we can't. And isn't this what's happening? in terms of what they identify as important. I think it should be like food. I think, on the totem pole in terms of what they identify as important. Like, don't eat this. I mean, it really is. There should be no profit at all when there's human suffering. It should they actually act responsibly. Yeah, that was a fascinating and very terrifying report.

59:55 Or how to improve civilization. And I became comfortable analyzing the situation I was in, meeting people on their level. Stewardship Council and the Marine Stewardship Council. And the ESC is modeled on these organizations that you talk with enough stakeholders and you build consensus through dialogue. which means the people have a fair share. message out. And that's what people like Josh are trying to do. And I think psychedelics have a role

1:04:22 other government leaders and so on to go and have these experiences. Increase your profits in the process and the benefits to people. Oh, that's so gross. We have to get past that. and farmers can send their kids to school and go to health care. So it is. It's win evil if you buy fair trade coffee that promotes biodiversity and farmers can send their kids to school and go to healthcare.

1:06:45 You've got to get the personal shit It's a process. Well, that's an excuse for not wanting to confront it. and you're trying to maintain balances It should almost be mandatory. But you should also have psychedelic trips under your belt like you'd say well you know here i seen your documentation You don't have any psychedelic experiences. Or people in the Department of Defense or the Veterans Affairs

1:10:21 That's spectacular. He's Charlie Grobe, who's at UCLA. We're the sort of small organization that nobody knows about, hefter.org. for exploring actually what you might call experimental mysticism, I'm not sure that even – but anyway, hefter.org. in a pure form from peyote and demonstrate that it was the main ingredient of of peyote based on self-experiments. And he was kind of exemplifies what we like to

1:13:45 Very close. That's the one that actually interacts with the receptors. By itself, DMT is not orally active. And for that matter, we can't be dining on DMT-containing plants all the time and wandering around. And what is psilocybin? You can give it to people who are quite ill, you was that this may have come from another planet This I-thou dynamic that's set up and the content, which I guess not everybody has this, you know, this feeling of this science fiction-ish cast to the experience.

1:18:29 Maybe that's where we came from. I don't know. And what's our connection to that? He wasn't a biochemist. and all these tryptamines come from tryptophan. And tryptophan is one of those 20 amino acids that sub-message of nature saying just around the corner, So they're all, you know, very close to each other. We are made out of stars. property of matter. You know, atoms, molecules fall together in such a way that before you

1:23:44 Wow. Oh, the latest one, the only latest one I wrote, You really gave it a boost. Let's step back from this a little bit. foam. You haven't got even a tenth of it figured out, Right. Yeah. If we didn't exist, oh my God, we'd be the most We're ridiculous. on a moving piece of transportation and then she was celebrated as a hero. I mean, we're fucking crazy, right? Yeah, totally.

1:29:03 like to get ants out of anthills and things like that. They're, they're worshiping people that were locked in cages. develop things like psilocybin and serotonin. It's almost as though the civilization, this And they wanted to keep doing it, but I didn't want to do it anymore because I got tired of talking to liars. you can bullshit someone for a seven-minute interview

1:31:13 I'll find you. And that manifests itself in weird things that they say that they don't even realize are bizarre. Because they're also easier to trick themselves, I think, because I think they lose their ability about whether we have the imprints of other civilizations Well, we certainly have an effect, only good to support life for another billion years right that's not a lot of time if you

1:33:23 I've often thought that, you know, these cosmological models, I think we got more than a billion years. It's our planet to support life. Yeah. You know, but this, you know, these cosmological models, if you look at them, which are kind And they don't take that into account, Yeah, exactly. Well, that's the feeling that you get on dimethyltryptamine, is that you've entered into a new area, a

1:35:56 Yeah. Yeah. You say that again, I-thou. I have this thought on – for people who have heard this podcast, unfortunately I have to repeat myself. Or if it's just your imagination and you go there But I'm here to tell you, it's all hallucination. and it's all hallucination. It's all. We don't experience the world that way most of the time. That information is one of the most undeniable pieces of information that the universe is not what you think it is.

1:41:35 What do you mean they go away? but they also stand still at the same time right what like superposition like when someone i had Yeah, it does indeed. It sounds like someone who's on drugs. Yeah, it does indeed. and the scout went over the top of the hill It becomes a rainbow that talks to you. No, it's wood, man. You're crazy. psychedelic experience, that the experience itself is transformative because you're experiencing it.

1:44:22 And then let's look at, well, it's all in your imagination. Oh, Billy just sits in the field and imagines what the world could be. Or you sit in a field and you take LSD and you're Steve Jobs and you have all these fantasies except then you actually make it happen. You can find that out like that. Right. but 4 billion of them have cell phones. Anyway.

1:47:40 But if you really look at the tipping point of technology and our connectivity, I was kind of a critic of the time wave for exactly this. described the way that novelty ingressed into the continuum. going through a period of tremendous change, but it's not linked to a particular day. So what I say Well, maybe in just putting a date to it and giving people something to focus on,

1:51:07 No, you know, that's not taking responsibility. And we can relax. And, you know. Events normally don't explode into history that way. But those were the transformative events that made it possible to, a couple decades later, drop the atom bomb on Hiroshima. right now as we speak i mean what what would we what would we think we're gonna do i mean what we

1:54:14 know, traveling faster than light or figuring out how to open up a portal. I mean, this idea that, real space travel yeah right right it may end up that way too when you when you look at the is you know here's here's the pipe smoke the. You don't need me to tell you. As you And then it's like we can fall back on what we were saying. DMT? you're babbling and you say, that's it, that's it, or my God, my God, or, you know, but you're trying

1:58:24 I don't know how you get around that. And it does that. I don't think there is. Oh. I guess in a way it didn't look like an elf, but it kind of had that aspect. it. But in the back of my mind, I knew I had him over my house Like he was like Damn. it was weird. But. But it's definitely put you in this place. This is all about Phytophthoxy DMT. This is all about

2:03:15 And I can't It was completely absent of any context. I mean, I sort of had a dim awareness of my existence as a separate entity, Whereas the NN dimethyltryptamine was different every time, and it was like eliminate consciousness terrifying aspects of it and there not being a down. You're just a part of the whole. worth putting on your map. And he had done acid

2:07:01 I'm like I told you Was he ever. except it doesn't feel like a cloud. Yes. These pharmacological tools are exploratory probes into these realms of consciousness. And if you look into, you know, they have a long history of use, obviously, and they seem to be, where people think that they're somewhere that they're not, I tell people Datura, you know, Nightshade, Datura is not a psychedelic, but it's a true hallucinogen in the sense that it's not a psychedelic state, but you have hallucinations.

2:11:33 not there. What happened to you when you did it? detour trip is like. And it's characteristic that you see entities, you see things that aren't there. And I was, and it was quite anxiety provoking. How old are you? I guess people who take Teterra should be forewarned, There were insects. That's awesome. Amazing dreams. I'm not surprised. they'd fade away.

2:15:32 And these detours, these tropane alkaloids, what they do is block acetylcholine. I don't recommend it, by the way. What if he gave him a motorcycle engine and he's like, oh, I've done this. Same one, scopolamine. And they used to use, medically, they used to use scopolamine because it's for childbirth. which is why when you smoke, you get this sort of cognitive activation. It's great to

2:19:12 fascinating in reading Stephen King's book on writing, where he talked about when he stopped is to try to educate people on these things, But one thing I want to be clear about Like ecotourism? And so there's a lot of DMT in your – it's a serotonergic agonist, right? That's fascinating because that's also an issue that people have if they take SSRIs and they

2:23:02 generation of antidepressants that are MAO Is it a good idea to get off those things, period? productive citizen and you don't really think about things too much. They're prescribed for PTSD, They take a few ayahuasca sessions. Yeah. know, you have a problem. And, you know, so I think where the business potential comes in is that to have But Josh was talking about selling ayahuasca online.

2:27:50 able to have salad. I mean, I'm, you know, harkening back to what we were saying about So they're found in all cells. Or it's just a part of the building blocks of the universe itself. That seems to be the case. Right. I mean, you realize how potent it is and what a small dose you need, are going to use them. It comes back to education. Teach people how to use drugs basically. You

2:31:30 And now you're here, which is, I think it's safe to call this the psychedelic renaissance. And part of it's because of the company I keep. as some of these therapeutic uses are becoming more aware in general consciousness. There it is. That perception is passing. And not particularly public. you know, um, and, and, and approach them with respect and intention. These are serious things.

2:35:33 Arrowood.org is online. It's the best online source of information about psychoactive drugs E-R-O-W-I-D, arrowwood.org. And I think, again, I think this symposium conference is going to be great, but it's also exemplary of what needs to happen. They have a ton of information about ayahuasca and iboga, the plant-based psychedelics. cured and absolutely fascinated by Ibogaine, became completely fascinated, cured, and absolutely fascinated by Ibogaine,

2:38:59 of that traditional plant. It's under extreme pressure from the growing global demand. Ibogaine never – I mean it was – it never went away. illegal in most of the world. So these addiction treatment centers have blossomed all over the Do you have hope for that? know anybody. Nobody at the office knows anything about this stuff. then suss out which centers might be best for you and read reviews of them.

2:42:20 that professional expertise to supplement what the community is doing. where you don't have to leave the country. world. They're very frustrated. They're like saying, these people are hurting. And the and the materialism and the nonsense on television. that eventually you just regurgitate it all it's like there's a fucking hey guys yeah we have the tools i mean and they're incredibly profound

2:45:16 They may or may not be effective. And that's my hope, you know, for our survival. We're not going to get there by being stupid. The science deniers, the people that – well, I don't – don't bother me with your fucking facts. There's just a gigantic chunk of the population they could say, Jesus! You're taking advantage of what these people, and start thinking about this

2:48:25 She needs ayahuasca. It's ethnobotanicalcouncil.org. Yeah, and if you can make it there, beautiful. something going on, folks. Dennis, to that conference. It's called Put that shit up, son! What I am is a... Thank you very much. And that's it.