#90 Hyperdimensional calling cards on Earth and elsewhere
Is DMT a Chemical Messenger from an Extraterrestrial Civilization? by Dennis McKenna, pages 38-68
I recently read a chapter by Dennis McKenna wherein he postulates whether DMT has extraterrestrial origins. His brother also spoke about this in his own lectures. Some ideas that have been put forth is that mushroom spores or other psychedelic compounds hitched a ride in/on asteroids or meteorites and that said compounds, or perhaps any form of life itself, crashed into Earth and either started life as we know it or gave us these interesting mind-altering substances. Dennis makes a compelling case that DMT is very much a terrestrial secondary compound that evolved here on Earth. The title of his talk is the topic Dennis wants to uncover through his pharmacologically/biologically informed meditative exploration. If he says DMT originated here on Earth, that’s good for me, case closed. To be honest, I don’t care from where it originated; what interests me is what it’s capable of doing to human consciousness. But I have questions now that I know of Dennis’s arguments regarding DMT’s terrestrial origins.
First, if DMT originated on our planet, this suggests that other planets with carbon-based life could also make psychoactive compounds like DMT through photosynthetic and evolutionary processes, namely, in plant life. DMT, then, likely is a product of any carbon-based ecosystem in the universe, especially since it’s such a simple molecule. Of course, there are determining factors that play a role in DMT’s development on Earth and other planets. The biggest factor, as far as I know, is the types and degrees of light emitted from a star onto the non-Earth planet. DMT evolved as a result of photosynthesis and since it is an alkaloid, we can assume that it serves as a defense mechanism for plants. At least some scientists believe alkaloids are produced by plants to protect themselves from predation. (Note: I’m dropping lots of assertions here, point taken, but this is a stream of consciousness writing and I don’t want to mess with the flow for this one.) So, if we find DMT on Earth, we can assume that DMT or a similarly structured psychoactive compound is on other planets. This is what I want to know: Do all carbon-based ecosystems produce visionary compounds as some kind of “calling card”? I believe Terence McKenna said something similar in his lectures. Remember that film, Mission to Mars (2000), when the astronauts found that alien ship in the Martian landscape, and they realized that this thing was waiting for its genetic ancestors to find it and “return home”? Is DMT and other psychedelics like a dormant calling card, always there, toll-free like a 1-800-COLLECT service, placed there through some intentional or nonintentional means, but for argument’s sake, it’s there, patiently waiting for someone to pick up the receiver. Are these communication devices peppered across the universe, at the ready, waiting for conscious beings to figure out how to extract it from plant sources, consume it, and then use it somehow? In this way, psychedelics on our planet and others might be like a consciousness internet of sorts that allows whoever is using the substance at that particular time to “dial in” or “tune into” some vast, cosmic, and multi-dimensional internet-equivalent VoIP network, and therefore, communicate with other sentient beings. And why couldn’t this be the case: before an intelligent species develops interstellar travel and makes other scientific and technological advances they could at least communicate with other conscious beings, possibly distant genetic relatives (i.e., panspermic cousins; through spontaneous generation of life but sharing similar/exact DNA structures; etc.). It might be possible too that knowledge could be shared between whomever happens to be tuned in to that particular channel at that particular time. We might be able to share and compare notes of what we know over here on the planet we call Earth, and they can do the same with us. For example, many people cannot visit their loved ones during the ongoing corona virus pandemic, but we still have the internet; we can voice and video call each other even though we are separated by oceans and continents.
This now leads into my second question: if we have multiple types of communication mediums (e.g., Facebook, Skype, WhatsApp, ordinary telephone service, etc., ad infinitum), is DMT just one such platform out of hundreds of possible mediums? A distant planet might not have DMT, for example, but they might have psilocybin. So, if one takes psilocybin on Earth and the denizen of another planet or dimension takes something molecularly similar, do we tune into each other’s frequency which enables contact and communication with each other? It’s hard to say and highly speculative, but very interesting! We might test out this hypothesis of psychedelics-as-communication-devices by giving multiple (human) people in different locations the same substance and dosage and try to meet up in the altered space. I think similar experiments have been done with out-of-body experiences (Charles T. Tart rings a bell), that is, attempts at meeting up in the nonphysical plane. I can’t remember where I heard this as I’m sure many people have proposed this idea, but what if psychedelic beings alter their consciousness too in order to make themselves perceivable by human psychedelic users? Altered state of consciousness #374904020, for example, might be just one of infinite dimensions, timelines, or platforms for hyper/trans/extra/inter-dimensional communication to take place between physical-to-physical beings, nonphysical-to-nonphysical beings, and/or physical-to-nonphysical beings. Some years ago at a retreat I took a large 7-gram dose of mushrooms and one of the non-verbal messages communicated to me was that one of psychedelics’ utilities is communication. Communication with what or whom I did not find out. Are humans so inexperienced with these substances, relatively speaking, that they don’t know who they’re calling when they pick up that receiver?, or I should say, ingest that receiver. I find the idea of psychedelics as communication system enticing. There are too many variables to consider at present, like which substance and dosage gets the best reception; what set and setting variables should be combined with a particular substance/dosage; what kind of information or knowledge do experiencers seek; how can we tune into particular conversation partners or speak to them again in subsequent doses? It’s still early days on this kind of research. I’m curious what future generations will discover regarding psychedelics’ capability, efficacy, and utility.
McKenna, D. (2018). Is DMT a Chemical Messenger from an Extraterrestrial Civilization? In D. Luke & R. Spowers (Eds.), DMT Dialogues: Encounters with the Spirit Molecule, (38-68). Rochester, Vermont: Park Street Press.