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'Artificial' Fallacy - Diminishment by Labelling as a "Forced Method"
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Natural/artificial mysticism; prohibition
Jonathan
Ott is one of the few people with a right-side up view -- drugs are natural
techniques for ecstasy; mediation and religious ritual are artificial
techniques.
Entheogenists
debate about synthetics. For all we
know, LSD may very well occur in nature, thus invalidating all distinctions
between supposedly "natural vs. artificial" entheogens. Those who disparate synthetics are at risk
of being discredited.
A more
sound position is to assume that it is likely LSD can, or certainly *could*,
exist in nature. To evade this
possibility, the natural-entheogen puritans then say "the best plants are
those which have been traditionally used, because they are spiritually infused
with our shared consciousness."
But those like me who don't significantly believe in shared
consciousness or molecular memory find that argument completely unpersuasive.
Existentially,
taking responsibility for our own reading of these plants and chemicals, there
is *no reason* to prefer natural over supposedly "artificial"
entheogens. My view is that of the
greatest chemist, Sasha Shulgin.
Molecules are molecules. Plants
are not sacred; cultural historical usage of psychoactive plants is not sacred;
only the molecules themselves are; that is, what is relevant for transcendent
experiencing is the brain action of the entheogenic molecule, not the carrier
plant or usage tradition.
Some such
as Huston Smith say feebly that LSD is a valid imitation of true religious
experience. I insist on the reverse,
that religious practice such as meditation can sometimes be a valid imitation
of true religious experience, which is entheogenic. Entheogens are not the only way to have religious experience, but
they are by far the main and authoritative method.
Ed wrote:
>religion
is an inferior imitation of drug experience; drug experience is not an
imitation of religious experience. The term "entheogen" suggests that
a drug evokes or generates the notion or reality of "god". I would
say the reverse: the notion of "god" is reminiscent of a drug
experience. So, maybe we start renaming religions after drugs. But not the
other way around.
Here is a
debate of mine about some aspects within this theme.
http://www.wf.net/~aardvark/ee/essays/painter01.htm
Dan
Russell seems to condemn refined, concentrated synthetics in his recent book
Drug War. He seems at times less
sophisticated than Ott and Shulgin on this count. But he disparages the concentrates because of political reasons
behind them. I glorify all
psychoactives, the full pharmacopoeia, which is the most historically sound and
informed view.
Fenatyl,
psilocybin, methamphetamine, cannabis, opium, smokable cocaine, and all the
rest, I respect like I respect the contents of pharmacies in general. They are all tools to explore the mind.
With
prohibition policies, there is only a single question, only a single issue that
falls in your lap: Would you, or would
you not, put someone in jail for using a drug you disparage? I would not, because I understand the
meaning of political freedom.
It is not
surprising to see young people holding an incoherent mixture of prohibitionist
and anti-prohibitionist views, since they are in the midst of prohibitionist
propaganda that is at a fever-pitch as the WOD totters on the brink of
collapse.
Nic is a
prohibitionist; he believes prohibition is effective and warranted. He says we should prohibit drugs he
considers harmful -- drugs other than natural entheogens. Nic also condones the notion of "abuse
potential" and believes that drugs with higher abuse potential should be
prohibited by a war on drugs. I assume
Nic represents many young Millenials, with his only partial breaking through of
the prohibitionist propaganda.
I
recommend reading the books at http://www.promind.com if you care about ending
prohibition. Also see
http://www.reformnav.org for a rapid-navigation portal to drug policy reform
sites. I receive daily newsletters and
bulletins from these organizations about the battle on the front lines of the
WOD and the reform movement. These
newsletters work together with http://www.mapinc.org, which has hourly news
updates about the War.
Nic wrote:
>>Almost
ALL *natural* substances give one experiences to see deeper, profound religious
enlightenment, a new outlook and vision
Do you
consider opium to be good, or bad?
Should we put people in jail for using opium? Is opium a legitimate sacrament?
Opium was considered the most important drug by doctors before 20th
century prohibition, and is likely illegal *because* it is so effective that it
threatens the for-profit medical establishment. Know your history, know your philosophy of political
freedom. Develop principled views
founded on wide-ranging knowledge and evidence. Read the books at promind.com, such as A Short History of Drugs.
Nic:
>>it
is just another form of suppression and control to outlaw these gifts God
himself gives us--parents do it, the govt. does it, society does it...and the
only reason mushrooms and peyote are "drugs" is because the govt. has
lumped psilocybin with mescaline, LSD, and heroin as a class1 drug. Given the fact that heroin, cocaine,
ketamine, Ecstasy, and all other artificially synthesized drugs cannot be
considered "eye-openers" for they are specifically made for recreation
and abuse...but in other words, we are taught that they ALL fuck you up,
>>If
we want to be closer to God in any way, shape, or form because we love Him to
the fullest--let it be--it is our religion, our belief and if we want to expand
our love for him through expanding our consciousness and capabilities of our
minds, souls, and this world--so be it.
>>I
truly believe there should be an effort to fight the war on drugs but not
against the substances which the good Lord creates himself. there should be a
war on all artificially synthesized, man-made substances which when abused,
will kill you. It is actually hard to abuse peyote or mushrooms, because the
voyage is sometimes so powerful one does not feel he even wants it for a long
period of time afterwards, or possibly ever again. I am positive that if these substances were legalized, people
would actually learn to look up to them and the respect the powers of God.
>>I
am only 15 yrs old... I do not know how nor if I even can do anything about
this situation but it is a goal for me...i want to take action, we should all
take action...i just don't know how. If anyone is in a position of authority,
some kind of authority, is reading this, and feels they may be able to do
something...by all means--use my statement.
You
absolutely can do something about the situation. More people now are literally dedicating their lives to ending
prohibition and releasing the prisoners with full amnesty and restoration of
rights. Drug policy reform is the
hottest political issue among young people.
There is a lot we can do. See
http://www.reformnav.org for online resources, and read the entheogen history
and policy books at http://www.promind.com.
One of many good books on the subject is Steve Kubby's The Politics of
Consciousness. You can become an
authority without great difficulty by reading and monitoring these resources
and participating in effective activism.
Nic:
>True
freedom for all. We aren't
Communists. We should not suppress
these freedoms. ... the most important and fundamental piece of this country
"...for life, liberty, and the _*pursuit of happiness*_. Then shan't we?
That is what this what the country was made for. Now we cannot live in the same
way. The country has deluded itself into thinking we are unable to do anything. However, don't we all believe in something,
to say that the mind is more powerful than anything in the universe? Then come
together. And if we all have the same
firm opinion and desire to lay down true justice and change this folly, then
perhaps someday there will be life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
You don't
have the right to talk of liberty if you want to put people in jail for
choosing to use synthetic psychoactives which you disparage. The smell of freedom is cannabis, the true
litmus test (as Kubby points out) of whether a politician believes in political
freedom and the principles of America is whether he would be willing to take a
hit off a joint in a presentation.
But
reformers, too, have litmus tests: do you honor fenatyl, smokable cocaine --
can you respect them, can you respect everything that comes out of Shulgin's
lab? Or would you condone prohibiting
those and dehumanizing the citizens who choose to use them?
Nic wrote:
>I
meant, "I do not condone anything, artificial or synthetic, which *does
not/cannot* have any harmful effect to it."
From your
postings, you probably mean you could not rationally condemn any psychoactive
substance which is incapable of causing harm.
For example, we should legalize mushrooms, LSD, cannabis, and DMT.
And you
also mean you do not condone (allow as legitimate) any psychoactive substance
that can cause bodily death. For
example, we should conduct war against heroin.
You wrote
"I truly believe there should be an effort to fight the war on drugs, but
not against the substances which the good Lord creates himself. There should be a war on all artificially
synthesized, man-made substances which when abused, will kill you."
>The
only reason mushrooms and peyote are "drugs" is because the govt. has
lumped psilocybin with mescaline, LSD, and heroin as a class 1 drug.
>Given
the fact that heroin, cocaine, ketamine, ecstacy, and all other artificially
synthesized drugs cannot be considered "eye-openers" for they are
specifically made for recreation and abuse ... we are taught that they all fuck
you up [harm you]...
>We are
supposed to have freedom, to do what we want with ourselves, be who we want to
be and live our lives how we want to, correct?
>Then
we should have the fundamental freedom to do exactly that ...
>Believe
in what we want and do what we want with ourselves, our bodies, our minds, and
our souls, for the benefit of how we live, think, and love ...
>If we
want to be closer to God in any way, shape, or form because we love him to the
fullest--let it be
>it is
our religion, our belief and if we want to expand our love for him through
expanding our consciousness and capabilities of our minds, souls, and this
world--so be it
>I
truly believe there should be an effort to fight the war on drugs but not
against the substances which the good Lord creates himself.
>There
should be a war on all artificially synthesized, man-made substances which when
abused, will kill you.
>It is
actually hard to abuse peyote or mushrooms because the voyage is sometimes so
powerful one does not feel he even wants it ... again
>if
these substances were legalized, people would actually learn to look up to them
and the respect the powers of God
Ever since
the cannabis prohibition conspiracy was started by Anslinger, the entire issue
depends on who is to decide what constitutes "abuse" and what
"can potentially kill".
If you
give society and the government the power to prohibit one chemical, you have
just put a big stamp of approval on the entire idea that prohibition is
effective and warranted.
Your
as-yet unenlightened view, an incoherent mixture of prohibitionist propaganda,
will be used by society and the government to continue the current sham
"war" of persecution-for-profit.
Most
heroin deaths are due to prohibition, adulteration, unknown dosages, dirty
needles, and the underground economy, not the heroin chemical itself. Prohibition kills far more people than
heroin -- study the history of prohibition.
You can
count on society and government to take that idea and run with it to the
fullest extreme. The only practical way
forward is to love as well as fear drugs such as aspirin, caffeine, and heroin
which can kill if abused.
We don't
even know which substances the Lord decided to create. Did the Lord put heroin into some plant on
this or some other planet -- how could you be sure? What is so specially relevant about the sheer fact of a substance
existing in nature that makes this somehow more legitimate than some other
plant?
If we are
conducting your war against some synthesized substance that could possibly kill
a person (like aspirin and most other substances in a pharmacy), and we
discover that actually the substance *does* occur in nature, does that suddenly
change your war on that drug from right to wrong?
It is
awfully presumptuous for you to sit in judgement over the potential of opium to
harm or enlighten someone. You won't
persuade many people in the entheogen discussion areas if you continue to hold
such unenlightened views on ketamine and ecstasy.
You
condemn the enlightening experience of many of us when you disparage the
sacraments which are beloved to many of us, vehicles for the Holy Spirit sent
by God for our spiritual salvation and ennervation, such as blessed cocaine,
blessed opium, blessed ketamine, blessed X, and other glorious forms of
Christ's flesh.
God
obviously is the master botanist, but God is also the master of chemistry
including all magical plants and all their potential products and poisons, so
you ought to hesitate before you pronounce judgement on his angels with their
diverse molecular, chemical messages.
I tremble
in respectful awe before the majesty of his arrayed ranks of angelic
messengers. I enthusiastically
recommend studying the scriptures at http://www.erowid.org and gain a wider
view of the diversity of God's wisdom.
You rely
too much on your peers, who have very (and deliberately) limited horizons, to
present the story of what psychoactives are all about and what their full
potential is. There are many more
viewpoints than you have been allowed to see so far.
It is too
bad you don't have the money to buy a psychoactives library, but the Net has
tons of information now -- such as the book excerpts at Dan Russell's
http://www.drugwar.com, including the book Drug War: Covert Money, Power &
Policy and the book Shamanism and Drug Propaganda.
Do you
consider a water extract of ergot to be artificial, synthetic, and
man-made? If not, at what point does a
substance slip from being on your approved, natural list, to your disapproved,
man-made, dangerous list?
Extract of
ergot may have been used in Eleusinian Mysteries and in Jewish practice, per
Dan Merkur, who has a second book coming out on the latter subject. The groups of psychoactives you try to
establish cannot possibly hold up.
You try to
divide psychoactives into "safe, natural, enlightening" versus
"dangerous, unnatural, unenlightening" -- but those rigid, moralistic
categories don't hold up even for five seconds under critical scrutiny.
My
solution, along with Ott, Shulgin, D.M. Turner, Leary, and many others, is much
simpler: respect the entire pharmacopia, respect it as a whole, be careful with
it as a whole, and legalize it as a whole.
Empower
people to take responsibility for their use of the pharmacopia as a whole and
let them draw their own conclusions about what is safe enough and enlightening
enough or pleasurable enough.
>>the
sacraments which are beloved to many of us, vehicles for the Holy Spirit sent
by God for our spiritual salvation and ennervation, such as blessed cocaine,
blessed opium, blessed ketamine, blessed X, and other glorious forms of
Christ's flesh.
>does
coke, K, X, or opium really give a 'divine' revelation through the experience
though?
The
ancient "wine" actually should be translated "wine-suspended
psychoactive mixture" which may have blended cannabis, wormword, ergot
extract, opium, and various other psychoactives. Such wine could drive you mad, produce entheogenic inebriation,
and had to be 8-fold diluted with water.
Some
researchers conjecture that Soma was not just Amanita extract, but included
other psychoactives including cannabis, opium, and peganum harmala. So opium may very well be involved in
entheogenic mixtures, and it was, like wormwood, certainly involved in poetic
vision in more recent times.
Dan
Merkur's forthcoming book investigates whether the famous Catholic mystics used
ergot extract or other entheogens.
I do not
look upon cocaine or X as a promising vehicle for divine revelation. Cannabis is a very strong *potentiator* of
entheogens such as mushrooms, so we should also consider the potential for
opium, with its known poetic visionary use, to potentiate entheogens.
Cannabis
could be a likely companion for Amanita, cancelling out the excessive
salivation of Amanita.
The surest
vehicles for divine revelation include LSD, psilocybin, 2CT7, Salvia, DMT, DPT,
4-HO-DiPT, and the psychoactive chemical in Amanita. Borderline vehicles include LSA-containing plants such as
Hawaiian Baby Wood Rose.
>>God
is also the master of chemistry including all magical plants and all their
potential products and poisons, so you ought to hesitate before you pronounce
judgement on His angels with their diverse molecular, chemical messages.
>we
have made many a thing [human products] through combining one with the other
too. does that make THEM divine?
If God
makes two plants, each of which is independently non-psychoactive, and then
humans combine the two plants and create a bridge for the descent of the Holy
Spirit so that the researchers see Christ suffer, and be crucified and
resurrected, would it be reasonable to say that the plants lack the Holy
Spirit, for which God should be given credit?
This
subtle question of theological metaphysics exceeds the power of my analysis.
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