Thanks, Brady. 3fs.org
Friday, March 21, 2014
Dogma and Theism?
"Religion is an insult to human dignity. With or without it you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, that takes religion" Physicist and Nobel laureate Steven Weinberg.
I could replace the word religion in the above quote, with the more encompassing word dogma. Dogma is a built in and dangerous flaw of theism, but the word dogma has a wider scope, and a broader area of evil to fight against. The analogy is still completely coherent, and in my view, can be more generalized and therefore potentially more effective - even if a little blunted from the original spear-point of targeting religion. In my view, dogma is inherent in most of the world's large religions, but the literal word dogma has a wider vision and covers the Nazi's and other dictators, despots, oppresors, tyrants and all the countless dogmatic caused atrocities of history. So by using the word dogma as well as, or instead of, religion, one could possibly cover two bases at the same time.
"Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities." Voltaire.
Thanks, Brady. 3fs.org
Thanks, Brady. 3fs.org
Thursday, March 20, 2014
The Smoking Gun In Our Mouth's - Smoking in the 21st Century (P1)
Smoking in the 21st Century. (Part 1)
Tobacco smoking is now practiced by hundreds of millions of
people around the globe. One can hardly find a country that does not have a
substantial fraction of tobacco smokers within its borders. The only nation in
the world that currently has a prohibition on smoking is the remote Himalayan
Kingdom of Bhutan. Bhutan forbids smoking, but allows visitors to bring tobacco
into the country with them - so virtually every country has access to tobacco. However the three leading countries in tobacco use - and predictably tobacco related death - are China, India and Indonesia in sheer
numbers. Indonesia alone has well over 50 million adult smokers, the actual statistic
is probably many millions higher. This is significantly more than the
populations of Australia and New Zealand combined, just in smokers who live in
Indonesia.
One can then further imagine just how many people in India
and China smoke – the number is literally in the hundreds of millions, there
are more smokers in India, China and Indonesia than Russia or the USA have in
gross population. This would not be an issue if tobacco use did not carry with
it such high rates of mortality, illness and easy availability. These dangers,
coupled with the large scale ignorance of tobacco’s risks, and their effective
marketing strategies are a recipe for both current and future disasters – of epic
proportion.
So, how many people worldwide will die in the next few years from smoking? – Hundreds and hundreds of thousands of us will continue to perish, year after year, time and time again – a mini, annual slaughter, that shows few signs of slowing down - That is how many and how often. There will be over well over a Billion human deaths in the coming century if we do not take this issue seriously on a global scale.
So, how many people worldwide will die in the next few years from smoking? – Hundreds and hundreds of thousands of us will continue to perish, year after year, time and time again – a mini, annual slaughter, that shows few signs of slowing down - That is how many and how often. There will be over well over a Billion human deaths in the coming century if we do not take this issue seriously on a global scale.
With the modern and unambiguous evidence that smoking
carries high mortality rates, there can be little doubt as to whether many of
the hundreds of millions of 21st Century peoples’ who smoke will
someday die, or have already perished directly as a result of smoking. Two prescient
facts stand out here, the first is that our species find's inhaling tobacco for
its nicotine payload rather popular and shows no signs of stopping; on the whole.
The second more startling fact is that these same people run the gauntlet of
serious illness and death as a direct result of their tobacco use.
So why do people keep smoking? I suspect that many people
are simply ignorant of the health consequences of adopting smoking as a
lifetime pursuit in the first place. Once these people become dependent or
addicted it may already be too late, then again, there is cause for optimism in
the 21st Century. This is partly due to the decline of smoking in
western countries, the rise of education about its harms, strict new policies,
taxes, and new less harmful treatment options. However, after someone is
dependent or addicted to tobacco the success rate of complete cessation ‘cold turkey’ is sadly not very promising. Tobacco smoking is one of the hardest drugs to stop using
statistically. Even with nicotine replacement therapies, such as nicotine
patches or nicotine gum, the rates of successful tobacco cessation are only around 1 in
every 10 people.
What are our species options in regard to this ongoing and perpetual
tobacco genocide? What can we do to stop the death and grievances of countless
millions? – In part 2 of Tobacco in the 21st Century we will examine
how we could lower the harm caused by tobacco. We will discuss replacement
therapies, electronic cigarettes and other policies; be they legal, political,
educational or cultural. Somehow we need to minimize this truly mind boggling
death rate, while also allowing for individual’s freedom.
Tuesday, March 18, 2014
Gravity Waves and the God of the Gaps...
Gravity Waves Detected! (Gods may not be able to Hide)
""AA"As we learn more about the cosmos, the places gods used to hide are ever diminishing"
Now we can finally see beyond what is called the surface of last scattering or the "dark ages" in Cosmology. Optical telescopes cannot see what happened until the Universe was 300 000 years old, they cannot see past this time because light (photons) did not exist yet, but gravity waves did!.
For decades now, we could only see or measure what happened 300-000 years AFTER the Big Bang. Now we have finally measured Gravity waves, we can potentially now "see" ALL the way back, past the "dark ages" - How far back? - Virtually to the beginning of the Universe! - Literally a nanosecond after time and space itself began!
This is a great discovery, maybe even greater than the Higgs Boson. As it is the first direct confirmation of the Inflationary Big Bang model, and it now may be within our grasp to 'see' and possibly understand the origin of our very own origin!
Let's continue this amazing journey, the unravelling of not only our own origins, but what our whole cosmic origin actually is.
Thanks. Brady. 3fs.org
For decades now, we could only see or measure what happened 300-000 years AFTER the Big Bang. Now we have finally measured Gravity waves, we can potentially now "see" ALL the way back, past the "dark ages" - How far back? - Virtually to the beginning of the Universe! - Literally a nanosecond after time and space itself began!
This is a great discovery, maybe even greater than the Higgs Boson. As it is the first direct confirmation of the Inflationary Big Bang model, and it now may be within our grasp to 'see' and possibly understand the origin of our very own origin!
Let's continue this amazing journey, the unravelling of not only our own origins, but what our whole cosmic origin actually is.
Thanks. Brady. 3fs.org
Friday, February 28, 2014
NEW SERIES: Chapter 1. Part 1. "We Stand on the Precipice of an Unknown and Unlocked Potential"
NEW SERIES: Chapter 1. Part 1. "We stand on the precipice of an unknown and unlocked potential"
Our cosmos is a place of rich complexity - the laws of
physics not only allow for drugs and drug users, if given enough time they directly lead to psychoactive
molecules and creatures curious and eager to consume them! Every
drug that ever existed and every drug that is yet to be created by nature or by human ingenuity, had its origins in the same
plasma of charged particles over 13 billion years ago - in the Big Bang. The
universe was full of potential and over time this potential unfolded into a truly epic
story.
This story is about how we humans came to find ourselves here in the 21st century on Earth surrounded by almost countless varieties of mind altering drugs. Over our 100 000 year tenure on the planet we have almost always, provided there were drugs to be found, been a drug using species. We are perched here and now at a critical and controversial time in the grand saga of psychoactive drugs and their use. This century alone has seen huge global changes in the social, political, scientific, economic and cultural uses of drugs. The story of conscious human beings, whose brain neurochemistry interacts with drugs, and in some cases ironically resembles psychoactive drugs (or is a psychoactive drug), is largely a history of their consumption and misunderstanding.
The history of drugs and their use is much more complex than just one long story of consumption. The recent and not so recent past is also full of other stories, human stories, about how we discovered drugs through good fortune, trial and error and ingenuity - or how we learned what drugs actually are, after much confusion, or how we discovered their connection with consciousness and our brains and how we ended up at this crucial junction in history.
In the last century our species launched a global war on drugs - the project has not been able to stop the use of drugs though? Maybe drug use is ingrained too deeply in our societies and cultures, maybe we are naturally too curious, perhaps it is in human nature, there is much more to learn.
Also in the last century, for the first time, we understood the true relationship between our brain chemistry and mind altering drugs. Drugs and conscious entities are both forged from near identical ingredients, drugs and consciousness are largely defined by organic chemistry. Psychoactive molecules are often only a few atoms different from the brain’s actual chemical neurotransmitters, this often allows for consciousness to be altered by drugs in the first place. In other cases the relationship is not so well understood yet.
After 14 billion years of cosmic time and after 200 thousand years of human intelligence we only in the last several decades exceeded all other known species in our ability to make new drugs – at least in principle. Furthermore, there is no known limit to the number of novel or unique psychoactive drugs one could make. I sometimes wonder whether this number is in the hundreds of thousands, or in the millions? Or more still? – Nobody knows how many ways atoms can be configured so they become psychoactive. The number is well into the thousands already, the potential number is far greater still. Given the complexity of the brain and the sheer number of drugs one could invent - simply using the known laws of chemistry and changing one atom at a time, the true number may be truly astronomical.
In the last century, we also learned much of the neurochemistry of our own brains. By unlocking the secrets of psychology and chemistry we found that the story of drugs and our species is partly a story of self-discovery. Maybe sometime soon we will enter a strange new world, we are now the stewards of our own minds– we are creating new ways of thinking and new states of consciousness at will, by understanding how our brains work and by finding how to change our minds with molecules.
This story is about how we humans came to find ourselves here in the 21st century on Earth surrounded by almost countless varieties of mind altering drugs. Over our 100 000 year tenure on the planet we have almost always, provided there were drugs to be found, been a drug using species. We are perched here and now at a critical and controversial time in the grand saga of psychoactive drugs and their use. This century alone has seen huge global changes in the social, political, scientific, economic and cultural uses of drugs. The story of conscious human beings, whose brain neurochemistry interacts with drugs, and in some cases ironically resembles psychoactive drugs (or is a psychoactive drug), is largely a history of their consumption and misunderstanding.
The history of drugs and their use is much more complex than just one long story of consumption. The recent and not so recent past is also full of other stories, human stories, about how we discovered drugs through good fortune, trial and error and ingenuity - or how we learned what drugs actually are, after much confusion, or how we discovered their connection with consciousness and our brains and how we ended up at this crucial junction in history.
In the last century our species launched a global war on drugs - the project has not been able to stop the use of drugs though? Maybe drug use is ingrained too deeply in our societies and cultures, maybe we are naturally too curious, perhaps it is in human nature, there is much more to learn.
Also in the last century, for the first time, we understood the true relationship between our brain chemistry and mind altering drugs. Drugs and conscious entities are both forged from near identical ingredients, drugs and consciousness are largely defined by organic chemistry. Psychoactive molecules are often only a few atoms different from the brain’s actual chemical neurotransmitters, this often allows for consciousness to be altered by drugs in the first place. In other cases the relationship is not so well understood yet.
After 14 billion years of cosmic time and after 200 thousand years of human intelligence we only in the last several decades exceeded all other known species in our ability to make new drugs – at least in principle. Furthermore, there is no known limit to the number of novel or unique psychoactive drugs one could make. I sometimes wonder whether this number is in the hundreds of thousands, or in the millions? Or more still? – Nobody knows how many ways atoms can be configured so they become psychoactive. The number is well into the thousands already, the potential number is far greater still. Given the complexity of the brain and the sheer number of drugs one could invent - simply using the known laws of chemistry and changing one atom at a time, the true number may be truly astronomical.
In the last century, we also learned much of the neurochemistry of our own brains. By unlocking the secrets of psychology and chemistry we found that the story of drugs and our species is partly a story of self-discovery. Maybe sometime soon we will enter a strange new world, we are now the stewards of our own minds– we are creating new ways of thinking and new states of consciousness at will, by understanding how our brains work and by finding how to change our minds with molecules.
We will return to our present century, but the history of
drugs begins long before any conscious being was alive. We are fortunate to
live on our biologically diverse planet and be part of a remarkable species - one that will, after years of absence and ignorance - hold the fate of mind altering molecules in our
curious hominid hands.
Tuesday, February 25, 2014
NEW SERIES. Psychoactive's from the Big Bang until Today. Chapter 3 Part 1. "Smoke and Coke"
NEW SERIES. Psychoactive drugs – from the Big Bang to Today.
Some form of psychoactive drug use has been embraced, to varying extents by most cultural groups. As of the 21st Century it is rare to find a large group of peoples who do not have one or more forms of drug use ingrained in their traditions, their culture, in religious or spiritual contexts, or in national and multinational policy and of course in social and recreational situations. I will take you on a journey of discovery from a nanosecond after the big bang right up to the complexity and controversy of psychoactive drugs in the 21st century. Enjoy.
Some form of psychoactive drug use has been embraced, to varying extents by most cultural groups. As of the 21st Century it is rare to find a large group of peoples who do not have one or more forms of drug use ingrained in their traditions, their culture, in religious or spiritual contexts, or in national and multinational policy and of course in social and recreational situations. I will take you on a journey of discovery from a nanosecond after the big bang right up to the complexity and controversy of psychoactive drugs in the 21st century. Enjoy.
Chapter 3. A Clash of Cultures: Old World Drugs Meet New
World Drugs. Part 1.
In this section we will look at stimulant drug use in pre-1495 South
America. We will be examining a time just before the pivotal ocean voyages of Columbus, Magellan and Cook tied the world up into more or less one big network connecting the major ports of the Earth like a web. This enabled the establishment of a global drug market, which provided lucrative profits for merchants willing to trade in these high demand psychoactive materials.
A thousand years ago the people of the Americas had already discovered several novel psychoactive drugs, mostly from native plants. The drugs in these plants would in another millennia become household names in much of the world. Cocaine, Magic Mushrooms, Mescaline, DMT, Salvia Divinorum, Alcohol and last but by no means least Tobacco, all these drugs would become popular and/or infamous to different extents in most major cultural groups and many smaller social groups. Of all the drugs discovered by the new world peoples of pre-Columbus America; Nicotine and Cocaine would become two of the most predominantly used drugs in the 21st Century. Hundreds of millions of people use these drugs today, but nobody outside of the Americas had tried them, or even knew they existed half a millennia ago.
Tobacco and Cocaine are both Central Nervous System (CNS) Stimulants - this means they increase the activity in the CNS. These two stimulants are perhaps the most prescient stimulants in some 21st century countries - in some countries tobacco is the most ubiquitous drug there is. These substances were discovered during the long interlude of time somewhere between pre-recorded history many thousands of years ago and the merger of the old and new 'worlds' in the 16th century. In pre-recorded history, Homo sapiens journeyed on foot across the Bering straight of East Asia and meandered southwards, through the Amazon and to the southern tip of the new continent. They travelled as far as they could go, many stopped and set up tribes and communities along the way. A great many new drugs were discovered by our ancestors during this time. These brand new territories had unique plants to try, many of the drugs they found existed nowhere else on earth. As the old and new worlds slowly developed, very different drug cultures arose as did new civilizations. The two worlds were separated by the great oceans of the Pacific and Atlantic and each world had different species of plant, fungi and animal to investigate for psychoactivity. The fact that each world was largely ignorant of what mysteries and cultures existed across the Oceans, meant that the two worlds developed drugs and drug cultures that were not only novel but were qualitatively different in psychoactive effects.
A thousand years ago the people of the Americas had already discovered several novel psychoactive drugs, mostly from native plants. The drugs in these plants would in another millennia become household names in much of the world. Cocaine, Magic Mushrooms, Mescaline, DMT, Salvia Divinorum, Alcohol and last but by no means least Tobacco, all these drugs would become popular and/or infamous to different extents in most major cultural groups and many smaller social groups. Of all the drugs discovered by the new world peoples of pre-Columbus America; Nicotine and Cocaine would become two of the most predominantly used drugs in the 21st Century. Hundreds of millions of people use these drugs today, but nobody outside of the Americas had tried them, or even knew they existed half a millennia ago.
Tobacco and Cocaine are both Central Nervous System (CNS) Stimulants - this means they increase the activity in the CNS. These two stimulants are perhaps the most prescient stimulants in some 21st century countries - in some countries tobacco is the most ubiquitous drug there is. These substances were discovered during the long interlude of time somewhere between pre-recorded history many thousands of years ago and the merger of the old and new 'worlds' in the 16th century. In pre-recorded history, Homo sapiens journeyed on foot across the Bering straight of East Asia and meandered southwards, through the Amazon and to the southern tip of the new continent. They travelled as far as they could go, many stopped and set up tribes and communities along the way. A great many new drugs were discovered by our ancestors during this time. These brand new territories had unique plants to try, many of the drugs they found existed nowhere else on earth. As the old and new worlds slowly developed, very different drug cultures arose as did new civilizations. The two worlds were separated by the great oceans of the Pacific and Atlantic and each world had different species of plant, fungi and animal to investigate for psychoactivity. The fact that each world was largely ignorant of what mysteries and cultures existed across the Oceans, meant that the two worlds developed drugs and drug cultures that were not only novel but were qualitatively different in psychoactive effects.
"Burning Tobacco Leaves"
Smoking tobacco dates to the pre-Columbian empires of the Maya and the Aztecs. These mighty civilizations and other South American peoples were oblivious to their eventual fates. The Maya the Aztec and Incan empires eventually crumbled. Taking much of their drug culture and drug knowledge with them as they declined or were conquered by old world empires such as Spain and other nations who arrived in the 15th and 16th Centuries. There was a clashing of cultures and a mixing of drugs. These South American civilizations and their drug discoveries were not all lost or ruined, some of the ideas and inventions were picked up by the Europeans and were brought back to Europe. Tobacco quickly became popular for the kings, popes, aristocracy and merchants who first brought the items back. One of these inventions became so popular it became one of the most popular, harmful and ubiquitous behaviors in all human history: smoking.
Generally speaking a lifetime smoker will on average take 10 years off their life and approximately 1 in every 2 lifetime smokers will die as a result of tobacco smoke *. Reflecting upon these incredibly high mortality rates is shocking, if one takes into account the fact that many hundreds of millions of people smoke tobacco it is clearly one of the most deadly yet obviously popular psychoactive drugs in the 21st Century. The life expectancy of medieval citizens was not the 70-80 years as some countries now average, it was far, far lower so death from smoking may not have been as common in medieval American communities. The history of tobaccos active ingredient, nicotine will play a tremendously larger role as we examine more recent drug use history. But tobacco made its debut in human drug culture many millennia ago, in a small, but not completely lost corner of human history.
Smoking tobacco dates to the pre-Columbian empires of the Maya and the Aztecs. These mighty civilizations and other South American peoples were oblivious to their eventual fates. The Maya the Aztec and Incan empires eventually crumbled. Taking much of their drug culture and drug knowledge with them as they declined or were conquered by old world empires such as Spain and other nations who arrived in the 15th and 16th Centuries. There was a clashing of cultures and a mixing of drugs. These South American civilizations and their drug discoveries were not all lost or ruined, some of the ideas and inventions were picked up by the Europeans and were brought back to Europe. Tobacco quickly became popular for the kings, popes, aristocracy and merchants who first brought the items back. One of these inventions became so popular it became one of the most popular, harmful and ubiquitous behaviors in all human history: smoking.
Generally speaking a lifetime smoker will on average take 10 years off their life and approximately 1 in every 2 lifetime smokers will die as a result of tobacco smoke *. Reflecting upon these incredibly high mortality rates is shocking, if one takes into account the fact that many hundreds of millions of people smoke tobacco it is clearly one of the most deadly yet obviously popular psychoactive drugs in the 21st Century. The life expectancy of medieval citizens was not the 70-80 years as some countries now average, it was far, far lower so death from smoking may not have been as common in medieval American communities. The history of tobaccos active ingredient, nicotine will play a tremendously larger role as we examine more recent drug use history. But tobacco made its debut in human drug culture many millennia ago, in a small, but not completely lost corner of human history.
Smoking tobacco has been practiced for a minimum of 1000 years –
it may very well be a far older and therefore unrecorded human behavior. There is archaeological evidence,
such as pictures carved into pottery, that show tobacco smoking was practiced 1000 years ago by the natives of South America. Pottery left over from artisans indicate that tobacco must have been a significant part of these cultures, why would they make ancient art about something they attached no significant meaning to? Someone did have to be the first to try tobacco though, we have no known way of knowing when this was. Most likely they tried eating the leaves, then graduated to the most effective method of inhaling the burnt plant material.
I wonder how the practice caught on in the Americas, perhaps as a religious sacrament that put shamans in touch with what they perceived as something divine or transcendent. I can imagine regional shamans smoked it in large amounts to induce 'head spins', intoxication or to initiate 'contact' with the "divine", such as in a sacred ritual. Many ancient cultures around the world today have one or more divine plants, used in spiritual ceremonies, tobacco was very likely revered as, and used as a holy sacrament. Maybe the rich oligarchs of the area or the countless serfs who harvested the plant could acquire tobacco regularly and therefore probably used it every day.
There is evidence today that we can use to infer that people were dependant on tobacco in pre-Columbus America. The number of people who use tobacco and become dependent on the drug, in modern times is approximately 1 in every 3 or 4 people. This high level of dependency is due largely to nicotine's high affinity for the dopamine receptors of the brain - the part of the brain that largely causes feelings of pleasure and reward. The more a drug excites the dopaminergic pathway the more addictive it is, as a heuristic rule. Tasty food and sexual stimulation are natural ways to increase levels of dopamine in the brain, this is partly why food and sex 'feel' good, because dopamine is being released which we experience as "pleasurable". Our brain's, and many other organisms brains, use the neurotransmitter dopamine to reward behaviors that increase their own chance of survival, eating food for example releases dopamine, which leads to a desire to experience the sensation again, which leads to eating, which causes feelings of pleasure via dopamine, to further survival and so on. Dopamine is also used as a reward mechanism to encourage humans to pass on their genes and propagate the species, sex releases dopamine in order to "encourage" the behavior to be repeated. The human orgasm is an example of the largest 'natural' spike in dopamine levels -this may come as no surprise as biologically we are wired to sexually pass our genes down the ancestral chain by having children, you may have noticed yourself that an orgasm is not the average state of consciousness, it is an intense and euphoric one.
Some modern drugs cause dopamine spikes that are several times greater than an orgasm, humans had not yet refined natural drugs or invented chemistry to do this though. So smoking tobacco would have been as "rewarding" dopmainergically, to the natives of South America all those centuries ago, as it would be with a smoker alive today. So a surge in dopamine increases the chances that the behavior will be repeated, as dopamine helped us survive and reproduce. This is just how our brains evolved, dopamine did not evolve to be artificially stimulated by drugs, but many cultures made the discovery that certain plants do alter one's consciousness. They did not know how or why, but it is as true now as it was true then; nicotine increases dopamine levels in the brain. So, given the pharmacological qualities of nicotine and its relationship with the "reward" neurotransmitter dopamine, it would be reasonable to infer that many native Americans became dependant on smoking. The discoverers and pioneers of smoking did not know why they wanted to repeat the activity of inhaling burnt tobacco leaves, but a modern perspective shows that they were simply repeating a behavior that was "rewarding" them with dopamine. The strongest naturally occurring stimulant in the world was found on the South American continent, it was not nicotine, but similar to nicotine it was discovered thousands of years ago and is manufactured in the leaves of a small green plant. Unlike nicotine this drug causes the largest spike of synaptic dopamine that has ever been measured by a drug in the biological world, that drug is Cocaine.
"CHEWING COCA"
I wonder how the practice caught on in the Americas, perhaps as a religious sacrament that put shamans in touch with what they perceived as something divine or transcendent. I can imagine regional shamans smoked it in large amounts to induce 'head spins', intoxication or to initiate 'contact' with the "divine", such as in a sacred ritual. Many ancient cultures around the world today have one or more divine plants, used in spiritual ceremonies, tobacco was very likely revered as, and used as a holy sacrament. Maybe the rich oligarchs of the area or the countless serfs who harvested the plant could acquire tobacco regularly and therefore probably used it every day.
There is evidence today that we can use to infer that people were dependant on tobacco in pre-Columbus America. The number of people who use tobacco and become dependent on the drug, in modern times is approximately 1 in every 3 or 4 people. This high level of dependency is due largely to nicotine's high affinity for the dopamine receptors of the brain - the part of the brain that largely causes feelings of pleasure and reward. The more a drug excites the dopaminergic pathway the more addictive it is, as a heuristic rule. Tasty food and sexual stimulation are natural ways to increase levels of dopamine in the brain, this is partly why food and sex 'feel' good, because dopamine is being released which we experience as "pleasurable". Our brain's, and many other organisms brains, use the neurotransmitter dopamine to reward behaviors that increase their own chance of survival, eating food for example releases dopamine, which leads to a desire to experience the sensation again, which leads to eating, which causes feelings of pleasure via dopamine, to further survival and so on. Dopamine is also used as a reward mechanism to encourage humans to pass on their genes and propagate the species, sex releases dopamine in order to "encourage" the behavior to be repeated. The human orgasm is an example of the largest 'natural' spike in dopamine levels -this may come as no surprise as biologically we are wired to sexually pass our genes down the ancestral chain by having children, you may have noticed yourself that an orgasm is not the average state of consciousness, it is an intense and euphoric one.
Some modern drugs cause dopamine spikes that are several times greater than an orgasm, humans had not yet refined natural drugs or invented chemistry to do this though. So smoking tobacco would have been as "rewarding" dopmainergically, to the natives of South America all those centuries ago, as it would be with a smoker alive today. So a surge in dopamine increases the chances that the behavior will be repeated, as dopamine helped us survive and reproduce. This is just how our brains evolved, dopamine did not evolve to be artificially stimulated by drugs, but many cultures made the discovery that certain plants do alter one's consciousness. They did not know how or why, but it is as true now as it was true then; nicotine increases dopamine levels in the brain. So, given the pharmacological qualities of nicotine and its relationship with the "reward" neurotransmitter dopamine, it would be reasonable to infer that many native Americans became dependant on smoking. The discoverers and pioneers of smoking did not know why they wanted to repeat the activity of inhaling burnt tobacco leaves, but a modern perspective shows that they were simply repeating a behavior that was "rewarding" them with dopamine. The strongest naturally occurring stimulant in the world was found on the South American continent, it was not nicotine, but similar to nicotine it was discovered thousands of years ago and is manufactured in the leaves of a small green plant. Unlike nicotine this drug causes the largest spike of synaptic dopamine that has ever been measured by a drug in the biological world, that drug is Cocaine.
"CHEWING COCA"
Cocaine is a stimulant like Nicotine but they are very different drugs; molecularly and psychoactively. Tobacco is a relatively mild stimulant, exciting acetylcholine in the brain. Cocaine stimulates the CNS by increasing the levels of (nor) adrenaline in the brain, which causes a strong sensation of increased energy and alertness. Cocaine also has the potential to increase levels of dopamine in the brain more than any other naturally occurring stimulant. Cocaine is one of the top 5 illegal drugs consumed in the
USA. Cocaine use dates back at least a few thousand years and was culturally ingrained in the Incan empire
of South America. The cocaine used during the time of the Inca was not the
extracted white powdery substance most people are familiar with today, which, if smoked as Crack or Injected into a vein can cause the strongest surge of dopamine from a naturally occurring molecule.
Cocaine is found in the leaves of the green shrub Coca (Species). Pure cocaine was not isolated from the plant until the late 1800’s. Thousands of years ago the Inca would chew the leaves of the Coca plant to achieve a relatively mild euphoria, a loss of altitude sickness, an increase in energy and a decrease in fatigue. Chewing the leaves breaks down the cell walls of the plant and releases the psychoactive molecule Cocaine into the mouth. The cocaine can then enter the bloodstream through the buccal or sub lingual membranes of the mouth, with effects being experienced within fifteen minutes and lasting around one hour. If the Cocaine is chewed then swallowed (instead of absorbing the drug in the mouth) the drug is absorbed by the digestive tract, meaning the drug takes longer to produce its effects – but lasts longer due to a slower rise in peak drug plasma levels. Cocaine is the same molecule today as it was when the Inca chewed it.
The Incan empire did not have horses to ride upon to carry important messages of state, so 'runners' delivered messages in relays, chewing coca leaves to relieve fatigue, altitude sickness and ultimately to run faster so the message was delivered sooner.
Cocaine is found in the leaves of the green shrub Coca (Species). Pure cocaine was not isolated from the plant until the late 1800’s. Thousands of years ago the Inca would chew the leaves of the Coca plant to achieve a relatively mild euphoria, a loss of altitude sickness, an increase in energy and a decrease in fatigue. Chewing the leaves breaks down the cell walls of the plant and releases the psychoactive molecule Cocaine into the mouth. The cocaine can then enter the bloodstream through the buccal or sub lingual membranes of the mouth, with effects being experienced within fifteen minutes and lasting around one hour. If the Cocaine is chewed then swallowed (instead of absorbing the drug in the mouth) the drug is absorbed by the digestive tract, meaning the drug takes longer to produce its effects – but lasts longer due to a slower rise in peak drug plasma levels. Cocaine is the same molecule today as it was when the Inca chewed it.
The Incan empire did not have horses to ride upon to carry important messages of state, so 'runners' delivered messages in relays, chewing coca leaves to relieve fatigue, altitude sickness and ultimately to run faster so the message was delivered sooner.
I wonder what people back then would have thought about the
cause of the “mystical” or "mysterious" properties and effects of these plants - nowadays the enigma
is understood simply as a change in brain neurochemistry - our ancestors could only guess why certain leaves had certain "powers" over the mind. Our resourceful,
experimenting species discovered and used nicotine and cocaine in spiritual,
recreational and utilitarian circumstances by the inhabitants of the “new world”
– yet they were ignorant of how the plants worked their “magic” in the first
place, often it was explained as a way to connect with the divine, these plants were not "food" or inedible plants, they were something else, they had properties that seemed like manna from the gods to some. These peoples knew smoking or chewing leaves affected one's state of mind but they could only speculate as to how or why this occurred, like almost every other culture the plants were thought to be sacred or godly. These plants also were used as medicinal plants in early societies and later used rather extensively in the mighty Inca, Aztec or Maya empires. Ironically tobacco was probably used to 'cure' disease, instead it has little medical value at all.
Cocaine in its original form is still used in Bolivia and other South American nations by farmers, workers - Regular citizens chew coca leaves in Bolivia for much the same reasons the Incan farmers, workers and regular peoples chewed them - for pleasure, reduced fatigue, altitude sickness, socializing and so on.
Cocaine in its original form is still used in Bolivia and other South American nations by farmers, workers - Regular citizens chew coca leaves in Bolivia for much the same reasons the Incan farmers, workers and regular peoples chewed them - for pleasure, reduced fatigue, altitude sickness, socializing and so on.
Cocaine and Tobacco
are two of the most ubiquitous stimulant drugs in the world today. They began
their journey inside the leaves of the Coca and Tobacco plants of Central and
South America. Here they sat idle, harvesting sun, Co2, water and nutrients to
manufacture the alkaloid drugs; cocaine and nicotine. Then one day a curious new
species called Homo sapiens started chewing their leaves – probably surprising
and confusing these ancient peoples at first, - after all, they did not know why or how the
plant produced the effects it did. Many attached religious, divine or spiritual
connotations to these unique plants. It is only in the last century that we
have understood the neurochemistry of the brain in any great detail, yet these
peoples took these drugs frequently and used them widely for over 1000 years
before Columbus sailed west and the drug cultures met.
Apart from Tobacco and Cocaine the peoples living in pre-Columbus
America seem to have been the first to have discovered multiple psychedelic
drugs. Psychedelic drugs are serotonin agonists, they bind to pre-exiting
serotonergic receptors in the brain and directly stimulate them. Serotonin is a neurotransmitter like dopamine, adrenaline or acetylcholine - they are different in that they have different functions in the brain. Serotonin will be elaborated on in more detail in part 2. Virtually
every psychedelic drug is an agonist of two or more serotonin 2(x) receptors. Intriguingly the new world had exclusive access to many psychedelics, the old world did not have as large an inventory of psychedelic's. Either they were not used or recorded as much, or were not discovered at all. Psychedelic drugs have been invaluable in discovering how the brain works because serotonin is one of the most important neurotransmitters in your brain. You even manufacture a psychedelic drug in your own brain called DMT (Dimethytriptamine). You are a walking drug lab.
In part 2 of Chapter 3 we will look into the other notable drugs
that were commonly used in large parts of the New World, particularly the psychedelic
drugs; DMT, Psilocin and Mescaline, as well as other drugs that are not psychedelic but like psychedelic's are classed as a Hallucinogen. This unique hallucinogen is Salvia Divinorum.
After Part 2 the world will be all mapped and global drug markets will open up for trade.
Thanks for reading!
Monday, November 18, 2013
APOLLO'S GIFT
"We Humans had Entered the Realm of Myth and Legend..." C. Sagan
Here's my thoughts on the Moon landings, and an allusion to why our species should venture to Mars.
For me the Apollo Missions to the Moon are the most remarkable achievement our species has ever accomplished. For all but the last few decades of our species 200 000 year history, we gazed up at the night sky, and would see the Moon.
Often the Moon was a God. It was after all in the heavens, forever out of our mere human reach. We could no more go to the Moon than grow wings and fly there. If one were to suggest, back then, that we sail a ship, land on the Moon and then walk about on the Lunar surface, before safely flying home - You would be looked on as foolish, crazy or even as heretical. One could no more send a man to the Moon than climb there on a ladder, it was an absurd idea, it was literally unbelievable. The proposition was not possible. The Moon belonged in the realm of legend, myth and Gods. It was forever out of reach, distantly drifting across the heavens above Earth.
On July 1969, We did achieve the impossible. We humans, by journeying to another world, finally entered the realm of the Gods, the realm of legend. In our complacency we take Apollo for granted, we forget that we went to the Moon a decade after entering space. Next time you see the Moon just remember "If we humans can go to the Moon, as so many have asked, what else are we capable of?"
The picture in below, taken by Apollo 8, is one of the most important pictures we have. It showed, for the first time our home planet as a small blue and white ball, it seemed surreal. The Earth viewed from the Moon is a delicate world, surrounded by an immense cosmic darkness. A picture like this, from a new vantage point, had never been seen by anyone in history. We gained a new perspective on Earth. You see no crude national borders, you cannot observe humanity's delusions of cosmic importance. You only see a fragile oasis. How can someone, after gaining this new perspective, ever see the Earth in the same myopic way again? To find our true cosmic place, in time and space, it was necessary to go to the Moon. In a profound and literal way we discovered the Earth by journeying to the Moon.
This is the true gift of Apollo:
Thursday, November 14, 2013
Book Review: Space Chronicles, by Neil Degrasse Tyson.
Finished reading Space Chronicles by Degrasse Tyson. Amazing book. Makes me sad we have not left earth orbit since 1972! Makes going to mars seem like a distant dream unless we go to war again. The main reason we went to the moon was to beat the Soviet Union in the space race during the cold war. What an ignoble thing it is that war between super-powers is one of the greatest drivers of discovery. 8/10
Not his best novel, but this is only because his other works are so great. Easily readable as Neil takes us on a wonderful journey; taking the ultimate frontier of space back down to earth. This is more a collection of essays on the space race and the future of space than a novel, this it is not all that noticeable as the general story unwinds with ease. The style seems to work and each section is both informative and interesting. The contrast between the brutal reality of space exploration and what really drives and motivates this industry is tragic.
Space is expensive and we went to the Moon, he explains, due to the Space Race - a battle to the death between the two cold war superpowers. America won, they got to the Moon and the cold war ended and funding dried up. Yet the Moon landings are historic and Tyson must be aware of how important it is to educate people on our true coordinates in the cosmos. Carl Sagan's Pale Blue Dot is what Space Chronicles could have lived up to. Tyson has Sagan's ability to be truly profound. The book is full of his powerfully cosmic perspectives and vivacious enthusiasm which makes one want to keep turning the pages. His love of the cosmos is evident, yet his disappointment about the state of Space Exploration was obvious to me - He wanted to call this book Failure to Launch (one can't blame him).
Space Chronicles is worth reading for anyone who has read his other works and enjoyed them. Or for anyone looking for a gripping Sagan-like voyage. He is not Sagan, nor does he do a cheap imitation. Tyson gives us his own, usually enthralling stories about the space frontier. Will it be breached again by humans? Perhaps.
Not his best novel, but this is only because his other works are so great. Easily readable as Neil takes us on a wonderful journey; taking the ultimate frontier of space back down to earth. This is more a collection of essays on the space race and the future of space than a novel, this it is not all that noticeable as the general story unwinds with ease. The style seems to work and each section is both informative and interesting. The contrast between the brutal reality of space exploration and what really drives and motivates this industry is tragic.
Space is expensive and we went to the Moon, he explains, due to the Space Race - a battle to the death between the two cold war superpowers. America won, they got to the Moon and the cold war ended and funding dried up. Yet the Moon landings are historic and Tyson must be aware of how important it is to educate people on our true coordinates in the cosmos. Carl Sagan's Pale Blue Dot is what Space Chronicles could have lived up to. Tyson has Sagan's ability to be truly profound. The book is full of his powerfully cosmic perspectives and vivacious enthusiasm which makes one want to keep turning the pages. His love of the cosmos is evident, yet his disappointment about the state of Space Exploration was obvious to me - He wanted to call this book Failure to Launch (one can't blame him).
Space Chronicles is worth reading for anyone who has read his other works and enjoyed them. Or for anyone looking for a gripping Sagan-like voyage. He is not Sagan, nor does he do a cheap imitation. Tyson gives us his own, usually enthralling stories about the space frontier. Will it be breached again by humans? Perhaps.
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