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Articulations: On the Utilisation and Meanings of Psychedelics. Julian Palmer (2014)
Chapter Two : The Meaning of DMT in the Trees
There is a Neurotransmitter in Acacia Trees
The most that science can say about an acacia tree regarding the alkaloids they can contain is that a certain percentage of different alkaloids (such as DMT) has been extracted from the tree bark, phyllodes, or root bark. Typical phytochemical analysis of trees (and plants) is based upon one alkaloid test from one botanical collection at one time. Such a test clearly cannot tell us the range of alkaloids found in different trees and the differing amounts of those alkaloids, which changes depending on the time of year and also the time of day.
Most phytochemical essays report quite a stable percentage of alkaloids as if this were a consistent factor. For example, it has been commonly stated that Mimosa hostilis root bark contains 0.57% DMT (Friedman 1957). However, this is not quite correct as that percentage of DMT was obtained from testing only one particular specimen of Mimosa hostilis at one time. Underground researchers report that Mimosa hostilis root bark commonly contains between 0.5% to 1% DMT, and with a high yielding batch of inner root bark, 1.5% and even up to 3% DMT is not unheard of. It is also well known that plants will contain different amounts of alkaloids at different times of the year and even over the space of a day. Studies have been carried out on a plantation of Psychotria viridis plants which show that the amount of DMT alkaloids is higher at certain times of the day: from as high as 9.52mg/gram (about 0.95% DMT) before dusk, to a smaller amount – 8.97mg/gram at dawn, and almost half as much at midnight – 5.57mg/gram. (J.C. Callaway, 1998)
DMT in Australia is most consistently found in acacia trees growing among granite rocks. In fact, around significant sites of acacia stands, one will almost always find veins of quartz. It may well be that this quartz is somehow useful to the tree in transmitting information, as crystals can be information transmitters – the most simple example being that of the silicon computer chip. In sacred sites of native Australian aboriginal significance, one will often find acacia tree species containing DMT. I have seen Acacia obtusifolia trees right on the edge of rock formations considered very sacred to aboriginals, and yet nowhere else in the area will these trees be found. Acacia obtusifolia trees can be commonly found growing around waterfalls, yet nowhere else in the immediate vicinity. There are also two species of acacia that only grow on one specific mountain, normally on the north facing side of the mountain and only among crystalline granite rocks.
So we must ask, why do these acacia trees contain DMT? Some will say that DMT acts as an insect repellent, but we must take into account that the vast majority of acacia trees do not require DMT in order to successfully repel insects or animals. Even those trees that are known to consistently contain some DMT, such as Acacia longifolia or Acacia obtusifolia, can also contain cyanogenic glycosides that repel most insects. For an acacia tree to produce an alkaloid such as DMT requires quite a lot of metabolic expenditure – therefore it simply does not make any sense for the tree to produce DMT as an insect repellent, especially in very high amounts. Interestingly, it is often the case that the acacia species in Australia with the highest concentrations of DMT are micro-endemic (i.e. they only grow in one small area). What is even more striking is that DMT alkaloids extracted from acacias will induce what can only be termed a mystical experience when smoked by human beings. Are we aware of any other kinds of insect repellents in nature that induce visionary experiences in humans?
The wattle trees that contain DMT command attention with their striking nature. Their phyllodes (strictly defined as stalk-like flattened leaves) are often much larger than that of other acacias. Young obtusifolia phyllodes can be almost up to a foot long and their phyllodes are spaced apart from one another in a striking and spiky fashion. If you hold these phyllodes up to the sun, you will see a network of nerves and veins – the most basic signature that indicates this acacia contains DMT. As far as I know, there is no acacia that does not have this signature that contains DMT, yet less than 10% of all acacias possess the feature of anastomisation in the veins of their phyllodes.
The word ‘anastomisation’ is derived from the Greek word, ἀυαστόμωσις (anastomosis), that translates as ‘communicating opening’ or ‘to furnish with a mouth or outlet’. The Oxford dictionary defines ‘anastomosis’ as the ‘the cross connection between adjacent channels, tubes, fibres, or other parts of a network’. Anastomisation represents a wholistic communication within the network of an organism. On the physical level of a phyllode, there is the communication of dissolved ions, hormones and nucleotides within the phyllode. However, not all wattle trees with anastomising veins promise DMT, or even any alkaloid in the acacia. Yet all wattles with phyllodes that contain DMT have anastomising veins in their phyllodes. The only exceptions are the bipinnate species, with their much smaller, feather like leaves – most notably Mimosa hostilis, a tree from South America, and some of the Middle Eastern and African acacias. When very young Australian phyllode-bearing acacia seedlings sprout, they begin to grow as bipinnate seedlings, and then they develop phyllodes, which indicates that the development of a phyllode is a newer evolutionary development than bipinnate leaves.
Underground mycelial networks also anastomise, and this type of mycelium gives rise to many mushrooms varieties including mushrooms containing psilocybin (O-phosphoryl-4-hydroxy-N,N-dimethyltryptamine). Anastomisation represents not just the merger of two different streams, but also the interconnectedness of many streams. Streams of water are also known to anastomise, as do quartz crystal veins. Networks of neurons also anastomise, revealing the brain to be an interconnected processing unit. In the field of botany, it is said that the ‘nerves’ anastomise within the phyllode or leaf. The definition of a nerve is a fibre or bundle of fibres that transmits impulses. Nerves also imply aliveness and sensation. So what is being transmitted along these nerves? And what could be the meaning of these transmissions?
The Sentience of Plants
[See Peter Wholleben’s books, e.g. The Heartbeat of Trees, for detailed, relevant information. Also see The Light Eaters: How the Unseen World of Plant Intelligence Offers a New Understanding of Life on Earth (Zoë Schlanger, 2024) and this post of mine: https://www.reddit.com/r/DMT/s/EvWVFo2W5L]
Typical scientific human understanding at this time contends that sentience is dependent upon a nervous system and brain. Yet, plants are living tissue. Their internal, spiritual nature is based in their flesh, just as the nature of our life force is indeed not ‘within’ the nervous system or brain, but an inherent and integrated part of our fleshy makeup. The present day scientific paradigm tends to posit natural life processes in mechanistic terms and typically discounts animistic views that plants have a soul or could, in fact, be aware in a similar way that we are aware, and therefore, possess a kind of sentient intelligence.
If acacia trees are not simply producing DMT for their survival or for their protection from insects, then what are they producing DMT for? It is remarkable that DMT (N,N-dimethyltryptamine) is quite obviously directly related to one of the primary neurotransmitters in the human brain, serotonin (5-hydroxytryptamine). Simply put, a neurotransmitter allows the transmission of information between neurons. So is it then plausible that the presence of a neurotransmitter in a tree gives us some evidence that the tree possesses one of the primary physical mechanisms of sentience that we possess? My understanding is the trees create a kind of metaphysical field of intelligence through these neurotransmitters via the evident nervous system of veins and nerves in their phyllodes, which appear to receive, transmit and even process information. But what kind of information would the trees be processing, or even communicating?
I cannot adequately answer this question, but what I can say is these trees appear to have a function and a purpose that we would understand as metaphysical, involving the transmission and reception of frequencies to and from realms related to earth and also beyond earth. So if we can come to understand that the trees are transmitting and receiving some sort of information or frequency, what does this communicate to us about human meaning and function? And if we humans do not understand our own biological meaning and function, then how can we hope to understand the meaning or function of trees?
It is commonly presumed within the Western world that we humans don’t have a function or meaning and so just happened to come into existence accidentally. If this is to be believed, then this puts trees in the same category as us. They just randomly happen to exist, and because their existence is just an accident, there is no meaning or function they can have beyond survival. If they happen to contain potent neurotransmitters, then that is also an accident, and does not have to have any reason or significance. These kinds of views are indicative of the dead-end nihilism of materialism, which could be perceived as a quaint and somewhat primitive stage in humanity’s development.
Scientific materialist reductionism will communicate only what is most evident and physically measurable through the present system of interpretation. As it stands, if we stay with what we can currently measure (or try to measure) in the realm of the physical domain, we will not come up with anything significant or meaningful, but rather only static data that gives priority to external values, which remain largely consistent, mechanical, and meaningless. From this viewpoint, we must give little credibility to internal values that shift and move like waves – like emotions. But in fact, emotions, thoughts and other largely non-measurable phenomena are our primary and most immediate reality as human beings. And what are emotions and thoughts but a kind of frequency?
So why would this frequency be occurring? And why would we be occurring or why are we occurring? I perceive that our function, in terms of the natural world, is to radiate or transmit a frequency that is felt by us internally and is, perhaps, measurable. The transmission and reception of this frequency gives us a feeling of wellbeing and satisfaction and accords to ‘happiness’. The frequency of being most esteemed by humans is what we call ‘love’ in English. My perspective is that love is the recognition of frequency, the generation of frequency, the approval of frequency! That frequency is unique and individual – it is a radiance, an expression of beingness. When we feel it, we know what it is. It seems to me that the trees are radiating a kind of frequency of aliveness and they have their own inner world, as we humans have our own inner world. Then it stands to reason that the trees have a particular meaning in their aliveness, as each human being has a felt sense of aliveness and meaning in themselves.
Chapter Two : The Meaning of DMT in the Trees
There is a Neurotransmitter in Acacia Trees
The most that science can say about an acacia tree regarding the alkaloids they can contain is that a certain percentage of different alkaloids (such as DMT) has been extracted from the tree bark, phyllodes, or root bark. Typical phytochemical analysis of trees (and plants) is based upon one alkaloid test from one botanical collection at one time. Such a test clearly cannot tell us the range of alkaloids found in different trees and the differing amounts of those alkaloids, which changes depending on the time of year and also the time of day.
Most phytochemical essays report quite a stable percentage of alkaloids as if this were a consistent factor. For example, it has been commonly stated that Mimosa hostilis root bark contains 0.57% DMT (Friedman 1957). However, this is not quite correct as that percentage of DMT was obtained from testing only one particular specimen of Mimosa hostilis at one time. Underground researchers report that Mimosa hostilis root bark commonly contains between 0.5% to 1% DMT, and with a high yielding batch of inner root bark, 1.5% and even up to 3% DMT is not unheard of. It is also well known that plants will contain different amounts of alkaloids at different times of the year and even over the space of a day. Studies have been carried out on a plantation of Psychotria viridis plants which show that the amount of DMT alkaloids is higher at certain times of the day: from as high as 9.52mg/gram (about 0.95% DMT) before dusk, to a smaller amount – 8.97mg/gram at dawn, and almost half as much at midnight – 5.57mg/gram. (J.C. Callaway, 1998)
DMT in Australia is most consistently found in acacia trees growing among granite rocks. In fact, around significant sites of acacia stands, one will almost always find veins of quartz. It may well be that this quartz is somehow useful to the tree in transmitting information, as crystals can be information transmitters – the most simple example being that of the silicon computer chip. In sacred sites of native Australian aboriginal significance, one will often find acacia tree species containing DMT. I have seen Acacia obtusifolia trees right on the edge of rock formations considered very sacred to aboriginals, and yet nowhere else in the area will these trees be found. Acacia obtusifolia trees can be commonly found growing around waterfalls, yet nowhere else in the immediate vicinity. There are also two species of acacia that only grow on one specific mountain, normally on the north facing side of the mountain and only among crystalline granite rocks.
So we must ask, why do these acacia trees contain DMT? Some will say that DMT acts as an insect repellent, but we must take into account that the vast majority of acacia trees do not require DMT in order to successfully repel insects or animals. Even those trees that are known to consistently contain some DMT, such as Acacia longifolia or Acacia obtusifolia, can also contain cyanogenic glycosides that repel most insects. For an acacia tree to produce an alkaloid such as DMT requires quite a lot of metabolic expenditure – therefore it simply does not make any sense for the tree to produce DMT as an insect repellent, especially in very high amounts. Interestingly, it is often the case that the acacia species in Australia with the highest concentrations of DMT are micro-endemic (i.e. they only grow in one small area). What is even more striking is that DMT alkaloids extracted from acacias will induce what can only be termed a mystical experience when smoked by human beings. Are we aware of any other kinds of insect repellents in nature that induce visionary experiences in humans?
The wattle trees that contain DMT command attention with their striking nature. Their phyllodes (strictly defined as stalk-like flattened leaves) are often much larger than that of other acacias. Young obtusifolia phyllodes can be almost up to a foot long and their phyllodes are spaced apart from one another in a striking and spiky fashion. If you hold these phyllodes up to the sun, you will see a network of nerves and veins – the most basic signature that indicates this acacia contains DMT. As far as I know, there is no acacia that does not have this signature that contains DMT, yet less than 10% of all acacias possess the feature of anastomisation in the veins of their phyllodes.
The word ‘anastomisation’ is derived from the Greek word, ἀυαστόμωσις (anastomosis), that translates as ‘communicating opening’ or ‘to furnish with a mouth or outlet’. The Oxford dictionary defines ‘anastomosis’ as the ‘the cross connection between adjacent channels, tubes, fibres, or other parts of a network’. Anastomisation represents a wholistic communication within the network of an organism. On the physical level of a phyllode, there is the communication of dissolved ions, hormones and nucleotides within the phyllode. However, not all wattle trees with anastomising veins promise DMT, or even any alkaloid in the acacia. Yet all wattles with phyllodes that contain DMT have anastomising veins in their phyllodes. The only exceptions are the bipinnate species, with their much smaller, feather like leaves – most notably Mimosa hostilis, a tree from South America, and some of the Middle Eastern and African acacias. When very young Australian phyllode-bearing acacia seedlings sprout, they begin to grow as bipinnate seedlings, and then they develop phyllodes, which indicates that the development of a phyllode is a newer evolutionary development than bipinnate leaves.
Underground mycelial networks also anastomise, and this type of mycelium gives rise to many mushrooms varieties including mushrooms containing psilocybin (O-phosphoryl-4-hydroxy-N,N-dimethyltryptamine). Anastomisation represents not just the merger of two different streams, but also the interconnectedness of many streams. Streams of water are also known to anastomise, as do quartz crystal veins. Networks of neurons also anastomise, revealing the brain to be an interconnected processing unit. In the field of botany, it is said that the ‘nerves’ anastomise within the phyllode or leaf. The definition of a nerve is a fibre or bundle of fibres that transmits impulses. Nerves also imply aliveness and sensation. So what is being transmitted along these nerves? And what could be the meaning of these transmissions?
The Sentience of Plants
[See Peter Wholleben’s books, e.g. The Heartbeat of Trees, for detailed, relevant information. Also see The Light Eaters: How the Unseen World of Plant Intelligence Offers a New Understanding of Life on Earth (Zoë Schlanger, 2024) and this post of mine: https://www.reddit.com/r/DMT/s/EvWVFo2W5L]
Typical scientific human understanding at this time contends that sentience is dependent upon a nervous system and brain. Yet, plants are living tissue. Their internal, spiritual nature is based in their flesh, just as the nature of our life force is indeed not ‘within’ the nervous system or brain, but an inherent and integrated part of our fleshy makeup. The present day scientific paradigm tends to posit natural life processes in mechanistic terms and typically discounts animistic views that plants have a soul or could, in fact, be aware in a similar way that we are aware, and therefore, possess a kind of sentient intelligence.
If acacia trees are not simply producing DMT for their survival or for their protection from insects, then what are they producing DMT for? It is remarkable that DMT (N,N-dimethyltryptamine) is quite obviously directly related to one of the primary neurotransmitters in the human brain, serotonin (5-hydroxytryptamine). Simply put, a neurotransmitter allows the transmission of information between neurons. So is it then plausible that the presence of a neurotransmitter in a tree gives us some evidence that the tree possesses one of the primary physical mechanisms of sentience that we possess? My understanding is the trees create a kind of metaphysical field of intelligence through these neurotransmitters via the evident nervous system of veins and nerves in their phyllodes, which appear to receive, transmit and even process information. But what kind of information would the trees be processing, or even communicating?
I cannot adequately answer this question, but what I can say is these trees appear to have a function and a purpose that we would understand as metaphysical, involving the transmission and reception of frequencies to and from realms related to earth and also beyond earth. So if we can come to understand that the trees are transmitting and receiving some sort of information or frequency, what does this communicate to us about human meaning and function? And if we humans do not understand our own biological meaning and function, then how can we hope to understand the meaning or function of trees?
It is commonly presumed within the Western world that we humans don’t have a function or meaning and so just happened to come into existence accidentally. If this is to be believed, then this puts trees in the same category as us. They just randomly happen to exist, and because their existence is just an accident, there is no meaning or function they can have beyond survival. If they happen to contain potent neurotransmitters, then that is also an accident, and does not have to have any reason or significance. These kinds of views are indicative of the dead-end nihilism of materialism, which could be perceived as a quaint and somewhat primitive stage in humanity’s development.
Scientific materialist reductionism will communicate only what is most evident and physically measurable through the present system of interpretation. As it stands, if we stay with what we can currently measure (or try to measure) in the realm of the physical domain, we will not come up with anything significant or meaningful, but rather only static data that gives priority to external values, which remain largely consistent, mechanical, and meaningless. From this viewpoint, we must give little credibility to internal values that shift and move like waves – like emotions. But in fact, emotions, thoughts and other largely non-measurable phenomena are our primary and most immediate reality as human beings. And what are emotions and thoughts but a kind of frequency?
So why would this frequency be occurring? And why would we be occurring or why are we occurring? I perceive that our function, in terms of the natural world, is to radiate or transmit a frequency that is felt by us internally and is, perhaps, measurable. The transmission and reception of this frequency gives us a feeling of wellbeing and satisfaction and accords to ‘happiness’. The frequency of being most esteemed by humans is what we call ‘love’ in English. My perspective is that love is the recognition of frequency, the generation of frequency, the approval of frequency! That frequency is unique and individual – it is a radiance, an expression of beingness. When we feel it, we know what it is. It seems to me that the trees are radiating a kind of frequency of aliveness and they have their own inner world, as we humans have our own inner world. Then it stands to reason that the trees have a particular meaning in their aliveness, as each human being has a felt sense of aliveness and meaning in themselves.
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