Joe Rogan Experience #2047 - Brian Muraresku
Joe Rogan podcast check it out The Joe. Rogan Experience Train by day Joe Rogan. podcast by night all. day all right well what's up Brian. what's up man good to see you last time. I saw you we were on another continent. uh the European continent yeah was fun. that was exciting thank you very much. for that you're welcome going to visit. the the Greek ruins with you was really. special that was very cool that was uh.
was that your first time seeing like the. Acropolis and downtown yes it's my first. time in Greece yeah yeah really mhm and. the girls too my wife had been but the. girls hadn't been it was exciting it was. fun man it's so crazy it's just to be. there in that place where all this. started is just to be on in that on that. soil standing there and the place where. those people were 2500 years ago very. special or longer or longer Yeah Yeah by.
thousands of years potentially yeah yeah. really exciting stuff it's cool man. what's also interesting you know when. you're. there how it seems like your work is uh. it's getting out there but it seems like. the people that are involved in the. daytoday there like the people that are. giving tours and the people that they. don't really know yeah that's it's still. I think it's still I wouldn't say it's. controversial but I think it's still a.
subject of debate which which is the way. it should be and what we're talking. about is the the potential of the. ancient Greeks using psychedelics yeah. to find God which is a big idea it well. it seems not just. likely all it all all the pieces I mean. it's like oh duh you know like if you. found a murder weapon in the house where. someone was suspected of being a. murderer yeah you go like guess probably. that's probably what. happened like if you find vessels that. contain psychedelic compounds in an area.
where people experience these profound. rituals right well they're probably. doing drugs. man well at least in Spain they were. yeah the fact that there there were no. vessels found in Greece in Mainland. Greece and most especially by at the. sanctuary in alus I think that that. leaves healthy room for debate I was. there like I was there the week before. last at this at the conference I Was. preparing back in July so we finally had. the the conference at alus because of. all the cities in Europe it was.
nominated to be the the European capital. of culture for 2023 so it was postponed. from 21 because of the pandemic and. people finally came through town a. couple weeks ago and the the site. archaeologist her name is poy Pap Angeli. who was on site when I first was. interviewing her for for the book back. in 2018 I got to see her again for the. first time in five years and she's. probably spent more time at alus than. any human being living or dead wow. because she spent like 40 years.
basically maintaining the site and so. she used to commute from Athens from her. home to ucus every day for like close to. 40 years so she's done that pilgrimage. more than any person living or dead. throughout recorded history wow and when. when she finally saw the the evidence so. so I gave like a PowerPoint of the. things that I talked about here a couple. years ago all the evidence from the book. about these ritual vessels that were. discovered in the 1990s in Spain and. they show pretty clear evidence of of. Urgot inside like a beer chalice so.
something like an erti beer which was. the thing that was hypothesized back in. the 1970s as The elusive you know. mystery to the to these great Mysteries. and so I showed her all the evidence did. my PowerPoint and Poppy was thoroughly. unconvinced that psychedelic had. anything to do with the mysteries in. elus interesting what's her Theory her. theory is that uh it's a modern. interpolation that we think that we. can't achieve these these states of Mind. in the absence of drugs and so when I do. ask her she talks about the long.
pilgrimage and she talks about the. fasting that would have taken place and. she talks about like the emotional. preparation for years in advance of this. sort of culminating experience of a. lifetime so she points to all kinds of. different things maybe some like. endogenous ously produced ecstatic. experience but she's just not a fan of. the drug hypothesis and so the fact that. uh you know this forensic evidence for. drugs was found in these vessels 2,200. years ago you know at the place at the.
time where it looks like there's a. connection to ancient elus she's. unpersuaded which I think is very funny. and and super cool because I think I. think debate is is is needed well it's. always good to be healthy you know in. your skepticism but at a certain point. in time you got what do you think is. going on like what do what does she. think why why the evidence that connects. to the vessels that uh we in Spain does. she think that has no. connection it seems like they're the. same people or at least from the same.
teachings I asked her that yes she she. believes there was a Greek influence so. we know that the the place where this uh. these vessels were found 2200 years ago. uh we know that it was there was a Greek. colony called impon and so we know that. there were ancient Greeks who founded a. colony not too far from this place and. the place we're talking about is pontos. so it's a town a bit further Inland so. it's undeniable that ancient Greeks were. at this ancient Colony as far back is. like 575 BC by the way it's when they.
established the colony and so you have. like 400 years from the establishment of. this Colony until you see this like this. helenistic period where people who were. influenced by the Greeks were then. reinterpreting what seems to be their. idea of the Mysteries in honor of demer. and pany that the two goddesses who are. worshiped back in Greece at alus so um. it that all that all lines up and you. see you know images of what could be. like an in sense burner that looks like.
Deiter pranie and you find these vases. that look like they belong in Athens. showing diis and this drunken parade and. you see what the the most interesting to. me was the this kathos that shows tripus. and tripus was kind of like the. missionary of the ancient Mysteries and. you see images of him in the museum at. alus and they found a near identical. image of him in at this uh at the not. too far from this site in Spain so like. all the pieces kind of fit together but. I think that you know I can't speak for.
poppy but maybe she sees it as sort of. like like a renegade group you know. something that that was because you know. again to celebrate the Mysteries outside. the temple outside deer's Temple at. alusa was a sacrilege we have to keep. that in mind it doesn't mean that people. weren't trying to recreate what was. happening there and there's this famous. incident in Athens in 414 BC called the. profanation of the Mysteries where we. know that some people at least were. trying to recreate what they thought was. happening in the temple at home in. private dining room so if that was. happening and the Mystery was spilling.
out of this Temple it stands to reason. that something was happening in Spain. maybe in southern Italy I spent a lot of. time looking there to uh or maybe across. North Africa or the near East so like I. think it's very possible I I think I. think what she's looking for is evidence. in Greece at alus or thereabouts which. is why I've been spending so much time. there over the past couple years well it. seems like even. today. rituals and you you know these.
psychedelic ceremonies that people do in. other countries when they go to the. Jungle there's so much fanfare and. there's so much behind it there's so. much there's a lot of Secrets like. people contain these secrets they talk. about these things that they're about to. embark on and they're they're in control. of this experience for these people like. they're they're not going to tell you. the exact recipe how they do it you know. most of them kind of keep that secret. they they brew it they bring it to you. there always been like someone who holds.
like secret information and it kind of. makes sense and then that you see the. exact same thing in America you see. these little psychedelic ceremonies that. people do outside of the Jungle you know. and they've brought iasa back and now. the they get a group of people together. in the living room and they burn candles. and trip balls together you know that. sounds fun but it seems very similar to. that kind of thing where they would try. to reenact it or recreate it somewhere. else yeah I mean even in the classic. period like so we we think elus goes.
back to sort of like the Acropolis right. so when you're looking at at these sites. you're you're looking at uh different. moments in time so you can't look at the. Acropolis and not think about the mum. period that goes back to like 1500 BC. and you can't think about like the. classical Golden Age of Athens in the. fifth century BC and you can't think. about what happened to it thereafter. because the power changes hands right to. to the Romans yeah uh in 146 BC and then. you know it goes into the Byzantine. empire in the fth century ad and then it.
goes to the Ottomans after that so like. there's always been this transfer of. power and these sites experience. different levels of uh of participation. and ritual and mystery so when you look. at ausus you know as as old as it could. be um going back you know probably to. 1500 BC in The Classical period it was. always changing so when you talk about. secrets you talk about potions and. sacraments I think they were always. always changing throughout time and so. maybe the secret recipe and 5th Century.
BC was different from what it looked. like a thousand years before that and a. thousand years since and so what we do. know is that diis who's this other God. of ritual Madness and ecstasy in the. theater remember we went to the theater. of dianis you know he he sneaks into the. Mysteries at some point and I think what. you begin to see is this like this urge. towards uh what some Scholars call. Private spontaneous Pagan piety which. means that aside from these these these. centralized temples like the Temple of. demer it sits at alusa and that's where.
these rights happen and it's an utter. profanation to celebrate them outside. what you see with diis coming into these. Mysteries is this urge towards the. celebration of ritual and ceremony. outside the temples privately and. spontaneously so like the the churches. the temples of dianis were sort of. outside they were always celebrated in. the forests and the mountains and at the. Southern Slope of the Acropolis which is. interesting and urban centers too but I. think over time you begin to see like. this thirst to celebrate these Mysteries. outside the temples which is why the.
evidence in Spain makes so much sense to. me when it comes to endogenously created. U experiences have you ever looked into. what people experience doing Kundalini. Yoga H yeah have you that's it's that's. pretty interesting I practiced yoga yeah. for a little time I studied Sanskrit oh. really wow I studied Sanskrit so you can. read that stuff yeah have you seen that. new AI That's um it's it's translating. uniform yeah yeah isn't that amazing I.
saw a story about that earlier this year. isn't that amazing we're getting smarter. that's well not us our our. successors maybe they'll Crack the Code. oh they'll definitely Crack the. Code I'm sure it'll be easy for them uh. probably I mean if we didn't have the. Rosetta Stone how much would we know. about hieroglyphs and ancient Egyptian. writing very little and that was. relatively recently in the grand scheme. of History right it's just amazing that. one piece of archaeological evidence led.
to like oh my God like a jigsaw puzle. that's the piece yeah this is it that's. what we're looking for here we're. looking for um a little jigsaw so with. calini yoga which I I I think is very. I've not practiced it I've only done. like your [ __ ] soccer mom. yoga that counts too I've done I mean. I've done some other kind of classes. flow classes and classes to music and. stuff like that but most of the yoga. that I've done has been that berrum. stuff that. 90minut hot yogurts 20 something poses.
you do them the same ones every day I. really love it but um I know that gives. you some sort of strange high it really. does like when you leave there like it's. not a coincidence that yoga people are. all flaky and super peaceful like it. really it does something for you that it. just puts you in a very relaxed and. unique state but Kundalini uh as. practiced by several people that I know.
I've just never done it is supposedly. you can reach states that are very. similar to being on psychedelic drugs. yeah in terms of like absolute Visions. geometric patterns that are flowing. around you like but you're not supposed. to concentrate on that which is. interesting like at least in according. to one of my friends who took it his his. instructor was saying that you're you're. getting distracted by trying to trying.
to have these experiences that's not the. goal it's decidedly not they call them. the cities the the powers that arise and. it can be everything from Visions to. Supernatural powers and oh Supernatural. Powers superal I didn't know about that. like what have they claimed um well when. you're traveling outside time and space. the ability to see into the deep past. and the far future the ability to uh to. transport your body a Teleport um all. kinds of uh mental telepathy and things. like that I mean these aren't that's not. the goal of yoga obviously they call.
them the CES um but it it it happens um. does it though well it's of sure we have. lots of literature that attest to it. eight classical cides uh anema the. ability to reduce one's body to the size. of an atom that's a superpower yeah. mahima the ability to expand one's body. to an infinitely large size leima the. ability to become weightless or lighter. than air Gara the ability to become. heavy or dense and property the ability.
to realize whatever one desires that one. seems like a. problem it's not a superpower you want. yeah that seems like it be a real. problem yeah yeah you want be the king. of the world uh yeah it's not a good. thing not for some people you can handle. it I don't know if I could I don't know. if anybody could yeah um and that that's. well that's kind of the whole point is. that the you know you're talking what. you just talked about is the the way the. ego gets in the in the what way it steps. into this river right so in in all these.
spiritual practices it's supposed to be. about the the the deflation of the ego. and so if if you're going through these. spiritual exercises and these practices. and these disciplines and your ego is. still very much intact then when the. superpowers arise what do you what do. you do with them I think and that that's. the dangerous part of any spiritual. discipline it's the dangerous part of. psychedelics for sure yeah um because. you get this this dramatic insight into. the nature of yourself and maybe the. underlying structure of the cosmos and.
all of a sudden you think you're all. knowing right and maybe all powerful. well also you sort of espouse that to. others who haven't experienced it and. there's like the guru thing that happens. which I think is really problematic for. Western people for whatever reason. there's a lot of especially men in. Western culture that get involved in. those things and then they become. leaders and they're semi cult leaders. you know yeah someone sent me an article. yesterday about this as an interesting.
title chasing the numinous hungry ghosts. in the shadow of the Psychedelic. Renaissance uh just came out in this in. this journal chasing the numinous and. and talk this notion of the hungry. ghosts is um it's pra in Sanskrit. speaking of of more Sanskrit so pra. these these hungry ghosts who are. constantly hungry constantly thirsty and. no matter how much they feed or try and. satiate themselves it's never enough and. so it's sort of this this metaphor for. uh the Western mind and consumerism and. extraction and you know wouldn't it be a.
shame if we approached psychedelics yoga. all these spiritual disciplines with. with that sort of that broken Western. mentality trying to figure out what this. can do for me yeah that's what it is. what can this do for me um most. psychedelic experiences that I've ever. had one of the. key sort of overwhelming aspects of it. is to get out of your own way and that. you're in your own way and that you. think about yourself and you thinking of.
yourself and it's just wasted energy. wasted and that instead you should be. thinking about like the things you're. doing and how you're interacting with. the. world and also your ego is just [ __ ]. it's just just it's just some leftover. chimp [ __ ] that's designed to Keep Us. Alive it's designed to make sure that. you procreate make sure that you think. very highly of yourself uh so you want. to procreate but you came to. psychedelics later in life right yes.
yeah was that I mean was that a good. thing yeah probably because I made a lot. of mistakes and you know you learn from. that like you you do need mistakes in. life and you you also need to understand. what it's like to be very stupid and. very foolish and young and Brash and. then also older and more experienced but. still know nothing in terms I mean you. really as much as you know the smartest. person alive knows basically nothing. about the nature of the universe uh you.
know you might know things on a. molecular level on a cosmic level you. understand how galaxies are formed. that's cute but you really [ __ ] don't. know [ __ ] you don't know [ __ ] you. haven't seen [ __ ] there's too much out. there it's just too big it's it should. be a and I think it was forever when we. didn't have light pollution it was the. overwhelming evidence that you're not. [ __ ] you know the the the if you thought. very highly of yourself and you lay on. your back and looked up into the cosmos. at best best you could think that you.
were sent down from God to do his. bidding but you didn't think you were. anything greater than that you couldn't. it's too there's too much evidence the. sky is just filled with these [ __ ]. enormous nuclear explosions that are. happening all over the cosmos it's. impossible to even wrap your mind I mean. back then they had no real knowledge of. the the scope of it all but it's pretty. obvious that it's insane the I mean the.
night skies I'm sure have you seen the. night sky in a place where there's. absolutely no light you know s yes but. sadly like I can count it on on two. hands I can only count it on one well. twice the second time not as profound. but I went to the um the kek observatory. on the big island and you go uh the. first time I went um it was quite a. while ago and uh when we first drove up. there I was really bummed out because it. was so cloudy I was like ah this sucks.
we're not going to be able to see. anything but then when we went through. the clouds to where the observatory is. there's nothing it's just stars and you. get out you're like oh my God it's like. being on a spaceship it's like you're in. a convertible spaceship and you're. hurling through the Galaxy because what. what they've done on the big island is. pretty profound they they put these uh. lights the the street lights are you. know a type of light that doesn't it.
doesn't expand outward what is it called. what are those lights called Jamie. you're a photographer diffused that's. right thank you diffused lighting so. diffused lighting all throughout the big. island so it doesn't [ __ ] with the light. pollution issue that you get when you're. trying to look at the at the real sky so. even though there is light from these. you know streets and all that it doesn't. affect it when you're way up there it's. like a couple hours drive from the shore. and you get up there and it's just the. one time that I went there and this is I.
guess this is about 20 years ago the one. time I went there was just like oh my. God just oh my God like you can't. believe it you can't believe it's so. it's so much and it really made me sad. because I was like that's what people. used to see every night that's what. people used to see every night before. these jackasses invented. electricity Edison you [ __ ] what. have you done what have you done we. don't think of it as anything like that. because we just electricity is amazing. you can go out at night you can go to.
dinner you can [ __ ] drive your Tesla. electricity is amazing but it it has. made us so ignorant to our place in the. cosmos and it's taken away so much. Wonder because when the sky is just. totally dark you look up and you see a. star you know way over there or Oh look. The Moon I can see the moon you just get. used to it it's just you don't see. enough you don't see enough and then. when you actually do you're like. oh now I know why well you know why. would they when people are starving to.
death and just struggling huning hunting. and Gathering why would they be. concentrating on. constellations of course they would. because there's nothing to do at night. that's why yeah and it's amazing what do. you think you do all night I think I. think that that could be the origin of. the religious. sensibility if you think that when we. when we were hunting and Gathering. you're talking about like 99% of our. history by the way um and then when you. think about what comes before us I know. you think about this a lot. uh yeah I've been.
fascinated uh with some conversations. I've been having with a friend called. Lee Burger he's a paleoanthropologist in. South Africa um and it got me thinking. about all these archaic hominins and one. of them is is Homo erectus which I'm. like I don't know why I'm so fascinated. by erectus of all the of all the. hominins but you know it goes back at. least probably 2 million years uh which. is something to think about Homo habis. comes before erectus that could be like. .8 million years and so erectus probably.
sheds the body hair of habilis it's. bipedal obviously um and they probably. discover fire uh and so what that means. and by the way they go off and explore. the planet which is crazy for a being. that old I mean they were potentially. the first seaf farers really the first. seaf fairing hominins do we know what. kind of vessels they used no idea. probably raaps if Jamie can find it uh. they were heading I mean they we have. erectus remains. from Africa to Europe to Asia uh so so.
they I mean they were they were on the. move you know over a million years ago. and the thing about fire why I mentioned. that the thing about fire is that if. they whether or not they were cooking. their food they had fire for warmth and. light at night U but it didn't obscure. the night sky and so it's interesting to. think about whether erectus sat around. their campfires a million years ago and. told stories the first stories about the. night sky they had language we don't. know if they had language or not but.
there's they speculate that maybe the. beginnings of protol language would have. begun because I mean I I was joking but. like what do you do at night right what. do you do at night you know which again. we're so dist we're not just distracted. by light pollution we're distracted by a. million things when the sun sets um and. that's again that's relatively recently. I mean even in the Middle Ages there was. there was nothing to do yeah um uh and. so but think about a million years ago. and so it's possible that around these. primordial fires the very first stories.
storytelling would have emerged uh. around these around the constellations. in the next what Homo erectus look like. Jamie did they have an artist. interpretation that's cool oh wow so. very personlike this article says that. if they sailed they they probably also. had a lingo for it a sailing lingo to. describe probably where they were going. or what you were going to see and they. sort of had the I mean the the shape of. the arms and the legs and the.
proportions very similar to. humans yeah similar but but but this I. mean they were bipedal um yeah but that. looks like almost like a. person and that's and that's really old. by the way yeah it's there it's at least. 2 million years old um what what 1.8. million so what freaks me out is like. what made them stand. up you know like we're the only ones. like what what the hell was that all. about what was that about you do see.
chimps occasionally walking on their. hind legs and you see gorillas doing it. as well yeah a rangat Tans but it's just. not normal like what what would make. someone say this is the only way to go. uh I don't need four. legs they were curious right but but how. would that be an evolutionary. Advantage I mean well you can you can. scavenge a lot better um and you can. protect yourself from prey a lot better. and also you can hunt prey a lot better. and so what they think I'm not sure if.
it was a rectus or another one uh but. they would uh they were good at. longdistance running so they they could. they could wear out potential prey so. there's there's an adapted there's at. least one adapted Advantage it's. persistence hunting right persistence. hunting to to to wear out and Chase down. prey that's a hard way to do it that's. yeah that's they don't sweat they they. sweat so you just run them down just run. them down a lot of things that run. really fast can't run really long a lot. of them some of them can M like antelope. can. Good Luck running one of those down have.
you tried no but like um the ones that. we have in America that we call Antelope. that I think they're I want to say. they're maybe even in the goat family. because sometimes they call them speed. goats but those the the antelope that. they have in America the pronghorn. antelope is actually the reason why it's. so fast is because at one point in time. there was a cheetah here and they're. they went extinct but the antelope. survived so it has the speed to evade. something that runs insanely fast so.
these little [ __ ] can go like 60 M an. hour damn they're amazing I I only saw. one for the first time um this year on. like actually in the wild where in Utah. huh yeah it's really cool we parked the. car got out put the pulled the. magnifying glasses out to check them out. just it's an it's a prehistoric creature. it really is it's just a remnant of the. past it lived with all the other. megaphon that went extinct about you. know whatever was it 15,000 years ago.
12,800 yeah at least starting then yeah. so those those creatures were like The. Last of the Mohicans like they they had. to run super fast so they can now like. nothing can [ __ ] with them other than. humans like at a certain point in time. when they're young they're very. vulnerable but at a certain point in. time they get to the like good luck. catching me. [ __ ] like KY cies and Mountain lines. like you can't catch them they're too.
fast yeah I mean they're faster than. everything what's the population like in. in you not so good yeah not so good um. it's good in some places it's good in. Wyoming it's good in some places in the. west but um they get hammered the the. babies get hammered by. coyotes and it's it's hard for them to. to compete you know it's just when your. calves and your your your you know your. fawns are getting slaughtered there's. not a lot your species can do you know.
that that that becomes an issue in areas. that have a lot of predators you know. that becomes an issues areas that have a. lot of bears and areas like areas that. have a lot of bear like the moose. population just gets hammered because. the babies never make it like in most PL. I think in one of the places in Alberta. it's more I think it's somewhere in the. range of 50 to 60% of all baby deer and. moose to just get eaten by bears jeez. yeah you think a lot about about death. well the cycle of of of I think a lot.
about nature and how amazingly. fascinating that it's so amazingly. fascinating to me that we live in this. very. bizarre. technological sort of raft in the middle. of nature you know we live in these. cities these little little communities. that we have everything set up for the. the nature of the human animal in 2023. but the rest of the like you go out in.
the wild like they they have no idea. that game is being played they they. don't they they're doing the exact same. thing they've been doing forever and. it's things chasing after things and. things trying not to get eaten and. that's every day that's all it is that's. all it is and then when things die. there's you know Raptors come in and and. vultures come in and and all these. scavengers come in and that's their job. that's why the way we treat our dead is. so at least we used to think was so.
unique to Homo sapiens and how we treat. the notion of uh of death and burial. have we talked about Homo Al Lady before. we need to talk about Homo Al Lady okay. uh Jamie I brought some some slides in. that um I brought some some things I. want to show you okay um I'm G get a. cigar yeah go little tiny one suck this. will be a fun a fun adventure okay. do you see where it is it's at the like.
number 16 there. yeah homon lady homon lady that's a cute. name it sounds like a song doesn't. it like it have a good beat to it um. what what year is homeown the lady there. there it is so it was discovered by by. Lee in South Africa in the Cradle of. humankind this goes back uh well he this. the discoveries in 2013 that they think. that this could be anywhere from 250 to. 300,000 335,000 years old um that's what.
I want to show you um this is this is. where it was discovered so you see the. rising star Cave System there in South. Africa um it was found in this in this. cavernous underground Labyrinth of. networks uh where uh lee found uh a. number of different bodies that had. been apparently left there by this. species homon um and the reason that's. interesting is because again Homo. sapiens to our knowledge are the only.
species to have ever intentionally. buried their dead so you see things like. uh you see grief and mourning practices. in the animal you talked about the. animal world like when they when they. just die they're they're left to rot. typically although you see you see. mourning practices in in citations and. you see it in elephants and maybe. chimpanzees but no one buries they're. dead so that was the big bright line uh. that no species had ever crossed. seemingly aside from Homo sapiens. although there's also evidence for uh. for Neanderthal burial which is goes.
back a potentially a very long time like. over 400,000 years there's a site in. Spain called Sima de losos um but. Neanderthal is very close to us as well. you know we have Neanderthal DNA like in. our own genetic makeup they're kind of. cousins uh so that that wasn't really. too shocking the fact that there could. be Neanderthal burial but the fact that. something that looks like that and is. potentially um you know at least 300,000. years ago but but morphologically it's. archaic kind of like we're talking about.
erectus like it's it's really archaic. looking homon lady it's it's short it's. about 48 to 52 it's Slender and skinny. um but it there are features on it that. look again like archaic like it could be. at least a million years old for example. or or longer so it's strange that a. being that archaic Finds Its way into. this into this cave system and and. deliberately deposits the debt so that. was like a very controversial idea it. was so controversial that like Lee. didn't know what the what the bones were.
doing there uh because it just didn't. make sense and by the way like it's it's. become the richest site for hominid. discovery on on the continent and maybe. maybe anywhere because of because of the. profusion of Bones they they found like. 1500 different bones I think it's close. to 2,000 now which is really really. strange in paleoanthropology so Lee was. digging another site called gladus Veil. not too far from this for years years. and typically what you find are animals. you find tens or hundreds of thousands. of animal bone fragments and a very.
small percentage of of hominids so for. example at that site in Gladis Vale he. found a tooth and a pinky bone over the. course of like many many years which is. not unusual he comes to this Rising Star. cave system and all of a sudden there's. 1500 bone fragments they're able to. assemble what they think is like 15. different individuals so 15 individual. specific hormonal lady are being. deposited in that denal lady chamber and. they don't know why uh and so they begin. to to look more into it I want to show.
you how how difficult it is to get in. there by the way and why it was so. difficult to to believe at first if you. look at the the cave chamber there um it. was just up up there before it's um on. the next one maybe yeah it's it's really. hard to access that you can see um so. you enter at the top there and this is. what homo a lady was doing potentially. 300,000 years ago they found this Cave. System they would descend there on the. left go down into what's called. Superman's crawl which is just 10 in. high so they had to go their bellies. potentially and so they think they.
dragged the bodies through that superraw. the dead bodies that Superman's crawl is. only 10 in high and you could drag a. body through that it's it gets it gets. worse so they not only drug it through. that crawl there they went up dragon's. back as you can see there and then down. what's called the Shute you see the AR. the yellow arrow at the shoot so the. Chute goes from the top of dragon's back. into the den chamber the Shute is like. seven or 8 in wide seven or 8 in and it. goes down like 40 F feet from the top of. Dragon's Back to den lady and inside Den.
lady is where they found at least 15. bodies how did they get a body through. seven in yeah I mean we we can go there. too like it's a so Lee um avoided it for. many years he was able to actually make. it down himself there's a great document. you got to see the documentary it's on. Netflix it's called Cave of Bones if you. look up look up unknown unknown colon. Cave of Bones you'll find an awesome. documentary that that charts the. discovery and what they call the. underground astronauts who managed to to.
get their way through Superman's crawl. and Dragon's Back and actually man. managed to get into the den lady chamber. it's like it's it's it's so captivating. how they discovered uh and then root. through the these bones and so okay. there's a bunch of bones in there it's. it's so strange that it doesn't make. sense at first so the like the the. working hypothesis are that it was some. kind of accident or it was animal. predation okay animals killed these. homon and animals drug them through that.
that that chamber complex uh into Den. lady that that was one or maybe like. maybe there was a flash flood or maybe. you know something happened or like it. wasn't like an Excursion party gone gone. bad a bunch of people spelunking and. they got trapped in there but it turns. out that that that's that's not the case. it's not only not the case it seems like. they were intentionally buried in these. holes and so they found pits which look. like Graves and again against all. expectations because only sapiens and. maybe the does this this archaic being.
is deliberately disposing of their dead. in ritual fashion inside this chamber. which is super difficult to access in. the first place it would take it would. take you like at least 30 or 40 minutes. to make your way from the surface how. would I even get in something that's. seven inches wide you can you have to. see the the footage for how to do it you. you can make your way through it I mean. there's it gets wider at Parts but at at. very like at very uh there there's. there's sections where it's really. really tight and like like leag get. stuck at some point and so the people. who went down are really really thin.
thin people who can navigate and like. professional spelunkers for example it. was that dangerous to to access it can. be and if there's any earthquake. activity at all you're [ __ ] yeah. something else to think about you just. have to imagine like what would motivate. them to take this journey in the first. place that's that's why I mentioned it. because it's it's not just the first. discovery of the deliberate burial of. the Dead by a species that's not us they. go to Great Lengths to do this because.
they too were thinking about these. cycles of life and death right uh and so. if it wasn't an accident and it wasn't. flash flooding and it wasn't animal. predation and this was deliberate burial. ritual like why would they do that and. it seems like and again now you're. speculating but it seems like they set. up this complex or they they use this. this naturally existing complex to. actually reenact a passage right some. Passage from light Into Darkness um and.
sort of like the passage into the. underworld into death itself and this. this has so many resonances with ausus. by the way um and everything that that. that we saw there and these ancient. mystery complexes again this notion of. of of of spelunking into the underworld. and meeting the gods and goddesses of. death and really confronting death and. mortality in a powerful way like it's. happening in a different species 300,000. years ago so what else are they bringing. into the these caves it gets it gets. crazier the do the documentary is.
fantastic what what they also find is. fire and so I mentioned that homoerectus. probably had fire so that's not entirely. surprising but you know they figured out. a way uh this species figured out a way. to illuminate the P which is pitch dark. obviously right and so they figured out. a way to light fires along the way we. think at least for light but they were. also cooking down there uh they they. found speaking of I think they found. Antelope or spring Buck the the the. these tiny bones uh that were cooked in. this fire so they they they were.
manipulating fire um at least having. some sort of like I don't know if it's a. ferary meal or something that could have. been related to this this ritual complex. so they're they're they're controlling. fire they're dragging bodies into this. into this pit um over over different. Generations potentially which makes you. think about the possibility of language. and how this ritual is communicated from. one generation to another and uh the. craziest thing is that they also found. um Ju Just last year when Lee finally.
made his way into the den lady chamber. um in the anti chamber before that they. found scratch markings which I think. there's some pictures in that in that. file Jim they found um like like hash. markings just like so there you go so. the one on the right is is Nady that's. that could be 300,000 years old the one. on the left is Neanderthal and you can. see like the crazy similarity they they. took a rock and they just etched it into. these cave walls um Homo sapiens did. does the same thing in in blombo's cave.
not too far away in South Africa that. that's 80,000 years old so that's only. 880,000 years old that's that that's as. old as we get in South Africa Homo. sapiens that's 880,000 years old so now. lady is doing something that looks to. the untrained eye very similar. potentially 300,000 years. ago. wow so homo sapiens when do we first. start appearing uh the numbers are. always changing it could be like three. 300,000 400,000 years ago so hom lady.
and Homo sapiens existed at the same. time and so because of what Lee found. there like some some of the some of his. critics claimed that actually it was. Homo sapiens who were making these. markings like it's so unbelievable that. Nady is dragging these bodies in there. and making these markings and. controlling fire and potentially having. tools by the way it's so Unthinkable. that that that some people some Scholars. think that's it this is this is the. evidence of sapiens finding these caves. is it. possible did they interact with each.
other do we have any understanding of. whether or not they interact could have. I as I asked Lee the same questions the. they could have we we don't have any. evidence of sapiens in the area so we. don't know for sure but it raises like. really really profound questions and. this is pure speculation but if they did. come into contact with another because. we know we have this relationship with. with Neanderthal we interbit with. Neanderthal we have no idea what our Rel. relationship with homon lady was like um.
did we interbreed did we exchange. knowledge. communication uh did they teach us this. pure speculation did they teach us about. death did they teach us about these. these burial practices did they did they. even know something that primitive. sapiens didn't know did they pass it on. to Neanderthal etc etc what could they. possibly know other than you know how to. do this the the mystery I mean why are. they doing it right why why are they. doing it why does no animal do this. right and uh again like Lee and the team.
they can't answer this but if if you're. going to those lengths to bury your dead. over successive. Generations it raises the the big. questions that maybe they were asking um. well before us what happens when we die. did they believe in an afterlife did. they have a concept of God did they have. a concept of spirituality that they look. at the stars at night and wonder uh. where we came from and how we got here. and where we go after death and did they. have a special Insight that death maybe.
wasn't the ending but the beginning of a. new Journey Back to the Stars into this. underworld who knows but you know we we. see this mythology pop up in our. earliest historical societies which goes. back 5,000 years think about the Book of. the Dead and the Egyptians or the. Tibetan Book of the Dead Or all these. classical Mysteries I spend all this. time researching that's the essential. question they're trying to answer is. what happens after death so to think. that a species that precedes us uh was.
asking the same questions and developing. rituals around it like completely upends. our notion of what it means to be human. because if the way we approach death is. not exceptional in the hominine world at. least then what is what else does that. say about us right and how did that get. started who was the first person to take. a body and go you know we should really. do something with this and why would. they do that yeah especially during the. time where you're basically spending. most of your time trying to eat and.
avoid. Predators yeah like that seems like an. immense undertaking to crawl through all. that and deposit bodies and your cooking. and lighting fires along the way it. seems like there had to be some. communication right so Lee looks at all. those data points and says on a bash. atly there's something like a culture. here a nonhuman culture and could be the. first nonhuman culture we found in. paleoanthropology it kind of makes sense.
though too that it shouldn't be just. human culture is the first culture like. if if you're experiencing these things. that are I mean if you're experiencing. what's the the remnants of these things. that were there before people it's not. like we just like I got an idea like out. of nowhere and we just all of a sudden. came up with all these ideas I mean they. they might have. been I mean how in intelligent do we. think this thing. was so I mean that's the crazy part so.
you couldn't really tell from some of. the the Recreations and what we think. they look like but their brain I didn't. mention this is the size of an orange oh. it's onethird the size of a homo sapiens. brain I kind of buried the lead that's. the shocking part of all this is that a. being with a brain onethird the size of. ours figures out this complex ritual but. is that should that still be shocking. when we know so much about crows M you. know crows are very smart like clever.
they play games they they know how to. solve puzzles they know how to drop. rocks into a water bottle to raise the. level of the water so they can drink. it they do they use tools to extract. food they they you ever seen uh crows. make cats start fights with each other. no they do it for sport like one crow. will like two cats are on Rival rooftops. and the crow will fly over and just be. just close enough to the cat the C can't.
get him and he kind of [ __ ] with him. and irritates him [ __ ] on purpose and. then he flies over to the other cat and. kind of [ __ ] with him and the cat's. like get out of here man so they're both. like they're heightened because they're. being [ __ ] with by this Crow and then he. kind of like coaxes these cats into a. fight and then these cats fight and they. fall off the roof watch this [ __ ] watch. this look at this look at this Crow he's. getting close he like hey [ __ ]. what's up hey hey [ __ ] what's up he. just gets just close enough see the.
cat's like get the [ __ ] out of here man. like he's he's [ __ ] with them and. every time the cat tries to move on him. he flies away and then the cat just. jumps on that other [ __ ] cat and they. start duking it out like look and he's. like sitting right next to it they fall. off the roof and the crow flies down. with him he's like yeah get him get's. still going it's fun for. him he's having a good time like there's. no evolutionary advantage to doing that. that's that's Blood Sport look and then. they fall down that that little.
boom cats are just going to war and that. that Crow is like yeah get him kick his. ass weird they're very very very smart. they've done all these studies where. they show that um if you give a crow a a. one siiz tool it will use that tool to. extract a larger tool and it'll use that. tool to get the food like they've done. all these like weird little mazes and. had crows solve them they're very ever. sneaky little [ __ ] tiny little brains.
so we're not exceptional well how about. octopi octopuses are very smart what the. [ __ ] are they you know they they found. that there's a a poisonous jellyfish. that uh it's very toxic jellyfish but. even though it doesn't have a brain it. has the ability to. learn that's something they just. recently discovered see if you can find. that it's pretty interesting it's like a. some just [ __ ] weird ass jellyfish. that it stings you you're [ __ ] but. this thing has the ability to learn. which is very surprising like it doesn't.
even have a brain like what okay so all. right what's learning then like where. where is memory is Are We Wrong about. where memories are stored scientists. provide evidence that tiny Caribbean box. jellyfish with lack which lack a central. nervous system can learn to navigate. through Mangrove. routes yeah it's interesting that just. came out yes couple weeks ago yeah so. what what is learning then I mean is it.
all do are we Silly by thinking it's in. the mind H is the mind and antenna is is. are there other antenna in the body is a. gut feeling a real thing you know you. know that expression gut feeling like. why why gut like what is. that maybe we focus on the brain too. much perhaps or well we know if you shut. the brain off the Consciousness shuts. off too so it makes sense MH that you. would con concentrate on that thing and.
it it is very big and it's very unusual. how quickly it grew there's there's a. lot of weirdness to the human brain the. doubling of the human brain size that's. like one of The Biggest Mysteries Ever. they don't know what the [ __ ] caused. that yeah from erectus uh to sapiens. like we were talking about over a period. of two million years yeah yeah double. but then you have these small brain. creatures in the meantime which are. doing exceptional things and so maybe. the increase in the brain isn't what we. should be focusing on at least not.
exclusively if brainless jellyfish can. learn and uh a hominid species with an. orange brain can develop complex rituals. around death yeah but there's also. clearly a correlation between the larger. brain and much more ability to. manipulate its environment m i mean the. the difference between what a human. being a homo sapiens capable of and like. we're amazed that they drag their body. into a hole in the ground you know we we. build rockets fly to outer space it's.
like a big difference in the weirdness. of what the the creative mind can. achieve in a homo sapien some of us yeah. some of us sure yeah yeah some not so. much yeah the brain hasn't done anything. for ditch diggers. too someone's going to dig ditches until. Ai and then you know that's what's going. to be interesting then you said our. successors take over our successors yeah. when President AI solves all the world's.
problems we just give in I don't know I. have faith in the human spirit I gave a. talk about this uh in in Paris a few. months ago about artificial versus. ancestral intelligence and I happen to. think that what homon lady was doing is. among some of the most intelligent. activity our species can uh get itself. busy with which is investigating this. notion of life and death. um I think that's that's what makes us. human is asking these big questions and.
trying to figure out the nature of. Consciousness and this is this is what. all these mystery religions were trying. to do I think there there was more. science than religion um I mean they're. called mystery religions but this was uh. the process of our ancestors trying to. figure out um the the secrets to the. universe in Antiquity and and for the. working hypothesis is that psychedelic. drugs and Altered States Of. Consciousness had something to do with. that ability to probe into uh into these.
Mysteries and I think that you know the. the caves also have a lot to do with it. like there there were caves constantly. um uh being used by well predecessor. species for sure but then also ancient. societies to enter into these profound. states of awareness going back into the. womb of the earth to really figure out. that border between life and death and. maybe navigate it maybe navigate. successfully this was this was the. Enterprise of of in Egypt is being able. to successfully navigate into the into.
the Afterlife again which is not a. beginning which is not an end but a. beginning this is how the Myst religions. always talk about about death and. befriending death and confronting all. mortality like I'm not sure if AI will. be able to to to Plum those Secrets the. way that we've been doing for all these. thousands of. years that's interesting I don't. think well why wouldn't it be able. to I mean it what it's essentially doing. well all human beings everyone that is.
listening to this and everyone who isn't. you're you're essentially riding on the. work of the people that came before you. we're we're all speaking a language that. other people invented we're using. mathematics that other people invented. we you know we live in structures that. other people invented that there's been. just this massive sea of human beings. before us that have innovated and. created but if AI can have access to.
everything they've ever learned and. everything they've ever. done and have an understanding of. biology and of subatomic. science in a at a level that the the. average human beings just not capable of. maybe it could understand a pattern that. we've missed maybe you can understand a. code that we've missed that this whole. thing is like there's there's some sort.
of an underlying code to the entire. universe and that it all works together. and you're experiencing it as a human. being riding the subway driving in your. car going to work you're experiencing. this very minute realm of this overall. experience that is all working together. through this code that's creating. everything I think AI could figure that. out. I think we're we're very limited because. we're talking about our own experience.
and we're talking about our own. biological mortality so we have this. window of time to sort things out M you. know like what is that quote. Enlightenment is possible within your. lifetime that we we have this very small. window it's 100 years if you're lucky. and during that 100e period you're. you're asked a lot if with this. primitive monkey B mind to try to figure. things out but if you didn't have that. if you didn't have that thing looming. over you maybe you'd have a more.
objective assessment of what's actually. going on like what this species is. actually doing like what it's here. for what is the what's your what's your. Takeaway on our biological mortality and. what we're doing here in light of your. most profound DMT. experiences uh I it would be just. guessing and talking [ __ ] yeah I don't. know I mean for us in our experience I. think the best thing you could do is. spread as much positivity as possible in.
every way you can be as charitable as. possible be as nice as possible spread. as much positivity as possible that. seems to be like a valuable lesson that. I get from all those experiences but. again we're everything we're doing is. based on the biological limitations of. our Consciousness and our life. experiences everything we're doing is. based on like who we are and who we. think we are and what what what mean. meaning it has for us that we're we're. here right now but if you didn't you.
weren't burdened down by all these. biological limitations if you were. burdened by this uh existential angst. and this fear of death and and this re. this we have this desire to figure it. out like to have like oh this is what's. going to happen we have this like this. this desire to have an answer to almost. the unanswerable M what if AI didn't. have those it's not going to have those.
problems it's just going to have. information it's just going to have just. pure information with no ego no desire. to survive no no greed no desire to. reproduce no no Envy it's going to be a. fascinating thing once it does happen. because it might be able to like quickly. figure out a lot of things that we've. been burdened by but we're looking at. these things through the limitations of. our biological experience and through. the ego which tells us that this. biological experience is uniquely.
important everyone thinks that they are. uniquely important but yet there's all. this evidence that you're not you're. you're a part of this very bizarre thing. but this very bizarre thing as it. interacts with each other is very. psychedelic like if you weren't a human. and you didn't and you you had no idea. what what human life is and you were. some other kind of Consciousness and you. took a drug and the drug LED you to. experience human life in a big city. you'd be like this is crazy what a drug.
if you just saw the lights going back. and forth on a highway and how similar. they look to like blood flowing through. arteries and you see these things that. are getting constructed it's like these. growths on the earth that this being is. creating like what is this [ __ ] wild. species doing you know I think we would. have a a more objective sense of it I've. said this too many times but I'll say it. one more time I think we're here to make. things I think our curiosity is all.
about Innovation that's the the primary. function that this species has if you. looked at it from afar you'd say look. what is this thing doing oh it's making. better stuff every year it always does. that no matter what it does it makes. unless it nukes itself into the Stone. Age which is always a threat because the. better stuff that it makes is often. weapons and it often gets better at. making money by utilizing those weapons. so it keeps doing that which is what. you're seeing all over the world right. now but I think if you looked at like.
the one thing it's doing it's making. better things and it's so wrapped up in. buying those better things materialism. is so rampant and everybody despite what. you have being more than enough you want. more and better and new things and that. fuels consumerism and consumerism fuels. more. Innovation and it's like baked into the. mentality sort of like I don't know if. bees know exactly what they're doing. when they're making a beehive but they. all make beehives you know they're all. they're all doing that same thing and.
human beings what we're doing is we're. we're at least working towards buying. these things that someone's making don't. you think human creativity is what makes. us uniquely human on top of all that our. ability to to Fashion things from. nothing uh to create music and beauty. and art um like you look at those those. scratch marks from 300,000 years ago and. then you go into the painted caves. 30,000 years ago uh and then you follow. the production of art throughout our. species you know I feel like that's I.
feel like that's the kind of thing that. AI won't be able to resolve for us theh. the process of what it means to engage. in a creative act and to produce. something that the whole species can. resonate with well it would the question. would be why would it want to do that. you know if it doesn't have those kind. of feelings that you have when you hear. a great song or see a great painting. like why would it want to do that right. and why do we want to do that do it for. each other well you you talk about.
creativity and and I think creativity is. the fuel of. innovation all things that we use today. whether it's a cell phone or a laptop or. whatever it is all of those things came. out of the imagination all those things. came out of someone's mind and I've. always wondered I wonder if ideas are. life forms like a type of life form like. a thing a an En energy that manifests. itself in the creation of actual.
physical objects and that it it gets. into your mind and it interacts with. your being and it talks you into making. a coffee. pot I mean doesn't it make sense all. these things that we have everything in. this room came out of someone's mind. everything see that that that's where I. think we have the edge on on on AI and I. think that we don't understand the. genius the Divine Genius of where that. creativity comes from I I collect. different quotes from like. musicians um talking about the creative. process Jamie I sent you a couple um.
there's in in the email there's one from. John frante he's the guitarist for Red. Hot Chili Peppers like I love listening. to musicians talk about where music. comes from and where inspiration comes. from because I think it's like it's one. lens that we can use to think about the. creative act in general like it it may. start with music it goes to everything. that's here it goes to the art of a. conversation it goes to Comedy it goes. to the way we make children. by the way which is a very a very. creative act and something that comes.
naturally to most of us like I think. that's what makes us human is that this. this H this ability to to translate. something that extends beyond our. physical bodies and then to embody it. whatever that it is fanti calls it the. force and then to make something of it. something that that that can resonate. with the community I think that's. something that AI will be able to do and. fits and starts but I'm not sure that we. understand the process and that's why I. think about the process of life and. death too that that's why I think that.
the thing that makes us human is the way. that we engage with those invisible. forces. yeah the way we engage with those. invisible forces yeah that I mean that's. what's it's unique about humans for sure. on Earth Jamie do you have that quote. from from John yeah what is the quote. it's a saying like it's a video I don't. know if you wanted to read it or play it. or what yeah you can play it. is expressing itself through our. existence I don't believe that a musical.
idea starts in your brain I believe it. starts at a place before that that we. don't have any direct contact with and I. believe that everything that we do. everything that we create is nature. expressing itself the same way that when. a flower grows out of the ground or A. Tree Grows out of the ground it's nature. expressing itself and you might say that. the tree is expressing Itself by the way. its branches move out but it's the force. that drives nature the tree is the. visible thing that appears to our senses. but I don't at all believe it's the. source of why everything is perpetuated.
all the time you know force that created. us that makes sense H yeah well most. comedians will tell you that jokes come. to them like like a gift like your your. mind just like a door opens up and like. here it is and you're like oh wow oh my. God what a great idea like these ideas. just pop into your head you see and. sometimes you see things and you Des. cribe them and you like and you the idea. will come from that but sometimes ideas.
just come to you they don't you don't. they don't even feel like you don't feel. responsible for them because it's not. like you dug a hole like this is the. hole I dug you do right you sit down and. write right you do the physical act of. summoning The Muse which is how. pressfield talks about it in the war of. art which is a great way to cuz it is. that whether or not the Muse is real if. you treat it as if it's real it will. show up. hm like if you show up every day and you. write you say I'm from 9:00 a.m. to noon.
every day I sit in front of my computer. and I write if you do that the ideas. will come they will come to you that's. crazy well where are they coming from. where is that yeah what is that thing do. you think AI can figure that out I don't. I don't think I'm not sure if we can. figure that out I don't know it's a good. question it's a good question like what. is the unique inspiration for ideas and. our desire to pursue them like what what. is it I think that's part of what makes. us innovate and that's part of like what.
you know if you were looking at us from. afar and you go what is this species. doing it's making things and how do you. make things without creativity you don't. you you wouldn't you would have no. desire to so there's the question about. AI it's like can you program that desire. to innovate into a thing without all of. the primate. characteristics that we possess we seem. to have this innate ability to do it in. a way that we know will resonate with. people have you ever like have you ever. read AI jokes yeah they're they're not.
inspired but they're real young it's. like a joke from a 5-year-old yeah. 5-year-old tells you a joke it's like my. daughter's really young one of her. favorite jokes was what kind of tree. grows in your hand I go I don't know she. goes a palm. [Laughter]. tree and she'd have this big long. punchline a palm tree when you're five. it's hilarious and I thought it was. really funny like that's a solid joke. but like that's a 5-year-old joke if you.
try to do that on stage at the. mothership on a Saturday night they be. like really you know that's kind of my. point man yeah so where do your jokes. come from but AI is Young is what I'm. saying yeah is AI is a 5-year-old. telling jokes when AI becomes a PhD from. Princeton you're going to be dealing. with a very different thing you know as. AI. becomes I just can't imagine. that the whatever it is that makes.
creativity because creativity is. absolutely inspired by our predecessors. as well there's a lot of uh I could. speak to Comedy there's a lot of styles. of Comedy that you go oh that guy's. clearly a Richard prior fan or that. guy's you know he's he's definitely been. influenced by Kennison he's definitely. been influenced by Jerry Seinfeld. there's something that we carry with us. from the people and you see it in music. as wellie R clearly influenced by HRI so. you see this as well but it's just.
couldn't it just do that couldn't it. just absorb all these patterns and then. come up with unique patterns that it. knows will resonate with people like if. you I think you could probably create. some [ __ ] jamming pop songs that are. just entirely AI created and you you. could use all the best voices because. you would just be able to voice swap. them you could have you doing them you.
could be singing the next lizo song it's. you know it can do weird things now and. some of those weird things are going to. resonate with people and become very. successful and then it'll figure out. what those things are okay so this Drake. song that I made is this got you know. four million listens on Spotify so now. we'll do this and now we'll make one. like that and now I'll add this and and. now I'll do something that people have. never figured out before and do that so. might be able to do the same thing that. cre creativity is capable of. accomplishing but it won't be done with.
the same sort of spirit and soul so it. won't be able to resonate with us the. same way as say like a Janice Joplin. song there's like there's something to. like couter Wall's voice there's certain. people that they have a thing in them. like you can't you can't fake that. whatever the [ __ ] that is like there's a. word for that they call a frisan have. you heard of that no son it's the it's. the term when you get like Goosebumps. from from music or when when music.
affects you in such a way like I I'm not. saying it's impossible but I think. humans at the moment are much better at. producing that effect than than than AI. oh for sure do you know cter Wallace. Jamie play Kate. McCannon there's this song Jamie turned. me on to this song and this dude is. singing he wrote and sing the song when. he was 21 years old and you you listen. you go what the [ __ ] this it's very rare.
that I'll listen to a song and just go. what the [ __ ] but listen to this. [Music]. okay. Raven a wicked bird his wings are black. as s. and he floats outside my prison.
window. Mark. [Music]. within SS to. me hell to where you. go you murder. K 21. [Music]. one this sounds like a 50-year-old.
Rancher this is the music video that. along with. [Music]. it long dream. [Music]. when she I meet she.
was prettiest girl in. [Music]. the good luck. AI you ain't going to make. this you never think of this that's the. point yeah it's not going to thing but. why is this is this as special to.
us so what we are is special to. us cuz we are us but it'll be the next. thing we have this snack for producing. things that we know will resonate with. us with our species yeah and what do. those things do they they motivate. movement they. motivate creativity they inspire you. they fuel you they're they're a a. strange drug it's an audible drug an. audio drug like it's great music is.
certainly a drug like you and I got to. see guns and roses live which is pretty. [ __ ] dope right that was pretty dope. in Athens have you told that story I. think I did yeah I think I did yeah you. came back to the table I went to the. bathroom yeah and you came back and you. said oh my God Axel Rose is here yeah. and I was like whoa where's he at you're. like he's right over there so you had to. walk by you know I tried to talk to him. right yeah you. tried you tried to say hi didn't go so.
well um I I saw him when I left to the. bathroom out of the corner of my eye I. saw him with the with a woman and I. thought oh that that's that that's Axel. and I went to the bathroom and I'd had a. margarita and a glass of wine. because because you peer pressured me. into drinking over. dinner it's my fault look how I'm. responsible for you you're a grown a. grown man so I made I made the choice to. have a glass of wine with dinner and so.
I was feeling pretty good and so I I I. saw him at the table so on the way back. I'm thinking I got I got to I can't not. say hi and so like in my mind I have. like a tuxedo and slicked hair and and a. martini asking if excuse me Axel we need. to chat but I think like it's not. impossible that I said Mr Rose like. excuse. me Mr Rose um and and The woman there. was like uh just I mean she just like. she didn't even say anything she just. waved waved me away and I thought okay I. mean I I would do the same thing if I.
were Axel and so I went back to the. table dejected and let you know that. Axel was still sitting there yes and. then my dilemma was do I say hi cuz I'm. like I don't know if he knows me I don't. know if he knows who I am you know I. don't want to be an idiot yeah I don't. want hi Axel like [ __ ] out of. here I try tried that especially if it's. like my first time meeting Axel Rose. I've been a fan of his for so long you. got to I think I used to work out to. Welcome to the Jungle in the 80s so that.
guy's been famous since I was like 21. years old I I 22 when how when when did. Welcome to the Jungle come out Appetite. for. Destruction ' 87 or I think it was '87 I. remember very clearly being in the gym. the first time I heard it I was lifting. weights at this place and uh Welcome to. the Jungle I was like oh my God a. [ __ ] song7 1987 yeah that makes sense. I remember um standing on the pool table.
of my neighbor uh Ryan down the street. and playing with whiffle ball bats and. air guitaring Welcome to the. Jungle when I was eight so luckily he. knew who I was he actually knew my. comedy he was asking me questions about. some jokes and I loved this bit and I. was like oh God thank God cuz you went. in with confidence by the way you you. forget that part dude we we walked in. and like I did the wrong thing and you. walked in with total confidence idence. and you stuck your arm into the booth. and said hi like you didn't give him a.
chance not to say hi I did is that what. I did you drunk. [Laughter]. too I I just got lucky he knew who I was. you went it was full confidence with the. Joe Rogan tattoos you went right into. his face and said hey man hey man and. like he stopped for a second cuz it was. odd and he's like oh hey man yeah he. knew you he knew you immediately that. was what a relief That was cuz you don't. know you don't know if someone [ __ ]. with you you know it's it's weird it's.
weird to like assume that this very. famous person knows who you are he was. super cool he was very cool and he asked. what you were doing there yeah and you. said I'm here with my family and he said. oh this is your family pointing to. me like no this this is Brian you're. very nice like he wrote this thing he's. a he's a he's a writer um and he told. him the hypothesis and axel like he gave. me the best T-shirt for the book he's. like okay cool so everybody got high and. made. democracy pretty much it's pretty much.
what we think Axel pretty much yeah then. he invited us to the show which was. super dope and but you know that what I. was getting to is like when you hear. like Welcome to the Jungle your whole. body goes wow it's like a drug it's a. drug that human beings have invented for. ourselves there's something about music. that like music when you're tired like. say if you're on a treadmill or. something you're tire and a good song. comes on you're like [ __ ] yeah it gives. you an extra gear inspiration through.
music is very much like uh a. performance-enhancing drug it does. something to you it motivates people to. dance Mo you know when someone hears a. good song like [ __ ] that let's get on. the dance floor it's like the music like. does something to you your being it. interfaces with whatever the [ __ ] you. are in some very very special way but it. only does it to us like why would the. universe think that that's interesting. like does it don't animals dance to.
Human music there must there must be. videos of animals dancing to Human music. there's definitely some videos of dogs. dancing but I've always wondered if. they've been trained to dance why does. that make you smile cuz it's cool it's. cool to see dogs dance I wish my dog. could dance but they you know but. animals are so especially dogs in. particular they're so tuned into people. in some weird way like my dog. understands English like I could say. yeah I problem today but everyone was at. the house and he was having fun there's. a deer in our backyard there was a lot. of drama today there was a deer with a.
broken leg in my backyard oh man yeah um. yeah some poor little Buck a little. young buck and um I was uh get it was in. the morning it was like 7 o'clock in the. morning everyone's getting ready to go. to school I made a cup of coffee I uh I. let the dog back in and he hadn't seen. it so he's like chilling on the back. porch and uh I let him in and I look. over over there it looks like a [ __ ]. statue it's a buck just standing there I. mean like 40 ft from me and I'm like why.
is there a deer there and then I close. the door girls girls girls come here. check this out and then I look at the. way he stand and go ooh his back leg's. broken he's got uh his shin is fractured. his back like where your your shin would. be it's bending back the wrong way it's. it's broken and so called animal. protection and they didn't know what to. do and so we're we're literally trying. to find them an animal veterinarian to. fix this deer's leg which is just so. crazy cuz I shoot deers and I eat them.
but you feel bad for this one for that. one it was like he's first he's very. young I would never shoot him he's a. little young fell he's just it looks. like a yearling like he's just got his. horns for the first time and he's like. really confused and he's hurt he can't. and he's in my yard because I guess he's. like safer there and so the dog finally. does find him and when the dog finds him. he's he's like kind of jumping around. him and bouncing and like you want to. play like what and the deer can't run so. he's just standing there going hey you. going to eat me like what's going on.
here and it was it was very interesting. but he know like my dog I can say come. on man cut this [ __ ] get inside and he. goes inside or I can say don't go out. this door we're going to go to the other. door okay he just goes to the other door. like I can say things like that like he. knows like I say not that door dude the. other one and he'll start going towards. the other door it's very weird like I. say you want to watch TV and he goes. into the TV room and like he waits for. me to plop up on the couch then he hops. up next to me like he he speaks English. or he knows English he just can't talk.
it's a golden yeah yeah so animals. whatever the intelligence that they have. like whatever the [ __ ] they're tuning. into it's a a comprehension of language. I think Beyond just like saying words. that they respond to like you want to go. for a walk you know and the dog pops up. they're just recognizing the word walk. no I think they understand like speech. they understand tone they understand. what you mean they understand when. you're in trou when they're in trouble. did you did did you [ __ ] [ __ ] on the. carpet dude you know.
like did I they run away they know. things but they don't seem to give a. [ __ ] about. music you know dogs don't they won't. they won't calm down if you play calming. music supposedly they do and. unfortunately now that it's in my. [ __ ] YouTube algorithm because uh he. was freaked out because of the um uh. thunderstorms that were happening he was. like and so uh my wife said oh there's. this music that you can play for the dog. and it calms them so there's YouTube.
channels so now every time I turn on my. YouTube app I get calming dog. songs I don't even know if they work how. does anybody know if they work ask your. dog yeah he's not going to answer that's. the problem but the the the act of. moving the body to music is uniquely. human yeah I mean what other animals. dance to music let's find that out. chimpanzees don't I don't think so boy. they're smart as [ __ ] though yeah.
they're spooky smart when you watch them. solve puzzles for candy mhm you know. they gave uh chimps money they taught. them that if they take this money they. this thing these tokens and give it to. this person or put it in this thing they. would give them candy you know the first. thing they did was they gave it to the. female chimps and they had sex with. them they like immediately engaged in. stuff oh that's old that's an old study. that's from a long time ago I've just.
been always fascinated by chimpanzees I. mean they're one of the most bizarre. relatives to us that's still around. you've seen chimp Nation yeah on that. amazing right like God so fascinating. yeah but I don't think they. dance do you think they do I think they. have rhythm yeah yeah they move around. there's videos of them um doing some. some ritual oh I think ritual some. rhythm. so what is this look at he's break. dancing that having a good time that's.
dancing is that what he's doing is there. music. playing but is that real is that the. real music that seems like that's added. after the fact yeah look he's doing fast. steps look how long his arms are is that. crazy it's just crazy that that's we. come from the same original route we it. branched in a bunch of different ways. yeah but 7 million years ago that's. what's fascinating is that they're still. here they're still here in that form.
which is the dumbest anti-evolution. question ever if we came from monkeys. why are monkeys still. here it's a good question well why are. amoeba still here sir yeah you know why. is anything still here why are we still. here yeah well but some things can. function in the state they are and they. don't need to adapt that's why. crocodiles are they've been the same. forever you know sharks existed before. trees hm sharks predate trees sharks are.
so old they've been along for so they're. I think they're 50 million years older. than trees but trees are pretty old to. begin with mhm. yeah I think sharks are somewhere in the. neighborhood of like 300 something. million years old and trees are 50. million years less what is it yeah there. it is sharks have been swimming our. oceans much longer than trees have been. swaying in the breeze on land. the birth of trees on Earth is believed. to have occurred roughly 370 390 million.
years ago that Mak sharks at least 10. million years older than trees oh so I. was off by 40 million but yeah older. than trees miss your calling as an. evolutionary biologist not really no no. I just like interesting. information but especially about things. like that you know like sharks the. cleanup crew of the ocean that's a like. how do you manage a just just vast. literal sea of life that moves in 3D. space it just moves all over the place. and things are going to die and what. happens to them sharks this massive.
Beast that has to keep moving or it dies. and it's so old and it it's designed. just for killing and eating and it has. rows of replaceable teeth and the only. bones that it has at all are this. massive jaw bone and these ridiculous. razor sharp saws that just slice things. in half and it just roams the ocean. looking to.
consume have you ever had a shark. encounter I've had sharks bite fish off. my line but I've never like had a shark. encounter like was like Jesus this a. shark no um have I seen them in the wild. I do not know I don't think I have I. don't think I've seen a shark like. swimming through the water seen a lot of. dolphins a lot of whales I don't think. I've ever had a physical en counter with. a shark have you dreamed about. sharks not really what do you psychology. what the [ __ ] is going the guys are a.
shrink now what happened where where'. regular Brian go I'm curious about your. mind I dream about wolves that's I'm. getting somewhere with this yeah I dream. about wolves a lot really yeah what do. you dream about running from wolves. you're running from Wolves yeah why are. wolves chasing you I think wolves chased. people a lot I think some people got. away and I think that genetic memory. gets imparted in some folks I have a. high percentage of Neal DNA you know.
when they do 23 and me yeah 57% more. than regular people wow yeah so you were. chased by lots of w I think ancient. people I think I think most ancient. people that's what the big bad wolf and. through like Little Red Riding Hood all. those ancient stories of wolves were all. because they were killing people like. wolves wolves have always prayed on. human beings it's always been a part of. human existence until we eradicated them. and now we're bringing them back which.
is to me wild like have you guys thought. this through like there's a reason why. we were so scared of them forever but. then we forgot being forgot what it's. like to be scared of them like oh well. if they did get too many we'll just kill. them again like no you won't how do we. domesticate them in the first place you. don't domesticate wolves how did it. happen make dogs how where did dogs come. from [ __ ] wolves that's what it is. [ __ ] wolves that were willing to. come near us in the fire and then we. give them a little food and then they. they realize that they could be our.
friend they can get food they don't have. to hunt and then we use them to protect. the Outer Perimeter and to keep Bears. out and things like that and cats away. from people that if the Wolves stayed. close things didn't want to get near the. wolves and so they would avoid us and as. long as we kept that kind of a. relationship you know they've done these. uh studies with foxes where they've had. wild foxes and in a small period of time. every time they had an aggressive Fox at. all they killed that fox and they kept. these domesticated foxes and over time.
their ears flopped their eyes got bigger. they became more appealing to us more. submissive they basically became dogs. over a very short period of time see if. you find that fox study it's very. interesting that's probably what. happened with Wolves I think the wolves. that realize like hey you know it's hard. out there you know running a pack and. being an alpha and getting cast out and. like maybe I could just get near these. other things and I could get a little.
bit of their leftovers like if they do. really well like maybe they get a. buffalo or something like that they kill. a bison that's a large animal they're. not going to be able to eat at all. they're going to leave like a little bit. for me and they're probably not going to. eat the bones and wolves Crush bones and. so like maybe they sort of develop this. sort of. relationship because wolves are very. curious of people too they come near. people and they're fascinated by people. but. the problem is when they want to eat you. and that does happen and it's always. happened it it's always happened.
throughout history in fact in World War. I there was actually a ceasefire between. the Russians and the Germans because so. many of them were getting killed by. wolves that they decided to stop. shooting each other and kill the wolves. and then go back to killing each. other you ever heard about that one yeah. well because it's trench warfare right. so people getting shot and you know when. you're getting shot you're you're dying. in this trench and sometimes these guys.
would just get overwhelmed by wolves. like wolves would find them in there and. just tear them apart so imagine you're. you know you're in trench warfare in. World War I and you're hearing in the. middle of the night people screaming and. you they're just getting torn apart by. Wolves they would send out parties and. like search parties and you know they. would find no one would come back and. then they would go out and they'd find a. boot with a human foot in it and like. what the [ __ ] and they realize oh my God. these wolves are killing people and they.
were in large packs cuz they were. feeding on the bodies from the war you. know the war back then is just. unbelievably brutal it's very close. range you know you're you're not dealing. with you know longdistance missiles. you're dealing with people like. literally creeping up on each other and. shooting each other with rifles it's. horrible horrible [ __ ] and they're not. that good at killing people so a lot of. times it kills you low and so these. people are dying in these trenches and. getting eaten by Wolves and the Wolves. decide that they're a primary food.
source now why would I chase caribou and. reindeer when I can just eat. people this explains your strange dreams. yeah well I think human beings have. always been afraid of monsters right. what is that like children that like um. ruer chel has talked about this children. that grow up in New York City are not. afraid of uh things that they probably. should be afraid of you know they're not. afraid of child molesters they're not. afraid of they don't know what that is.
right but they they know what a monster. is like a monster is in their head like. kids are scared of the dark it's because. of cats like we used to get eaten by. cats all the time so like a giant part. of being a an ancient hominid was. probably avoiding predation from cats MH. I mean there's been so many even. eagles they found uh evidence of human. beings that were killed by like that was. that big eagle that lived in h New. Zealand they think they the reason why. that thing went extinct I think it's.
called The Host Eagle it was an enormous. eagle that they think probably prayed on. human. beings which is like what a [ __ ] up. way to go a hand glider comes down and. takes you out with its. Talons like a bird the side of of a hand. glider yeah um so I was looking up the. Russian it's the Russian Fox yeah. experiment I was finding a bunch of. articles about it like we've talked. about before but then one of them I said. said there was a new study which this. say is from 2019 that might not counter.
it specifically but has a different. understanding of what was happening. maybe I was trying to read through it. and it just says that like what his. final result was might not actually be. what was happening with the. domestication well let's let's read this. part right here it says the Russian Farm. Fox experiment's best known experimental. study in animal domestication by. subjecting a population of foxes to. selection for tameness alone Dimitri BV. um generated foxes that possess a suite.
of characteristics that mimics those. found across domesticated spe species. this domestication Syndrome has been a. central focus of research into the. biological Pathways modified during. domestication here we chart the origins. of how do you say his name baliev you. think how you would know better than me. man how how would you say that name BV. BV foxes in Eastern Canada and critical. and critically assess the appearance of. domestication syndrome traits across. animal.
domesticates uh our results suggest that. both the conclusions of the farm Fox. experiment and the ubiquity of. domestication Syndrome have been. overstated to understand the process of. domestication requires a more. comprehensive approach based on. essential adaptations to human modified. environments so what they did though. this this is interesting so they're. saying there's like more to it than just. this study but what they did do in this. study was pretty fascinating that's. right so starting with 30 male and 100.
female silver foxes from the Soviet fur. Farms he selectively bred foxes who. responded less fearfully when a hand was. inserted into their cage the ofre. repeated narrative was that just with. just 10 generations of selection on on. wild foxes he produced foxes who craved. human attention and exhibited a range of. unconnected phenotypes including floppy. ears turned up Tails pie balled coats. diestrus reproductive cycles and later.
shorter and wider faces BV did I say. right BV BV proposed that the selection. of behavior altered the regulation of. multiple interconnected systems that. produce the traits Darwin described H in. 10 Generations yeah that's pretty crazy. so in whatever Generations from camp. fire to poodle campfire to Shibu enu. from campfire to Chihuahua we did that.
slowly but surely over time but that's. you know the root of all I mean they. only found that out over the last few. decades they used to think that dogs. were probably the ancestors of their. ancestors probably wild hom wild um dogs. rather wild canids but then they found. no no it's not wild canines it's [ __ ]. wolves they all came from wolves all of. them all dogs came from wolves just like.
what a pug yeah yeah selective breeding. over time created something barbaric. something mon this is kind of uh. necessary too I think to know whates it. say this part it says that it's a. misunderstood that he found these were. like wild foxes when he first got them. and they were not right they're f farm. boes yeah that's what they were saying. right what was the misrepresentation. that people think that he'd found uh uh.
oh that he W wild yeah whatever yeah oh. so the they were already bred for. Furs purpose bread it says yeah purpose. bread so they probably already were. subject to a certain amount of selective. breeding right I I mean yeah if you're. trying to breed it for a fur then you're. looking for a specific coat and yeah so. they probably yeah they probably yeah. fed them. domesticated like you ever seen. domesticated deer just eaten out of. people's. hands yeah there's a weird thing with.
the domesticated deer world do you know. this no I come here to learn about. animals so this deer right here that's. on the table that is the first deer I. ever shot that's a wild mule deer from. Montana yeah that's from the Missouri. breaks Wild Country I mean like it's. where you see homesteads out there that. are like from you know the 1700s and. 1800 of people just didn't survive and. they had these just old buildings that. were falling apart they're littered out.
there there's a bunch of them out there. it's a really fascinating place but that. is a typical wild deer like a few years. old he's probably like four years old or. something like that they make deers in. these deer farms where they feed them. these protein tablets and so like a big. deer a really big deer is a 200 in Deer. and what that means means is the antlers. of the deer like there's big bodies. that'll be about 300 lb for like a mu. deer a really big one their bodies are.
big but then their antlers are this. massive [ __ ] structure on their head. of bone that grows quicker than anything. in the wild is the quickest bone that. grows that we're aware of in all of. nature is an elk or a stag or or even. deer this [ __ ] grows so quick it's just. a couple months and all a sudden this m. they they drop their horns at the uh. when you know the end in during the. winter and then these new ones in the.
spring just and within months they grow. so with these Farms they're taking these. animals and then giving them these. Preposterous diets that would just never. exist in the wild and they have a deer. with like 350 inch antlers like that. jeez they just gross it's is weird it's. weird what they're doing so they're. selectively breeding for genetics and. then on top of that they're feeding them. this crazy diet and then they're letting. them loose in these high fence areas and. people shoot them and they hang them on.
their wall like a trophy and almost all. Hunters have the same reaction was. like they're gross it's like something. gross about it yeah it's like something. about but people who like look at that. 300 inch deer I shot like people that. don't give a [ __ ] that's what they want. they want the biggest antlers so it's a. very controversial thing in like the. wildlife conservation community and it's. also a way that CWD gets spread. unfortunately how because these wild.
deer come in contact with these deer. that have been captive and these deer. that are captive may be carrying CWD and. then they put these deer out in the wild. they hop fences they get out there and. then CWD spreads and it's a real issue. and especially with white tails and. they're seeing it in mu deer as well but. it's chronic wasting disease is what it. is and it's horrific and it there there. saliva uh gets on plants and then with. other animals eat the plants and they. get it much like how uh bison give.
cattle brucelosis like C cattle Farmers. have a real problem with wild bison. getting onto their range because if the. the Bison contain brucelosis then their. entire their all of their flock could. they could all have brucelosis and. die this is the thing with CWD and a lot. of it comes out of this captive uh canid. or captive uh uh deer there's like Farms. that they it's like that it's a whole. business this business of raising these.
captive deer it's real. weird it's very unnatural because you do. and then they let them loose like the. with these big stupid antlers it's just. you know like if you see an elk a wild. Elk's antlers like that that is there. because they're they're fighting each. other and they're smashing heads and the. bigger the antlers the more impressive. they are for the females and the more. they can fight off the males and it it's. there's an evolutionary reason for that. for this is just some freak that's been.
given steroids and a bunch of. protein. yeah I don't know how we got to that I. mean me neither I'm trying to figure. that out yeah well I just we're talking. about domestication yeah domestication. and its effects yeah the the wolf one is. one of the most fascinating ones now. that we know that all dogs come from. Wolves yeah it's really interesting to. watch how species will adapt over time. and then wonder what is happening to us. cuz clearly it's a very similar thing is.
happening to us yeah and if anything. should remind us. or in any way if we're similar to any. animal in the variety of sizes and. shapes like it would be dogs like human. beings vary so. widely and that's and we are. domesticated we're self-d domesticated. you know but we're clearly. domesticated and that process started a. long time ago remember the homeown a. lady that I showed you so what they know.
about them is they had um canines um. like you and me obviously but so in the. primate world the canines are much. bigger obviously because when you when. you bear your teeth you're meant to be. threatening yes obviously so what they. realize about homon lady is that they. had smaller canines so instead of using. them to to threaten others what they. realized is that they were such a size. that they were using them to smile wow. so they they were smiling they were the. first ones to show their teeth as a nice. thing that's a nice thing they were. smiling 300,000 years ago.
wow wow. so why wouldn't they have Canin chimps. have canines gorillas have canines and. they kind of use their teeth to smile a. little too chimps seem to they seem like. when they're having fun they they when. they're laughing they see like chimp. seem to laugh right yeah like and they. they show their teeth and it doesn't. seem like they always show their teeth.
in a threatening. way right like that dude's smiling for. sure that dude's smiling I mean come on. look at him looks like a school photo he. is 100% smiling. yeah yeah it seems like they they smile. and they have canines yeah they got K9. they're they're certainly larger than. ours but it's also like you saw that. like is that a smile I mean I don't know. what the [ __ ] that is I'm getting out of. there it's ambiguous get click on that. one with the waist up right above you.
right yeah look at that are you I mean. Jesus. Christ you imagine seeing that in the. wild you be like oh my God I'm so. [ __ ] that's terrifying that's a happy. he found dinner I think I don't know. about yeah he's ready to [ __ ] you. up yeah that's a what a crazy thing that. just the fact that they still exist is. we're so fortunate to be able to observe. and watch these very humanlike patterns.
that we see in terms of like their. social structures and how they manage. them and how there is like one leader. and how they'll Branch off into separate. groups they even wage war on each other. they fight over territories and food. it's so interesting it's so interesting. because they're so like us but then so. not like that thing is kind like that. show that picture again it's kind of. like us but God that thing's. terrifying I mean look at his face if he.
was mad at you oh my God that would be. so. horrible and their eyes and some of them. uh have white around the eyes that was. something they showed in the uh the. chimp Nation documentary which is really. interesting too because he's got animal. eyes I mean he's terrifying this one. right here but some of them they have. almost like you can almost like you look. into their eyes and you see like a. motion. M very fascinating species do have you.
uh studied at all the The Hobbit people. from the island of Flores the. floresiensis yeah yeah that's another. that's another strange one like lady. because it it it disrupts the The. Narrative about the the doubling of the. human brain size as if there's this. constantly escalating Trend in One. Direction yeah so you see the fienis and. the lady occupy these these strange. places yeah questioning whether or not. it's it's the physical brain or. something else that imputes intelligence. yeah yeah what about the hobbits well.
it's interesting that they coexisted. with humans because they they're fairly. recent right what what is the timeline. for those uh definitely when saens was. around yeah what is the what's the um. most recent carbon dating on those uh. homo florenci. Enis I think it's less than 100,000. years and they think those things had. tools they think um there was a lot of.
dispute as to whether or not they were. just misformed or deformed human beings. they there was a lot of dispute as to. whether or not this was a unique branch. of the human chain but they think it is. now and they think they're all they're. probably also subject to Island dwarfism. you know like uh mammals are but for. some reason with reptiles it goes the. other way what's the age on fasis. I was trying to find an updated article. this article is from last month so. assisting okay initial carbon dating of.
the sediment determined the remains to. be 18,000 years old wow which is. startlingly Young putting the previous. unknown species closer in time to us. than. neanderthals uh the date was revised in. 2016 estimating instead that The Hobbit. was 50,000 to 60,000 years old. interesting I wonder what changed and. wonder what they got out of the first. one the specimen was just wrong in about. five different ways and unexpected to. the point of people thinking like this.
can't be possible said Paige Madison a. historian of paleoanthropology and. science writer is currently working on a. book about The Hobbit titled strange. creatures Beyond count to be published. in. 2025 H that's still pretty recent though. I mean the grand 50,000 is pretty recent. I wonder why they thought it was 18 and. why they changed that 18 is more magical. it's closer that's Magic yeah that's. like well do you know about the oring. pend deck M the oring pend deck is a a. mythical creature that they people have.
spotted in Vietnam and in some other. places of the world rejected name what's. that they rejected they were going to. use that name first but they had to. reject Flores anus yeah me flower anus. flower anus oops oh boy yeah you can't. say that I wonder why they did that. um but the oring pendek is a very. similar creature that has been talked. about by uh indigenous people and people.
that live in the jungle and they insist. that it's a real thing it's a tiny hairy. little human that is very similar to. these Hobbit people and you know the. speculation like you know from the. crypto zoology people is that this thing. is still alive in very small populations. yeah there's some [ __ ] videos that. like show one running across the road. you ever seen that video M it looks fake. right for sure yeah it looks fake do you.
think the gimlin footage is is real. Patterson gim footage 100% fake fake. yeah it looks fake everything that looks. fake is fake is it a a person in a suit. yeah 100% yeah yeah it's guy walking a. guy in a suits yeah 100% although I did. get really high once and I was convinced. that it was really Bigfoot and I was. being an [ __ ] all this time I was. like oh my God what if that really is. Bigfoot i' just been a dick cuz somebody. these. hardcore Bigfoot Believers that's their. footage the Patterson but there's so. many problems with that first of all. Roger Patterson literally got arrested.
for writing a bad check to pay for the. camera that he used to film that they. went there specifically to film it um. the guy uh Bob heronimus who says he was. Bigfoot when you see him walk he's this. big old gangly Cowboy looking dude when. you see him walk he walks exactly like. that Bigfoot thing you think it was him. 100% huh yeah they even have the a. receipt from a [ __ ] gorilla suit that.
they bought have you ever seen him. walking side by side find a video of Bob. heronimus walking side by side with the. original Patterson footage so they show. the Bigfoot walking and then Bob walking. and you're like oh like I mean cuz he's. he he looked like a Bigfoot the guy was. a [ __ ] you know there's dudes a big. old Cowboy looking dudes big old [ __ ]. Farm Country Strong dudes they look like. apish they're just big old [ __ ] and.
this guy was one of those guys and you. see him walking and you see him walking. and it's he walks right you know they. they they superimpose it they put side. by side rather and when they do it you. you go oh yeah definitely what a. disappointment do you want to believe. that it's real no I don't want to. believe did you ever believe it was real. when I was eight yeah yeah. and when you're nine you're like get the. [ __ ] out of here yeah but my God there's. people to this day those hardcore. hardcore Bigfoot people are cult members.
they really are they they they they. decide to shut off a part of their brain. that critically looks at information. aren't there any eyewitnesses who strike. you as as credible I was talking to um. Les stoud about this you know Les I was. talking to Les once about this I think. yeah Les he's a very credible guy in. terms of like survival tactics he knows. a lot about that but his he didn't see.
one with his own eyes he heard something. and he heard noises that sounded. chimpanzee. like Bears make those noises all the. time I've seen Bears make those I've. watched Bears make those noises they. make them particularly when they're. fighting with each other they sound very. much like gorillas. they're they do that all the time so if. you were alone in the the woods and you. heard that and you heard smashing and. thumping around you're like oh my God. there's a gorilla out there oh my God. there's some kind of a primate out there.
there have been people that have spotted. things that are very eerily similar to. what you would think is a large bipedal. ape the problem is a lot of these P. places are heavily wooded and populated. by bears and bears walk on two legs all. the time so here there's Bob and there's. the Bigfoot right I mean case closed. right I never saw that I mean look at. that. dude look isn't he like what I said big.
old country dude yeah I mean you see. that guy walking and you imagine him. with a a [ __ ] gorilla suit. on I mean it doesn't even doesn't even. look good it looks like. [ __ ] I mean look look at that thing it. looks like a guy in a gorilla suit and. in my opinion everything that looks fake. is fake. I've never seen anything that looks fake. that's real I mean I could be wrong. yeah I don't know I don't know what that.
is yeah but I definitely know that the. guy that that there's like there's a. whole paper trail of buying a gorilla is. that what he saying that's the suit I. honestly don't know I've never seen this. video I was trying to find the side by. side I was having a hard time finding it. and this is the one I picked and okay so. he's saying that that's what he wore but. that thing does look like if you go back. to that video that photo of where he's. holding up that suit that looks pretty. [ __ ] similar man pretty [ __ ]. similar and all you'd have to do is put. that thing on and walk through the woods.
and it's just too convenient all of It's. too convenient that the fact that the. guy went looking for it and found it and. filmed it and you know the whole thing's. corny it's corny data matters data does. matter and there's no real data in terms. of um genetics you know there's been a. lot of like goofy talk that they found. like some kind of human DNA and samples. of hair the problem with that is all. that all that DNA's been contaminated I.
actually talked to an actual biologist. about this and we we did an episode of. uh Joe Rogan questions everything for. the Sci-Fi channel on Bigfoot we hung. around with Bigfoot Hunters Duncan and I. went out with them and looking for. bigfoot and camping with them and. everything and I I just it's people that. are just looking for something you know. and some of them have had experience. some of them have said they've seen. things but it just all of it just reeks. of. horeshit and it's unfortunate because I.
think at one point in time it was real I. think most certainly at one point in. time human beings did interact with. gigantopithecus it was a real animal you. know about that and gigantopithecus. matches exactly like what people talk. about when they talk about Sasquatch it. looks exactly like that and then ormous. bipedal homonid that was you know maybe. more than 8T tall and they found out. about this thing by accident when a guy.
was uh looking in an apothecary shop in. China and he found gigantic teeth that. were clearly primate teeth he like. where'd you find these and they go there. and they go to the site they they dig. out jawbones that indicate it was. bipedal and so now they know it's a real. thing that existed and they I think they. date that to when do they. date I think they date that to 100 ,000. years ago when did they date. gigantopithecus. to Wikipedia Wikipedia says roughly 2. million to 350,000 years ago 350,000 I.
thought it was closer thought it was. closer to to us um that's just what. Wikipedia says I see if there's other. disputes or something yeah see if it. because i' read that these date that the. carbon date that they did on these teeth. I think they said that that was. somewhere in the neighborhood of aund. and something thousand years ago so that. would put it you know with semi. modern looking human beings M so the. question isern right and then the. question is. like how long did it survive like just.
because you find something you find like. I say if you find one that's 200,000. years old doesn't mean it didn't exist. 100,000 years ago or even 50,000 years. ago like when was the last one when did. they die off and when did humans. encounter them and if you look at their. range like if they found them in Asia. and then you look at the bearing land. mass and you you look at where where. does it drop off well it drops off in. the Pacific Northwest like that's like. literally like goes down Alaska makes. its way down the coast dense forest.
which is where a thing like that so. proteins extracted from roughly 1.9. milliony old tooth of the Appley named. gigantopithecus is a close relative to. mon. orangutans so protein comparisons. amongst living fossil Apes suggest that. gigantopithecus and orangutan. forerunners diverg from a common. ancestor between 10 and 12 million years. ago jeez but when did it die off it says. the same thing it says they hadn't found.
from the late plasticine era they only. have this from the early part of it okay. so it said the fossils date from around. 2 million to almost 300,000 years ago. the sizes of individual teeth and Jaws. indicate that it weigh between 200 and. 300 kilograms that's a big. [ __ ]. interesting so that was that was Bigfoot. the so if humans did make it to the. point where we had language and the. ability to communicate ideas they.
probably would communicate about all. these creatures that they encountered. and that would be one of them yeah but. the actual like Patterson footage. Bigfoot that's. horseshit there's just too many Hunters. out there too many hikers who would have. seen something yeah they don't see. anything I've talked to many people that. have spent like they've spent months in. the backr Woods I know multiple guys. that do like my friend Adam green tree. from Australia every year he comes to.
America and he'll do uh a a remote. Wilderness elk hunt solo and he he live. streams it he puts it like pieces of it. on his Instagram and he was out there. for 28 days he did see a grizzly bear a. couple years back which is not supposed. to be there in the San Juan mountains of. Colorado but that's close to Wyoming and. Wyoming is a a habitat for Grizzlies and. it makes sense that Grizzlies would go. across the border and make their way in. there and there's been historical.
sightings of things that people thought. were grizzly bears there but no. bigfoots none zero you think somebody. would get a camera footage shot of it. like from these trail cams or camera. traps or something I mean nothing and. you personally never heard or. experienced anything no like a big. you don't think I would say that. first that' be the first thing May. holding out Joe no I've never even seen. a wolf I mean I I think I did see a wolf.
once in Alberta but it was uh very very. dark it was like it was getting dark at. night and I saw something run across the. road it looked like dog sized I thought. possibly could be a wolf M um but they. have wolves up there they spot them. there all the time that's not uncommon. the Bigfoot thing is just it's just one. of those Legends you know like the yeti. and we we know too much about about the. world night what's C can I have some. yeah please we know too much about. what's really in the world now to fall. for something like that it's my first uh.
my first coffee in a while oh really I. think so how long at least a year what. yeah really this is probably going to be. wild Michael pollen said that he took. three months off of caffeine and then. the first cup of coffee he had was like. psychedelic so Cheers Cheers man cheers. to you thanks to. that what kind of coffee is it Black. Rifle coffee. H how you feel I feel. crazy feel wild ready to go into a. trance it's been a while man I gave it.
up um sometime last year what made you. just want to sip right now um watching. mejoy it it is peer pressure just like I. got you drink like in. aens it was that. Margarita margaritas will do it yeah. Margarita has been responsible for more. bad decision- making than probably any. other beverage you don't drink that much. though no no no no I I like a couple of. drinks every now and then though I you. know it's one of those things it's just. not good for your health you know and.
I'm very conscious of my health so I. realized that yeah it really hit me last. year I got Co last uh last summer um and. I'm not sure what the connection was but. just my body felt terrible for like at. least at least a month or so and then I. couldn't I just couldn't get back to. myself and so I quit I quit alcohol um. and caffeine coffee for sure uh and I. felt a lot actually felt a lot better A. lot better A lot so Co really got you. bad it got me really bad I was sick for.
I mean I was in bed for definitely a. week or two and then I had like um just. persistent kind of Mala for at least a. couple. months uh and that went on through most. of last year wow so when I stopped so. long co uh what they call long that's. what it felt like man yeah I mean. obviously I never had a diagnose but. it's what is it's a weird term right. because it's kind of big what does that. mean you know it's like people get. wrecked by the disease and then they. don't seem to recover very well and and.
return to their robust. self and why why is it get some people. how come some people get sick and they. get over it can I ask you about your. vitamin. intake yeah it's pretty poor I mean so. after so last summer I started uh taking. a lot more vitamin d and vitamin C and. eonia uh but that's Bas that's basically. it yeah yeah that's not enough I know. it's you know you can take things that. cover your bases like there's a there's. a product called ag1 athletic greens. it's nice because you just mix it in.
water Little Packet pour it in water or. you get like a like a scoop of it and. put it in water and mix it up every day. yeah but it's easy it doesn't taste bad. tastes good and uh but you do need. Vitamin D and you should also take. vitamin D with vitamin K2 it helps your. body absorb but you should be taking a. host of things you should be taking. colloidal minerals you should be taking. essential fatty acids like if you want. to optimize your your body's ability to. recover and uh to be able to perform you.
really need to supplement and. supplementation I think is something. that many people have maligned that do. not experience it when you talk to. doctors all you need is a balanced diet. and those doctors always have pot. bellies and they look like. [ __ ] if you talk to someone who's a fit. Doctor Who's like really healthy they'll. they'll tell you the the value of not. just good news nutrition but also good. supplementation and you really should. supplement and supplementing with. vitamin D is critical especially to. avoid uh colds you know that's the.
speculation about why we get flu and. colds in the winter oh it's flu season. what why flu of a [ __ ] season well. because that's when people are very low. in vitamin D because there's not getting. any the best way to get vitamin D for. sure is sun exposure yeah and vitamin D. is a hormone it's not just a vitamin. it's it's it's responsible for a lot of. things in the body including your. ability to have a a properly functioning. immune system and I think there's some.
nutty number of people in this country. that are deficient in vitamin D and uh. out of the people that were hospitalized. with Co I think the number was 84% of. them were had deficient levels of. vitamin D how much do you take by. supplement me yeah um you don't have to. reveal it what's it 20,000 milligrams a. day 20,000 yeah like the each little. tablet is like 5,000 I take four of them. a day yeah yeah yeah go.
hard but I go hard with a lot of things. that's a lot of D but I also I'm almost. 60 years old I'm 56 years old and I push. my body I I work out really hard I work. out as hard now as I did when I was 25. you know and that is possible to do but. you have to do it right like you have to. give your body the tools that it needs. to recover and but those tools and the. food that you eat and the supplements. that you take all those they help your. overall help health which helps your.
ability to recover from illness you were. telling me that in Athens too that it. makes sense like some some sort of. strength training strength training is. critical like first of all it's critical. as you age because you lose bone mass. you lose muscle mass and there's a lot. of people that look similar to the way. they looked 10 years ago but they have. more fat and less muscle and dense and. less dense bones and it's just just for. your ability to do things and to be. mobile and you you have to force your. body to lift heavy things and I don't.
mean really heavy like the heaviest. thing I lift is my body weight the. second heaviest thing I lift is 70. pounds you don't do heavy weights no huh. no I don't do heavy weights at all I do. kettle bells so what I do is like cleans. and presses and swings and windmills and. I do all these things that make my whole. body work as one unit like I don't do. anything that's an isolation exercise. everything I do is my my so it's all. stuff where my body is forced to balance.
this weight and press it and then lean. over and press it up or Turkish getups. where you lie on your back and you press. it up and then you get up and you stand. up on one knee and then you stand all. the way up and then you slowly lower. yourself back down they're not glamorous. exercises but they're really good for a. coordination of all of your muscular and. all all of your your your entire core. and your your whole system working. together instead of like curls or you.
know tricep extensions those are good. for isolating and developing specific. muscles but I don't do any of that stuff. everything I do is just I use my whole. body how many times a week I work out. almost every day H do something I do. something almost every day I got to step. it up well it's not hard to do it really. isn't you just have to get in a habit. doing it like if you just get in the. habit of doing 100 push-ups and 100 body. weight squats every day that'll change. your [ __ ] life and it takes 15. minutes it does not take long you can do.
100 push-ups in 15 minutes I do 100. push-ups and 100 body weight squats in. 15 minutes yeah I might have to work up. to that you just do sets of 20 just do. five sets of 20 so I do two in a row. where I do 20 push-ups 20 body weight. squats 20 push-ups 20 body weight squats. then I catch my breath have something to. drink and then when my heart rate gets. down a little bit I'm ready to go again. I do another 20 another 20 another 20. another 20 so now I'm in two you know so. now I just need one more and then I do. my last 20 and my last body weight squat.
it's. 100 okay it's not hard to do I can do it. man you just say this is what I do every. day and maybe it'll take you a half hour. but it's a nice little workout it's. simple you can do it anywhere I can do. it on the road I can do it anywhere it. doesn't cover all of your bases but it's. a really good base to start from and. then once you start doing something like. that then you can incorporate other. things and you can incorporate lunges. with like maybe dumbbells or chinups or. things along those lines dips like you. could most certainly get a really good.
workout every day with just your body. weight there's so many things you could. do and now with with YouTube and all the. resources that are available you can. just Google body weight routines and Bam. you've got so many different options. that you could just follow along to some. video and people do things like that. super easy to do okay yeah I'm on board. yeah but but resistance training is very. important it's really important as you. age what about cardio though because. that's the one thing I don't have.
trouble with I've been doing cardio in. the mornings and getting lots of. sunshine cardio is great that's kind of. that that's how I feel a lot better so. when I when I got sick last summer. that's when I I needed to move a lot. more plus I was sitting at the desk too. much you know like typing and writing. and stuff oh yeah so that um my back was. all out of whack I've been going to a. chiropractor I went for months to a. chiropractor and then. uh I've been sleeping a lot more and. just being more mobile more active I. mean there there were days I would sit. down to research and write I could go.
for hours at a time and like in the. aggregate maybe 15 hours a day like when. I was trying to finish the book and that. that caught up to me bad man makes sense. so I pulled my back out a couple times. trying to lift the girls that's that's. when I that's when I realized I was like. grossly out of shape do you use an. ergonomic chair when you sit uh no you. should use one of these get one [ __ ]. these things are amazing I mean I'm. sitting in this thing 3 hours every day. I used to have like a regular office. chair and after every podcast my back be.
like it hurt but this forces you to have. correct posture I've noticed it's it's. not very it's it wasn't comfortable at. first it's a little odd but overall it's. it'll be more comfortable if you if you. get used to this like I have the exact. same chair at my home desk when I write. same that lower back support which is. cool and it also it's just like the way. it's it doesn't allow you to kind of. like slump in like the way that's what I. was doing I was slumping over the. computer like like this and my my spine. was all out whack I used to get a bad.
neck pain when I was uh riding too much. on a laptop because you know you're. sitting there like this the whole time. and that just this like head down in a. bad office chair some shitty chair I. would get like a my neck would hurt and. that's when I knew I had to stop. sometimes I'd try to keep writing but my. neck would be irritated I'm like I got. to stop M but this doesn't I don't get. any of that anymore with this these are. what are they called kisos and the they. used to be the company used to call be. called fully but I think they sold to. another company now these are the.
[ __ ] I've tried everything I've tried. the ones where you're on your knees yeah. you know when when you it's not really a. chair it's like your all your weight is. sitting in those are pretty good those. are pretty good I used to have one of. those at the house uh some people like a. balance ball they like sit on one of. those bosu balls yeah that was. recommended too those are good cuz it's. the same princip then you you have to. watch your posture the whole time yeah. but that's the idea is that what posture. is essentially is is a a constant static. exercise right because you really want.
to just do those and I have a I used to. have terrible posture I'm much better at. it now but it's because I've had back. problems you know so just like force. yourself to like stay in this this is. how your body is supposed to be yeah. it's pretty unnatural though it is at. least for me but that's also like why I. wonder like why did those animals those. ancient hominids why do they choose to. stand up like what what what facilitated. that you. know you all right yeah I'm okay you.
okay with the coffee see like you're Ro. Tri balls back there buddy I had a. moment. there do feel it we were talking about. this before but the reason why I brought. up Kundalini Yoga and I was going to. bring up holotropic breathing there. there are some methods that people use. yeah and I'm I'm saying this as someone. who hasn't I've done some breathing. exercises that did create a very bizarre. State and breathing exercises I do have. some experience but I've never done the. holotropic breathing where they they.
have these you know like real rituals. where they do holotropic breathing and. people have what what they describe as. very psychedelic experiences that was. Stan gra after some of his LSD. experiences I think I think he created. holotropic breath work as a way to uh to. engage the the the same process. interesting discovered through through. LSD and then of course there's John Lily. who developed a sensory deprivation tank. that also makes you achieve a.
psychedelic State endogenously just but. but through an external mechanism of. lying in the water that's we have one. here have you seen the one that we have. here no in the we have one right here. yeah yeah yeah I'll give it a try does. it work oh yeah yeah it's pretty wild. it's really interesting I used to have. one in my house but people my wife got. weirded out by it people got weirded out. when they come over they like what the. [ __ ] is in your basement is that a. freezer like no. it's body in your freezer no it's a but. it's even weirder like you got a tank. that you float in your basement like.
yeah you would too if you did. it once you do it you go oh my God this. is amazing have you had out of- body. experiences in there yeah well it's it's. essentially the idea that Lily came up. with and he had a bunch of different. iterations of it the initial one he wore. a uh scuba tank helmet like a scuba. helmet and uh he was sort of suspended. by straps in the water and he had this. helmet on and the water was the same.
temperature of his skin and so through. this method he was able to relieve. himself of most external stimulation. because the external stimulations that. you have right now are like obviously. we're sitting at this desk you see. everything you hear everything your feet. are touching the ground your butts. touching the chair your back's you're. that's all sensory input and in the. absence of any sensory input Lily's. suspicion was that you could achieve. psychedelic States and so if you could.
free the mind and so he did a bunch of. different versions of it and then. eventually he figured out that if you. just added a ton of salt to the water. and you used uh what what is like um. water bed heaters so water bed heaters. at the bottom you line it with plastic. and then you get it to a steady 94. whatever degrees and with that salt in. it you'll float and when you do get in. there the water becomes impossible to. different you you can't tell the.
difference between where the air is and. the water is because it's just all the. same temperature and so it's the same. temperature skin so as long as you don't. move you don't even feel the water and. it feels like you're just flying through. space and you don't see anything you. don't hear anything your half your face. is underwater so your ears are. underwater a lot of people put like ear. plugs in I generally don't but then half. your body like is like above the surface. and you're just lying there floating and. it's very relaxing it's a great way for. your body to absorb Epsom salts you get. magnesium through that you know like.
people take Epsom salts when they're. sore it's magnesium you're taking. magnesium and you're just tining It. Through Your Skin I'm taking notes man. I'm going to incorporate all this but. these are all ways that people have oh. Jesus I almost got the book but didn't. is that amazing look that's amazing it's. pretty good like it literally like cut a. line. that's a crazy line check that Jamie. thank you sir um but I so my question. was is there any historical evidence or.
any information that leads you to think. that possibly they were engaging in some. other kind of thing so your friend who. doesn't believe oh right like maybe. there were some other options that they. were also doing when you think about. these rituals right uh yeah that's a. possibility I mean we know there were. there were cave techniques um so I mean. it's not just it's not just puppy p and. Gilly there other I'm going to clean the. coffee at the same time thank you um.
there were other Scholars too who just. aren't aren't big fans of the. Psychedelic hypothesis for any number of. reasons but also it's like very. unpopular until recently to even suggest. anything about psyched I mean think. about all the different people that. their career suffered because they did. bring up psychedelic that's who I write. about in the book yeah Professor Ruck. who's 88 years old he's still at Boston. University he was at Boston University. in the late 70s when they Unleashed that. hypothesis and it it really impacted his.
career in the 80s and 90s and and Beyond. so like that's you know that that people. are aware of that they're aware of not I. was aware of that yeah for sure that's I. mean it's at least part of the reason. why I haven't tried. psychedelics yeah you know I wasn't I. wasn't personally called to that. experience well it's also you you know. from your perspective I if you were a. guy who did psychedelics and then you're. reporting on psychedelics like oh this. is confirmation bias this guy wants to.
believe this but instead you know since. you haven't it's probably better for the. the overall you know acceptance of your. research that you're you're looking at. it purely from an academic perspective. you're just looking at fact-based. evidence-based historically based and. trying to find the data um yeah like we. were talking about I think uh yeah my. experience is is meaningless compared to. all that you know I just I never I don't. know I managed to avoid it for so many. years that when it came time to write.
the book it just seemed like it it. wasn't a priority at all well I think. you should do it eventually because it's. so profound you can't you're not going. to be able to believe that you never. experienced it before but also one of. the most bizarre things about the the. DMT state in particular which is. something that we know is produced. endogenously in the human body body that. you you've been there before like when. you get there you're like oh I've been. here before it seems familiar oh 100%. like the first time I did it I was like.
oh my God it was it's so mindblowing but. also so familiar that you think oh I've. been here before and I think you're. there all the time I think you probably. go there to some extent every night you. know when you're dreaming yeah and we. don't know we don't specifically know. like we do know um because of uh Rick. Stan's work stman who wrote uh DMT The. Spirit Molecule and did the first uh FDA.
approved uh studies that they did with. uh IV slow drip DMT experiences and. these people had just wild experiences. with entities and Realms and apparently. there's some stuff that's going on right. now in London and Graham Hancock told me. about this that there there there's some. really profound work that's being done. uh that they're doing these studies. where they're doing the same sort of. technique they're doing it for like 3. hours and that Imperial is that what it.
is yeah it's an imperial yeah do you. know more about it you can tell us yes. it's uh it's it's long I I'm not sure if. it's that long I think it's um 30. minutes oh but there's another team in. in basil in Switzerland that's also. experimenting with uh infused I think. it's like 90 minutes and uh. interestingly this is somewhat breaking. news there there's a new study happening. in the US so the the first uh the first. US research on uh Extended State DMT is. happening at UC San Diego which is.
really cool actually Jamie there's a. there should be a press release about it. which came out earlier this year um. there's a team there being headed by a. guy named John Dean Dr John Dean uh he's. he's talked with Rick by the way about. his research um and they recently got. some funding uh to be the first uh Us. site to host these Extended State. infusions um and to really trying to get. in the root you are you interested yeah. sign me up well I'm I'm I imagine it. will eventually become something like. ketamine therapy you know um one of my.
friends uh Neil Brennan who's uh. suffered from depression his life. hilarious comedian um he uh went. to I I guess it's a psychiatrist I don't. know who does these things but he went. to this place where they give you an IV. camine drip and he's like okay okay it's. probably going to be you know just. relaxing what he go oh no no no you you. are tripping your balls off in a. doctor's office like hooked up to an IV.
bag closing your eyes and experiencing. this like full-blown ketamine state. which you said is like profoundly weird. and very very psychedelic and some. people it it helps them uh alleviate. depression H yeah but it's also like. super abused recreationally especially. around here. there CU there's a lot of people that. get prescribed ketamine for depression. they have like these nasal pumps of. ketamine see see people at.
night we had someone in the club that. went into a khole no way yeah yeah yeah. someone in the audience the husband was. like she did do much Cam me just lady. like at a comedy club because you're. you're spraying this stuff up your nose. and you know no one's stopping you from. doing it 10 times that seems. irresponsible yeah that's people do I. know but this is this is my that's my. concern with with some of these drugs. right that that is a legitimate concern. but also that is a concern with food you.
you can't tell people you can't regulate. people's food consumption just because. people get overweight yeah you got to. let people figure it out and you got to. give them the information and the tools. that they need to make good choices and. the only way you do that is if it's. legal and studied and people understand. you know what is the correct dose like. what is the correct thing what's the. best way to do the most beneficial and. least causes the least harm and treats. it with the most respect CU one of the. things about rituals I think and these. ritualistic settings is that there's.
this heightened state of importance and. significance of the thing that you're. you're about to embark on this this. journey that you're about to go on and. um related to this there was uh a place. that I had initially purchased before I. put the mother ship at the Ritz uh. before I bought the Ritz I I was in. under contract to buy this one building. that was owned by a cult and uh there's.
a documentary about the cult it's called. holy hell and it's about this guy who's. a hypnotist and also a gay porn star who. started a cult in California and then. moved it out to Austin and this guy. would do this thing with these people. where he would call it the knowing it's. a crazy documentary because like all. cult documentaries in the beginning it. looks awesome in the beginning it's like. oh they figured it out this is the. solution to what ails us the modern.
society where people are disconnected. there's no sense of community these. people are splashing around the water. together they're going on Hikes together. they're doing yoga together they're. eating together they're singing together. God it looks amazing amazing and he had. this thing that he would do it was. called The Knowing and there's videos of. him doing it to people and he would. when these felt like they were ready and. it took for some people would be very. angry he's like you're not ready cuz he. was just a con man but but what he did. was convince them that when this thing.
would happen and he would touch them and. give them the knowing that they would. have this profound experience where they. would connect with God and it worked. that's what's crazy when he did it to. these people and obviously these people. are deeply committed right they're cult. members they're they've bought in. hookline Sinker and he's a hypnotist so. he's doing hypnotic therapy on these. people and when he does it to them you. see them.
like like and they talked about it like. it was the happiest moment in their life. and they were talking about it in this. documentary in the context of describing. how this guy was a con man and about. this guy ruined their lives and they. followed him for two decades now they're. lost and 50 years old just trying to. find their way in the world and they. were just young people were trying to. find a. way they still talk about that. experience being one of the most. impactful profound moments of their life.
and it was [ __ ] but was it it. clearly wasn't [ __ ] if I mean he. didn't really have magic powers but he. did have the power of suggestion he did. understand hypnosis and because they. believed in him so much they really did. have this experience so what is it about. this trick this place EO effect this. this this thing that you can hit this. switch that you can hit where these. endogenous chemicals that we know exist.
we can make them bust out of your brain. in some profound way that makes you have. this complete Transcendent experience. that's that that's what's that's what. interests me about this research at UCSD. I think they're in addition to the. Extended State infusions with DMT. they're also setting up these volunteers. to fmr eyes to really try and figure out. how DMT is interacting with with the. brain how it's released or not and I and. I think part of that that interest in. that research is really trying to figure.
out the endogenous that's sort of the. Holy Grail of DMT research so this guy. John Dean I think he's he's found it in. in in Rat brains but we've we've never. actually seen conclusively um never. measured the presence of DMT in the. human body in the human brain I think. that that's part of his interest is. trying to figure out if he can um. endogenously identify. the presence Within These states of mind. so whether it's you know someone in deep. meditation or or in Dreaming or some. other um you know altered experience I. think that part of the the really.
interesting part of that about the. research there is trying to isolate. exactly how that gets triggered because. if we're sitting on this incredibly. potent chemical and we don't know how to. release or to control it it's something. that that deserves a little more. attention I think um for sure but the. the Kundalini people think that you can. achieve that state through Kundalini so. that that needs to be studied then I. think this is coming from people that I. know that have done both yeah but my. question is one of the things that does. happen when you have a profound.
breakthrough experience you don't have. flashbacks really but you can have a. dream and McKenna talked about this and. in that dream you'll you'll smoke DMT. and you'll have a DMT trip MH it's. almost like a doorway gets opened. up I've had dream dream like that have. you yeah what do they what were they. like yeah yeah because I set up this. boundary in my real life it hasn't. happened often but I've had a couple. dreams where I've uh I've em bibed the.
potion and. uh it's very strange actually man um I. don't have I don't have visions there. there there isn't a breakthrough. experience but there's this sense of. like overwhelming calm and serenity and. so I I never felt like I was. hallucinating things that weren't there. maybe I got the wrong potion but when. I've had these experiences in the dream. world it's like the dream world wraps. itself around me in a cocoon and I have. this ability just to um also Lucid lucid.
dream of this very rich dream life uh. have you always been able to lucid dream. yeah since I was a since I was a kid. interesting that's another thing that. you would think that I would have. practiced like it seems like there's. actual strategies to locid dream right. and it seems like it's fun but why have. I not looked into it at. all you know I think about that like. it's worth your attention holotropic. breathing and I think about that with. many McKenna talked about that too which.
is really funny he he said because. people were talking about all these. different ways to achieve psychedelic. states without psychedelics and he said. it makes me think of this um one monk. who had uh practiced a city of. levitation and uh one of those cities. yeah and he had practiced this for like. 10 10 years and uh the Buddha came to. town and he said I have practiced a city. of levitation I can walk on water and. the Buddha was like yeah but the fair's. only a.
nickel and the idea is like yeah you. probably get there endogenously but why. would you when mushrooms are everywhere. that was McKenna's take on it like yeah. okay maybe you can get there through. yoga or whatever but you can definitely. get there through DMT or. if you understand the dosing like like. you mentioned if you understand yeah um. how to grow them uh how to use them. properly and I think that I think that's.
kind of what we're missing from the. ancient past and so it's it's kind of. funny I've had all these weird. conversations over the past three years. about like um the application of the of. the ancient ritual to today and you know. my my feelings on psychedelic have. changed quite a bit over the past three. years um and what I've realized amongst. other things is that it's less about the. the drug and I think it's more about. everything you just described it's more. about the ritual it's more about the.
ceremony the the fact that these drugs. are organic and they've been found on. the planet and they're um you know the. their their use on every inhabited. continent has been cataloged is. something worth reflecting on so they're. there you can't ignore them but. throughout the long Arc of history there. have been uh practices and protocols. around their use which typically. obtained within small communities um. small tight-knit communities where. people took care of each other uh where. people knew how to grow and and dose.
these things and I think that uh one of. the things I talk about in the book is. this the secret to pharmacology is. posology the notion that it's it's all. about uh it's all about the dosing and. it's and it's all about uh the ritual. around which this experience is taking. place and so like when you write elus. for example remember we went to you got. to see elus in person like if if this. hypothesis is true right about this this. psychedelic potion you know it wasn't it. wasn't consumed in a dining room like in.
haste with no preparation like you would. have prepared for at least 18 months if. not longer to to walk that sacred. pilgrimage Trail to show up there and to. over the course of nine days by the way. to experience this right of passage. which for many people was the. culminating experience of a lifetime uh. and I think that that's something we're. just we're just missing today at least. at least in the west I don't think we. have that kind of sacred container well. it's illegal that's a big part of it and.
um you know there's a lot of ignorance. as to like what these things are and. what the experience actually is and I I. absolutely agree that ceremony is. important and set and setting it's very. very important having the proper mindset. making sure that you haven't eaten. anything before you've done it but I. don't know if ceremony is more important. than the actual experience Because the. actual experience you could have with a. bunch of your Idiot Friends sitting on a. couch and if you do DMT you will [ __ ]. 100% go there and and you'll be like how.
is this possible how is it possible that. this is literally 15 seconds away like. you take three giant hits and you're. gone and you exist in this realm that. it's just unimaginable that and it's you. there it's not you're seeing things that. aren't there it's you're there you're. there in this thing cuz it's you're not. just seeing things you're experiencing. them you're you're it's like they're. working on your brain it's very weird.
whatever it is like you see you can. sometimes see them like moving around. they're like like mechanics like guys. with screwdrivers and [ __ ] like [ __ ]. around with your head it really it's. very weird it's very weird experience. and unfortunately it's illegal and it's. crazy cuz fenel isn't you know it's like. you could buy opiates at a pharmacy you. you you can't experience something that. is probably the root of a lot of. religious experiences if not most of.
them and there was just re gavan Newsome. just vetoed something in California that. was going to make uh was going to. decriminalize uh psilocybin and a bunch. of other psychedelics what was that that. he he vetoed yeah over the weekend yeah. why yeah why in this day and age why why. why less freedoms for people that seems. so stupid his written response was that. it um there was an absence of theraputic. guidelines and that if they were.
formulated and then published I think I. think he would have reviewed the bill. differently well that's fair that's what. it said exactly that's actually Fair. that's fair but the the I think. the proper solution would be to come up. with guidelines right California should. immediately Begin work to set up ated. treatment guidelines repete with dosing. information therapeutic guidelines rules. to prevent against exploitation during. guided treatments and medical clearance. of no underlying psychosis all those are.
good that's actually very good that's. better than just okay so I take back. what I said it wasn't that it was stupid. like maybe they should have had that. before they attempted to decriminalize. it Newsome statement said unfortunately. this bill would decriminalize possession. prior to those guidelines going into. place and I cannot sign it. that's actually. fair but that means that they should. just get together and put put together. some guidelines and the problem is in. order to find out what the proper dosage.
is you have to run studies and they have. to be approved and they have to be you. know it has to be legit so but they. should do that and if they do do that. they should pass those things and and. also I think it's important he said uh. to keep people like like what was the. specific language that they used about. rules about. can you hold it up again. yeah what is is actually what we're. talking about with gur prevent again's. exploitation during guided treatments. the guru thing that we're talking about.
and the the cult thing it's a big deal. man because you're very I mean not that. I know but but one I mean one is very. vulnerable yes in that position and I. think that I always look back to the way. um psychedelics were spoken about in the. 50s and 60s right one of these famous. lines is about psychedelics are. non-specific amplifiers and so you just. make bear the unconscious right right. and to someone who hasn't done a lot of. depth work into the into the unconscious. and those processes it can be very. traumatic man and screening for. psychosis that's another very good point.
about his rejection of it because that's. an issue that's a giant issue and people. that struggle with normal Consciousness. really shouldn't be [ __ ] around with. these things you talked about this with. cannabis by the way 100% yeah that's. Alex Baron's book and it's also me. personally having experienced it with. multiple people I've seen multiple. people over the time that lost their. [ __ ] minds and one thing a lot of them. had in common was they're heavy pot. smokers and including some one friend of. mine who lost his mind and came back he. quit weed and he was like dude I thought.
the [ __ ] FBI was following me in the. sky with drones and like I was freaking. the [ __ ] and there's no reason for him. to be followed it's not like he's a. criminal or even a bad guy or even a. even a [ __ ] person of note just a guy. who was freaking out because he was. smoking too much weed and it was. literally making him psychotic I he was. or at least SK schizophrenic like he was. hearing voices stopped smoking weed came. back to normal M so I think there's. certain people but that's just like. everything there's certain drugs that.
people cannot take certain foods people. cannot eat there's certain people have. allergies they have sensitivities to. things there's we've we vary. biologically so much like the idea that. everyone should do a certain thing is. kind of crazy cuz some you know there's. people that are allergic to red meat M. got bit by a tick the lone star tick. gives you something called Billy rubben. oh no not Billy rubben um Alpha gal. Alpha gal and it makes you uh allergic. to red meat huh and it's fairly common.
happens a lot it's a tick bite and for. him it was like a whole year for a whole. year he's allergic to red meat M weird. you know so it's like you can't tell. people like everyone should do iar no no. no no no no no some people shouldn't do. anything ever some yeah some people. should take whatever medication their. psychiatrist is giving them that's. keeping them from [ __ ] jumping off a. bridge right that's another thing yeah. um contraindications and people on. medication it's very very complicated.
man oh sure especially people on. medications I know people that suffer. from uh anxiety and they're on. anti-anxiety medication they would like. to try psychedelics but they cannot. while they're on that medication so. there's this like weird little Balancing. Act what to do yeah it's a big deal I. think there there have been a lot of. studies on MDMA and psilocybin over the. past 20 years um less clinical studies. on on some of the other things obviously. and I think that as governments engage. we'll see policies develop that you know. really try and and account for all that.
safety yeah um uh you know knowledge. around dosing and therapeutic guidelines. ethical considerations and I think I. think that's all very very important man. it is very important but it really is. important for us to get a an actual. understanding of like you know kilograms. per body weight how much body like what. is like what's the effective dose for a. person who weighs 140 lbs versus is it. different does it vary you know I don't. think it varies with some I I think.
that's one of the things about DMT is. it's not specific or maybe it's cybin. not specific to your body weight which. is interesting psilocybin is I think is. it yeah but not is that what it is I. think so yeah okay so that's weird right. like why isn't DMT specific to your body. weight like why wouldn't a dose for a. 500 lb man be you know way too much for. you but we have to know we have to find. the only way to know that is to study it. and to get accurate research and data. that's on the on the medicinal and.
therapeutic front um and but I do think. there's lots of other good work um. around Transcendence and Consciousness. studies and psychedelics like outside. the medicinal realm and this is that's. that's kind of you know that was my. interest in writing in writing the book. was trying to to sus out like the. societal implications of this the. historical implications of this well if. you if it really was psychedelic rituals. that led to the birth of democracy that. seems pretty important we should we. should be looking at that but kind. doesn't it kind of make sense though. like who else is going to say you know. everybody should have a say you'd have.
to be tripping if you were like the. whole world was essentially run by. dictators back then why why would. anybody vary from that strategy because. it seems like that's the default mode of. people who don't do psychedelics I would. imagine about all the world leaders that. are currently involved in horrific. things all across the the globe how many. of them are doing psychedelics probably. zero mhm probably zero and this idea. that psychedelics could fix the world. like I wouldn't say it that way but.
maybe you know it might it it it'll have. it would have a profound impact on just. the. consensus of like the general population. just most people that have done them. what the way it change the way they see. things and that alone would change the. way they think and behave and vote and. and what they accept and don't accept. from their leaders what they accept and.
don't like the dangers and the harms of. censorship and propaganda they would be. much more aware of that like oh you're. like literally like creating mind. viruses and shaping the way people think. to benefit your own. good yeah I think I mean but that's all. the more reason to to I think to try and. study the way that we engage these. things in the past yes and so uh since. the book came out I mean there was this. you know there was all this pandemic um.
space that opened up and so I was on. zooms a lot with different people uh and. uh one of the one of the projects that. came from the book which I'm pretty. proud of uh is this guy uh Andrew Co I. mentioned in the book quite a bit he's. an archo chemist he was based at MIT. when I was writing the book and he's one. of the few people who really looks into. these ancient containers to try and. figure out what organic compounds were. were left behind uh it's a really cool. science you also need to U be a good. classicist to do this you need to be. able to to to read the ancient languages.
and compare them against the the. chemical data that's coming up you need. to know ethnobotany um it's you know it. also helps if you can build out these. sort of like paleoecological habitat. Maps you know what was growing where and. when and why so like it's it's kind of. this mix of the art and the science and. he was one of the very few people doing. this and over the past couple years uh. he was invited in in into Yale uh to. continue uh doing this work at the Yale. P body museum which is one of the. world's most prestigious natural history.
museums uh and they've offered him the. opportunity to continue studying this as. part of the the Yale ancient. pharmacology program which is really. cool that's very cool there there's like. there there are Professionals in the. world who exist uh amongst other things. who are taking into account these kinds. of questions about the the the way ways. that that these beverages or or these. compounds impacted the growth of of. civilization uh the birth of religions. Etc like this this wasn't a field before.
and I think it's been it's been really. cool for me to have conversations with. folks like Andrew and his colleagues at. Yale and elsewhere who are taking this. uh like pretty seriously that's very. cool and can I ask you this like they've. how many vessels have they found that. contained Urgot and have they found. anything other than Urgot that may be. Psycho. active uh throughout Antiquity yeah we. found all all kinds of things the The. only positive Urgot finds were the ones. from from pontos and how many different. vessels did they discover that contained.
it so uh to the best of my knowledge. they found uh around 10 miniature cups. and and for some reason they only tested. one uh so only one came up positive uh. for that Urgot in addition to the Beer. sediment so it was it was Urgot mixed. with mixed with beer and this was all. done archaeobotanical so there was no. chemical analysis this was them using. like scanning electron microscope and. Optical microscopy to look in and find. that and so in addition to the cups uh.
the Urgot also popped up in um in a. tooth in a in in a in a a Jawbone that. was also discovered on site which adds. Credence to the hypothesis that there. was intentional consumption because. within this little domestic Chapel where. that those vessels were were found um. what they what what they found were were. two Mills for like either grinding wheat. or maybe even like fashioning a beer uh. and they didn't find any ergot in the. Mills so the fact that it was inside. this ritual vessel which is the the.
shape and size of the kind of cup that. were used by the devotes of dianis in. this uh helenistic domestic Shrine of. sorts uh combined with the evidence in. the jaw I mean really led the. archaeologist to believe that there was. something strong there but I haven't. seen an Urgot fine quite like that. anywhere else do they know of any way. that they would cultivate this Urgot is. there some sort of a theory as to how. they CU urgot's a it's a fungus right.
and they know it it grows on wheat right. yeah it's more common on on rye but it. happens across the serial grains and as. far as we know it's been happening as. long as we've had agriculture which is. at least 12,000 years so the the big. question is is what spawned that that. Revolution the Agricultural Revolution. was it was it to uh to start baking. bread or to start brewing beer it's. actually pretty good debate that goes. back to the 1950s between sour and. Braidwood these two professors did we. did we uh did we first settle down into.
settled life uh and and start growing. grain to make bread or to brew beer and. there's there's good reason to suggest. that maybe it was actually the beer and. this um this religion of Brewing that. brought people together in the first. place and if if you're Brewing then it's. pretty it's it's it's foreseeable at the. very least at Urgot would pop up on that. agriculture now does it go back 12,000. years we don't we don't know we don't. even know if Brewing goes back that far. um I think the oldest evidence for for.
beers are places like um like Goen teepe. which is like uh 3500 BC and we have. some evidence for some kind of Brewing. at gockley teepe for example 9th. millennium BC and then we have these. mortars these Stone mortars in Israel uh. that were dated to 13,000 years ago uh. for where at least there's evidence of. malting and mashing if not fermentation. so we know that grain goes back a long. time the question is how far back does. the Urgot go with it and when did we.
discover that Urgot had these other uh. these other capacities U because it's. not a very pleasant experience I mean. even to this day if you're brewing beer. you want to avoid Urgot for lots of. reasons well people have died from Urgot. poisoning right like that was there was. a whole village in France that. accidentally got got poisoned yeah the. font spre yeah and there was an island. um aliki that that's a great one there's. a great Vice article about that uh about. the the ergot poisonings and people.
people seeing witches and people seeing. all the yeah what a weird [ __ ] thing. that some fungus that grows on your food. causes you to wildly hallucinate and. think you're losing your mind it might. have been responsible for the Salem. Witch Trials hm. yeah it's possible yeah they think that. that's one of the speculations yeah. makes sense there was late Frost. apparently or early Frost rather which. apparently uh contributes to the growth.
of Urgot on. rye the Rye wolves you know they're. called the Rye wolves by the way the Ry. wolves the Rye Wolves yeah it was they. were thought to be um there's a. mythology around where the where the. Urgot comes from and there's in German. there's a lot of different words for it. and they call it like after corn and. tote cor and like like death Colonel and. the Mad the Mad Colonel and they think. that it was um the the the the the the. Mad wolves running through the fields.
leaving behind this these oh wow these. hallucinatory fungi that's how much they. are scared of wolves made wolves. responsible for tripping. too well I imagine back then if you were. paranoid and tripping you would really. think about wolves you. know I mean back then that was a real. primary concern if you went on a hike. and you're by yourself and all you had. is like a single shot. musket we're going to go down another. woles Rabbit Hole yeah um did they have.
the ability when when did they have the. ability to recognize what Urgot was I. wonder like when did they recognize that. oh it's this particular part of the. grain that's giving us an issue this. thing that's on the grain I mean uh we. figured out UR ISM I mean at least in. the Middle Ages I'm not sure how much. further than that but throughout the. Middle Ages there were lots of balance. of. ergotism um but were there bouts of. people using it recreationally not that.
no not that we know of it was usually. accidental that that's why it's such a. strange fungus yeah and and why the. history of its uh of the chemical. synthesis of LSD is so strange because. uh you know Hoffman famously was not. looking for LSD right right he was. working In Obstetrics and Gynecology um. he was looking for something to induce. labor yeah so it was kind of an accident. and didn't realize until years later. what he what he' synthesized until. 1943 uh so before that um I mean outside.
that that medicinal context it was. typically seen with lots of uh lots of. Suspicion it was I mean it's it's toxic. dangerous stuff yeah and if it poisons. your whole village and everybody starts. freaking out what do we have any artwork. or anything else that would indicate. that there was possibly mushroom. consumption I know that exists in some. ancient religious artworks there's. depictions of mushrooms is there any of. that from the any of the ancient Greek.
periods um I never really saw convincing. evidence for uh for mushrooms um among. the ancient Greeks but there are I mean. there's like Neolithic evidence for for. mushrooms both in in North Africa and. then also in in Siberia there's the. famous pi pictographs the mushroom. pictographs the the peg TL where's that. uh in in Siberia uh the the peg TL um. pictographs I wrote an article about. this how old are these um the 1500 BC or.
the the if you look up I wrote an. article for big think um where that. tracks some of the the better data that. we have across time for this stuff can't. wait to see. that got. something oh yeah that's yeah he found. it. interesting oh so they have a mushroom. over their head yeah that's kind of wild. oh and they look at them they look at. they're tripping.
balls that's. wild and there's mushrooms on the ground. there look at that animals and the. mushrooms I'm sure we I think we talked. about this before McKenna's stoned ape. Theory mhm which is very fascinating. that that picture is crazy though so. that's that's from Siberia yeah. wow very interesting that those people. from thousands of years ago made those. drawings of a human figure with a. mushroom above its head they're old too.
I think it's it's it's it's Bronze Age I. mean they're they're pretty old um. there's there's an older one in in North. Africa um it's called T tasil tasil njer. so if you tassili and then n apostrophe. a JJ r that one's even older it could be. Neolithic so we're talking several. thousands of years even before the pegel. it's through this beheaded wizard priest. it's one of the most famous images. probably it but I don't where's the. that's I guess there yeah that that's.
one of the more famous. ones wow look how cool that looks so. that was found in in a painted Gallery. there and he's got handfuls of. mushrooms yeah and that's. that's imagine tripping and seeing that. guy maybe he's there for you but the. crazy thing is that image especially the. cleaned up version of it it really does. look psychedelic like the the geometric.
patterns it's one of the things that you. do see in the Psychedelic States is. these interconnected geometric patterns. that are moving they're always like in. motion like this yeah you would. definitely could you definitely could. see something like that h. elsewhere in the Badlands is a rock. painting of mushroom men running in. ecstasy amidst geometric shapes where's. that one what's that one I don't know. see if I can yeah see if you can find.
that one wow all right the talisi t t. mus Shaman so that's 6 to 9,000 BC wow. [ __ ] cool that's that's one of the. oldest ones well we know that psilocybin. existed back then and we know that. people experimented with food they tried. things to see if they're. edible again that was the basis of. McKenna theory was that ancient hominids. flipped over Cow Patties yeah when the. rain forest receded into grasslands they.
tipped over Cow Patties looking for. grubs and beetles and that these. mushrooms had grow in these Cow Patties. and surely they would experiment with. them oh wow yeah that's elsewhere in the. same region look at that that's wild. that's pretty cool they're just running. tripping they look like they're tripping. too look at the. heads and just like they look like. they're in an ecstatic State and they're. all holding mushrooms wow so there there. was a long debate about the the the.
relationship between these kinds of. images and Shamanism and the the ritual. consumption of psychedelics like among. like rock shelters and cave art and uh. Graham Graham Hancock wrote a lot about. this and it's my favorite book of his. it's called Supernatural yeah yeah it's. he looks at all the different cave. paintings going back 30 40,000 years and. so there was um always a long debate. about whether or not there were there. was actually some kind of relationship. between those painted images why they. were why they were left behind by the uh.
the priest class of the time and and. kind of like what engendered them and so. it's funny just after the book came out. in the fall I think it was of 2020 there. was a discovery in California um related. to to rock art and it was it was hailed. as the first uh unambiguous evidence for. the consumption of psychedelic in. connection with rock art it's called the. pin wheel cave and it got it got so much. press that you can you can find it. pretty easily I think the Nat Geo. covered it it was it was like headlines. for uh for for weeks it's called the pin.
wheel cave there you go it's called it's. called that because of the the image. that's painted in red ochre on the. ceiling of the cave you can see him. looking right there that that's that's. it's thought to be the unfurling flower. of the. datura uh which is this very very potent. very Visionary flower in the night shade. family datura datura is a weird one ween. of talked about datura and about how he. had to stop taking it because it was too. weird that he was having a conversation. with a man in a market and he realized.
in the middle of the conversation that. the man thought that they were at home. in his living room that it was it was so. bizarrely transformative in terms of. like the way it interfaced with reality. that it was just too strange like you. would be sort of semi functional but. thinking you're in a completely. different place than you are and. thinking that it's actually. happening this I again this this is why. the history matters like we think you. know a lot of the focus over the over.
recent years has been on the medicinal. and therapeutic value of psychedelics. and to the extent they can relieve. suffering I I understand the need for. research and the need to um the need to. assess safety right um when you look. into history yeah like but there there. are other ways of using datura that seem. have survived through in the pin wheel. so that was used by by the cheum mash. people for example and they had a very. specific ritual a ceremony around the. use of datura that they left you know. explicit evidence for that that doesn't.
go back that's not prehistoric that's. only about 400 years old to the 16th. century but they knew what they were. doing with datura and they're not sure. exactly what but they say there's these. great Papers written on the tumash and. datura saying how they they would use it. in in order to to look beyond the. surface of things and in some cases to. communicate with dead ANS cestors and. you see that a lot communication with. with the ancestors and so whether it was. some sort of puberty ritual or. initiation right they clearly knew uh. the dosing and and correct.
administration of datura and they. weren't alone by the way there were. other folks in the Americas my friend. Danny Newman has done some awesome. research around something called the. black drink you have to look up uh the. the black drink it's from the. Mississippian um indigenous communities. and there were some studies done a few. years ago that tested these vessels. you're asking about about evidence and. so there's uh you know beyond sort of. the pictographic evidence I love looking. at the archa chemical evidence so in. addition to the pin wheel site first.
unambiguous chemical data for the. connection of of of rockard and. psychedelics a couple years ago there. there were some studies um gas. chromatography Mass Spec studies like. real proper chemical studies done on the. black drink have you heard of the black. drink no the black drink was was used um. like I said in these Mississippian sites. and there was a paper dated uh some of. the finds from like 1100 to 1700 ad so C. centuries ago and they came in the in. the the this drink was prepared in these.
special vessels um and sometimes they. take the like these. anthropomorphic um visuals one is called. like the the old woman uh and So within. uh Within These vessels they found the. evidence not only for datura like we. just saw the pin wheel cave but for the. Yao Pon Holly I think it's the only it's. the only plant native to North America. that's naturally caffeinated it's called. the The yaoon Holly And so it was this. this this caffeinate beverage that. definitively had traces of of atropine.
and Scopolamine in them and those those. are the active alkaloids in datura the. same alkaloids they found through. chemical analysis at the pin wheel site. so Scopolamine is a wild Scopolamine. yeah that's a wild one that's that's. wild that's the the zombie drug mhm. that's the drug that they can literally. blow in your face and get you to do. their. bidding you've heard about that yeah. Colombian drug lords used to use it on. people yeah they' blow it in their face. yeah they think that is the root of the.
the concept of. zombies that you know these people are. just oh yeah way Davis has written some. some cool work on that you know what. it's also it's also like when you get. one of those little uh patches to avoid. seasickness drama mean that's camine. that's great. crazy but see under the right. circumstances right right tose yeah. you're not tripping but if you took. those dram me patches and put them all. over your [ __ ].
body I don't think that's recommended no. it's not I don't recommend it yeah but. if you did I bet you trip balls yeah um. but it's um I. think if you're thinking about these uh. tribal communities and how life was very. difficult um in these especially Hunter. gather communities living off the land. um you needed people to have their [ __ ]. together you couldn't have n duells when. you have 50 people that rely on each.
other and they all have very specific. tasks everyone is responsible for. something and you you cannot have. irresponsible consumption of something. that's so profound so it makes sense. within their their best interest to. create a real framework like a the way. to use this and also this recognition. that this is a very profound and. Powerful experience this is not to be. taken lightly at all correct this is not. at all recreational this is something. that you're going to do because you're.
going to it's going to you're going to. have a Transcendent experience correct. and that's what we lack today that's. what we lack today and the more you. study the ancient past whether it's in. ancient Greece or a lot of my book. focuses on Paleo Christianity the more. you see this kind of ritual can I can I. show you some images of of. paleochristian ritual yeah okay cool do. it I love it I love talking to you okay. cool what do you got uh Jamie there. should be um a folder called. cersi Cersei like the lady from Game of. Thrones like the lady from Game of.
Thrones yeah and she's my. favorite then well you'll get to know. her a lot better A Great Character. you'll get to know her a lot better. Shame. Shame what am I looking for here on this. um it's it's in in my uh my Google Drive. oh no no yeah I have the folder what do. you want me to pull up first few. pictures are just yeah just from the. just from the first one yeah we can. start with with we can go into the. pictures I my point I'm just my point. it's just words though it's it's that's. fine okay we can we can move forward. from there so what I'm going to show you.
are some images from a. hypium and I don't think we got around. to this last time but a hypium was this. underground chamber and it was the site. where most of the early Christian ritual. took place so if you if you think back. to paleo Christianity um between the of. Christ in Constantine which is 300 years. later give or take you know Christianity. was this illegal cult it was this. underground religion and some cases. literally so the the only places where. you would celebrate the Eucharist and.
the Proto Mass were in um like small in. in private homes and and this Agape meal. and then sometimes you'd go underground. into these like necropolis like the the. these places of of the dead and that for. some reason was the place where the mass. was celebrated and so uh as part of my. research for the book I went into some. of these underground Chambers to see. what the earliest Christians would have. seen and some of the evidence that was. left behind in in in terms of like. Fresco so there's no Botanical chemical.
analysis of what was happening in these. places but we do have images we have. frescos and we have the idea of what the. early ritual would have looked like and. a couple weeks ago I reached out to the. Vatican specifically uh to ask them if I. could show these images uh to you today. and they and they said yes all right. thank you. Vatican they actually take P all the. [ __ ] I said about. you they're actually they're they're. great research Partners um the it's the.
pontifical commission for sacred. archaeology so it's the archaeological. team that is responsible uh for the. preservation and conservation of all. these ancient sites and I think it's. it's an aspect of of early Christianity. that like very few people know about and. so uh what was happening underground um. if you want to go back to the first. slide just just quickly there was this. Yale Professor who sadly uh died um in. recent years Ramsey McMullen and what he. talks about are these underground um.
these underground chill outs they were. called vigilia the Latin word for them. is refrigerium where we get the word. refrigerator so they were like. underground chill outs where uh. certainly the Romans and it's believed. the earliest Christians would have gone. to celebrate um the Dead with uh with. sacramental wine with celebratory wine. they would have a wine ceremony in these. dank Chambers underground to like Usher. the dead into the Afterlife or bring. them bring them refreshment they were.
called refrigera uh and so it's it's. kind of unclear when the referia a pagan. Roman ceremony became like a Proto. Eucharistic Christian Mass like the line. again the line is very blurred at this. period of time uh which I call the Pagan. continuity hypothesis this notion that. the the the the older wine drinking. consumption by the Romans the Greeks. before them somehow influenced at least. in some in some cases the earliest. celebrations of the mass and so I just. show this quickly to show um that you.
know in these wine parties uh Ramsey has. this great line saying that this was not. just picnicking at the bottom there he. said this was religion so even though it. looks like a picnic it looks like they. were gathering over like kind of like. almost like a Mexican Day of the Dead. ceremony like they would meet by the. graveyard to uh to remember the dead and. the ancestors yeah there was there was. Wine and Food but this was this was. religion to the ancient Romans and I. think to to the romanized Christians who. follow them in the first first century. second century third Century um so the.
next slide is um that that's just a. bunch more text from uh a Catholic. Encyclopedia by the way from 1907 if I'm. not mistaken and it talks about how the. celebration of the dead and this funeral. banquet you see right in the middle. there this notion that the funeral. banquet is really really kind of at the. core of what the early Mass was even if. you go back to the Gospels it was you. know Jesus asking for the commemoration. of this event you know do this in memory. of me as you do this in memory of me. remember my life death and eventual.
Resurrection this is this is sort of the. the prototype for for the mass and so. it's important to remember that the. funeral banquet was there to bind those. together who remained faithful to the. memory of Jesus after after his death. it's very similar to this Roman. refrigerium so I I give that all that as. background just to show you the first. couple images from the hypium so if you. uh skip to the next one or May so that's. what it looks like when you go. underground um there was it was. discovered in 1919 I think as as a Fiat.
shop around the corner was trying to. expand into a sunken garage they they. came across these uh these monuments wow. which which is not uncommon in Greece. and Italy and around the Mediterranean. so they found this this hypium which. dates to the 3r century ad so we don't. have firm dates it could be anywhere. from like 220 to 250 ad so this is the. time period we're talking about um so. the these the it was these were tombs. they're Rock Cut tombs in the hypium. here if you go to the next one uh one of.
the first things I saw when I went into. the hypium was this which uh you know. it's it's a little strange because again. you're trying to figure out if this is a. Roman Pagan refrigerium or if this is a. Christian celebration of some sort of. Eucharist because again this site is. controlled by the Vatican the Vatican. has preserved this uh for uh uh for for. reasons um and you know it's been said. by the pontifical commission that these. are some of the most explicit and. concrete evidence for the origins of.
Christianity so this is you know whether. this is purely Pagan or Christian is. sort of a a moment of of debate but you. now if you just look at it what's odd is. that you see 12 people gathered around a. table and when you think of 12 people. gathered around a table you think of. something like the Last Supper m and so. it's it's pretty clear that what's. important to this dinner is the Chalice. that that's being lifted by uh by the. servant there or maybe it's a priest of. some sort so it's clear that whatever is. happening wine is important to this.
Gathering of 12 people the interesting. part is the woman who's appearing in the. back if you look closely um there's sort. of like the this Effigy Of A woman. descending exactly from the background. to the foreground it's thought that she. is Aurelia Prima and aelia was one of. the the the dead women to whom the. hypium was was dedicated and so what. they think that's her this is one one of. the vatican's interpretations is that. that's her emerging from the world of.
the Dead to take place in this funeral. banquet in this. ceremony so we're not really sure how do. they interpret that because she's not. seated at the table and because what. what they think this is is that whenever. especially because of of the place that. we're in which is underground that when. wine is being being served um at a. refrigerium that the Romans would would. habitually do this in order to commune. with the dead not as a picnic but as. religion as Ramsey McMullen says so this. is this was their religion for for.
keeping alive that relationship to the. dead and refreshing the dead in the. afterlife and when you went there to. celebrate them they would appear oh and. Ramsey has this great line in his. scholarship where he says the dead. themselves participated which one of my. favorite lines in his research the dead. themselves participated wow so so that. that's that's Aurelia participating in a. funeral banquet that's happening. underground okay so if if we go to the. next slide so again unclear if that's um.
if that's Christian or Pagan and then uh. you see some of these images that's. interpreted as Jesus as the Good. Shepherd from The Gospel of John you see. the the goats down below so that's and. this is um that's either interpreted uh. as St Paul or platinus platinus was this. neoplatonic philosopher uh who lived in. around that time in the third Century um. and so it's unclear if that's St Paul or. platinus or maybe it's Paul using the. image of platinus to call up the the the.
imagery and again everything is very. ambiguous because Christianity is. illegal so you don't go you don't go. down there and paint very explicit. images of Jesus or the last supper or or. Christian elements because you could get. in trouble for that obviously so there's. a lot of ambiguity in these frescos uh. so if you move move past that this this. is the the most important one which is. kind of kind of mindboggling so this is. just to the right of that banquet scene. and it's called the homeric Fresco and. it's called the homeric Fresco because.
it seems to portray a very famous scene. from Homer's Odyssey uh and it's it's. when odius is stuck on the island with. Cersei the witch Cersei The prototypical. Witch of antiquity Cersei he stuck on on. on the island with her and the three. dudes you see there on the bottom to the. left have just been transformed from. pigs back into men it's one of the most. famous scenes in book 10 of the Odyssey. where Cersei uh delivers a potion she. concocts a potion and in Greek it says.
that the verb that they use for concoct. the potion is CIO like she just like the. ancient potion at ausus this is one of. the mythical um this is one of the. mythical precedents for what would. become the actual Kon that was used in. the Elan Mysteries and so she she used. is this this mythical kukan um in which. she um she casts these drugs it says. that she puts drugs into this potion to. transform the men into pigs then back to. men so it's a very I mean like of all.
the 27,000 and changed lines of the. Odyssey and The Iliad it's it's it's a. particularly strange image to evoke from. Homer because Cersei amongst all the. many things she's famous for is for. being a witch and and for having this. this profound knowledge of the botanic. world and potions and things that we. might call psychedelics today and so. it's just it's it's it's a really. strange image to have there and um so. the Vatican produced this this monograph. uh over a decade ago where one of their.
Scholars Alexia latini goes over this in. great detail to to demonstrate why. exactly this is this is Cersei and up. above that's another image of Cersei. with all her animals on this magical. Island and what they found there exactly. was was cinear um and during the. conservation process they they were able. to identify the uh the Mercury sulfide. that had been used to paint this this. red image of of cinear around the house. which is a a very telling detail because. there's a line just before this in the.
Odyssey where it talks about the fiery. smoke coming out of cersei's cersei's. Palace so between the fiery smoke and. the cinear and um and the the web down. below the there there's a lot of. certainty that this is this is probably. Cersei um if you go to the next slide. what is can I ask you what are those. people laying down if you zoom in on. Cersei right here yeah up above what are. those people laying down supposed to. represent that's the the interpretation.
from the monograph is that that's some. sort of funeral beer so oh so those are. dead people that could be dead people. yeah which is also. strange what's that. Satan like Satan that we can't make out. so the the the loom was another Telltale. sign so there's the fiery smoke at the. palace and the loom is another Telltale. sign so this is if it were just this you. you would think okay may maybe uh maybe.
it's just Cersei and Alum but if you go. to the next slide there's there's a and. the next one yeah there's there's a. manuscript um at the v in the in the in. the Pope's Library uh called the. virgilius vaticanus you can find this. online in the virgilius vaticanus. manuscript which is from about 400 to. 430 ad there's this picture of Cersei. and the loom which corresponds to Cersei. and the loom on the right so they they. know for sure you know with with. relative certainty at least uh that. there's there there's some image.
continuity between Cersei and the loom. and sheal she's talked about in the. ancient literature as as always being at. the loom uh so the confidence is rising. this this is for folks who don't know. what a loom is it's how you create cloth. with. threads some people yeah that's true. so with this for you're just listening. to this what she has is like if you've. ever seen people make cloth in in a. traditional way with a loom she's got. the the why did they depict her with a.
loom why was she known as a person who. makes cloth because that that's what. Homer said that's what Homer says in his. epic poetry and that that's what Virgil. also says in his epic poetry so Homer. writes The Odyssey centuries later uh. Virgil writes the anid and that's sort. of the the mythical founding of of Rome. the the main character anas and in both. versions there's a Cersei character so. this Cersei character survives for. centuries in the ancient world uh from. from the Greek to to the Latin uh and in. in both cases uh the the loom is.
mentioned and also what's mentioned um. in in these passages are are the fact. that that Cersei uses potent herbs in. the Latin says potius eres so she's. using potent herbs and mixing up potions. to transform these men into pigs and. vice versa so like it's a very it's very. strange it's a very strange idea to have. a pagan Witch uh in a fresco that's been. preserved in this paleo-christian. Monument uh combined with this this.
refrigerium sort of Eucharistic. celebration of the dead and then in the. last few images um what it depicts is a. woman being initiated into these into. these high. Mysteries so things you don't normally. associate with early Christianity um. Jamie there's just in the last slide. real quick I just want to show you this. image of the of the woman um so there. are three different three different. chambers in the hypium um if you go back. a.
couple and I'll show you these two in a. second yeah there right there that's. fine so that that Circle that that's on. the ceiling of one of the final Chambers. and there was a German scholar himman in. the 1970s who attempted to um um to. interpret that image and he says it's. some kind of initiation typical of. dionan or eleusinian initiation he says. the way the wand is held is typical to. what you might find uh with the God.
dianis and and and true enough if if you. look around at different artifacts. there's the bores Evas on the left which. is from about 40 BC it's now in the Lou. you see the thus the wand above the head. of the initiate uh who's dropped his his. sacramental cup and on the right that's. the bill of the Mysteries um in Pompei. uh which goes back 2,000 years obviously. and again you see this notion of the. wand over the head of the initiate so. you have a female initiate uh which is.
um you know calling forth images of of. pagan eleusinian dionan initiation next. to an image of Cersei a pagan witch next. to this image of this refrigeran banquet. and it's all very ambiguous why would. why would a Christian descend into these. Chambers to celebrate uh these these. wine Mysteries um with the dead and as. you go outside the hodium to other. catacombs around Rome I mean just just. quickly in 30 seconds I can show you.
other images uh of of different women. consecrating the. wine way yeah that way yeah and the next. one yeah there that that's perfect so. you see in Latin there it's written. Agape MKE nois so that's um they think. that's Agape is the woman's name name. Mis nois is mix it mix it for us so what. they're saying is is not pour the wine. for us but mix it up for us agape and. Agape is a very Greek word uh it means. love and so you you find all these Greek. connotations despite the fact that we're.
in Italy um if you look at the next one. it's very. similar it says. d uh Irene could be another Greek name. it means peace and just like M nois mix. it up for us you see da we don't really. know what kala is but if you go to the. the next slide there was a scholar yeah. this this there's some great text here. he tries to interpret what Kal is it's. not certain um it seems to have been. more than an infusion apparently it was. a mixture of hot water wine and.
drugs. wow so the the question becomes what. what kind of what kind of potions were. were being mixed in these underground. Chambers um this is at a different. catacomb of of China s Petro I showed. you the hypium and so there's you know. this these were the places where where. wine was being consumed by paleo. Christians and Antiquity um and I think. it's fascinating it.
is and it raises lots of questions a lot. but it only makes sense we know those. compounds existed and we know that. people take those compounds and have. these profound experiences and when you. had no explanation for that and you. didn't know like how it was you know. interfering or interacting with the. human mind and what chemicals they were. like of course you would you would lean.
on those I mean you would probably that. would be like the primary source of some. sort of an attempt of understanding the. the the great mystery of the. life just makes sense and the dead are. remember the dead are participating. that's right it's a funeral banquet and. you see this time and again in these. ancient Mysteries this notion of of a. funeral banquet and the ritual. consumption of of powerful compounds. McKenna believed that when you entered. into psychedelic States you'd enter into.
a Well of Souls disembodied. souls or it was it at least theorized. that was like one of his thoughts like. that that's what you were experiencing. H yeah it's the same with it's the same. with dianis actually and this notion of. uh sort of the Greek Halloween was. called anadia and there was this uh this. ritual of un uncorking the the wine jugs. and out of them you would see different.
different spirits and entities fly. out so there there's something there's. some the dead participated the dead the. dead the dead themselves. participated um so it I mean I I find. the iconography like really interesting. like having gone to Catholic School my. whole life because you don't you don't. really hear about the hypium no you. don't hear about pale Christianity much. actually what is the the source of the. Eucharist what's the original.
Eucharist uh Body of. Christ I mean well in in the book I I I. explore the potential Greek origin of. that at least at least in some. communities I mean the notion of the. notion of consuming the body and blood. uh was you know. that that wasn't born like 2,000 years. ago with Jesus there you know even the. blood of. dianis uh the wine of dianis is called. the blood by uh timotheus of madus 400. years before Jesus so this notion that. wine is blood and should be consumed in.
the sacramental fashion I mean that was. that had been around for for a while and. this notion of of theophagy right you. see this in lots of different world. cultures the consuming of the god to. become the god and in the Greek world. theophagy really takes its place with. with dionisis and these Mysteries much. more so than the linian Mysteries that. we talked about and so for the ancient. Greeks like to embibe the wine was to. embibe the god the God dianis so the.
question becomes was was was dianis the. god of wine or is diis the god of. intoxication right and and psychotropic. plants or fungi or poisons or medicine. because the wine of the time like we've. talked about was routinely mixed with. different different plans and compat. and so the enthusiasm that resulted from. drinking that wine was it's been. described as like the central aspect of. Greek tragedy for example like when we. saw the theater of diis on the Southern. Slope of the Acropolis uh they think.
that that wine was consumed there in. another way to experience communion with. with dianis the wine at the theater was. called Tria and Tria in Greek means like. rubbed or pounded and Professor Ruck for. example thinks that it's you know it it. signified the different things that were. pounded rubbed into the wine to create. this sort of mass possession that took. place at the theater between the live. audience and the actors between the. actors and the dead persons in some.
cases that they were they were uh they. were acting out uh remember I mean we. take it for granted now but to stand on. stage and you know spew out lines that. belong to a dead person is like closer. to necromancy than entertainment so that. was that was a Trippy thing to begin. with so you combine that together with. this this tho wine and this very sacred. ritual it it it goes well beyond the the. bounds of of entertainment like for for. them there was a religious purpose to. the theater and to Comedy and to.
tragedy. wow it's so it's so interesting you. would love more concrete evidence of. what they consumed other than this one. vessel which is it's very interesting. and it's it makes sense that one vessel. contained Earth forgot and that this. would lead you to believe that this was. a part of what they were doing yeah but. it's not enough for me either I mean. that that's what that's what I've been. doing with my time the past couple. year thank God you're doing it I'm not. convinced either I'm not convinced I'm.
I'm I'm I'm I I try and be a real. skeptic about this that's good I try and. be a genuine skeptic there's there's. this incredibly compelling piece of data. from Spain from helenistic Spain what is. today's Spain 2200 years ago I would. love to find something in Greece I'd. love to find something at alus this this. was part of my presentation. uh for the elus Symposium a couple weeks. ago what kind of artifacts do we possess. or do people possess from elus I I I. asked this question of uh the. archaeologists on site there of uh of. the government folks and there's an.
American School of classical studies too. which has been Excavating in the area uh. for uh for decades obviously um so the. the last time I went to elus to ask. poppy about this they have uh a lot of. different vessels actually um I'll show. you um Jamie if you want to go into the. elus file I think it's the first file up. there and I think we see an image of You. by the way and yeah and then there'll be. some there'll be some vessels we can. look at okay um so there's there's lots.
of different there's you first that's me. yeah that's me at that site I was. freaking. out I kind of. was I remember walking around it just. feeling so strange yeah what was what. was going on that. day well I knew where I was which you. always have to take into account right I. knew that this was supposedly the site. where these people well not supposedly. this was the site where these people had. these experiences MH and there was. something about that.
site whether or not you believe that. places have memory they certainly. certainly feel like they do and that. that place felt like there was a memory. attached to it in some strange way like. a lot of memory that there was a there's. something very profound had happened. there but maybe that was because I knew. something very profound had happened. there but there was a quite a long. moment like five or 10 minutes where I.
was just standing there under that thing. just like feeling it yeah that was the. plut that's the plutonian so that's. that's the mouth of hell where pranie. would emerge from the underworld and you. were you were locked in there for a. while I was just trying to empty my head. and just try to figure out how much of. this is just suggestion and [ __ ] you. know you're a good skeptic too well you. have to be otherwise you buy into your. own nonsense yeah you know and I was. trying to figure it out what is this. like what's this feeling that I have.
here it's was very. intense but it's also also an incredible. place to be just to even if that the. feeling didn't happen like just to know. that you're there in this place where. these people have these experiences and. The Wonder of what was it like M you. know could imagine if you had the. ability to travel back in time to any. point in in human history where would. you. go I have to I can only choose one yeah.
just. one maybe the crucifixion of Jesus. Christ oo just to find out if it really. happened what if it didn't would you. tell. anybody that'd be in big trouble yeah. I think I would choose uh ancient Egypt. what do you want to see I want to see. the construction of the pyramids huh I. want to see why I want to see what was. civilization like back then I want to. see what what's the real timeline like. what are we really looking at are we.
really looking at 2500 BC are we looking. at 10,000 20,000 BC like what what are. we looking at they don't really know. it's a lot of guesswork especially when. you're dealing with um you know you. can't carbon date stone but just know. the construction the the expertise that. was involved the the appears the use of. some sort of a drill there was like some. things that CED Stone some things that. cut stone they have no understanding of.
how these people were able to do this. just the scope just the scale of the. construction the massive Stones you know. the obelisks the these enormous things. that were cut from quaries hundreds of. miles away and somehow or another. transport recorded. and and assembled into this thing that. we wouldn't be able to do today no. matter what anybody tells you certainly. wouldn't be able to do in a human. lifetime. 2,300,000 Stones Some weighing upwards.
of 50 to 80 tons hundreds of miles away. carted through the mountains no clear. roads how do you get them down what are. you doing how'd you get them what' you. do that's to me the big one have you. spent there no no we were supposed to do. both in this one trip I said it's too. much yeah you know you have young kids. you don't want to [ __ ] freak out can. I go home and see my friends you know. you don't want to drag kids away for too. long but but I think it was important.
for them to see the ruins you know to. see delos and to see all these other. different places and to just take into. just see a place where people used to. live and Thrive and then they didn't you. know and now you're walking around these. areas and. and um but to me Egypt it's because it's. so it's so above and beyond everything. else that exists in terms of just the. the scale of the. construction what did they do when you.
see the Great Pyramid of Giza it's just. like what did they do how did they do. this who who why what was the purpose. you know there's there been all the. speculation that at one point in time. there was a a burial chamber for a. pharaoh but there's no evidence of that. so what is it and why and how put it on. the agenda for next summer yeah and even. then you're just going to be walking. around freaking. out which I think is great but um I.
would I would if there was a place that. you could go back in time and see one. thing that would be the thing that I. would see there was um there was a. recent study on a psychedelic potion out. of Egypt for the first time remember we. talked about uh some of the first. ambiguous evidence for psychedelics and. rock art and and this Mississippian site. I think it was only was it earlier this. year actually uh Jamie if you want to. look up this a great Google term uh. psychedelic blood cocktail psychedelic.
blood cocktail and maybe Egypt um oh. there it is they drank a gnarly Brew of. hallucinogenic drugs and human blood. whoa the drink also contained a few. secret ingredients like vaginal. mucus uh. how do you know. that look at that dude that looks like. the kind of guy you'd see if you drank. blood in psychedelics that's B. be that seems like the dude Bess was The. Giver of oracles and dreams and it was.
thought that you would consume this. beverage and go into an incubation at. his Temple um wow which is not not too. different from from Greek incubation. temples look at this he was described as. part dwarfish part feline yeah whoa best. followers believe beli he could provide. protection from danger while. simultaneously averting harm and being. able with his powers to prevent. evil so like all cults best heads were.
required to drink some gnarly stuff. rather than the classic poison Kool-Aid. though the members of this sect guzzled. a mysterious liquid from ceramic vessels. decorated with the Effigy Of The or the. head of best known as best. vases the best figure was revered as a. protective genius it might be assumed. that this liquid drunk from these mugs. might be considered benefit. beneficient interesting so what do they. find that's in these things well so it. came from Tampa which is crazy like. there wasn't I mean at some point it was.
in Egypt but they had this vessel. sitting around in Tampa Florida in Tampa. Florida oh waa from the second century. BC which which is why the science is so. interesting these can be vessels that. sit in museums for decades and they. still preserve these compounds so they. did um liquid chromatography tandem mes. speec this chemical analysis and what. they they found a number of different. things the mucus was because they did. proteomics as well they did a human. protein analysis and they they found. something that was it was either mucus. or other human body fluids that's why.
they they call it the secondo blood [ __ ]. why do they think it was vaginal mucus. because that's one of the possibilities. is either oral or vaginal mucus I'm not. sure why would they go with vaginal. because it's a good headline but it. seems like spit would be more likely I. would say spit seems like I'm going to. say spit and blood getting the vagile. mucus to seem like that's like a big or. but was there any indication of why they. chose the vaginal why they would even. say not not that I know of beyond the.
proteomic analysis cuz that seems like I. know it's weird. leap you find mucus like how much. difference is mucus from spit to vaginal. mucus okay in addition to mucus because. we know that people spit in fermented. beverages right you know. right like there's there's certain. alcoholic beverages that the women will. will chew up certain things and spit. them into a vessel and then people drink. it it aids in the fermentation right and. that that's what that could have. happened here too they found evidence of.
fermentation probably grape so this is. some kind of wine cocktail and in. addition they found uh the chemical uh. signifiers for Naya Cara which is the. blue water lily and they also found um. peganum harala or seeds that either came. from like the Syrian Rue seeds from. Syrian Ru panum har harmel isn't that an. MAO inhibitor correct okay yeah correct. harala. yeaha okay so they were taking something.
and then so it was very similar to iasa. in that regard because an MAO inhibitor. would be something that would allow at. least diyl tryptamine to be orally. active if that's what was happening here. but I I think I think blue water lily is. orally active so it's unclear what the. made it more profound maybe so blue. water lily what is that supposed to be. like um there have been some some. Recreations of that there there's a. great YouTube uh called sacred weeds if. you ever look at sacred weeds yeah it's. a lot of fun it's from like so many. rabbit holes go down on.
YouTube it's amazing there's so many to. go down also five terrifying datura. trips you have to at some point that's. one of my favorites yeah Toro so this. water lily what is it supposed to be. like uh I don't think so again this is. where dosing comes in they the sacred. weed series it was a series in the UK. they tried to recreate this and. obviously they got the dosing wrong um. so I think were they ineffective is that. why you say obviously they got the. dosing wrong yeah because if you look at.
the participants it's really funny they. get kind of Giddy and euphoric at some. point but they don't have anything uh. hallucinatory did they take it with. harmala uh no no they weren't doing the. Psychedelic blood cocktail they were. just doing the just the water just the. water maybe the water lily has to be. taken with harot to have the profound. effects the MAO inhibitor it makes sense. this is why the Science Matters and the. data matters not because we want to. recreate blood cocktails but of course. but we. do so it seems like there's a lot of. vessels that could be tested if we're.
aware of these vessels everywhere yeah. and they haven't been studied some are. sitting in in museums in Tampa uh some. are sitting in in new fresh dig sites. some are sitting museums in Greece and. Italy look at that's that's the best V. from second century BC can I get a. recreation of that on eBay they do. somebody make that that seems dope I. want to drink my coffee out of that. someone's got to make Joe a best vessel. [ __ ] yeah for coffee in the morning. that'll be a way to start your day off.
correctly you spit drink out of that no. I wouldn't do that drink out of that. guy's head drinking out of that guy's. head would be pretty [ __ ] cool um so. with this this uh blue water lily and. the the this so they they know that. those two things were in there harmala. and blue water lily was there anything. else other than. fermentation so presumably some alcohol. there was some alcohol we're not sure in. in what amounts there was just some.
evidence of fermentation um aside from. the harala and the blue water lily and. uh maybe some honey and which was also. used as a preservative for psychedelics. right it was one of the ways that they. preserved um mushrooms they preserve. mushrooms in Honey yeah and that shows. up a lot in some of these ancient. potions the combination in fact of um. potassium gluconate is the chemical. signifier for that they often find that. with tartaric acid which shows wine and.
calcium oxalate which shows beer and so. you see these Pat McGovern did a few. studies on that which shows sort of like. this beer wine Mead concoction oh and he. famously recreated one called the midest. touch with the Dogfish Head Brewery the. midest touch oh interesting that was the. how is it any good yeah it's great. that's great um has there been any talk. of these vessels that we do know. available of running studies on those. yes this so this is this is this is at. least part of what Andrew Co wants to do. at the ELP body museum I mean he's.
already sitting on thousands and. thousands of samples oh from all over. the Mediterranean that haven't been. properly assayed and within they're all. filled with drugs I. mean boy that would rewrite everything. yeah. no matter what they're filled with and. again his job is not to look for drugs. he's looking for ancient Organics such a. good academic I love how you bring it. back down to normal Joe focus. focus thank you thank you for being.
science thank you appreciate you but it. could be it could be fragrance or. Medicine sure yeah let's find out what's. in there incense Kei incense his famous. Egyptian incense uh you know he famously. found that the TA C Bri wine and they. they announced that in 2014 from From. Galilee at Tel cabri it was wine mixed. with all kinds of things we talked about. last time I think like honey and storax. and terab benth Cyprus Cedar cinnamon. all kinds of fun things so like uh he's.
been able to show that that wines of the. time were routinely mixed with different. things you're seeing the the blood. cocktail you're seeing the detour use at. pin wheel um and you're seeing um the. black drink in the Mississippian sites I. mean this is all relatively that too. deeply like what was the black black. drink made with uh datura and yaon H and. that was the the caffeine and what does. it look like this yapon Holly is it a. fruit is it a leaf it's a it's a plant.
it's a plant and it contains caffeine. yeah I found something I was trying to. bring it up but I didn't get to it yet. it it scientific name is something. interesting um elex vomitoria yeah oh. which means makes it puke yeah yeah it. was it was a perative apparently ooh. right like a lot of these are yeah yeah. yeah you purge and then you have this. experience. interesting interesting so doura and. caffeine mixed together is it a high. dose of caffeine like six times as high.
as a cup of coffee almost whoa whoa It's. the only caffeinated plant found in. North America I think that's what I read. too right um is there any um history of. humans using it other than in that. fashion like people eat it the ya Pon. Holly yeah like they do when they chew. cocoa leaves in order to get energy you. can find YouTube videos of people making. like a a a caffeinated tea today people. who know how to how to manipulate sounds. like you can [ __ ] kill yourself with. that kind of caffeine tea right there.
you go that's what it looks like so it's. little berries huh yeah plants and so is. the um fruit of the tree what gives you. caffeine or is it the leaves I think. it's the leaves it's like it's like. North American mate oh interesting have. you tried buy this no it says yap on. Holly drink for sale yeah I'm trying to. see oh you could buy it I would imagine. someone knows that you could black drink. Wikipedia yeah go shopping click the. shopping link just go shopping for yapon.
Holly interesting there it. is interesting so you can get it as a as. a te online I wonder if it's. legit cuz it seems like that would be. like super potent like they'd have to. tell you it's like a Monster energy. drink in one little tiny cup right. wouldn't it be what does it say there. Jamie for uh caffeine content I'm. looking that's what I was looking for it. doesn't say on that part of. it say it's makes a half gallon that.
little thing is like a concentrate like. cold bro or something guessing oh. interesting so you make a half gallon. out of that one little thing you you. have to mix it. up so it seems like we have a wealth of. things to test for but a scarcity of. tests that have actually been run and a. scarcity of testers which is why Andrew. CO's work is so important to to support. um and as a result of uh conversations. like this and the book coming out uh we. we're launching a foundation called the.
athanatos foundation which means. Immortal in Greek and part of the. Genesis behind that Foundation is to. help to support different work like this. uh which is largely unfunded um and. unacknowledged uh so there aren't many. aroch chemists doing the work that. Andrew is doing which I think is super. important for reconstituting some of. this really cool history I mean a lot of. which is just emerging in the past. couple years like a lot of the things. we're discussing are things that came. out after the book was published uh so. there there's a lot of cool work um and.
again between the sciences and the. humanities uh you know people who are. textualists and like to to compare this. folklorists anthropologists there's uh a. lot of disciplines that can converge on. these studies and in addition to the. work at Yale there's been some of. interest at Harvard too uh around. psychedelic studies outside the clinical. setting uh which is really cool um so. not only at at the Harvard Divinity. School but Harvard Law School and the. faculties of Arts and Sciences they have. a Humanity Center there um and I'm we're.
just about to launch actually uh a. series of fellowships together with with. Michael pollen uh between Harvard and. Berkeley to continue looking at these. kinds of questions again outside the. clinical setting so looking with a lens. of the social sciences and the. humanities. historians anthropologists uh you know. cultural criticism you name it like. taking a look at these kinds of studies. from from very different lenses to see. what we can learn about the ways that. our ancestors interacted with the. natural world So speaking of Michael.
pollen how's the caffeine treating you. did it do anything for you I definitely. feel it yeah yeah you feel it. differently than you used. to I mean I'm much more awake yeah I'm. much more awake I feel I've been feeling. very sleepy recently yeah yeah I feel I. feel much more awake got to get you. healthy Brian I know man I'm going to. put you on a a. schedule we going to change your diet. that's what's most important yeah yeah. people think of their diet as just stuff. to eat that tastes good like you really. have to think of it as the literal.
Foundation of your structure as a. biological organism I mean any nutrients. that I do get are are fully thanks to my. wife if it were up to me i' accidentally. I mean yeah cuz she she's a great cook. and she's very concerned about nutrition. for me and the girls if it's just me I. would eat peanut butter all day well. that's not. that's the problem with a lot of. intellectuals they spend so much time. thinking and not enough time thinking. about their body you think of the mind. is being separate from the body but it's. not it's all one thing and if the body. works better the mind works better yeah.
all right I'll get on the regime please. please I want to keep you healthy when I. hear about people taking so long to. recover from covid the primary thing. that I always ask him do you take. vitamins it's almost always no at the. time it was kind of a no yeah I take. more than I did but but even now you're. not taking enough no not really we got. to get you into that um so what's. interesting also is um you took a long. time to write this book The immortality. key you took a long time researching.
this and I know that there was a lot of. questions about how this would be. received and whether or not this is like. a whether it would be commercially. successful but it's been so successful. that they've ran out of copies like. really quickly right they [ __ ] up. right I'm not sure if I can say that but. yeah let's just let's say kindly they. underestimated the demand I think the. demand was underestimated yeah following. our conversation in September 2020 yeah.
yeah. um uh I didn't expect that either and. there were lots of issues with with. printers and and the pandemic yeah it. was hard to get copies out um and so a. lot of people actually turned to the. audible for for that reason uh and to. this St like the audible is out selling. the hard copy like almost two to one. people like to listen well you're very. good at it the the audible is excellent. cuz you read it it's really good it's a. fantastic book I've read it Twi I've. listened to it twice should say yes. thanks man yeah all the way through. twice thank you it's really good man.
it's like you know it's so compelling. and detailed and fascinating and it. really opens up people's imagination to. the roots of all these things and like. where this all came from and what these. people were experiencing thank you man. [ __ ] awes awesome it's been very. humbling to go through this that's cool. it's got to be great for you because. there was a lot of uncertainty of you. going down this path yeah man I quit my. job there was no plan be well sometimes.
that's what you have to do right it. worked out yeah spectacularly I felt. like I was losing my soul at some point. I was always uh I mean I love being a. lawyer I went to law school for a reason. but uh this this is is the stuff that. always kept me up at night you know like. this was just a fun passion project on. nights and weekends and then it became a. book and a thing but like that wasn't. that wasn't the the purpose I was and. and to this day like I'm I still want to. know that's why I said like I'm not. satisfied like I I want to know the.
actual answers of course to this stuff. yeah oh we all do well I'm very hopeful. in that there. is like real research being done and a. real attempt to test all of these other. vessels and I think that would be wildly. ambitious and really fantastic to see it. all come like to find out what the. results are maybe it's nothing maybe. it's like a rare and there's very few of. these things contain drugs and maybe. they all do which is crazy that'd be the.
craziest there's drugs everywhere yeah I. think that's probably the case you know. we were very fortunate um went to chich. chinita once and I had this really good. guide he was really interesting guy who. was a local professor in Mexico and he. would give Guides of the May temples and. one of the things that he openly talked. about was the Psychedelic consumption. that there was some area of one of these. temples where they would take this thing. that had a very LSD like properties to.
it they didn't totally understand it. when I went to chichin we're talking. about like. 2003 or something like that was quite a. while. ago and you know to have this guy. explain that to me it was really. interesting so I think I think it. existed in so many I think wherever they. could find it they took it there was. another I hate to keep bouncing off all. these headlines but there was another. headline from Peru around psychedelic. lace beer which uh you you can see it in.
CNN also n Geo I think if you look up. psychedelic beer Peru it'll probably. come up and this is recent and this is. also recent just in in the past in the. past couple years wow like you would. never I mean when I was I was. researching from. 2007 this book which came out in 2020. never did I come across a headline. psychedelic laced beer right if I had it. this would have been very relevant. ancient peruvians partied hard spiked. their beer with hallucinogens to win. friends how do you know why they did it.
to win friends that's a leap I don't. think you needed that part you know. lacing the beer served at their feast. with hallucinogens may have helped age. improvi in people known as the wari is. that correct yeah wari Forge iCal. alliances and expand their empire. according to a new paper published in. the journal Antiquity recent excavations. at a remote warry Outpost called how you. say that quila akilapa Kil Kila kilap. Pampa kilap Pampa uh une Earth seeds.
from the vilka tree vka vilka y vilka. that can be used to produce a PO potent. hallucinogenic drug the authors think. that. thei held one big final blowout before. the site was abandoned H. wild so the vilka is anadra anadra. either Kina or perrina and that's been. here a while there there's evidence of. the use of that going back thousands of. years um just after Christopher Columbus.
actually came to the Caribbean one of. his associates writes about it's called. yopo yopo or Coba that was in use um. around what is today like the the Dr and. that part of the Caribbean so it's been. around a very long time as soon as the. colonist arrived to this part of the. world they they found drugs wow yeah. cooba. yopo um last but not least before we get. out of here yeah one of the things I. found out about you when we're on a. little trip together is that you're.
interested in. UFOs there's a giant UFO behind you yeah. I well I anybody that's really. fascinated with it I have to bring it up. what do you what's your take on all this. U AP disclosure stuff and all these. reports and these fighter pilots that. are seeing these things that defy our. understanding of propulsion systems that. are currently available what what is. your your thoughts on these things um. there's probably something to it I don't.
know what it is I don't think anybody. knows what it is but I don't think you. can contradict the pilots at this point. and uh a friend of mine lesle Kane has. written um a book about this uh which is. sort of a gold standard in the field um. um it's called UFOs um and uh I don't. think we can really ignore it uh we were. able to ignore it for many decades until. relatively recently and now you see. Congressional investigations and you see. uh different Witnesses coming forward so.
I I think it's a gigantic mystery that. kind of like these ancient Mysteries. that fascinate me can't really go. ignored much longer uh I'm not entirely. sure what being witnessed are like. extraterrestrial craft like like. physical things being ped by like flesh. and blood beings from you know vast. stretches of the cosmos I think I've. said this before on the record I think. there's something like far far stranger.
about it I don't know I don't know what. it is but when I read um like jacqu fet. for example I I love the hypothesis that. these things you know fit better into. mythology and folklore than they do into. into science and Engineering journals uh. because there have been sightings for as. long as we've been around um and not. just about things in the sky but things. that interact with us and so uh passport. to Magonia is a really cool book that. talks about the interaction of you know.
what these could be today and what they. looked like in the past and uh I just. think it's it's a huge mystery it's a. huge mystery that's really all you. really can say right that's all anybody. can really say yeah except maybe some. people that work for one of the defense. department contractors that actually has. a UFO stored in the basement somewhere. it's not a mystery yeah to them yeah to. them it's not a mystery but they're. keeping their mouth shut unfortunately. yeah now you see NASA's taken an. interest and um I think that the.
conversations in Washington are really. wild yeah about about the new the new. interest in this stuff um but I I don't. know something in me tell just something. in me is not Dr to the. engineering um side of of the. conversation uh I'm I'm drawn like with. the ancient mysts I'm drawn to Folklore. and and mythology uh and I think that. you know to understand the the root of. that phenomenon will tell us a lot about.
ourselves actually which is why we. talked about Homo Al you know this this. ancient homin that I think that. Discovery tells us more about what it. means to be human you know if if if it's. not our brain size or we talked a lot. about creativity you know like I think. questions about the Deep past Force us. to ask questions about who we are today. and I think this phenomenon whatever it. is is the same like whether or not we're. alone in the cosmos that's one question. but like the relationship between these. sightings and our psyches and.
Consciousness I think is a far more. profound question and and again some of. the questions that the early researchers. like JL and heinik were asking about. this phenomenon he says something that. like when the long awaited solution to. the UFO problem comes um I think it will. prove to be not just um uh the next. small step in the march of science but. an a mighty and unexpected Quantum. Leap that to understand this issue is to. understand something very.
profound let's end with that that's. perfect Brian you're the man I. appreciate you very much it was really. cool hanging out with you in Greece and. it's always great to have you on here. and your book is now available on. paperback I I'm assuming they made a lot. of copies this time we will find. out we will find out okay thank you very. much bye everybody. [Applause]. [Music]. [Applause].
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