Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #7292 in Books
• Published on: 2001-06-15
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 320 pages

Alissa Hirshfeld-Flores, M.A., LMFT, The American Journal of Psychiatry, August 2002
This book is a highly readable, intriguing, provocative description of Rick Strassman's theories and research concerning the effects of DMT.

Paul Von Ward, The AHP Perspective, June/July 2002
The account of the project is an excellent inside view of human drug studies, especially those with psychedelics.

Vicki Ecker, UFO Magazine, December-January 2002
. . . an enriching journey into one scientist's courageous attempt to solve a bit more of the brain/mind/spirit mystery.

Customer Reviews

Mind Opening exploration into the nature of perception
Ever so often I find myself going "YES!" "YES!" again and again. This book brings together spontaneous mystical experiences, states of illumination and enlightenment and the NDE's with the secretion of DMT in the pineal gland. His research into laboratory administered controlled doses of the DMT and the emerging parallels in the description of the individuals is fascinating.
Not only does he take the lid of the "mystique" of the way in which we think that our perception of reality is unshakable and predetermined, his research also opens up doors to many more avenues and I hope that fellow researchers will be able to carry the batton further into this field.
This is essential reading for anybody with an intereset in the workings of the mind, in mystical experiences, the question of what happens to us after death, mental health and deviations from the norm, energy healing and manifestations of other-dimensional phenomena. DMT goes way beyond other psychedelic drugs, and is truly the bodie's own doorway to expanded perception.
The book is easy to read with a good balance of technical detail and background information with fascinating stories and often supplemented with the personal testimony of some of the volunteers.
This research is important as it brings para-psychological anecdotal evidence into the laboratory and thereby into serious science. I had the same reaction when reading Dean Radin and Candace Pert.

Does what it says on the back
This book is a full length explanation of one of the only authorised placebo controlled double blind studies of the very elusive chemical DMT.
It gives all the detail it needs from the lengths he went to to get the go ahead to the individual experiences and visions from the people in the study.
Very informative, a must have for anyone interested in neurotransmitters or this special tryptamine.

EXTRAORDINARY RESEARCH INTO CONSCIOUSNESS
This is a report of the author’s clinical research into the psychedelic substance DMT, a plant derived substance that is also produced by the brain. The volunteers reported a variety of positive mystical or frightening hallucinatory experiences including encounters with intelligent entities.

The research connects DMT with the pineal gland and the esoteric belief that the pineal, connected as it is with the crown or sahasrara chakra, eases the spirit’s movement into different states of consciousness or different dimensions of existence. It is clear from the book that further DMT research could lead to major progress in the study of consciousness.

Part One deals with psychedelic substances in science and society, describes the chemical qualities and molecular structure of DMT and discusses the pineal gland and its role in the psychedelic experience. Part Two relates the history of the author’s research, from the actual research proposal and the process of obtaining permission; this section may be skipped by the average reader.

Part Three describes the process of selecting volunteers, obtaining DMT and the first experiments, whilst Part Four details the case reports: what the volunteers said and did, their behaviour, etc. This makes for strange and fascinating reading. Some experiences were positive and illuminating like genuine mystical experiences obtained during meditation, others were eerie or deeply unpleasant.

Pat Five takes stock of the experiences and considers the question of whether it was worth it for each individual. There is an attempt to determine the ultimate benefit derived from the experience for the individual concerned. Definitions come into play but it seems to me that the experiments did benefit each individual in some or other way.

Part Six is a very interesting discussion of the psyche and different states of consciousness. It would seem that spontaneously occurring psychedelic experiences are mediated by elevated levels of endogenous DMT. This spiritual molecule thus provides access to unknown parts of the psyche. If the analogy of brain as receiver may be used, the substance finetunes the brain so that the individual consciousness moves beyond familiar awareness into invisible realms, most of which are inhabited.

There is a difference between this expanded awareness and normal dreaming and the current psychological methods do not satisfactorily explain the phenomenon or the peculiar experiences, especiall as regards the entities encountered. This leads to a speculative discussion on cosmology, the possibility of parallel universes, a multiverse and dark matter, with reference to David Deutsch’s book The Fabric Of Reality.

The author concludes this brilliant work with a discussion on the practical use of psychedelics as therapy, to stimulate creativity or as entheogens. In this regard I would like to recommend Huston Smith’s Cleansing The Doors Of Perception: The Religious Significance of Entheogentic Plants and Chemicals, William James’ Varieties Of Religious Experience, Stephan Hoeller’s The Gnostic Jung And The Seven Sermons To The Dead and the book Chaos, Creativity and Cosmic Consciousness by Abraham, McKenna and Sheldrake.