![]() ![]() Current use of entheogens will be discussed, focusing on the use of Peyote by the Native American Church and the use of Ayahuasca by the Santo Daime and União de Vegetal (UDV) in Brazil. An overview of the use of such ‘entheogenic’ drugs from an historical perspective follows, looking specifically at the use of Soma and its importance in the establishment of Hinduism the Kykeon of the Eleusinian Mysteries in Ancient Greece and the use of the sacred mushroom ‘teonanacatl’ and its place in Central and South American Cultural History. ![]() There is also a discussion on the nature of what could be considered a religious experience. There is an analysis of the psychological changes and the changes in perception that these substances cause and how these can be interpreted as contributing to religious or spiritual enlightenment. This paper examines the use of psychoactive substances such as Psilocybin, Mescaline, and LSD as adjuncts to mystical, religious or spiritual experiences. It nevertheless remains a phenomenon in need of further scholarly research. In the West, to believe in the existence of spirits is to risk being labeled “mad,” and as such the phenomenon of mushroom-induced animaphany goes largely ignored. When critiqued, only the animistic discourse- the belief that mushrooms occasion encounters with discarnate spirit entities, or animaphany-transgresses a fundamental societal boundary. By contrast, a series of resistive discourses (the recreational, psychedelic, entheogenic, and animistic discourses) have been constructed in opposition, as a means of making sense of the subjective experience of taking mushrooms. Predominant societally legitimated answers (the pathological, psychological, and prohibition discourses) are those that, in Foucault's sense, are imposed from the outside as “scientific classifications,” that is, they are based upon observations of the effects of mushrooms on others. This paper addresses the question of what happens to consciousness under the influence of psychedelic drugs-specifically of psilocybin, or “magic” mushrooms- and performs a Foucauldian discourse analysis upon the answers that have been variously proposed. It is organized into neurochemical models of paranormal experience (section 1), field reports of intentional and spontaneous phenomena incorporating anthropological, historical and clinical cases, and personal accounts (section 2), surveys of paranormal belief and experience (section 3), experimental research (section 4), and a methodological critique of the experimental research with recommendations for further work (section 5). The paper borrows widely, but by no means exhaustively, from parapsychology as well as transpersonal studies, anthropology, ethnobotany, phytochemistry, psychiatry, psychotherapy, psychopharmacology, and neurobiology, particularly neurochemistry. Psychokinesis (PK), aura vision, encounter experiences, and sleep paralysis only make a very limited contribution to this review as they are seldom related to psychoactive drugs within the parapsychological literature. It is primarily concerned with extrasensory perception (ESP)-telepathy, precognition, and clairvoyance-as well as out-of-body experiences (OBEs) and near-death experiences (NDEs). This paper investigates the relationship between psychoactive substances and so-called paranormal phenomena falling within the study of parapsychology. KEY WORDS: Time experience Hallucinogens Psychedelics Psychotomimetics Cognition. Results are discussed in the context of literature produced in the psychopharmacological and cognitive fi elds. The effects on subjective perception of time duration verifi ed an underestimation of the velocity of temporal passage by participants after substance intake, in which subjects presented longer subjective durations of seconds. Results of subjective aspects of the experience through the Hallucinogen Rating Scale revealed equivalent dosage effects comparable to other studies and similar to those of the psychedelic beverage Ayahuasca. Twenty-eight participants underwent a magic mushroom experience after consuming dehydrated Psilocybe cubensis mushrooms at the dosage of 55.6 mg/Kg (350 μg/kg of psilocybin). Magic mushrooms are rich in the active compound psilocybin, whose activity on consciousness deeply alters cognitive functions, can promote spiritual/mystical experiences and has high biomedical and psychotherapeutic importance.
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