Endogenous DMT is a myth

[Carl-Richard]

I see this way too often on the forum and elsewhere that DMT is essentially held as a "Theory of Everything" regarding spirituality, more specifically the idea that elevated levels of DMT in the brain is what causes enlightenment experiences. While this is not only a very simplistic understanding of the brain, there is actually no conclusive evidence for the idea that 1. DMT is produced in the human brain whatsoever, and 2. that this DMT is what mediates the endogenous experience of non-duality.

1:48:50

While the first point is rather unproblematic, there are both technical and intuitive reasons for why the second point is absurd. The most intuitive one is that DMT is notoriously known for producing A LOT of psychedelic visuals. The idea that these visuals would somehow disappear when functioning endogenously in the body while also promoting the non-dual experience should already make you very skeptical.

The idea that you can trace something as complex as a permanent change in baseline consciousness to the secretion of one specific structural analogue of serotonin would be so surprising that it would indeed deserve its name as "The Spirit Molecule" and that every neuropharmacologist and evolutionary biologist in the world would instantly fall to their knees and convert to whatever psychedelic mystical tradition that is the most responsible for this hypothesis.

Why this would be so surprising has a couple of reasons. Arguably the most important is that the brain has so much more going on than the production of serotonin-like substances, and very rarely will you ever come across anything brain-related being fully explained by the functioning of one neurotransmitter. This is for example why there are so many competing theories of which neurochemical is involved in mediating conditions like schizophrenia (dopaminergic, glutaminergic etc.) and why none of them are able to give a comprehensive explanation (hence the various side effects of highly selective anti-psychotic medications).

If DMT was in fact the sole cause of non-dual awareness while basically functioning as an on-off switch, that would also raise another question: how would such an on-off switch evolve through natural selection in this specific case? Why would it be adaptive to have just one chemical produce such an effect and for it to lay dormant up to a certain point? It's much more likely just from a purely computational perspective that it would be mediated by a slight overall change in the trillions of interactions that are already happening at micro and macro levels; at the level of networks, singular neurons and molecules. If you were to look at any other biological system, it's never like you suddenly get the software update of the Gods containing ONE brand new signalling substance that revolutionizes the entire functioning of the system. I would love to hear anybody give an example of something like that occuring in nature just anywhere.

Then you have the research on the Default Mode Network (DMN) which zooms out and looks at larger neural networks. They've done substantial research on 10 000 hour expert meditators and compared their DMN activation with novice and advanced meditators with some promising results. I believe this approach provides the most conclusive evidence for a mechanism behind mystical experiences that we've seen so far:

 

 

The irony is of course that the DMT model is the epitome of scientific reductionism. That it has somehow found its way into the culture as the explanatory heuristic for spiritual experiences is a symptom of how much work we have to do collectively both in terms of technical education and spiritual development. With that said, it's certainly possible that if DMT were to be produced in the brains of humans that indeed it would play a role in producing whatever experience of consciousness we're currently having and that maybe also it would be involved in facilitating the non-dual experience, but I would confidently bet that this effect would be so insignificant as to be dismissed as homeopathy.

Edited May 16, 2021 by Carl-Richard

[Tim R]

1 hour ago, Carl-Richard said:

The irony is of course that the DMT model is the epitome of scientific reductionism. That it has somehow found its way into the culture as the explanatory heuristic for spiritual experiences is a symptom of how much work we have to do collectively both in terms of technical education and spiritual development. With that said, it's certainly possible that if DMT were to be produced in the brains of humans that indeed it would play a role in producing whatever experience of consciousness we're currently having and that maybe also it would be involved in facilitating the non-dual experience, but I would confidently bet that this effect would be so insignificant as to be dismissed as homeopathy.

@Carl-Richard Very nice

Reminds me of a thread from a few weeks ago. Your post would've fitted well...where people were making claims about mystics transcending material limits to induce these superhuman levels of consciousness through sheer will... 

[Leo Gura]

Boiling everything down to DMT is rather silly. There are 100s of important neurotransmitters at work and they all probably vary due to your genetics.

[Carl-Richard]

16 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

Boiling everything down to DMT is rather silly. There are 100s of important neurotransmitters at work and they all probably vary due to your genetics.

It does seem sort of obvious when it's laid out like this, but you can't stop the trendiness of DMT ?

Here is another example: let's say DMT was somehow a main catalyst. How would that relate to spiritual practice? So you would work at something for let's say 10k hours like the Theravadan meditators in the DMN study and then suddenly out of nowhere DMT starts secreting? What prompted that? Certainly not DMT. We can easily assume that the practice must have changed the body or brain somehow. If that's true, that proves that it's possible to ignite a drastic change in mental state through a slow and steady overall structural change. Then why isn't that a satisfying explanation on its own? Why is the DMT part emphasized or even needed? ?

[Display_Name]

17 hours ago, Carl-Richard said:

The irony is of course that the DMT model is the epitome of scientific reductionism. That it has somehow found its way into the culture as the explanatory heuristic for spiritual experiences

Spiritual broscience

[Carl-Richard]

16 hours ago, Display_Name said:

Spiritual broscience

Joe Rogan basically 

[outlandish]

16 hours ago, Display_Name said:

Spiritual broscience

Bingo