I would like to start by looking at what has been called the spirit molecule, DMT. Joe Rogan has a done a wonderful job at introducing what DMT is. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=grcqs9cDuN8 stops at 4:19. The rest is his mentioning of isolation tanks and his views on the meaning of mankind. Funny but not relevant to what I would like to discuss.
DMT is a hallucinogenic drug that is classified as a serotonin affector due to its effects being related to serotonin receptors. Other indole hallucinogens include; LSD, psilocybin and psilocin, dimethyltrypatimine(DMT) and 5-methoxy DMT (5-MeO-DMT), Bufotenine (Bufo Toad), LSA (Morning Glory Seeds), and Ibogaine.
These are the hallucinogens that where the corner stone for the Shulgin's who are a man and wife couple wrote the books PiHKAL (Phenethylamines I Have Known and Loved) and TiHKAL (Tryptamines I Have Known and Loved: The Continuation). This couple have independently created, and basically standardized, the reproduction and synthesis of many of today's modern synthetic drugs. It is TiHKAL that is related to this discussion for as they synthesized new chemical structures they tried them and meticulously recorded their experiences and made attempts at their proposed mechanisms of action. Their mechanisms were a tad off.
In the 1950's Sir John Gaddum hypothesized that LSD's effects in the brain were due to similar blockading of 5-HT receptors in the Central Nervous System.
The Locus Coeruleus projections have been proposed to be one possible mechanism involved in the experience that indole hallucinogens induce and that can be experienced both during Near-Death-Experiences (NDEs), Lucid dreaming, and sensory deprivation. Amphetamine releases NE from the Locus Coeruleus (LC) axon endings by displacing it from storage vesicles. Electrical stimulation of the LC elicits strong startle responses and hyper-responsiveness to the environment (like an amphetamine effect) invoking the “fight-or-flight" response. Psychedelic drugs also produce hyper-responsivity to sensory stimuli as an alerting response.
Aghajanian and Baraban (1980) evaluated the effects of various psychedelics on LC cell activity.
- They showed that any kind of sensory stimulation (in all sense modalities) speeds up activity of LC cells (cell firing rate increases).
- The effect is even more pronounced when LSD and mescaline (psychedelics) are added, but not with amphetamine or anti-depressants (which are not psychedelics).
However, direct application of LSD or mescaline to LC neurons does not enhance their firing rate to sensory stimulation. Therefore, the effects of psychedelic drugs on sensory activity in the brain must be indirect and the drugs must act on other neurons that make synaptic contact with LC neurons.
The role of the LC allows for a possible explanation for why psychedelic drugs accentuate sensory perceptions and the emotional reactions to them. In general the theory is that the LC is a funneling mechanism that integrates all sensory input, and manages our arousal response to any form of sensory input but does not identify the particular sensory information per se, but controls the impact upon the systems threshold of excitation.
Indole & phenethylamine hallucinogens work by activating the 5HT-2A receptors that are widespread throughout the brain and that the greatest amount of 5-HT2A receptor binding has been found in the neocortical structures.
The limbic system is the main neural structure that is our decider of what is real and what is important, and when it is under high activity our experiences appear to become “hyper-real”. Another factor being that the limbic mechanisms also plays a role in the information coming out of our memory. So when ‘hyper-real space and sensations’ are being attended to the nonnormal consciousness, the raw material from our memories is not inhibited as strongly and fuses together with the physical senses and produces a hallucinatory experience.
The neural control of sleep and dreaming involves a subtle balance among: Serotonin, Norepinephrine, Acetylcholine, Adenosine, and Histamine in a widely distributed system throughout the brain. Interactions between the serotonergic and adrenergic systems in the brain are important in controlling the switch from Non-REM to REM sleep and generally regulates that dream-like mental contents remain out of waking consciousness. The effects of all kinds of psychedelic substances may be to de-repress this system. 5-HT2A receptors seem to be responsible for the bulk of the hallucinogenic effects and are due to changes in activity in; the locus coeruleus, glutamatergic neurons in the cortex, especially those that connect with the thalamus limbic system activation.
Another proposed mechanism is shown here in the second diagram. It is a hypothesized wiring diagram, depicting interactions among Serotonin, GABA, Norepinephrine and Glutamate in the generation of hallucinations.
Discussion:
The reason for this brief view into hallucinogens and their mechanisms is that these systems may be what Suefeld & Borrie’s work on REST and sensory deprivation where getting to with the idea that stimulus hunger hypothesis proposes that while the body is deprived of sensory experiences there becomes an increased sensitivity to any information that is available, both externally and internally. Yet the mechanisms involved in producing the effects seen in the use of REST have been thought to be similar to the mechanisms used in sleep. So here I am, with possible evidence for three different routes towards a similar experience of visual hallucinations and a possible safe environment to examine the impact of Sacred Ecstatic Experiences upon individual’s consciousness.
There will be a future post on a possible route for me to take this term by conducting a small introspective research study on SEEs, REST, and visual imagery.
References:
Aghajanian, G.K., and Marek, G.J. (1999). Serotonin and hallucinogens. Neuropsychopharmacology, 21.
Meyer, J. S., and Quenzer, L. F. (2005) Psychopharmacology: Drugs, The Brain, and Behavior. Sinauer Associates, Inc., Sunderland, Massachusetts.
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