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Interview: Terence McKenna |
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Written by Scott
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Wednesday, 24 December 1997 |
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Page 1 of 4 (ED:)
Whenever “straight” citizens ask me why I would be interested in taking a hallucinogen, I tell them so I can “see things the way they really are.” Why do you consider these plant teachers to be so important?
(TM:)
I would say: Because they dissolve my personal and cultural illusions.
(ED:)
When I was speaking to Dennis, he told me he has a daughter. Do you have any children, and if so, what do you tell them about hallucinogens?
(TM:)
I have a son 19 and a daughter 17. Both are drug hip and totally together. I never gave them a watered down version of reality. I make few real distinctions between adults and children, my kids grew up with ethnopharmacology all around them. It was never and issue, they were raised by example.
(ED:)
What do you think of marijuana as an entheogen? Do you see it becoming legal within the next 15 years?
(ED:)
First, I'd like to welcome you to Entheogen Dot, and let you know that we'd love to get your opinions (and knowledge) involved in our online forums. Seriously, we realize you're very busy, and appreciate the time you're taking for this interview.
We understand that you've been working on a new book? Could you tell us a little about that?
(TM:)
For a couple of years I have been working with my co-author, Phillipe De Vosjoli, on a book that we are calling “Casting Nets in the Sea of Mind” it is basically a book about communications and the evolution of humans toward a post historical, post egoic nano-mediated, machine symbiosis.
(ED:)
Sounds like a “must-read” book to me. What got you involved with entheogens and the hallucinogens?
(TM:)
I was a child of the '60s. I arrived in Berkeley in the fall of 1965. Ground Zero for the cultural revolution then taking place in the areas of sex, drugs, politics and music. All the talk was of LSD. Of course I had read Aldous Huxley's books, both “Brave New World”, the anti drug dystopia and his essay on mescaline, “The Doors of Perception.” I was eager to explore these areas so enticing to the bohemian intelligentsia and so anathema to the small town values that I had grown up with.
(ED:)
It's always interesting to hear how we all became aware of psychedelics. Are you and Dr. Alexander Shulgin friends? Have you ever took part in any sessions with Sasha?
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