Terence McKenna and Ethnopharmacology

Book excerpt: 'Terence McKenna and Ethnopharmacology' (Great Minds Series, Vol. 8) is a study that features one of the most famous 'psychedelic' philosophers of our time. Terence McKenna (1946-2000) has been studying the ontological foundations of shamanism and the ethnopharmacology of spiritual transformation for the past quarter century. An innovative theoretician and spellbinding orator, McKenna emerged as a powerful voice for the psychedelic movement and the emergent societal tendency he calls 'The Archaic Revival, ' title of one of his most popular books. Poetically dispensing enlightened social criticism and new theories of the fractal dynamics of time, he unraveled many aspects of the visionary lexicon. As Artist Alex Grey suggests, 'In the twilight of human history, McKenna's prescription for salvation is just so crazy it might work.' In 1993, McKenna wrote in 'This World and its Double: ' It's clearly a crisis of two things: of consciousness and conditioning. These are the two things that the psychedelics attack. We have the technological power, the engineering skills to save our planet, to cure disease, to feed the hungry, to end war. But we lack the intellectual vision, the ability to change our minds. We must decondition ourselves from 10,000 years of bad behavior. And, it's not easy. The books comes with a bonus essay by Peter Fritz Walter, entitled 'The Shamanic Method.'