This is a modified excerpt from Sam Woolfe’s new book, Altered Perspectives: Critical Essays on Psychedelic Consciousness (2024, Iff Books).
One aspect of ‘psychedelic teleology’ – the view that psychedelics are driven by the goal of improving human consciousness – is the notion that widespread use of psychedelics will lead to a much-improved society: a utopian (or near-utopian) world. This is said to be the goal of certain ‘plant teachers’. However, it can be doubted whether the psychedelic experience is inherently wise; we can, relatedly, doubt that psychedelics promote prosocial behaviour in all people who use them.
Consider the ancient Maya and Aztec populations, for example, who were known to ceremonially ingest psilocybin mushrooms, peyote, and LSA-containing morning glory seeds. The Aztecs referred to Psilocybe mexicana as teonanácatl (meaning ‘flesh of the gods’ or ‘divine mushroom’ in the Aztec Nahuatl language). This pre-Columbian culture certainly recognised this psychedelic, as well as others that they used, as a sort of divine messenger.
These cultures also engaged in ceremonial human sacrifice, although the Aztecs did so on a much larger scale than the ancient Maya. The historian Woodrow Borah has estimated that the Aztecs in central Mexico in the fifteenth century sacrificed 250,000 people per year, which amounts to 1% of the total population. The ancient Maya had fewer victims, but unlike the Aztecs, they would commonly torture the victim before the act of sacrifice (this might involve beating, scalping, burning, or disembowelling them). To get a sense of the brutality of these ritual sacrifices, consider this account from Bernal Díaz del Castillo’s book The True History of the Conquest of New Spain (1568), wherein the author and Spanish conquistador recounts his expeditions to Aztec-ruled Mexico:
“They strike open the wretched Indian’s chest with flint knives and hastily tear out the palpitating heart which, with the blood, they present to the idols in whose name they have performed the sacrifice. They cut off the arms, thighs and head, eating the arms and thighs at ceremonial banquets. The head they hang up on a beam, and the body of the sacrificed man is not eaten but given to the beasts of prey.”
Why did the sacred plants and mushrooms not warn against or impugn these bloody and cruel actions against the innocent? Why did the plant spirits not inform people in their altered states that they did not need to engage in human sacrifice to appease the gods in the name of good fortune? Or should we assume that plant teachers are cultural and moral relativists, or that they speak on some moral issues but not all?
It seems more likely that the plants are not intelligent themselves but can be used intelligently or unintelligently. They can also serve a religious or spiritual function without necessarily imparting prosocial or ecological wisdom all of the time. We can think of psychedelics as ‘non-specific amplifiers’ of the human psyche (to borrow a term from the Czech psychiatrist and LSD researcher Stanislav Grof). This would mean that in Aztec culture, psilocybin mushrooms simply amplified the belief that the gods need to be appeased through the sacrifice of many human lives. Under this view, psychedelics magnify whatever states are already present in an individual, which would include their beliefs and attitudes. The researchers Neşe Devenot and Brian Pace supported this perspective in a 2021 paper:
“We suggest that the historical record supports the concept of psychedelics as “politically pluripotent,” non-specific amplifiers of the political set and setting. Contrary to recent assertions, we show that conservative, hierarchy-based ideologies are able to assimilate psychedelic experiences of interconnection.”
When we look at the societies of the ancient Maya and Aztecs, do we find evidence that psychedelics led to progressive social structures? In the case of both societies, we find patriarchy essentially reigned. Early research illustrated that in ancient Maya culture, men were kings and rulers of the city-state as well as the home. Newer studies do not challenge this notion but they do reveal that, during the Classic period (c. 250–900 AD), certain women held power as rulers in their cities and as oracular priestesses at various sacred sites. Pre-colonial Aztec society was also not as male-dominated as previously thought, given that women held positions of status and authority. In general, however, women were subordinate to men and were constrained to serve the traditional role of caring for their households.
While the Aztec civilisation was patriarchal in many ways (men held most of the political, economic, military, and religious power), women were still considered equally important to the whole of society (most notably as mothers). Additionally, both genders were able to hold authoritative positions within the marketplace. There were generally strict binary gender roles, thought to be complementary, so gender parallelism was at work: the view that the genders are separate, with different but equal roles; neither men’s nor women’s work are held in higher regard. Indeed, many researchers have challenged the notion of male dominance in Aztec culture. Disagreements about the existence or extent of male dominance in Aztec society mean it is debatable whether psychedelic use in the culture had a positive or negative effect on gender relations, or any such effect at all.
One might still try to argue, nonetheless, that the traditional use of psychedelic plant teachers in Maya and Aztec societies did not help to subvert existing patriarchal ideology and hierarchical social structures. These are structures that many see as antithetical to spiritual psychedelic experiences. Dr Kimberley Hewitt, for instance, has advanced the notion of psychedelic feminism: the intersection between psychedelic experiences and female empowerment. Similarly, in Food of the Gods, Terence McKenna argues that “encounters with psychedelic plants throw into question the entire world view of the dominator culture,” with “dogma, priestcraft, patriarchy, warfare” standing out as “dominator values”. Yet these are values that the Aztecs ascribed to (barring perhaps strict patriarchy). The idea that psychedelics are non-specific amplifiers or politically pluripotent means that McKenna’s assessment is not necessarily true: psychedelic experiences can accommodate a wide variety of views. The psychedelic researchers Matthew J. Johnson and David B. Yaden have stressed that the available data does not support the commonplace notion that psychedelics change our political beliefs in a particular direction.
In any case, referring to human sacrifice, patriarchy, and warfare in Maya and Aztec cultures as a way to refute psychedelic teleology could be unwarranted if psychedelic use in these pre-Columbian cultures was rare. According to the researcher Martin Fortier-Davy, who documented psychedelic use throughout history and across cultures, only around 5% of indigenous American groups used psychedelics, which he stresses “is probably a very liberal estimate”. Still, it is difficult, from an archaeological perspective, to paint an accurate picture of the prevalence of ancient psychedelic use since conditions of climate can degrade traces of substances.
If psychedelic use among Maya and Aztec populations was actually this uncommon, then it is possible that indigenous trips were not widespread enough for the wise and moral messages of the plant spirits to make an impact on cruel practices like torture and human sacrifice. It makes sense that psychedelic use would need to be a cultural norm if it were to make a significant difference to ingrained religious beliefs and cultural practices. These changes might also require that the most powerful and influential in society experience psychedelic consciousness and become personally transformed by it.
Regarding this last point, the cultural anthropologist Marlene Dobkin de Rios suggests that even if psychedelic mushrooms use was widespread at a folk level at some point, in Aztec imperial society, psychedelics were usurped “for priests, nobility, and special guests of the empire”, used by specialists for “distinctive social goals”. As we have seen, these goals did not include the abandonment of human sacrifice and strict hierarchy. Even when influential religious and political authorities in Mesoamerican societies — such as high priests who were almost totalitarian in power and influence — used psychedelics, society did not become more progressive. Moreover, in Amazon shamanism, where the use of psychedelics is common, not rare, we still find rigid social structures. As the writer Jules Evans underscores,
“[Y]ou would … struggle to call the world of Amazon shamanism ‘liberal’ or ‘progressive’. Rather, Amazon indigenous cultures can be highly patriarchal, heteronormative and conservative. To live well is to live in static harmony with the land, your tribe, your ancestors and the spirit world.”
In any case, one could accept the rarity of psychedelic use in Mesoamerican cultures and yet still question whether the psychedelics used by Maya and Aztec peoples are genuine plant teachers. If psychedelic use was rare in these cultures, this might suggest an absence of plant teleology or perhaps an absence of wise or intelligent plant teleology. By this, I mean that the pattern of psychedelic use and its effects (or lack of effects) on indigenous cultures seems contingent — dependent on circumstances — rather than something planned by an autonomous plant spirit. Alternatively, there could be a purpose behind the existence of these psychedelics — that they exist for the benefit of human society — but they cannot fully achieve this aim. This aim may not be completely realised because these plant teachers are not highly effective. Another line of thought is that the plant teachers are truly wise and intelligent but they are not so purposeful that they can just force themselves into the consciousness of the most influential people in society. After all, people still have to decide to consume these plants and mushrooms.
In addition, it has been doubted that every household in ancient Maya society had access to psychedelics, or as Thomas M. McGuire puts it: “An ordinary Mayan family probably had about as much access to sacred mushrooms as an ordinary family today has to a Catholic priest’s holy waters.” While psilocybin mushrooms were abundant in Central America and Mexico, “a priestly litany of respect and fear kept the average person from picking them,” says McGuire. Instead, as Dobkin de Rios argues, mushrooms were “usurped by hieratic functionaries” to maintain legitimate power. This point is again reiterated by David E. Smith, a psychopharmacology expert, and Dobkin de Rios: “Psychotropic plants … are denied to commoners … access to the plants became part of a reward system … the Maya restricted psychoactive flora … restrictions of drug use helped maintain the elite in power.” These plants helped legitimise the power and authority of the elite because they supplied the priests — who represented the people — with visions, insights, and contact with the deific forces residing in the plants.
The anthropologist Peter T. Furst, on the other hand, challenges Dobkin de Rios’s and Smith’s basic premise here: “There is no evidence for a ‘usurpation’ of any of the hallucinogens employed in Mesoamerica by a priestly elite.” This may be true, but there is also no evidence contradicting Dobkin de Rios’s and Smith’s explanation. It is at least reasonable to assume that folk people would fear and respect priests’ assertions that these psychedelics were repositories of divine power and that they carried the risk of insanity, illness, and even death. While the picture of psychedelic use in Mesoamerica is uncertain, use amongst influential figures certainly existed, yet it seems that these plants and mushrooms did not encourage positive social disruption, contrary to an idealistic view of psychedelics.
To heed plant wisdom and manifest may depend on a certain level of pre-existing wisdom and morality in human society. If that is the case, does this indicate a deficit in wisdom on the part of humanity or the plant teachers? Should effective emissaries, diplomats, and teachers not be able to reach and influence all those who are ignorant and misguided, or is there something unsalvageable about human nature? Have we, throughout history, regrettably decided to turn our backs on these allies of the vegetal and fungal worlds? These are open questions, and I can only speculate about the appropriate answers. However, based on the notion that natural psychedelics are not teleological in nature, the picture appears simpler and clearer: some human societies have been able to alter their consciousness in a beneficial way — providing the cultural context and setting are appropriate — but these benefits do not depend on plant spirits that have awareness and benevolent motives.
Furthermore, we can look to societies in which psychedelic use is the norm and yet — unless we are moral and cultural relativists — we find that the use of ‘plant teachers’ supports some quite unpleasant beliefs and practices. Magical Death (1973), a documentary by the anthropologist Napoleon Chagnon, offers a particularly illuminating example of this. The documentary is one of the few depictions of indigenous shamans themselves using psychedelics in a sacramental context.
Magical Death portrays shamanism among the Yanomami people, an indigenous group constituting approximately 35,000 people who live in the remote rainforest of the Orinoco River basin in southern Venezuela and the northernmost section of the Amazon River basin in northern Brazil. Chagnon’s fascinating footage shows a group of shamans snorting a psychedelic snuff made from Anadenanthera peregrina (also called yopo), which contains bufotenin and small quantities of DMT and 5-MeO-DMT. But why were these shamans consuming this snuff, widely regarded as a plant teacher? It was to better prepare them for an act of war.
First, let’s provide some necessary context. In Yanomami society, the shaman plays a crucial role in calling, commanding, and being possessed by spirits, known as hekura. Chagnon’s documentary focuses on shamans in one particular village called Mishimishi-mabowei-teri. One of the residents in this village is a shaman called Dedeheiwä, who is known even in distant Yanomami villages for his shamanic powers: his ability to manipulate the hekura of the mountains and the hekura that reside in his own body. In 1970, leaders of the village Bisaasi-teri visited Dedeheiwä’s village — this was after 20 years of hostilities between the two villages. The purpose of the visit was to establish an alliance. After a conciliatory feast, one of the visitors from the Bisaasi-teri village stayed behind and Dedeheiwä asked him: “Brother-in-law, do you have any enemies you want us to kill with our hekura?” The visitor replied that those from the Mahekdodo-teri village had killed his older brother and so he asked Dedeheiwä to send hekura to destroy the souls of the children of that village.
For two days following this request, Dedeheiwä led a group of shamans in a shamanic drama, in which they took yopo, enabling them to communicate with — and become — the hekura. And all of this is done for the purposes of essentially killing innocent children. During the shamanic drama, Dedeheiwä called on a “hot and meat-hungry” hekura to devour the souls of the enemy children with fire. Some of the shamans ‘became’ their victims — writhing like helpless, dying children — in a pile of ashes, with others bending over the ashes, acting like murderous spirits, devouring their souls. Becoming hekura again, the shamans devoured the ashes that represented the dead children.
This kind of psychedelic shamanism is commonplace in Yanomami culture. It is not rare. It also contrasts with the romantic notion that all indigenous peoples are communicating with plant spirits for the sake of psychological healing, moral improvement, and ecological consciousness. The Yanomami, like other indigenous groups, use psychedelics to access supernatural realms and to engage in practices like divination, physical healing, weather change, and evil magic. As Evans writes,
“Amazon shamanism can also be rather violent — there is an entire form of magic known as ‘battle magic’, in which shamans try to kill each other to prove their superiority and steal their foes’ spirit-allies. Amazon shamanic culture is not always a culture of emotional openness and sharing, but has been described as a culture of suspicion and vengeance — its model of medicine is based on the idea that illness and misfortune are caused by curses. Psychedelics help you discover who has cursed you and get revenge.”
The Yanomami have been a subject of keen interest to anthropologists, including Chagnon, because of their patterns of warfare and revenge (although the nature, extent, and cause of this violence has been a subject of intense and long-standing disagreement within the field of anthropology). It appears that common psychedelic use does not necessarily mitigate the tendency to engage in violent conflict. We should, therefore, abandon the monolithic view of natural psychedelics as noble plant spirits and plant teachers. The actual picture of psychedelics is much more nuanced than this.
Traditions of using psychedelics to battle evil spirits and increase enmity cannot be ignored. Such traditions indicate that the prosocial effects of psychedelics depend very much on cultural context, intention, and integration — that is, these benefits depend on the people using these plants and their relationship with them. There is nothing innately wise or benevolent about psychedelics themselves. However, the potential of psychedelics to enhance prosocial emotions and behaviours, and reduce violence, is often realised and has been borne out by multiple studies. Assuming the ‘cultural setting’ in which psychedelics are taken is already anchored towards prosocial values and goals, then widespread use of these compounds could play a role in improving not just individuals’ mental health but also other elements of society.
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Sam Woolfe is a freelance writer and blogger specialising in psychedelics, philosophy, psychology, and mental health. He is the author of Altered Perspectives: Critical Essays on Psychedelic Consciousness, a book exploring the intersection of psychedelics and philosophy. You can find more of his work at samwoolfe.com. He lives in London, UK.
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