In this thesis I'd like to use the mushroom as a research method, finding small connections in topics that are very different,
but also not that distant from each other. By making small connections through jumping from these various topics, I hope to find and understand my personal fascination of mushrooms. Using my thesis as a way to collect research material, I would like to be able to navigate within this overwhelming network of thoughts: by literally dissecting the space vertically, I'm trying to reconnect all layers that are related to “the mushroom.” An attempt to create a digestible system, where you could map out and transport in between these micro-theses, a non- linear approach of reconnecting, where getting lost is part of this exact same process.
To create a scope or frame around my research, you'll start in outer space. Gradually we'll enter the Medium Earth Orbit, the Karman Line and earths’ Ozone Layer. Around 15-0 km above ground we find stories of the first potential encounters of the mushroom and human: where Indigenous practices and ancient histories meet. As you'd go further down, you'll slightly touch upon various aspects of the trails that the mushroom has left behind, such as the connection to psychoactive medical studies in between the 30's and 50's, that were quite important for the development and understanding of the chemical compound that somehow works inside the human brain. Zooming in the human cultural relations there are to mushrooms and what we associate with them; how psilocybin can offer us new perspectives and crack open our biggest fears, though still offering us enlightenment and a greater sense of consciousness. New doors open for the development of treating mental health problems, and this even stretches as far as being high in outer space. Nowadays’ western capitalized society seem to be more exhausted, stressed and detached from their well-being and nurtured minds. As we've been zooming in with arriving at each stage or layer of the mushroom, the last part of the thesis will magnify further than what we can see with our bare eyes to a microscopic scale.
Connected through microscopic electrodes, patterns between time and space are being created. Following and directing a rhythmic pulsation - like a heartbeat, our fluids are trespassed through intrinsic small and absurd enormous places. We can see everything that can be mapped out; underneath the soil, through the roots of each plant, in any tree you can find in the forest. We are here, we are making noise - even though you might not be able to hear us. We are present in almost every living organism, extending far from our own species. And being one of the first organisms that have roamed and inhabited the earth for over billions of years. As you take more steps, more breaths will follow. Going inside your nostrils, into your lungs. We know you are with many, but whilst you can’t see us - that doesn’t mean we’re not present here, close at your side. We watch you as you move from place to place, trying to make things even more “convenient” than they already are. Losing your connections that go beyond the physical, you become strangers of your own kind. We see you struggle, trying to find this convenience while at the same time losing the feeling of connectivity. You’re most present in the light, at the same time, we roam in the dark. Even when you’d place your hand on the earths’ crust, you’d still have a hard time understanding our expressions. Your sciences are trying to document and scale up our hidden behaviours, but is there more than meets the eye - for both of us…? We could work together and learn from each other. Why do all things that have been told, all things you know - why do all things need to determine one specific outcome, only one great answer or possibility? You stack and build on top of each other, we grow and thrive through all gravitating boundaries. We map out every inch we can find, not just for ourselves but for all species among us. We lend out our “fluid filled veins” to secure a fruitful soil that is healthy and has completed countless essential life cycles. You can find us at the beginning of life, where whole ecosystems are blossoming and show extraordinary phenomena of biodiversity.
+-36.000km (GEO) Geostationary Orbit
High in outer space
Imagine the following, that mushrooms are not only relevant on earth
but that psilocybin mushrooms could also play a greater role in outer
space: How could we visualize this? Before astronauts are sent into space they must fulfil long periods
of heavy studies, these include mental and physical tests, specified
training and overall being prepared for their first time temporarily
leaving the earth's surface. They are sent up with a top crew
selected for their mission, each with their own skill set and specialty
within the astronomic field. But astronauts are human, like you and me
and most of them will have a family, to say goodbye
to for a longer period. While having much to do for their mission,
feelings do still get involved when being shot with a rocket into outer
space and while having arrived at the assigned destination or space
station, thoughts could still wonder off to life on earth.
How can astronauts continue their mission and stay on that mission,
while having feelings of loneliness, developed trauma or sometimes fear and homesickness?
As the extra value comes upon astronauts while looking at the blue
marble2, the mental well-being of these
brave space agents is certainly at a risk. When astronauts are traveling
in space, they could feel lonely, secluded, depressed and sometimes
traumatized, or in general not feeling good at their mission. As the
research studies of Stamets3 show great evidence in
the benefit of psilocybin mushrooms for our mental health, a new gateway
or star hole could be opened for the astronauts in space. As Paul
Stamets told SciAm magazine:
...“Under carefully controlled conditions, our astronauts [being] able
to take psilocybin in space and look at the universe and not feel
distant and alone but feel like they're part of this giant consciousness
will give them a better frame of mind — psychologically, emotionally —
to work with other astronauts and stay on mission," Stamets told the
magazine. "I feel that isolation, loneliness, and depression are going
to be major issues that astronauts face”...4
In the article of Dan Robitzski (Neoscope, 3 Aug.
2021), Stamets talks
about his research5 receiving a funding to invest in his
ideas on global mental health. From this small but very informative article, that also
talks about astronauts literally being high in space, it also touches upon the
use and waste of current building materials and potential new investments
being made for ‘space’ constructions, either build for space stations or
on planets, made up out of mushrooms or other parts of fungal bodies.
I'm happy to see new interventions and the deepening of our minds and
mental well-being, besides from our western jobs that overtime make us
feel exhausted, sad and sometimes quite terrible physically and eventually mentally as
well. As psilocybin and other psychedelic drugs are not legal without the
framing of medical research, the species have been outlawed and considered
forbidden. Though there might be a possibility that the Dutch
government6
will invest more in psychedelic studies in the near future!
But how would this be managed? Are we ready for making psilocybin
into
a pharmaceutical drug?7 If this will be a pharmaceutical who
will have the right to use the substances for health benefits: In what
kind of proposal are
we supposed to imagine this? Will it be micro dosed as pharmaceuticals
that you already can buy legally on online web shops for recreational
use?
Let’s look on the other side: what would you say if in the next 10-20
years at least 50% of young people in society are depressed, anxious and
burned out? Is there actually a danger in expanding this psychedelic
research, not only for people suffering from mental disorders or severe
depression, but also the people that have a difficulty with dealing with
their anxiety or where their work experiences have weighted out in their
collective emotional trauma?
What about the people working in the health care system, people that
need
to be able to stay professional and distance themselves emotionally to
be able to do their work? Or would this also be part of the underlying
pressure of the people working in the health care system, where
detachment is mandatory
in order to maintain some sort of mental filter for obtaining that
“professionality”?
(MEO) Medium Earth Orbit
On eco-anxiety
As mental health issues are becoming more frequent in Western society
under people my age and younger generations because of working on high
demand, always being on –and online available through social media, the
internet and the pressure of "succeeding” and not being a failure has
opened a new development for supressed anxiety and stress, just waiting
around the corner. I hear more and more young people dealing with
burnouts and the overall exhaustion that has made us look for coping
mechanisms to sometimes escape reality. Next to our8
jobs, studies, and occasional
social activities, also eco-anxiety seems to be a connecting
factor of fear when we're trying to shape and imagine our futures. The
term eco-anxiety9 was used and described as “a chronic
fear of environmental doom.” by the APA10
(American Psychological Association) in 2017. Because of heatwaves and
natural disasters peaked in 201911, the rise of climate
protest and the reoccurring theme and news items in Western media were
filled around the worries of climate change. Eco-anxiety has a great
impact on the mental well-being of people around the world, but this is
also experienced in differently for each person, depending on where each
person lives12.
APA: “Changes in climate effect agriculture, infrastructure and
liveability, which in turn affect occupations and quality of life
and can force people to migrate.”
As daily news items still show: the people that are suffering the
most are the people that are in close relation to nature and their
environment – the people that are economically drained and come from
extracted countries are battling severe droughts, floodings (most recent
Pakistan, 14 June to October 2022)13, water and soil
pollution in the Brazilian Amazon and Congolese14
rainforests, and the suffering doesn't stop at people alone: Australian
wildfires burn mammals alive and catches everything in these natural
environments,
sinkholes15 spread over the USA, also the food
supply shortage due to dried out land and harvest failure, and so
on.
Survey data from youth mental health organisation Reach Out
measured students from 1595 different schools (14 – 25 y.o.) responding
to the following statement: “Climate change is going to diminish my
quality of life
in the future.”16 At least 82% of
these students agreed with this statement.
15-0km Earth
Humans encountering magic:
Our ancestors, indigenous knowledge and shamanism
When did we start ingesting magic mushrooms? Scientists and
researchers are still not quite clear on the answer of the first human ancestors in
the evolutionary spectrum,17 where and when
mind-altering psychedelic
mushrooms were ingested. Did psilocybin mushrooms play a role in the
cognitive development of the human brain? The study of Rodríguez and
Winkelman show a collected theory on the influence of psilocybin
mushrooms on the social behaviour of early human evolution, originating
from our ancient ancestors Homonin, in the Pliocene epoch:
“McKenna (1992) proposed that psilocybin’s effects stimulating visual
acuity, sexual activity, and ecstatic/visionary experiences influenced
hominins’ foraging, sensitivity to community, as well as religious and
spiritual concerns. He also argued the presence of psychedelics in the
early human diet drove the rapid reorganization of the brain’s
information-processing capacities by catalyzing the emergence of
self-reflective consciousness and language. These hypotheses about human
origins have received little attention and thus still need to be
examined further.”
(Arce, Rodríguez, M. José and Winkelman, J. Michael.)
But how did this small substance influence our evolution, also still
now
being able to let the human brain react on this psychoactive drug?18
There are different methods for preparing and cooking mushrooms. What
parts do we prepare and what don't we eat? Some species require a
specific cooking time due to the risk of poisoning. It's also
very important to distinct safe species over beautiful mushrooms that
are pretending to be. Foraging mushrooms are always advised to do either
under guidance of mushroom experts, mycologists, scientists or locals
that know the area and know the different characteristics between a safe
and poisonous mushroom.
Mushroom hunting, foraging and collecting mushrooms ourselves has become
a very popular activity for non-experts like you and me. We must
consider that the cultivation and ingestion of mushrooms hasn't suddenly
re-popped up in the West as its origins lay outside of the European
border
and has been re-invented in Western modern medicine by Albert Hoffman19, starting from the synthesizing
process of “lysergic acid diethylamide in 1938”20,
also known as LSD. This is a "synthetic chemical” that is made
from the infection of rye grain that the fungi Ergot causes in
this process. Hoffman didn't know of the psychoactive properties
until
5 years after his lab experiment in 193821.
When we dive in one of these ancient histories22,
there is an example of an early indigenous community, The Chimú culture,
which shows mushroom representation and "mushroom knowledge". These
artworks would be made from bronze, gold, ceramic, textile and stone.
The Chimú culture dates to early 900-1470 CE, Peru.
“Ceremonial Knife (Tumi)” The MET, www.metmuseum.org Accessed 5 Dec. 2022
In the figure above you see a ceremonial knife, also known as Tumi, that
contains characteristics of mushroom relating to the Chimú society,
Peru,
to their religious aspects and beliefs23.
This artifact is an example of many other objects that could have been
used for ancient rituals, rites and ceremonies. This could be connected
to the beliefs that embody, respect and honour nature's presence. The
Chimú people would adapt their way of living to nature and to their
natural living environments, whereas the epistemology of a capitalised
western society would either destroy, outsource and separate the nature
out of the human body24.
Even when you’d place your hand on the earths’ crust, you’d still
have a hard time understanding our expressions. Your sciences are
trying to document and scale up our hidden behaviours, but is
there more than meets the eye - for both of us…?
In the findings of Trutmann, there is no specification of the Chimú
people and their relation to psilocybin mushrooms. But there are
findings that indicate that the Moche people or other indigenous
societies (the Paracas)25 used the psilocybe species in their
lives and practices. As psilocybin mushrooms were used for spiritual
development and used in sacred context, rituals and ceremonies were
built around the psychedelic experiences. These findings have been
documented in Mayan and the surviving language of Popul Vuh26.
As Trutmann states: “We now know Peruvian ancestors were highly
expressive in representing mushrooms in ceramics, textiles and sculpture
representing them either realistically, or stylistically or
symbolically.”
What are psychoactive drugs?
Psilocybin the chemical compound in psychedelic
mushrooms
Would you believe me that the chemical compound, psilocybin in these
mushrooms, is far from damaging the mind and that they aren't related
to
any addictive drugs we already know? While having the knowledge that
XTC, alcohol, nicotine, Marijuana (weed), benzoyl-methyl-ecgonine
(coke), heroin, opioids (pain killers), amphetamine (speed) is more
likely to be addictive?
As the stigma around psychedelics have been slowly dissolving, fears and
taboos been broken, there is a positive outlook on the future of
psychedelics being accepted by more people in western society27.
Psilocybin is the alkaloid found within magic mushrooms. This chemical
enhances –and functions as an amplifier for hallucinative experiences.
Psilocybin is an alkaloid or chemical compound found in the
psilocybe species. Psilocin is the most active
substance that is produced by the metabolic28
process of psilocybin. There are approximately around 116 species known
and registered psilocybin species, growing at any place in the world.
This potentially could be around the edges and trails of tropical
forests or even across your local police station29.
What exactly happens in our brain when we ingest psilocybin? How does
are brain change the space between neurones while being on high on this
psychedelic drug?
In 1958 at the Sandoz30 laboratories, this was confirmed by
Albert Hofmann and later in 1959 produced as the first synthesized batch
and psilocybin was ready for is first pharmaceutical and the therapeutic
clinical research was presented as Indocybin by Sandoz.
(Geiger, et al. p2440, scheme 2: Synthisizing process of Psilocybin,
documented and reported by Albert Hofmann, 1959)
Once the drug is ingested, it will be absorbed and will start the
metabolic process of which is turned into psychoactive psilocin.
Psilocin enters the bloodstream without any struggles, travels and
enters the systemic circulation31 within the brain.
Neurons within our connectome, the mapping of all neural
connections and activity in the brain, will connect to each other on
multiple places and as the drug psilocybin promises, we reach a 4th
stage32 of consciousness as the drug
becomes psychoactive and hallucinations start to form.
If we would jump back to the list addictive drugs, psilocybin just
doesn't make the cut.33 As psilocybin uses up a lot of the
existing proteins, it occupies the space for new proteins to pop up.
This is also the reason for dosing patients within medical studies,
therapy sessions or recreational use with a high dose of psilocybin in
order to make this drug work in a more beneficial way for the therapy
session.34
We could work together and learn from each other. Why do all things
that have been told, all things you know - why do all things need to
determine one specific outcome, only one great answer or
possibility?
The cauldron of storytelling:
witches brew and psychedelic
representations
We cannot go around it, but the mushroom is everywhere - even in the
imaginary worlds. Fiction is intertwined with the connections and
representation of mushrooms with fantasy figures and fictional
characters35.
Although these visual representations of the mushroom can not only be
found in Western Europe, parts in Siberia and Scandinavia (Dugan, p29
& p38)36 show similarities and traces back
of the dominance the Fly Agaric has in these regions. When thinking back
to my own childhood, this is also one of the mushrooms I can think of
that would have been prominently used in fairy tales: In a forest
surrounded by magical creatures. Therefor the connections we can make
from mushroom in relation to these fictional characters are kind of
inevitable and hard to overlook. You can think of gnomes and leprechauns
sitting on the caps of mushrooms or even use them as little houses,
animals that would live in the forest alongside trolls, fairies or
witches that would use various mushrooms to create potions or
mysterious brews.
As a kid I was always in love with the imaginary worlds that I could
spend
my time with, and ever more so being excited to be able to delve into
these characters. Unfortunately, as we get older, we come to understand
that these “original” fairy tales relate to horrifying folktales37 that scare and warn people with a
deeper and inner rooted metaphor. Where strangers, out standers, people
with disabilities and women have been demonized and were often portrayed
as utterly evil.38
You’re most present in the light,
at the same time, we roam in the dark.
As the representation of mushrooms have also been widely connected to
witches, either as part of their potion brews or special species they
maintain in their mystical garden, the image of the witch goes beyond
the Western European fairy tales. Art and illustrations of the fantasy
figure riding on brooms, the making of mysterious potions, they are
either presented as an old and scary hag or a young and seductive
woman.
According to Federici's39 work on Witches, Witch-hunting
and Women, Caliban and the Witch: Women the Body and Primitive
Accumulation, et al., the accusing and the forming of the term
witch derives40 from the extensive torturing and
killing of innocent people, predominantly women, but also queer and gay
people, people of colour, comes from the witch-hunt that already dates
back around 3 centuries. From 15th, moreover in the
16th and 17th century, witch-hunting was something
practiced very commonly, and this range of terror and extreme torture
ended in Europe near the 18th century. One of the biggest
misconceptions on the figure of the witch, that originates from Western
Europe, is that there weren't any major witch-hunts in the start of the
Middle Ages. This was something that developed later, near the end of
the 15th century, where we're somewhere in the middle of the
Middle Ages.
But who were those so-called witches? Silvia argued that there is a
clear connection between the witch-hunting and the political and social
transformations that were taking place in Western Europe. This also
went
in hand with “the development of the capitalist economy.” This was also
the beginning of slave trade and colonization in the 16th C.
— “conquest of American territories” and the beginning of the capitalist
world.”
During the development of this new economic system and overruling
existence of the patriarchy, society needed a figure to blame when
misfortune would happen and where the reasons of this misfortune would
be impossible to explain or figure out at that time. Silvia: “They would
be accused of supernatural powers and for unfortune, that couldn't be
solved.”
“Bizarre accusations were made such as: 'witches' would be making poison
with their bodies.” 41
Federici: “After the torture, the accused, innocent
people would be burned at the
stake, being a quite known method in
Europe for witch persecutions.” (33:28 – 36:00)
The female body was seen as “a working machine” that would only
benefit society in the form of sexual reproduction and labour. Next to
labelling and accusing women (who for instance weren't married with
children), also queer and gay people, folk healers and Indigenous people
and their communities became part of the new target of which the
patriarchy has set his eyes on.
Women were not allowed to express their sexual power, their desires, so
far that not even just their love and “collective spirit” of female
friendship (where the sharing of thoughts, ideas and feelings) was seen
as a threat and danger and were seen as untrustworthy, suspicious, and
wrong.
Federici: “The scandal of the witch,
the portraying, the witch hunt has been thrown in the dustbin of
history. The witch has been transformed into a legendary figure, a
figure
of fantasy, …“the history of these persecutions is
being erased”… And has been transformed into a capitalist use of the
figure of the witch.”
Next to the story of witch-hunting and the origin of Western European
witches, the visual representation really shows how men viewed women in
society. From and throughout the 15th C. illustrations and
woodcuts42 would be depicting and translating
the patriarchal gaze by demonizing and sexualizing women's bodies
through the medium of the witch. Seen as a demonic creature, often nude
with strange habits, for instance riding backwards on goats and flying
on broomsticks.
43
Hexenflug der "Vaudoises" (hier Hexen, ursprünglich Waldenser) auf dem
Besen, Miniatur in einer Handschrift von
Martin Le France, Le champion des dames, 1451 Source: W. Schild. Die
Maleficia der Hexenleut', 1997, p. 97 {{PD-art}}
Alina Cohen44: “This vision of the
witch, and its subsequent demonization of female sexuality, persisted
for centuries.”
Poisoning and weaponization of psychoactive
drugs
As we already know that psychedelic plants and fungi have been
used
by Indigenous communities for medical practices and healing rituals for
centuries, the substances used for medical studies and therapies
didn't
enter Western modern medicine until Hofmann's study in 1938,
see Ingesting Mushrooms: Our ancestors, indigenous knowledge and
shamanism, (note 26 & 27)
After his first accidental testing of LSD, in between 1940 and 197045 experiments and research studies
have tested psychedelics for offering
new medical approaches to mental disorders, depression, PTSD,
alcoholism, anxiety disorders, etc. But Hofmann wasn't the first to
introduce psychedelic medicine to modern Western pharmacy. Already in
1895 Prentiss and Morgan (US) documented the healing practices
and ceremonial rites in “Central America” of the psychedelic effects of
Mescaline46.
In 1958 Hofmann synthesized ‘psilocybe’, a deriving alkaloid of
magic mushrooms (see note 35, Sandoz). Before the escape of
psychoactive substances from laboratories entering non-scientific
settings in the 60's
and 70's, other drugs and psychoactive substances have been widely used
during war times47, such as the Vietnam war in 1955,
also known as the “pharmacological war” - lasting for at least 20
years48.
Lukasz Kamienski: ..."by the end of the
1960s...
“The dark side of psychedelics began to receive tremendous amounts of
publicity— bad trips, psychotic breaks, flashbacks, suicides—and
beginning in 1965 the exuberance surrounding these new drugs gave way to
moral panic. As quickly as the culture and the scientific establishment
had embraced psychedelics, they now turned sharply against them.”
Because drugs (including psychedelics) came in touch with the
counterculture in 1960, there is also a dark side to the uses of these
substances starting from that era. As there were no policies from
pharmaceutical companies who were “offering synthesized psychoactives”49 to researchers on the condition of
sharing the results of these studies.
As psychedelics didn't have an instruction manual, people were
using
them recklessly and basically anyone could get their hands on these
drugs,
using them without prescription, in non-safe environments50.
While the civil rights movement, war protests, African American civil
rights movement and the second feminism wave developing from the 1960's,
in 1971 Nixon51 declared a national “war on drugs”
and signed the drug law enforcement on 28 Jan. 1972. Even though the war
on drugs was there to solve a “national emergency”, there was a “full
scale moral panic” (Pollan 24:50-24:56) of the adult generation on the
youth of America;
the Vietnam war was also a factor to move the drug law enforcement of
72’ forward, mainly because of the drug addicted soldiers it had
created.
But the war on drugs was also designed to discriminate and set as a
political strategy to demonize and criminalize people from different
races and ethnicities, and mostly just from being black. By
criminalizing a specific group in society, it shows the fear and overall
malice of Nixon's mark on American politics to the criminalization of
black people. As the war on drugs was generally failing, the US
government was looking for a scapegoat in society, but more importantly,
Nixon tried to cover his scandals52 and mistakes
of his time in the office.
A new report by Dan Baum for Harper's Magazine: John Ehrlichman
(1994)
"The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House after that, had two enemies: the anti-war left and black people. You
understand what I'm saying? We knew we couldn't make it illegal to be
either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate
the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin, and then
criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities. We could
arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings, and
vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were
lying about the drugs? Of course we did."
While those communities of black people and Hispanics53
were targeted
(and still are by today), 1980's Hollywood54
was praised for the use of crack cocaine. Barack Obama (8:46): “It's not
normal for black and Latino youth
to go through the system in this way.” ... “This is not normal.”
There is a huge link to the “violent” arrestment's we see in the news
and media almost every day, where innocent black people are being
targeted
and where the police are always looking for a “drug involvement”55 — so that those police officers,
who are guilty of violent arrests and the killing of black people, can
find a way and excuse to justify their actions while being in service
and duty of the American Law Enforcement56.
Slowly from the 90's, small groups57 of scientists and
psychotherapists still believed in the potential benefits of studying
and testing psychoactives for mental health therapies and this slowly
developed into the rebirth of psychedelics nowadays, also known as “The
Psychedelic Renaissance”.58
30–1 \mu m (micro meters)
Our unexpected close relatives
What are mushrooms – and how does humankind relate to them?
Somewhat mysterious, envied and still misunderstood, these amazing,
intelligent and extraordinary organisms are often connected to negative
stereotypes of being dirty and unimportant.
Consisting of a cap59 with gills, filled with spores that
release and travel
by wind for expanding their kin on big geographical distances. What are
mushrooms? Basically, a fungus itself, a mushroom is considered the
fruit of the fungal body made of the same materials as the roots growing
underneath the soil, mycelium. When we look closer to the
microscopic thin threads, they consist of rooted structures, the
hyphae. Mushrooms are made of these hyphae and are the
reproductive organ of the fungi.Not all fungi produce mushrooms, and they can also be classified
into sub-species: poisonous, medicinal, invading or even symbiotic
species.
When we look at the cell structure of mushrooms, we see that these
eukaryotic60 organisms are very different from
the cell structure of plants.
As fungi have a special and very own kingdom of species, not belonging
to the plant or mammal kingdom, we humans, share the same evolutionary
cell characters as fungi. Also, fungal behaviours are very similar to
our human-social-interactions.
Eukaryotic body, multispecies and symbiotic
relations
Fungi share similarities with us in social behaviour, survival instincts
and collaboration. But these similarities are even literally on a
cellular level.61
Did you know that mushrooms are closer related to humans than to
plants?
In the biological field, regna and their species can be
divided
in 3 domains: Bacteria62,
Archaea and Eukaryotic.
Animals, plants, algae or fungus are eukaryotic organisms and share
therefore also “the long-lasting intimacy of strangers”63.
This evolutionary theory is based on the symbiosis of organisms and not
on the interpretation we also know of the Darwin64
evolution theory, where survival of the fittest reflects similarly to
the competitive nature of the capitalised western society. What makes
this story so interesting and relevant to us, is that is based on most
of the significant moments65 in the evolution. It
shows the convergence, collaboration, coming together and staying
together of different organisms. (1967, Lynn Margulis, US
biologist)
We could call this coming together and sticking together of species
symbiosis. As mammals and fungi are both Eukaryotic organisms, our cell
structure is even almost alike. Could mushrooms help us find
the answers we're looking for? And could fungi be the actual dominating
species on earth?
The term originates from the former Botanist Anton DeBary in 1873 and
the idea of symbiogenisis has been invented by Konstantin Berezovsky
(1855-1921), which can be understood as "the living together of very
different kinds of organisms.” Margulis: “In some situation (I think
over the course of evolution) this shared living, collaboration came
from sharing the habitats, leading to living and sticking together. This
process can be understood as symbiogenisis.” Lynn is aware of her
different approach and belief on evolution hence she had to stand her
ground to other leading figures not taking her different take on
evolution theory seriously. Margulis:
“Appearance of new bodies, new organs, new species.” (p43, ch3)66
Figure and example of Lynn's symbiogenisis evolution theory
(p41 figure 2, SET Serial Endosymbiosis Theory) phylogeny
Another scholar who supports this theory is Donna Haraway67: she wrote
the Camille stories68 to speculate about on a different
future for our earthly survival, a way to break down the barrier that
has been put by the western capitalist driven minds between people and
nature. The Camille Stories were a way for Haraway to explain her theory
on making kin and not babies. Making kin can be understood as not only
the living and interacting of multispecies — going beyond the human
species world that has been created and finding the relations with and
through “nature”. Not making babies, in the sense that love and care are
not only running through blood, but they can also be expanded from the
current westernized human understanding of the natural environment that
focuses on the separation of human, nature and other species. The
reproduction of the human species shouldn't be the only solution to give
love and care, to share and gain knowledge alone. Haraway is breaking
the paths we take as human individuals and she's allowing us to
reimagine future aspects of our earthly world, by looking for solutions
beyond the human centred world and sees multispecies as the intersection
of symbionts not only working and cooperating, but also by love and
care,
trying to preserve multispecies habitat and sustain balance by
speculating on symbiogenisis of human and animal. Haraway
(21:05–22:05):69
“Camille is a symbiont put together by the biological operations
of sym (yoking) bio (living) genesis (beginnings). Symbiogenisis, bio
from linking. Only humans can take on the flesh of their symbionts to be
able to do their job better, see better, able to taste the air better.
To see things differently.”
The soils’ multi-universe: mother of
ecosystems
Next to human relations with fungi, plants too share a profound
symbiosis,
in order to survive, thrive and “involve” with one another (Meyers and
Hustak)70. This relation and long-lasting
intimacy of strangers even made it possible for “ancestor plants” to
transfer from the ocean and grow on land71.
(Sheldrake, p137): Mycorrhizal fungi can provide up
to 80% of a plant’s nitrogen and as much as a hundred
percent of its phosphorus.
These relations between plant and fungi can be understood as quite a
fluid process and an open exchange, depending on where plants grow and
what type of species are able to interact with existing types of fungi.
This type of relationship between plants and fungi is also known as a
"mycorrhizal relationship.” Fungi make sure the soil is fertile: holding
and spreading water they give to plants; they also give and exchange
nutrients like "zinc” and “copper.” Within this exchange, fungi take up
30% of the carbon that's being submerged by plants and get sugars in
return by the process of photosynthesis of the plant. Without the
involvement of fungi in the soil,
landscapes would face severe droughts and wouldn't be able to hold and
absorb any water. This relation of exchange doesn't really have a power
play, between both plants and fungi, as neither of them are in control
within this relationship, they negotiate the possibilities of this
exchange depending on what they could offer one another. Though there
are some fungal species that are less communal and collect large
supplies of “phosphorus” they can find in this relationship.
(Sheldrake p146): “Fungi can determine which plants
grow where; they can even drive the evolution of new species by
isolating plant populations from one another.”
Arce, Rodríguez, M. José and Winkelman, J. Michael. “Psychedelics,
Sociality, and Human Evolution.”
Frontiers, 29 September 2021, https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2021.729425
“Bacteria: They Are Everywhere.” Micropia, .
Accessed 8 Jan. 2023.
Burns, Ken and Novick, Lynn. “The Vietnam War Explained in 25 Minutes |
Vietnam War Documentary.” YouTube, uploaded by The Life Guide. 1 Nov.
2019, www.youtube.com/watch?v=7tNTh6KlXXU.
Doblin RE, Christiansen M, Jerome L, Burge B. “The Past and Future of
Psychedelic Science: An Introduction to This Issue. J Psychoactive
Drugs.” National Library of Medicine, 27 May 2019, pp.93-97, https://doi.org/10.1080/02791072.2019.1606472.
Dugan, M. Frank. “Fungi, Folkways and Fairy Tales: Mushrooms &
Mildews in Stories,
Remedies & Rituals, from Oberon to the Internet.” North American
Fungi, vol. 3, 2008. http://dx.doi.org/10.2509/naf2008.003.0074.
Fantastic Fungi. Directed by Louis Schwartzberg, Stephen Apkon,
Geralyn Dreyfous, et al.,
written by Mark Monroe, production by Louis Schwartzberg, Lyn Lear,
Elease Lui,
Moving Art Studio and Reconsider, 11 Oct. 2019, Netflix, www.netflix.com/nl/title/81183477.
Hart, Liam, host. Billings, Robin, guest. “Clinical Psychologist: Dr.
Robin Billings.” Perspectives on Psilocybin: The Science and Mysticism of Magic Mushrooms,
Spotify, 11 Jan. 2022
Hendelman, Ariel Dominique. “The Peyote Plot: The Indigenous Fight to
Conserve the Sacred Plant and the Spiritual Medicine It Contains.”
DoubleBlind Mag, 3 Aug. 2022,
doubleblindmag.com/the-peyote-plot.
Accessed 9 Feb. 2023
Myers, Natasha. “From the Anthropocene to the Planthroposcene:
Designing Gardens for Plant/People Involution.” History and
Anthropology, vol. 28, no. 3, Informa UK Limited, Mar. 2017, pp.
297–301. https://doi.org/10.1080/02757206.2017.1289934.
Accessed 14 Feb. 2023
Nowell, Charles E. , Webster, Richard A. and Magdoff, Harry. "Western
colonialism". Encyclopedia Britannica, Invalid Date, www.britannica.com/topic/Western-colonialism.
Accessed 30 January 2023.
Orita, M., Nakashima, K., Taira, Y. et al. “Radiocerium
concentrations in wild mushrooms after the accident at the Fukushima
Daiichi Nuclear Power Station: Follow-up study in Kawauchi village.”
scientific reports7, 6744 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-017-05963-0.
“Psilocybin.” How to Change Your Mind, created by Alex Gibney
and Michael Pollan, season 1,
episode 2, Jigsaw Productions, Tree Tree Tree, 2022. Netflix,www.netflix.com/nl/title/80229847.
Rucker, James J. H., et al. “Psychiatry and the Psychedelic Drugs. Past,
Present &Amp; Future.” Neuropharmacology, vol. 142, Elsevier BV,
Nov. 2018, pp. 200–18. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuropharm.2017.12.040.
Accessed 9 Feb. 2023
Rutledge, Kim. McDaniel, Melissa. et al. “Sinkhole: A sinkhole is a hole
in the ground
that forms when water dissolves surface rock.” National Geographic
Society, 15 July 2022, education.nationalgeographic.org/resource/sinkhole.
Schrader, Niels. “Acid Clouds: Mapping Data Centre Topologies.” Acid
Clouds, https://acidclouds.org/.
Accessed 30 Jan. 2023
“SG Online: Wxtch Craft with Silvia Federici, Reclaiming magic as
subversive practice.”
KABK Studium Generale 2020-2021, 12 November 2020 lecture created by
Erika Sprey,
hosted by Melanie Bonajo, published by Janne van Gilst, 16 Nov.
2020, web.microsoftstream.com/video/e5847ed0-9041-451c-ad1a-3ae90803e8d4.
Sheldrake, Merlin. Entangled Life: How Fungi Make Our
Worlds, Change Our Minds and Shape Our Futures. Reprint, Random House
Trade Paperbacks, 2021.
Paul Stamets (1955, Salem, Ohio) is a self thought
mycologist from the US, whom also has a PhD from NUMN, National
University of Natural Medicine, as Doctor of Science (HON.). He's also
known for his great discoveries on new psilocybin species and genomic
preservations, but next to this, he's very populair in the field of
mycology under experts and amateur mycologists.
As Stamets has been a (self-thought) expert in the field already for
decades, he's an innovative mycologist, medical researcher and author of
The Mushroom Cultivator (1983), Psilocybin mushrooms of the
world (1996), Mycelium Running (2005), and so forth.
Stamets has discovered four new psilocybe species in his career of
mycology.
Robitzski, Dan. “Scientist Says Astronauts Should Take
Psychedelic Mushrooms in Space.” Futurism, 3 Aug. 2021,
futurism.com/neoscope/astronauts-psychedelic-mushrooms-space.↩︎
Stadlen, Matthew, host. “Michael Pollan - How to Change
Your Mind.” How To Academy Podcast, Spotify, 28 Aug. 2019↩︎
Young people, like me, who have the privilege in Western
European society to study, to have a job and that can pay for extra
social activities. Even though I'm aware that climate anxiety has no age
limitations and I would like to make a disclaimer that I don't want to
exclude the adults and elderly people in society. On
Eco-anxiety is an oppurtunity to address this rising issue
connecting to our mental well-being and how interconnected these very
different topics (chapters that are presented) are. It's important to
think in long-term possibilities, but there are countless cases where
we're running behind the facts. Mental health problems should be at
every following step at the planetary agenda of the European Parliament.
We see that the importance of mental health problems arose during and
slightly after the covid-pandemic, but the last time this was on the
European Parliament Agenda was 5 July 2022.
Aimee Lewis-Reau and Laura Schmidt: The range and
"spectrum” of climate anxiety hits very different places on that scale:
nothing much going on, to denial and to destruction of humankind in the
coming decade. People living in wealthy countries or countries that
haven't dealt with disasters of climate damage have more a response of
uncertainty than that of those living close to the actual impact of the
climate crisis.↩︎
where Indigenous communities must fight for their lands
as mass companies from the west not only push these communities away,
criminalize, use physical abuse and intimidation, sometimes leading to
unnecessary killings of innocent people. https://www.oneworld.nl/lezen/essay/onze-energietransitie-is-koloniaal/↩︎
Rutledge, Kim. McDaniel, Melissa. et al. “Sinkhole: A
sinkhole is a hole in the ground that forms when water dissolves surface
rock.” National Geographic Society, 15 July 2022, education.nationalgeographic.org/resource/sinkhole.↩︎
Kennedy, D. O. (2014). Plants and the Human
Brain. New York NY: Oxford University Press.
Arce, Rodríguez, M. José and Winkelman, J. Michael. “Psychedelics,
Sociality, and Human Evolution.” Frontiers, 29 September 2021, https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2021.729425↩︎
18 The connectome is the mapping of neural
pathways that are present in the brain.
For more interesting information on the invention of high-definition MRI
scanning of human brain activity,
see the Human Connectome Project, led by USC-Harvard Consortium. HCP was
a five-year project which got its fundings from The National Institutes
of Health (US). This research project was set to be able and figure out
a way where the entire ”human neural wiring system” would be mapped and
scanned.
Pallab Ghosh: “A side view of brain pathways, from the right. At far
left is the visual cortex, connected by a large bundle, green, which
connects to the frontal lobes. At centre, the vertical pathways in blue
serve voluntary movement, connecting the motor areas of the brain with
the spinal cord and muscles. The green path at centre is the right
cingulum bundle, here seen from the side. The cerebellum, which controls
coordinated movement, can be seen at bottom left.”
Glasser, M., Smith, S., Marcus, D. et al. The Human Connectome
Project's neuroimaging approach.
Nat Neurosci19, 1175–1187 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1038/nn.4361
Accessed 15 Feb. 2023↩︎
Doblin RE, Christiansen M, Jerome L, Burge B. “The Past
and Future of Psychedelic Science: An Introduction to This Issue. J
Psychoactive Drugs.” National Library of Medicine, 27 May 2019,
pp.93-97, https://doi.org/10.1080/02791072.2019.1606472.↩︎
Up until the 50s and 60s, medical experiments with
psychoactive substances like LSD were able to be explored. By studying
and documenting indigenous communities, we have again been exploiting
and misunderstanding the meaning of spirituality, practices and rituals
that abide to psychedelic mushrooms.↩︎
Trutmann, Peter. The Forgotten Mushrooms of
Peru, Ph.D, Global Mountain Action, 2012.↩︎
As we might not know for sure what the function of the
human transfiguration with the mushrooms means, but it does show a deep
awareness and consciousness about the idea of human and nature not being
identified as separate entities. What I'm looking at is not the object
itself, it is a representation of the artifact, placed out of context,
within an archive of a Western institute and presented through a digital
medium as an image/photograph that has probably been taken in a studio
setting, far away from its original roots.↩︎
I must be very cautious writing this, while knowing I'm
writing from the perspective of a white person,
growing up in a dominant white western society, that has roots in
colonialisation and exploitation (still to this day) of the indigenous
people to the lands of: Africa, Tasmania, India, parts of Asia including
Java and Jakarta, but also, South America, Mesoamerica and the Amazonian
regions, and so on.
What I find so fascinating, again beautiful about this piece, is that
there is no separation from the natural environment whatsoever. Even the
end of the knife reminds me of the soil, the earths’ edge, where all
living organisms come from – a place where these organisms use minerals
and nutrients to survive. I see this reoccurring life cycle, where the
soil and the fungi are both at the beginning and the end.
Nowell, Charles E. , Webster, Richard A. and Magdoff, Harry. "Western
colonialism". Encyclopedia Britannica, Invalid Date, www.britannica.com/topic/Western-colonialism.
Accessed 30 January 2023.↩︎
(Trutmann p9)
The Paracas culture shows a prominent representation of mushrooms
embedded on ceramics and textiles.
In these findings of these beautiful objects and artifacts, symbolism of
the shaman and mushroom could be seen, especially flying shamans with
holding mushrooms in their hands. Trutmann: "The representation of
mushrooms in the Paracas culture may indicate their role in the
transformation, since through transformations it is believed shamans
were able to communicate and even battle with spirits and thus heal
illness or become clairvoyant.”↩︎
Libraries were burned to the ground by Spanish
colonizers, destroying almost all documented ritual traditions within
these cultures.↩︎
There are still countries where these substances are
restricted and stigmatised as harmful, making it hard for medicinal
possibilities to test and develop research and studies for people
suffering mental health issues, mental disorders, as they're still
marked as an illegal species in most countries
internationally.↩︎
ACS Neuroscience Chemical, Dark classics in
Chemical Neuroscience, sep. 2018↩︎
How to Change Your Mind. Directed by Lucy
Walker and Alison Ellwood , written by Alex Gibney and Michael
Pollan, 2022. Netflix. (How to Change Your Mind,
S1:E2 Psilocybin 0:21:43-00:23:33)↩︎
Liam Hart, Grand Valley State University (Major:
Psychology, Minor: Applied statistics)
Currently a research assistant at the department of psychology, mentor
at Psych friends.
Hart, Liam, host. Billings, Robin, guest. “Clinical Psychologist: Dr.
Robin Billings.” Perspectives on Psilocybin: The Science and Mysticism of Magic Mushrooms,
Spotify, 11 Jan. 2022↩︎
Dr. Alain Davis: “...you cannot really
overdose on magic mushrooms. With something like heroin — you keep
taking it... getting higher, and higher, and higher... until you
overdose and die. But with psilocybin. That doesn't happen...” The
reason for psilocybin not being a highly addictive drug has to do with
the way it binds to a specific protein in our brain. This causes the
feeling of being high.↩︎
Zukerman, Wendy, host. “Magic Mushrooms: Trip Through
the Science.” Science Vs, Spotify, 11 Dec. 2020↩︎
When I think of the stereotypical European fairy tales
and the image that is drawn of mushrooms that can be considered the most
popular to be depicted is the Amanita Muscaria, also known as
the Fly Agaric. This is a mushroom with a red cap, containing white dots
and a white stem. It is one of the most known mushroom species being
presented in old fairy tales and folklore and is still quite prominent
in the contemporary alternatives presented today that are based on these
old fairy tales and folklore stories.
Dugan, M. Frank. “Fungi, Folkways and Fairy Tales:
Mushrooms & Mildews in Stories,
Remedies & Rituals, from Oberon to the Internet.” North American
Fungi, vol. 3, 2008. http://dx.doi.org/10.2509/naf2008.003.0074.↩︎
As a reference of the Grimm Brothers Fairytales, the
probability of these stories still being true to its origin, would be
unlikely hard to testify to be completely true. Most of these stories
would be told from an oral tradition, which could indicate we'll never
be sure of the accuracy and small tweaks and adjustments that have been
applied over the past 200 years.
Dugan, M. Frank. “Fungi, Folkways and Fairy Tales:
Mushrooms & Mildews in Stories,
Remedies & Rituals, from Oberon to the Internet.” North American
Fungi, vol. 3, 2008. http://dx.doi.org/10.2509/naf2008.003.0074.↩︎
Silvia Federici (1942, Parma, Italy, currently living
in Slope, Brooklyn) is a scholar, author of various titles, Marxist
theorist and feminist activist, who teaches and works in the US.↩︎
“SG Online: Wxtch Craft with Silvia Federici,
Reclaiming magic as subversive practice.”
KABK Studium Generale 2020-2021, 12 November 2020 lecture created by
Erika Sprey,
hosted by Melanie Bonajo, published by Janne van Gilst, 16 Nov.
2020, web.microsoftstream.com/video/e5847ed0-9041-451c-ad1a-3ae90803e8d4.↩︎
The accusations were in general anonymous. You would
not know who accused you and what for. Caliban and the witch
(Persecution of witches and state initiative (CH4): Charges would
be being made in church with anonymous boxes that would go around, where
you could accuse someone of being a witch anonymously. The charges,
accusations, “new section of labelling”, criminalization and demonizing
of women and certain practices was just a façade and a weapon against
the fear and “the patriarchy and economic capitalist driven society.”↩︎
See note 41.
One of the myths and floating theories that would date back to 1450 in
the forms of documented text and illustrated manuscripts, are
unconfirming a never proven theory, that would just circle around as the
next tittle-tattle: Witchy women would apply psychoactive ointments on
their broomsticks or ‘crotches’ and would ride their broomstick for
transportation. One of the first known Western artworks depicting
witches on broomsticks was in 1451 by Martin Le Franc (French writer) in
the form of an illustrated manuscript.↩︎
Rucker, James J. H., et al. “Psychiatry and the
Psychedelic Drugs. Past, Present &Amp; Future.” Neuropharmacology,
vol. 142, Elsevier BV, Nov. 2018, pp. 200–18. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuropharm.2017.12.040.↩︎
Mescaline is the chemical compound (alkaloid) of the
Peyote Cactus which can be found in the buttons of the plant. Indigenous
cultures such as Wixaritari (Huichol), Yaqui, Cora, and Raramuri
(Tarahumara) used Mescaline for traditional practices.
Hendelman, Ariel Dominique. “The Peyote Plot: The Indigenous Fight to
Conserve the Sacred Plant and the Spiritual Medicine It Contains.”
DoubleBlind Mag, 3 Aug. 2022, doubleblindmag.com/the-peyote-plot/.
Accessed 9 Feb. 2023↩︎
Also, Nazi Germany used Pervitin to inhance energy
levels and combat, giving soldiers more survival strength and were able
to invade France. Other substances such as Crystal Meth, cocaïne chewing
gum and Eukodal have been used during the Second World War.
This war was a complete mess: not only for its
conflicts outside the borders of Vietnam (Laos and Cambodia), but
because of the immoral use and abuse of psychoactive substances and
drugs has not only led to unnecessary deaths of American troops, terror
and genocide (killing more than 2 million innocent civilians, alongside
200.000 Vietnamese militants and 20.000 American military troops) a
backlash of trauma would wash over as a big tsunami after the war, which
translated into an “outbreak” of PTSD.
Burns, Ken and Novick, Lynn. “The Vietnam War Explained in 25 Minutes
| Vietnam War Documentary.” YouTube, uploaded by The Life Guide. 1 Nov.
2019, www.youtube.com/watch?v=7tNTh6KlXXU.↩︎
Stadlen, Matthew, host. “Michael Pollan - How to Change
Your Mind.”
How To Academy Podcast, Spotify, 28 Aug. 2019
(23:12-23:30)
Because these substances came in society without an instruction manual,
it has led to the overall misuse of these substances that have let to
deaths and injuries, suicides, psychotic breaks and people running into
traffic.↩︎
Non-safe environments for taking psychedelics and drugs
can for example be open and public spaces where the awareness of people
is important for the social activity and space. Festivals like
Woodstock 69, where the substances we're seen and used as party
drugs, as spiritual enhancers and used as an escape medium to the
political involvement of the US during the Vietnam war.
1969: Woodstock Music & Art fair, August of 1969 organized in
Bethel, New York.
This was a three-day music festival where more than 400.000 people would
be enjoying music and celebrating peace in contrary to the ongoing war
in Vietnam (1955-1975). Considered to be one of the most iconic
festivals in American history. Even though the crowd was “extremely well
behaved”, there were 4000 cases of injuries and 2 deaths on the second
day of the festival, linked to people feeling sick and people having bad
reactions to drugs.
Watergate Scandal, Vietnam War, policing of black
people, etc. SOURCE?↩︎
Clifton (7:44–7:59), “The War on Drugs Is Designed to
Discriminate | the War on Drugs.” YouTube,
uploaded by VICE, 4 Nov. 2020, www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xf5qFIpJ2sk.↩︎
Deborah Peterson Small (J.D. M.P.P. Harvard University)
and Jamie Clifton, (6:13)↩︎
Deborah Peterson Small (J.D. M.P.P. Harvard
University), (9:10–9:42) and (10:50–11:11)↩︎
Also, in the Netherlands and other parts of Europe
police forces still make use of ethnic profiling that is also still
linked to the criminalization of black people and always linking this to
drug abuse.↩︎
In this informative video, Elizabeth Hargrave presents
in detail wat fungi are and that not all fungi species produce
mushrooms. Not all mushrooms consist of caps with gills, some are puffy
or very small and have various physical appearances. Mycological
Association of Washington DC. “Mushrooms 101.” YouTube, 9 Dec.
2020, www.youtube.com/watch?v=oDyvDwRjdoU.↩︎
Bacteria are unicellular microorganisms, that are
missing a cell nucleus. Bacteria are only visible to us under a
microscope. Archaea are single celled microbes with different membrane
than bacteria. Eukaryotes are multicellular organisms of which the cells
on microscopic scale are larger than that of bacteria and archaea.
Inside the cells of eukaryotes, there is a nucleus, where we can find
most of the DNA of the cell.
Sheldrake, Merlin. Entangled Life: How Fungi Make
Our Worlds, Change Our Minds and Shape Our Futures. Reprint, Random
House Trade Paperbacks, 2021.↩︎
In an interview written by Suzan Mazur, Lynn Margulis
explains why the Darwin evolution theory should be considered “dead” and
not be a solid piece of scientific research that we can apply to
understanding the lineages of different species, as there is no
“adequate evidence in literature” that is documented and can explain the
sudden mutations that would result into a new species. There is an
excessive number of high-quality studies that has shown no doubt that
“symbiogenisis” would be at the very basis of the origin of species or a
group of one or more populations of organisms. The long-lasting intimacy
of strangers: symbiogenisis.
Maybe to understand this visually, people from Gen-Z and the alpha
generation could think of how Pokémon would evolve sort of magically
into a newer version of that same species. The theory of symbiosis shows
theory and more steps that could explain the steps in between the
evolution of new species.
Margulis: "My earliest complete statement of 'serial
endosymbiosis theory' was published after fifteen or so assorted
rejections and losses of an early, painfully convoluted, and poorly
written manuscript. Called 'Origin of Mitosing Cells,' it was finally
accepted for publication in 1966 through the personal intervention of
James F. Danielli, then editor of the daring Journal of Theoretical
Biology. Of course, the article when it appeared in print in late 1967,
carried my first married name Lynn, Sagan. The theory was dubbed SET,
the acronym for Serial Endosymbiosis Theory (not to be confused with
SETI - the search for extra-terrestrial intelligence), by another
protist aficionado, Professor Max Taylor of the University of British
Colombia, Vancouver.” p38-p40 The Symbiotic Planet: A New View of
Evolution
(Lynn Margulis, p.40): “SET is a theory of coming
together, of merging of cells of different histories and abilities.
Before serial endosymbiosis and the establishment of the aerobic
nucleated cell, no cell-fusion sex existed. Meiotic sex, like of the egg
fertilized by the sperm, came later. Serial endosymbiosis made our kind
of fusion sex possible. Sex, too, is the coming together, the merging of
cells of different histories and abilities.”↩︎
Donna Haraway is a US biologist, philosopher, science
historian and ecofeminist. Haraway describes this herself: “I think
my work has been question-driven. It’s been driven by finding myself in
a conjuncture of events, ideas, things, people, and other critters —
plants and animals and microbes — that provoke needing to know something
and finding myself in an institutional environment that encouraged
that.”
Myers, Natasha. “From the Anthropocene to the
Planthroposcene: Designing Gardens for Plant/People Involution.”
History and Anthropology, vol. 28, no. 3, Informa UK Limited,
Mar. 2017, pp. 297–301. https://doi.org/10.1080/02757206.2017.1289934.↩︎
