July 10, 2004: Psychedelic Drugs - Daniel Pinchbeck
Podcast: The Art Bell ArchivePublished On: Sun Aug 31 2025
Description: Art Bell sits down with author Daniel Pinchbeck to explore the history, science, and personal dimensions of psychedelic drugs. Pinchbeck, whose book Breaking Open the Head chronicles his shamanic investigations around the world, argues that the government's war on drugs stems partly from the way psychedelics fundamentally alter a person's relationship to society and authority.The conversation centers on DMT, or dimethyltryptamine, a compound found naturally in the human brain that produces remarkably consistent visions across users. Pinchbeck describes being transported to an alternate reality populated by strange, chattering entities in a vaulted space. Art presses on the implications: if users universally experience the same realm, the simplest explanation may be that it actually exists. The discussion extends to ibogaine, an African psychedelic showing promise in treating heroin addiction by resetting both the psychological and physiological components of dependency.Pinchbeck also recounts a harrowing experience with DPT, a synthetic analog of DMT, that triggered weeks of poltergeist phenomena and required an exorcism. He reflects on the personal costs of his research, including the possibility that trespassing into these realms without traditional safeguards carried consequences for those around him.
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