HIGH-RANNOSAURUS WRECKED: Druggie dinos tripped balls on psychedelics – boffins Fossil hunters in Burma have discovered the earliest specimen of grass yet found – and say it’s laced with a hallucinogen. Ancient amber encasing early grass Ancient amber encasing early grass – no, not that kind The plant remains date from between 97 and 110 million years ago, and are encased in a chunk of amber. Around …
does ergotamine have the same effect on reptilian egg production as it does on mammalian pregnancy? Its a very effective abortifacient, causing powerful muscle contractions. If it had a similar effect on the reptilian oviduct, forcing the expulsion of eggs before they were properly formed, you could have another cause of saurapod extinction
"It seems like ergot has been involved with animals and humans almost forever, and now we know that this fungus literally dates back to the earliest evolution of grasses"
I remember watching a film in the late 90's that had a similar theme, almost like a docudrama with a narrator following the exploits of a pre homo sapiens/erectus ape wandering the plains of Africa (the premise being he was the last of his kind), and a particular scene that struck me was when the ape creature consumed a bunch of magic mushrooms; the narration went on to speculate that the consumption of halucinogenics could have been a precursor, trigger or catalyst for the evolution of primate minds, and that this was succesfully passed on to our ancestors and gave the species more of an edge in terms of changing the way an animal's thought processes works. I could never remember the name of the film, as it was one of those late night accidents that happens when changing channels.
I wonder how common it was/is for different species to consume halucinogens (by accident or on purpose), and how this has affected their development.
Which in turn was ripped of from Terrence McKenna:
>when the ape creature consumed a bunch of magic mushrooms; the narration went on to speculate that the consumption of halucinogenics could have been a precursor, trigger or catalyst for the evolution of primate minds
Yeah! Because all evidence points to that! Cows also ate the fungus... but, no opposable thumbs!
I think this says more about the film producers than anything else.
I wonder how common it was/is for different species to consume halucinogens (by accident or on purpose), and how this has affected their development.
It is quite common for animals to consume fruit that has started to ferment. Drunken elephants are quite dangerous. I shudder to think how a drunken sauropod might act, much less several of them getting into the prehistoric equivalent of a bar fight. As far as other naturally occurring psychoactive drugs, just think of what it would have been like to have the munchies millions of years before the invention of Twinkies. Bummer!
The Register 
Biting the hand that feeds IT
Copyright. All rights reserved © 1998–2024
