The ontological realities of psychedelic entities

Psychedelic entities are obviously experiences that occur. How are we to conceptualize this data with respect to ontology concerned with the nature of reality and the similarities and differences among basic categories of being that may exist (Encyclopedia of Philosophy)? The Merriam-Webster Dictionary’s (2017) definitions of entities help to clarify at least three types of psychedelic entities: transcendent entities (noumenon, “1a: being, existence; especially: independent, separate, or self-contained existence”); and objective (intersubjective phenomenon) and conceptual entities (“2: something that has separate and distinct existence and objective or conceptual reality”).

The meaning of definition 1 – “independent, separate, or self-contained existence” – implies an empirical entity with transcendent status. True believers who allege that psychedelic entity experiences are real represent the notion of a separate and independent existence, apart from our imagination – a transcendent entity that implies a noumenon. In my view, such claims have not been substantiated with rigorous methodologies (i.e., parapsychological research). I shall leave the evaluation of this transcendent reality of psychedelic beings for others and instead address the concepts of an objective entity (intersubjectively validated experience) and conceptual entity (an explanation for such experiences).

The concepts of an objective psychedelic entity can be derived from similarities in individual experiences that point to a shared intersubjective reality underlying the experiences – are there repeatedly encountered features/qualia in psychedelic entity encounters? The question of an objective psychedelic entity is concerned with whether across observers there are common features. Can we agree objectively – interpersonally and intersubjectively, and ultimately scientifically – about whether there are regular features exhibited in these experiences?

If encounters with psychedelic entities produce a repeatable pattern of experiences across people, those patterns establish an objective psychedelic entity, as well as a phenomenon to be explained as a conceptual entity. Just as we explain the experience of rainbows as your physical perspective on the sunlight reflecting off of water droplets in the air, we can seek naturalistic explanations of the nature of psychedelic entity experiences that do not require evoking the notion of a transcendent noumenon. There is not really a rainbow where you perceive one, but we can explain this repeatable intersubjectively validated observation through a conceptual explanation involving an understanding of the physics of light and perception.

I believe that the evidence available allows us to provide a similar materialist explanation of psychedelic entity experiences within the known frameworks of psychedelic effects on the brain. But the development of a rational and empirical discourse on psychedelic entities faces challenges due to the lack of formalized attempts at rigorous comparative examination. As Gallimore and Luke (2016) and Luke (2011) noted, we need an academic study of entity encounters that offers a thorough examination of the similarities in independent reports by identifying the recurrent characteristics common to these experiences.

This paper proposes a cross-cultural and interdisciplinary study of the features of entities and uses case materials and previous profiles of psychedelic entity experiences to offer hypotheses regarding what might be revealed by such systematic evidence. This paper outlines a methodology for empirically addressing the question of qualities of objective psychedelic entities and proposes a series of hypotheses regarding the qualities of these experiences based on principles of evolutionary psychology and the neurophenomenology of psychedelic experiences. These perspectives derived from evolutionary psychology provide hypotheses regarding the qualities of objective psychedelic entities, and explanations of their qualities through a conceptual definition of psychedelic entities by reference to brain processes involving innate modular structures and their functions. I propose explanations as to why objective psychedelic entities should reflect the modular structures of the brain and present a series of hypotheses derived from evolutionary psychology regarding the basic features of objective psychedelic entity experiences.

The possible qualities of objective psychedelic entities are suggested by case comparisons of reports of these experiences; this also reveals a wide diversity across various psychedelic entity experiences, including those from individuals using the same drug. Such comparisons call into doubt the assumption of a single unambiguous objective concept of a psychedelic entity experience, with a common set of features manifested across all experiences. But only through a systematic and comparative analysis of entity experiences can we determine, if psychedelic-induced entity experiences constitute a singular objective entity, a clear class of experiences that are uniquely and reliably associated with psychedelic experiences, or whether they are but another example of a widely distributed experience of various forms of an encounter with an alien other.

Nonetheless, in either case, the existence of a naturalistic basis for psychedelic entity experiences is suggested by reports of psychedelic entities that resemble other kinds of supernatural entities, such as elves, spirits, and extraterrestrials.

These similarities indicate a need for a broader explanation of psychedelic entities within the context of other kinds of mythological, spiritual, religious, and supernatural entities, an explanation found in their common basis in human biology. The apparent similarities in psychedelic entities and various other types of entity experiences found across cultures, time, and diverse conditions for altering consciousness suggest that an explanation be sought within innate functions of the human brain.

These cross-cultural similarities are examined within the context of humans’ innate operators and innate intelligences (see Gardner, 2000), ancient human adaptations that provide basic aspects of our unconscious functional processing modules. These involve innate functions for specific operations, such as detecting an agent, recognizing animal species, perceiving the thoughts of social others, imitative interpretation of others (mirror neuron inference), and other adaptive automatic information processing capacities acquired in the course of human evolution.

These features of psychedelic entities involving innate intelligences have been evoked as explanations for the universality of spiritual beliefs. These reflect the operation of innate intelligences, modules, and operators for unconscious processing of the most significant features of the environment – animals and other humans (see Gardner, 2000). Our innate evolved psychology involves a number of predispositions and interpretative structures provided by biology to detect features of human-like entities. This tendency is a consequence of millions of years of adaptations for the most important factors affecting human survival – other human-like entities. These innate structures cultivated a disposition toward interpreting the external world in terms of the presence of others and their desires, intentions, temperament, etc. These tendencies reflect the necessity for adaptation to a social world in which the ability to understand the internal dispositions of other members of our species – their perceptions, thoughts, intentions, roles, personalities, evaluations, and emotions – played a crucial role in adaptation and survival.

The inevitably of projecting human-like qualities in our perception of the world requires that we assess experience of psychedelic entities with reference to our evolved predisposition to project human-like entities with certain features. The paper proposes testable hypotheses derived from evolutionary psychology that link features of psychedelic entity experiences to functions of innate modular structures of the brain.

Case evidence regarding objective psychedelic entity experiences

The paintings of Pablo Amaringo (see Luna & Amaringo, 1999) represent a person’s psychedelic entity experiences. Amaringo’s work highlights elements that suggest more than a single profile for such entities. Nonetheless, they generally appear as humanoids, but these reflect a variety of cultural and religious themes, including Amerindian, Spiritist, Asian, and Christian. Amaringo’s depictions cover the range of themes reported by Shanon (2010) in his analysis of a wide range of supernatural beings experienced under the influence of ayahuasca. Shanon specified these different types as involving mythological beings; divinities and semi-divinities; half-human and half-animal shape-shifting hybrids; extraterrestrials – angels and celestial beings; and demons and other entities of death.

These predominantly anthropomorphic figures are mirrored in Luke’s (2011) summary of various studies on dimethyltryptamine (DMT) entity experiences that reported entities characterized as gnomes, dwarfs, elves, imps, goblins and other forms of “little people,” as well as angels, spirits, and gods. But even this humanoid form is exceeded in the characterizations of DMT entity experiences in modern clinical settings; Strassman’s (2000) participants experienced various types of “beings,” including “entities,” “guides,” and “aliens,” but appearing similar to insects, bees, cacti, clowns, mantises, reptiles, spiders, and stick figures.

These admittedly unsystematic assessments of psychedelic entities suggest that there is no single profile for a psychedelic entity, but a diversity of appearances manifested in these experiences. Whether they nonetheless share functional properties or features in their manifestations in human experience has not been determined through systematic study of accounts. Do psychedelic entities appearing as bees, reptiles, and spiders do the same things as those appearing as elves, angels, and ETs?

Case data show that what is reported about psychedelic entities is also found in many experiences and cultural traditions, which are often evoked in describing the nature of psychedelic entity experiences. Casual comparisons show overall similarities of psychedelic entity experiences with entity experiences in other contexts, such as religious and spiritual visions, shamanism, experiences of possession, spirit allies, guardians, and animal transformation; out-of-body experiences and a range of other anomalous body phenomena; experiences of haunting, ghosts, and apparitions; encounters with various entities conceptualized in folklore and mythology traditions as dwarfs, elves, “little people,” demons, etc.; experiences of unidentified flying objects (UFOs) encounters; the phenomenological content of dream experiences; and the phenomenology and neurophysiology of many psychiatric conditions, including hallucinations and properly speaking.

Whatever their unique properties may be, there are nonetheless notable parallels of many psychedelic entity experiences with other experiences of encounters with entities. For example, the experiences that result from extensive meditative practices may include encounters with entities that parallel the reports for psychedelic-induced experiences. Meditative traditions have numerous reports of experiences of entities that are encountered during profound meditative experiences, or even in everyday life!

Hancock (2000) noted substantial similarities of DMT entity experiences with experiences of fairies, UFO contact, and shamanic practices. Such similarities have profound implications for questions regarding the possible nature of objective psychedelic entities.

We need to verify if any types of entity experiences are unique to psychedelics. Are there consistent features of psychedelic entity experiences that are found only with psychedelics, or do the psychedelic entity experiences reflect the same basic properties found in entities experienced in other contexts? If there is not one type of psychedelic entity experience but a variety of subtypes, then we have several objective phenomena to be explained. If major features of psychedelic entity experiences mirror those of other kinds of entity experiences, then our questions are more broadly concerned with the explanation of entity experiences in general, as well as why psychedelics are so powerful in inducing these experiences that also occur in other contexts.

Entitiology

I propose that to determine whether there are consistent and unique features of psychedelic entity experiences, we need a cross-cultural and interdisciplinary assessment of phenomenological reports of diverse types of experiences of entities (i.e., see Winkelman, 1992). Formal quantitative comparisons of the reported characteristics of diverse entity experiences are necessary to discover any commonalities to psychedelic entity experiences and their uniqueness with respect to other types of entity experiences. We need a new field of scientific inquiry, entitiology, i.e., the study of entities, to address the questions of the nature of psychedelic, and other types of entity experiences. This field of entitiology might be viewed as partially subsumed within the field of philosophy called ontology [The Encyclopedia of Philosophy (2017) characterized ontology as concerned with the study of beings and their nature. Ontology is characterized as concerned first with the nature of being and reality, what it is that exists and is what it is made of, what are the general features of these things; ontology includes a concern with identifying the basic categories of being, determining evidence regarding what entities may exist, and how such entities may be related within a hierarchy, and subdivided according to similarities and differences (summarized from https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/logic-ontology; also see Kenny, 2012)].

To determine the significant features of the experience of entities, psychedelic and otherwise, we need to be able to code variables from detailed accounts of these personal experiences and subject the empirical data to systematic analysis to determine the patterns of characteristics. This assessment of the significant features of entity experiences requires first, a structured solicitation and coding of descriptions of these experiences; second, an analysis of the similarities and differences among entity experiences, by procedures such as cluster analysis which define similar groups; and finally a comparison of those empirically derived groups and their common features with other data, including the a priori labels for the experiences; the known effects of psychedelics on brain and perception; and the functions of innate modules hypothesized to account for their features.

This inquiry into psychedelic entity experiences must include entity experiences beyond those directly linked to psychedelics (as important as a clear delineation of the category “entities” might be, I do not think that it is necessary to have an a priori definition. We need to include all possible types of experiences and reports in our pool of entity data. We should be dissuaded by a priori determination or definition of entities, allowing the characterization to be empirically driven, derived from the data rather than used to define the data to be collected. While one might object that some types of experiences might not be valid for inclusion in the field of entities, empirical analyses should be able to show that the inclusion of specific kinds of data either distorts solutions or significantly increases dimension or variance in models. Inclusion of non-entity data points might also be useful in showing the relationship of entity types to non-entity concepts, providing bridges into the realm of ordinary phenomena of consciousness). If we are to establish that there are unique features of psychedelic entity experiences that require explanation, it is through the comparison of a consistent profile of psychedelic entity experiences with entity experiences that occur under other conditions. The possible unique nature of psychedelic entities cannot be effectively assessed apart from broader comparisons with all kinds of entities, with their similarities and differences providing crucial data for revealing the possibility of an objective psychedelic entity experience and its natures.

Our data on entities must be inclusive in many senses. Do entity experiences require a sense of a presence outside of oneself, exterior to the body? Or can entities also be experienced inside of the body or even just in the mind, such as in interdimensional experiences or possession phenomena? Recognition that our experience of the external world is a model produced in the mind undermines any rigid distinction between perception of internal and external entities, but such differences in experiences should be part of the data we collect from entity reports. Furthermore, psychedelic entity experiences are typically conceptualized as internal to the mind, rather than in the external world, requiring that all forms of internal entity experiences be considered for comparative purposes.

Since entities can be purely mental experiences, the experiences of dreams may also involve entities, especially incubus or succubus experiences, where there is a clear sense of being attacked by an entity in sleep. The experiences of other beings occurring during dreams provide a prototype of the entity experience, and dreams provide a normal and natural framework for assessing the possible unique qualities of psychedelic entity experiences. Indeed, the qualities of entities in dreams may manifest many, if not all, of the principal qualities of psychedelic entity experiences. On the other hand, if there are differences between psychedelic-induced and dream experiences of entities, this can reveal what is special about the psychedelic entity experiences.

Consequently, entitiology must encompass a number of existing areas of inquiry and by necessity will incorporate at least a part of the domain of the entities reported in the following areas of study:

A systemic coding and analysis of the features of these various accounts can determine whether or not a single type or several types of psychedelic entity experiences occur. And only through comparison with profiles obtained for reports of what are conceptualized as angels, fairies, extraterrestrials, and shamanic spirits can we determine, if there are unique features of psychedelic entities.

The data coded can include the labels given by percipients (i.e., elf, extraterrestrial, monster, etc.), but the data need to emphasize descriptions, characteristics seen or inferred such as physical features, behaviors, intentions, activities, as well as the set and setting of the percipient and entity.

Some of the general areas for coding of descriptive data regarding entities would include:

The variable list used should be derived from grounded research as well as theory. Ideally, literature from the numerous areas that have already assessed the specific qualities and characteristics of various types of entities (i.e., elves, leprechauns, angels, extraterrestrials, etc.) would be extracted and used as the basis of the descriptive variables coded. We need to know how psychedelic entities appear and are experienced, as well as what they are not like. The summary of the features of angelology (Fox & Sheldrake, 2014) is an example of preexisting variable areas ideal for such an inquiry.

The sequencing of features in the experiences should be a part of the data. Ideally, some of the personal features of respondents are also assessed, using standardized assessments [this can employ instruments, such as the Phenomenology of Consciousness Inventory (Pekala, Steinberg, & Kumar, 1986); the Five Dimensions of Altered States of Consciousness (Studerus, Gamma, & Vollenweider, 2010); and the Abnormer Psychischer Zustaende (Dittrich, 1998; Dittrich, Von Arx, & Staub, 1981, 1985)] of the personal tendency for experiences of alterations of consciousness.

An example of “entity studies”: The Census of Hallucinations

These relationships among features that systematic study of the qualities of psychedelic entity experiences might reveal are illuminated by the findings of the classic 19th century Census of Hallucinations (Sidgwick, Johnson, Myers, Podmore, & Sidgwick, 1894). This survey study asked people, “Have you ever, when completely awake, had a vivid impression of seeing or being touched by a living being or inanimate object, or of hearing a voice; which impression, so far as you could discover, was not due to any external physical cause?” Seems like a possible entity experience!

Their findings may also contribute to our understanding of entity experiences. Principal features of those entity experiences involving deaths were also generally characterized by their occurrence after awakening from sleep; a vision of a family member; and information that they had suffered a life-ending event, which was later verified. This seems to tell us something about the causal nature of these specific entity experiences – the prior condition of being in a sleep-induced alteration of conscious, an image of a close family member emerging from the unconscious, and their death, which was later confirmed. Welcome to the world of supernatural entities!

Modular capacities in the production of supernatural experiences

The cognitive science of religion (e.g., see Clements, 2017) has shown how the widespread human belief in the spirit world (and its virtual universality as a cultural belief) results from basic brain operators. This widespread human tendency to perceive animate entities wherever we look is a consequence of the automatic operation of modular capacities. This tendency is derived from the functions of a variety of innate human capacities (Boyer, 1992, 2001; Guthrie, 1993). Barrett (2000) proposed that supernatural belief is a direct function of a hyperactive agent-detection device (HADD). This is an automatic tendency to project the interpretation of an active agent responsible for ambiguous events. The basic function of the HADD is to attribute the intention of some agent as the cause of unexplained phenomena. This agency detection function or agency operator (Ernandes proposes that while the agency operator may acquire a rational component from the involvement of the neocortex’s causal operator, its basis is in reptilian and limbic operators) expanded in its functions across the course of primate evolution to enhance our capacity for detection of predators. This natural selection resulted in adaptations that were overly sensitive for the detection of agency because erroneous responses (false positives) had few costs in comparison to the possible loss of life resulting from the failure to detect the presence of a predator. We are hypertuned to detect an active intentional agent where information is ambiguous or incomplete, and the perception of entities during psychedelic experiences would be a clear example of such decision-making.

This projection is facilitated by the human expansion of the assumptions of an “unseen other” with assumptions regarding the status, mental states, and intentions of these others. The human capacity for modeling others’ cognitive states using our previous experiences makes it inevitable that we project our human cognitive dynamics into the interpretation of ambiguous circumstances we interpret as involving others. The unknown and ambiguous experiences within nature are animated with the projections of our own psychodynamics as the framework for the interpretation, giving our internal dynamics as the basis of our perceptions of the unknown. Thus, the ancient innate capacity for agency detection was further honed in humans for detection of human-like agents, making nature humanized (anthropomorphized) with our own self properties, social characteristics, and emotional qualities.

The experiences of spirits reflect the human capacity for a “theory of mind;” this capacity to infer the mental states and intentions of others is discussed by Gardner (2000) in terms of an innate intrapersonal intelligence. The intrapersonal intelligence is a metacognitive operator that provides an awareness of the contents of one’s own mental states and the ability to relate that awareness to circumstances in the social and physical environment. This same capacity for representing our own mental states allows for the “theory of the mind,” a capacity for an inferred awareness of the contents of other people’s minds.

Ernandes (2013) characterizes this innate function of “theory of mind” as providing capacities for meta-representation, a metacognitive “thinking about thinking,” including thinking about the mental states of others, providing forms of “mindreading” and “mental state attribution” revealing the likely internal states of others. The ability to assess others’ motives and intentions and the implications that these have for our self involves using our own self-models for representations of the mental states of those others.

Interpersonal intelligence is a social psychological operator for the internalization of the identities and properties of others. This interpersonal intelligence is a key concept for understanding a necessary aspect of human social behavior, the capacity to assume the perspectives, and the identity of social others. Collective human behavior is dependent upon processes of individual internalization of and identification with the properties of social others, especially dominant others. These processes are fundamental to human socialization and identity formation, and provide a basis for the internalization of norms and adopting for our own self the models and perspectives exhibited by socially significant others. This capacity also induces us to accept the notion of significant others with expectations for our behavior.

Spirits are typically conceptualized as being like persons with normal human minds and desires, perceive events, formulate beliefs regarding the world, and act to carry out specific intentions that are reasonable to the intuitive frameworks of humans (Winkelman, 2004). Projection of a concept of a human-like entity is an inevitable part of how humans conceptualize the unknown. We project human characteristics and an expectation of human-like entities, an inevitable aspect of default human cognitive function derived from adaptations to conditions in which we benefitted from knowing the expectations of human others and their thoughts and attitudes about us that we internalized as scripts for our self.

Our brains are further wired to detect the specific goals of the behaviors of others, embodied in the mirror neurons that fire when one performs an action – as well as when perceiving another doing the same action. This mimetic operator (Ernandes notes that the mimetic operator, localized in the amygdalar complex of the paleomammalian brain, also plays a central role in the modulation of facial expression) is an extension of a basic or communicative operator found across species, the isopraxic operator. This drives an individual to mentally represent and perform the actions observed in the behaviors of another member of the species. In humans, this isopraxic operator is extended in mimesis through the operation of mirror neurons (Garrels, 2005, 2011). Ernandes notes that a function of isopraxic operators is to produce a pattern in which animals of a group all behave in the same way. These capacities are a fundamental tool for conspecific recognition, entailing an awareness that an “other” is like one’s self, a member of one’s own species group.

Religious concepts of supernatural agency and causation reflect uses of a number of innate psychological systems that are linked together in ways that provided adaptive responses to the developmental and communication needs of more complex social groups. Pyysiäinen (2009, p. 13) proposed that the general dynamic of religious behavior combines the operation of the hyperactive agency detection with two other operators that he calls the “hyperactive understanding of intentionality device,” “the tendency to postulate mentality and see events as intentionally caused even in the absence of a visible agent” (Pyysiäinen, 2009, p. 13) and the “hyperactive teleofunctional reasoning device,” a “tendency to see objects as existing for a purpose.” The innate nature of these reasoning processes is revealed in studies of children’s natural tendency to offer pervasive teleological explanations of events they experience, postulating an intentional design by a supernatural agency.

Newberg and d’Aquili (2001) similarly characterize the neuropsychological mechanisms underlying religious experiences and behaviors as primarily involving a causal operator and a holistic operator. The innate function of the causal operator provides mechanisms of supersensible forces and powers to fulfill explanations with cause and effect mechanisms when direct evidence is lacking. The holistic operator perceives a wholeness to reality, an integrated whole that provides an experience of the absolute and transcendent.

This use by religion of modular functions of the social mind provides an understanding of how supernatural thought involved exaptations of previous modules, new adaptations targeted by natural selection to enhance social behaviors through the use of natural symbols, such as animal representations of social groups manifested in totemism. Cross-cultural similarities manifested in shamanistic and mystical traditions reflect underlying innate modules which are reflected in experiences related to those modular functions, such as animal identities, soul flight, death-and-rebirth, visions, and emotions of bliss, detachment, and void (Winkelman, 2010).

The operation of modules and operators in the production of religious behavior is not their independent function, but their combination to create a general model that links various elements of reality together to provide general explanatory models of how the universe operates (Ernandes, 2013). These combinations of innate intelligences are key aspects of how supernatural experiences contributed to new forms of intelligence, constituting symbols derived from the integration of operations from different cognitive modules (Winkelman, 2010). This combination of modules in the production of supernatural thought may have begun in the linking of the natural history or animal species module to the modules for personal and social identity. For instance, concepts of animacy and nature beings mix properties of personal and natural modules, while totemic groups represent the production of social identities with animal elements, exploiting modules for representing the natural world (Winkelman, 2010).

These beliefs involve the activation of the naturalist or natural history intelligence. This prehistoric hunter–gatherers’ intuitive biology that provided a template for learning about animals was extended as a system to organize information in other domains of significance, in particular, for thinking about personal and social identity. Consequently, an innate intelligence regarding animals provided the basis for creating a universal analogical system for extension of meaning through animal metaphors as representations of personal and social identity; these provide powerful adaptations for integrating social groups (one of the most prevalent aspects of “animal” thought is found in shamanistic incorporation of animal spirits and their abilities. Typically, these animals provide a personal social relationship and aspect of personality and personal powers, or as a group symbol for spiritual and collective relationship to the group. This use of the animal world also provided a natural system of knowledge for organizing relations within a group and between societies. Totemism provides a system for differentiating societies by means of analogy, using the innate differences existing among species to represent society, representing differences among humans through the innately recognized differences among species of animals. These cognitive inventions of shamanism were a natural outcome of the integration of the different innate modules caused by ritual alterations of consciousness. These modes of experience provide access to different aspects of the self, including animal selves, as well as the disembodied self or an out-of-body experience) (Winkelman, 2010).

Hypotheses of innate functions in entity experiences

The appearance of different innate operators in entity experiences, including the sequences of presentation and co-occurrence, should follow patterns that reflect the sequential effects of psychedelics on neurotransmitter systems, the modular operators, and the operation of the triune brain.

A predictable sequence of features experienced under the influence of psychedelics would support hypotheses of entity experiences as a direct result of their brain interference. The sequences of experiences under psychedelics will reflect the order of effects on major brain and neurotransmitter systems and their consequences for the stimulation and release of these innate modules. The emergence of modular operator features in psychedelic (entity) experiences will directly reflect the sequences of return of brain functions after their destabilization by psychedelic interference with neurotransmission functions.

Forms of self as innate processes

If the alien entity experience is an internally produced experience, not an external phenomena, who is the entity that is being experienced? There are frequent reports of psychedelic entity experiences in which percipients allege being told by the entity that it is an aspect of their own self. Perhaps we should take these revelations as true. But who is this other self?

The existence of various forms of self, with differential access to innate operators, provides a basis for different experiences of the self as an “other.” There are a number of forms of self development attested to in developmental studies, psychiatric assessments, and transpersonal development models. A general perspective is that there are stages in the development of the self, with each stage superseded across time through subsequent development. These prior stages of self remain within the cognitive and emotional structures, but not normally engaged with consciousness. These other selves may however still influence behaviors and desires and figure significantly in the emotional life of the person, operating as semi-autonomous complexes, particularly in projections and dreams.

This psychologizing of psychedelic entity experiences is reflected in Gallimore and Luke’s (2016) characterizations of DMT-induced experiences of dwarfs and elves as representing dynamics of the collective unconscious, particularly symbols of archetypes of the Self. They note that these can form self-contained psyches with autonomous psychic complexes potentially “capable of a consciousness of their own” (p. 12). This autonomy of alternative self forms is manifested in experiences of possession, characterized by the presence of an entity that can take control of the person’s experience, voice, and body.

Process of internalization of the self of another and socially projecting it in social relations is a basic feature of the autodynamics of the human persona. This internalization and socially projection of self is manifested not only in normal experiences but also in unusual psychological phenomena where a person assumes the identity of someone else, often a spirit. This process is manifested in possession experiences, where meek, submissive, and socially marginalized women assume the personalities of dominant spirits and command a social following and high prestige for their alter status as a medium of the gods. In modern societies, these same dynamics are manifested in dissociative identity disorders (previously referred to as multiple personality disorder). These terms refer to psychological phenomena where a person has a number of different personalities and shifts between them, often in a response to trauma. Notably, most personalities have amnesia for the others, a dissociation that is also a notable feature of the compartmentalized innate modules.

Seligman and Kirmayer (2008) characterize dissociation as involving an evolved mechanism [Winkelman (2010) has addressed how dissociation is an adaptive reaction which enables an individual to continue to function in relation to their parents or caregivers by dissociating from the emotional stress that is experienced in the relationship with them. Dissociation involves a regulation of attention mechanisms that allow a selective suppression of perceptions and memories and reducing physiological stress. These processes of dissociation involve psychological defense mechanisms that allow the emotional self to continue to function in the face of trauma that has devastated the personal self. Sar and Ozturk (2007) propose that dissociation involves a detachment of the psychological self from the sociological self. This sociological self, which functions in the interface between the individual and society, allows for a reestablishment of connections between the inner and outer world (Winkelman, 2010)] that functions to relieve the effects of extreme interpersonal emotional stress. Stressful parental relationships can disrupt the integration of individual consciousness and result in the formation of a separate personality with a dissociated dynamics that results from selective suppression of memories. Dissociation provides an emotional distance from the trauma that permits an inhibition of the normal flight-or-fight response, enabling the child to seek adaptive solutions in the relationship rather than facing the risks associated with flight (Sar & Ozturk, 2007). In the context of possession spirits, this dissociation releases mechanisms for identification with the idealized social norms that the possessing spirits present (rather than the pathological models which the parents present). In the phenomena of possession, the social roles provide mechanisms for personal control, exemplified in these higher order personalities represented in the possessing spirits who redirect the person’s identity and behavior to facilitate personal and social adaptations to troubling social circumstances.

The phantasy mode of consciousness

Our capacity to experience interactions with human-like entities – spirit or psychedelic – must be placed in the context of our broader capacity for engaging in phantasy. Horváth, Szummer, and Szabo (2017) propose that psychedelic visionary phenomena reflect the activation of a modular-like representational system for phantasy that blends various cognitive processes. Lohmar (2016, p. 20; also see Lohmar, 2010) proposes that this phantasy system involves a form of expressive thinking that predates language, functioning as a non-linguistic method for solving important tasks. This form of thought involves the use of image schemas which represent basic structures of sensorimotor experience. This expressive system is nonetheless symbolic. It has a significant role in providing a medium for three forms of support that are necessary for thinking. Lohmar (2016, paraphrase) notes that visionary phantasy provides the ability to retain in mind an object; engender other cognitions regarding this image object; and manipulate these to consider future possibilities. Lohmar argues that this form of thinking evolved to facilitate decision-making in situations with very mixed motives. The phantasy mode of consciousness involves a range of conscious acts and mentations that blend into the processes of perceiving, anticipating events, and planning for the future, as well as engaging memories and fantasies. Visionary phantasy is intimately related to a personal representational capacity that directly reveals to the person an imaginative and familiar presentation of affective layers of consciousness.

Horváth et al. (2017) suggest that this phantasy capacity functions constantly in our day-to-day activities, providing a synthesis of perception, affect, and thinking. In the case of alterations of consciousness, it often extremely produces exotic forms of experience with their own story-line narratives and revelations. When released by psychedelics, this latent human cognitive visionary capacity takes control of consciousness, providing an internal engagement with a level of the mind that presents a narrative regarding some significant aspects of the affective dynamics of the person.

Phantasy-consciousness emerges from reworking these experiences into more exotic forms of consciousness through embellishment with story-line narratives that contain personally significant revelations. This visionary phantasy is intimately related to innate representational capacities that directly reveal to subject an imaginative presentation of material from their own personal unconscious. The psychedelic visionary state typifies phantasy experiences, a polysemic manifestation involving intense affective responses, visual experiences and imagination, as well as significant intellectual realizations and personal awareness (also see Winkelman, 2010 on presentational symbolism).

Neurophenomenological mechanisms underlying psychedelic experiences

To date, we have no compelling reasons to consider psychedelic entity experiences as basically any different than guardian spirits, hauntings, elf visitations, or any number of other experiences of spirits. Furthermore, we have good reason to explain the worldwide distribution of beliefs in supernatural entities to the operation of innate brain functions. Evidence that psychedelic entity experiences reflect manifestations of such innate modular brain functions as the mimetic operator is also supported by evidence derived from the psychedelic effects on brain functions that provide plausible mechanisms for psychedelic visionary experiences (Winkelman, 2017).

But why should psychedelics so powerfully elicit these kinds of experiences of the alien other, whether in the shamanic or modern context? The answer must be sought in the approaches of neurophenomenology that examine the relationship between brain operation and experience. Neurophenomenology examines how the structure and content of phenomenal experience can be related to functions at the neurological level (Laughlin et al., 1992).

As an example, an apparent neurophenomenological effect of psychedelics involves what Kent (2010) referred to as frame stacking, a repetition of edges that is reflected in the appearance of objects. These phenomena of repeated edges are a consequence of the breakdown of screening and information integration processes normally imposed by the serotonergic system in its regulation of lower brain structures. The resistance of psychedelics to the usual serotonin reuptake mechanisms causes a repeated firing of a neuron, rather than allowing its deactivation through reuptake mechanisms; this repeated firing is presumably responsible for this visual phenomena manifested in psychedelic experiences and art around the world.

In the case of psychedelic entity experiences, neurophenomenology is concerned with how psychedelic effects on brain processes produce the effects of experiencing spirits. Why should psychedelics stimulate the release of these innate modular operations of the brain?

Psychedelic effects on receptors and mental organs explain ontological certainty regarding DMT entities

The reason that psychedelics in general, and DMT in particular, produce an “ontological shock,” a certainty of a more compelling experience of reality than ordinary reality, is revealed by Ray’s (2010) findings. Ray challenges the predominant theory of psychedelic action being mediated primarily by action at the serotonin-2 receptors (especially 5-HT2A). Ray’s (2010) study of the interaction of 25 psychedelics at 51 receptors, transporters, and ion channels found an affinity of the psychedelic drugs for 18 different sites. The historical model of psychedelic drug action primarily through effects on serotonin receptors contrasts with the dramatic differences in subjective reports from different chemical classes of substances (see Shulgin & Shulgin, 1991, 1997). Ray (2010, 2012, 2016) shows that diverse psychedelic drug profiles reflect their interaction with dozens of different receptors, with different subjective effects associated with each psychedelic substance being the result of the diversity of interactions of various psychedelics with different receptor systems.

Ray (2012) proposes that this diverse phenomenology of psychedelic experience reflects their elicitation of the operation of different mental organs and the capacities that are the result of the expression of specific genes that underlie the evolution of specific aspects of the mind. Mental organs involve a population of neurons that have common properties and provide a specific mental function through the expression of a specific modulatory receptor (e.g., 5-HT1, 5-HT2, 5-HT7, alpha-1, alpha-2, beta, dopamine, histamine-1, imidazoline-1, kappa, mu, sigma, and cannabinoid-1). The mental organs are defined in terms of the neurotransmitter receptor that they express, thereby reflecting the structure of the brain and manifesting the structure and content of the mind’s functions. Ray considers the concept of mental organs to be synonymous with receptor in many instances, with receptor representing molecular dynamics and mental organ reflecting the mental level.

Ray characterizes these mental organs as ordinarily unconscious, but through receptor stimulation enter into consciousness to provide a system for describing the contents of the mind, serving to represent internal, external, and social aspects of reality, as well as functions of language, logic, and reason, among others. The diverse mental organs revealed in the typical and distinct effects of various psychedelics have the functions of providing different forms of consciousness (i.e., adult vs. childhood); different time scales (long term vs. short term): salience to specific kinds of contents of consciousness; ontological categories; aspects of religious (through soul, compassion, and forgiveness); and specific mental functions (i.e., logic and language). Ray notes the frequency with which mental organs have an affective quality, giving consciousness a sense of feeling through which humans experience consciousness. Their effects on consciousness are not normally individual, but rather combined together to give a global perception of reality.

Ray proposes that the actions of psychedelic drugs on consciousness involve two major dimensions, breadth and depth, involving respectively: the number of different mental organs that are activated by a substance (breadth) and the intensity of consciousness (depth). Ray considers 5-HT2 and 5-HT7 to play intimately intertwined roles in that 5-HT2 shapes the breadth of consciousness by providing the content through integrating various mental organs, and 5-HT7 mediates the depth of consciousness. Breadth increases as a function of the number of mental organs that provide input to consciousness, expanding the contents of consciousness, with increases in the number of mental organs in consciousness producing a more complex and multifaceted representation of reality. Increasing depth is a function of increasing activation of 5-HT7 that provides “resolution, subtlety, nuance, complexity, tangibility, vividness, and capacity; to render thought, feelings, and sensory input” (Ray, n.d., p. 2). The increase in depth is responsible for the ability of psychedelic drugs to have dramatic effects such as visual experiences and ego-loss and at extremely high levels, producing a discontinuity in the contents of consciousness and a loss of contact with ordinary reality during which the organs of consciousness become more salient than external reality.

Of the psychedelic drugs that Ray assayed, DMT had the greatest depth of effect (relative affinity) and the greatest breadth of action (see Ray, 2010, Table 1, p. 19) with the receptorome, the total set of receptor proteins or the genes that encodes for traditional receptors, receptor molecules, as well as ion channels and transporters.

This combination of greatest breadth of mental organs (receptors) and greatest depth of consciousness attests to the special relations of DMT to the human neurotransmitter system that enables DMT to produce experiences of reality that are more profound and multifaceted than our ordinary experiences of reality. The DMT-mediated expansion of depth of consciousness through effects on 5-HT7 is what stimulates the creative genius and imagination beyond the experiences of actual reality. The experience of intense and complicated visionary experiences is a consequence of the great breadth of interaction that DMT has with the receptorome and consequently, the stimulation of a fuller range of mental organs. In addition, DMT is considered to be one of the most visual of all psychedelics, a property that enables it to produce a compelling experience of an alternate reality that is able to challenge one’s ordinary concepts of reality.

Ray also found that DMT was psychedelic with the highest relative affinity for any dopamine receptor, with the highest relative affinity for D1. Ray characterizes dopamine as an atypical mental organ in that rather than representing some cognitive capacity or aspect of reality, dopamine gives salience to conscious experience, marking both cognitive and affective content with significance for our biographical memory, imprinting ideas, memories, and social ideologies at deep levels. Dopamine has the ability to produce feelings of awe, combined with an uncritical sense of certainty to experiences, especially those involving religious and spiritual sentiment. The activation of dopamine by psychedelic drugs in general, and especially the very strong action at dopamine receptors by DMT, induces the capacity to allow new social constructs to take precedence over past learning and produce extreme changes in beliefs and behaviors.

In assessing the affinity of DMT across 17 types of receptor sites (5-HT7, 5-HT1D, 5-HT2B, alpha2B, alpha2C, dopamine1, 5-HT2C, 5-HT1E, 5-HT6, 5-HT5A, imidazoline1, alpha1B, alpha2A, alpha1A, 5-HT2A, SERT, and sigma1) and in contrast with 28 other psychoactive drugs (mostly psychedelics), Ray (2010) found that affinity profile of DMT had a number of distinguishing properties in addition to its exceptionally high affinity for all dopamine receptors. The relative affinity (normalized) of DMT at 5-HT7 was the highest affinity of any of the 29 drugs assayed; DMT also had the highest relative affinity at 5-HT1D, 5-HT1E, D1, alpha1A, alpha1B, and alpha2B receptor sites. DMT also had the second greatest relative affinity at 5-HT2C, the third greatest relative affinity at 5-HT5A and alpha2C, and the fourth greatest relative affinity at 5-HT6 and sigma1. Ray concludes that DMT is the neurotransmitter with the greatest breadth of interaction across all receptor sites, the second greatest breadth of interaction across 10 serotonin receptors, 7 adrenergic receptors, and the 3 alpha2 receptors assayed. This exceptionally high relative affinity of DMT for many receptor sites contrasts with the relatively little affinity of serotonin, dopamine, and norepinephrine for each other’s receptors.

“This is a long list of exceptional properties for any one drug. DMT is truly distinctive” (Thomas Ray, personal communication). The ability to stimulate so many receptor systems at such high levels offers a plausible explanation as to why the DMT-induced entity experiences give such a powerful sense of ontological certainty. This ability of DMT to construct a convincing alternate reality illustrated in the DMT entities and their ontological certainty is a reflection of the many receptors and mental organs that DMT stimulates and forces into consciousness. The ability to stimulate many different mental organs, far more than typical of ordinary consciousness, is why DMT experiences are considered to reveal a credible reality that is perceived as more real than ordinary reality (which is constructed by the integration of fewer mental organs). Furthermore, because of the large number of non-serotonin mental organs activated by DMT, it produces an experience that is more multifaceted than ordinary reality with rich, realistic details that provide a convincing experience of an alternate reality.