Erik Davis - On Psychedelics / quote 7 of 11
Mass-market book called dmt: the spirit molecule
After abandoning the study, Strassman published some of his findings in the usual journals. But he also decided to write a mass-market book called DMT: The Spirit Molecule (2001), which included many of the mind-blowing first-person accounts of his subjects, along with a number of Strassman’s own more imaginative ruminations. For instance, Strassman speculated that DMT, traces of which are found endogenously (within the body’s cells), is produced in the pineal gland upon the onset of death, and thus might explain the phenomenon of near-death experiences. Beyond his curious support for a long-mocked argument of Descartes, who had located the soul in the pineal gland, Strassman also invoked the crown chakra of Hindu Tantra, though he noted that the pineal gland becomes visible after 49 days of fetal development — the same period of time that The Tibetan Book of the Dead claims is required for the outgoing soul-force to reincarnate.