Wednesday 22 October 2008

Man, I'm Stoned ... Age

So man has been taking drugs since the stone age. Having progressed to an advanced stage of evolution and being all wise with so much history behind us, we decide using those drugs should be a crime ... and the world turns to shit. It seems to me that whilst humanity has achieved so much, we have learnt so little. 
Tell me again why the religious right, weird journalist and ignorant, selfish politicians make the rules about something they know nothing about?
Stone Age man took drugs, say scientists 20th October 2008 The Western Australian Scientists have discovered evidence suggesting Stone Age man used herbal mixtures to get high. It has long been suspected that humans have an ancient history of drug use, but there has been a lack of proof to support the theory. Now, however, researchers have found equipment used to prepare hallucinogenic drugs for sniffing, and dated them back to prehistoric South American tribes. Quetta Kaye, of University College London, and Scott Fitzpatrick, an archeologist from North Carolina State University, made the breakthrough on the Caribbean island of Carriacou. They found ceramic bowls, as well as tubes for inhaling drug fumes or powders, which appear to have originated in South America between 100BC and 400BC and were then carried 400 miles to the islands. While the use of such paraphernalia for inhaling drugs is well-known, the age of the bowls has thrown new light on how long humans have been taking drugs. Scientists believe that the drug being used was cohoba, a hallucinogen made from the beans of a mimosa species. Drugs such as cannabis were not found in the Caribbean then. Opiates can be obtained from species such as poppies, while fungi, which was widespread, may also have been used. Archeologists have suggested that humans were extracting mind-expanding drugs from mescal beans and peyote cacti as far back as 5,000 years ago, but have not found direct evidence that this is true. They consider that drugs were being used to induce spiritual or trance-like states by people who had religious beliefs.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

The Swiss Lake Dwellers, circa 5,000BCE, were grwoing poppy & hemp, very probably not unaware of uses other than the pretty flowers and strong fibres.
The really interesting point is that, until the 16thC there is no evidence in the Old World of people smoking drugs - it was the introduction of that bizarre idera with tobacco that changed the mode of getting wrecked.
The Arab/ME world ate its cannabis as a honied spice known as 'majoum' and the subcontinent of India drank it as 'bhang', a mix of milk, pepper & sugar.
Opium was only ever eaten, in India & China, until the brits "sent a gunboat" to force the decadent chinese empire to allow the landing of multi ton cargoes of indian grown opium, along with tobacco.
So if tghere is a world drug probloem it is tobacco, not the old pleasures of the neolithic age.
Also, another typo Terry - "all these problems that effect everyday Americans" that's "AFFECT"