Is There Another Level of Reality?

Rod Dreher raises questions about a new report on the use of psychedelic drugs:

Over the years, as I've read about varieties of mystical experience, I've thought about whether or not the temporary chemical changes psychedelic drugs bring about in our brains cause us to hallucinate things that aren't there -- clearly true in some cases -- and whether or not they cause our brains to become more perceptive to realities that actually are there, but which can't be perceived under normal circumstances. How would you tell the difference?

...I am still left with big questions about all this. First (and to repeat), do psychedelic drugs actually open up a door of perception into dimensions of reality that are closed to our brains under normal conditions, or do they only cause hallucinations? (And how would you know the difference?). Second, given the commonplace testimony from psychedelic drug users to experiences that closely resemble mystical episodes of insight that saints and spiritual geniuses in various religious traditions have had, is it advisable for people in search of enlightenment to assist their quest with hallucinogenic drugs? Why or why not?

(On that last question, my intuition is that it would be the difference between someone making a million dollars through years of hard, disciplined labor, and someone winning the lottery. The money is the same, but the lottery winner has no context in which to place his bounty, and, as studies have shown, is far more likely to have his life ruined by the gift. That said, if medical research can show that using hallucinogenics can help terminally ill or badly depressed people find a sense of purpose, positive meaning or peace with their condition, why on earth would anyone want to deny them that?)

You can count me as a skeptic about whether psychedelic drugs open the user up to another level of reality imperceptible to the brain not on drugs. I think there is only one reality in this life and I think our goal ought to be to learn to live in it with a clear head. Healthy spirituality is all about learning to let go of illusions and delusions and living well in the now.

Having said that I am sympathetic to the use of drugs for terminally ill and depressed people that relieve their physical and psychic pain so they can be more present in the here and now. If psychedelic drugs help by altering the brain chemistry in such a way that the here and now is more enjoyable then they should be part of a physician's arsenal. And I am certainly not opposed to the recreational use of mild stimulants. I like my coffee and beer and although I don't use marijuana I think it should be decriminalized.

It's the notion that there is some other more real or true level of reality that I am skeptical about. Let's make it our goal to grow deeper and happier in this all too fleeting moment of reality.

The Almost Beer Event

From the press pool here is what the President, Vice President, Sgt. Crowley, and Professor Gates were drinking:

The beers:
POTUS: Bud Light
VPOTUS: Bucklers
Gates: Sam Adams Light
Crowley: Blue Moon

Yikes. I had a Victory HopDevil Ale in honor of the event.

Brew Story

The New Yorker explores the rise and fall and resurrection of the craft brew business. First a great opening:

Elephants, like many of us, enjoy a good malted beverage when they can get it. At least twice in the past ten years, herds in India have stumbled upon barrels of rice beer, drained them with their trunks, and gone on drunken rampages. (The first time, they trampled four villagers; the second time they uprooted a pylon and electrocuted themselves.)

Then the brew story:

America used to be full of odd beers. In 1873, the country had some four thousand breweries, working in dozens of regional and ethnic styles. Brooklyn alone had nearly fifty. Beer was not only refreshing but nutritious, it was said—a “valuable substitute for vegetables,” as a member of the United States Sanitary Commission put it during the Civil War. The lagers brewed by Adolphus Busch and Frederick Pabst were among the best. In 1878, Maureen Ogle notes in her recent book “Ambitious Brew: The Story of American Beer,” Busch’s St. Louis Lager took on more than a hundred European beers at a competition in Paris. The lager came home with the gold, causing an “immense sensation,” in the words of a reporter from the Times.

Then came Prohibition, followed hard by industrialization. Beer went from barrel to bottle and from saloon to home refrigerator, and only the largest companies could afford to manufacture and distribute it. A generation raised on Coca-Cola had a hard time readjusting to beer’s bitterness, and brewers diluted their recipes accordingly. In 1953, Miller High Life was dismissed by one competitor as a beer for “women and beginners.” Within a decade, most other beers were just as flavorless.

Beer has lagged well behind wine and organic produce in the ongoing reinvention of American cuisine. Yet the change over the past twenty years has been startling. In 1965, the United States had a single craft brewery: Anchor Brewing, in San Francisco. Today, there are nearly fifteen hundred. In liquor stores and upscale supermarkets, pumpkin ales and chocolate stouts compete for cooler space with wit beers, weiss beers, and imperial Pilsners. The King of Beers, once served in splendid isolation at many bars, is now surrounded by motley bottles with ridiculous names, like jesters at a Renaissance fair: SkullSplitter, Old Leghumper, Slam Dunkel, Troll Porter, Moose Drool, Power Tool, He’brew, and Ale Mary Full of Taste.

Still true about Miller High Life. Then there is the odd ball angle:

He made a stout with roasted chicory and St.-John’s-wort (“The world’s only antidepressant depressant,” he called it). While other brewers were dyeing their beer green for St. Patrick’s Day, Calagione brewed his with blue-green algae. “It tasted like appetizing pond scum,” he says. “The first sip, you were like, ‘Wow, that tasted like pond scum. But you know what? I kind of want a second sip.’ ”

And the spiritual angle:

The grain had been cooked to mash by now, and a thick, lacy foam had bubbled to the surface. It was here that A. E. Housman’s famous lines—“Malt does more than Milton can / To justify God’s ways to man”—were borne out.

I'm ready for Sunday. But first, today, there is the Penn State/Michigan State game, which will be enhanced by a Sprecher Black Bavarian Lager. It's sublime.

Beer is Proof that God Loves Us and Wants Us to be Happy

Courtesy of a friend I have a tee-shirt with these wise words of Ben Franklin. Of course I have also seen the same saying with wine instead of beer which just proves that Ben covered all the bases. In any case via a GetReligion article about beer and beer-brewing monks I found the delightful website of the Lost Abbey Brewery in San Marcos, CA. Very amusing. I will have to see if I can find their beer. Here are their ten commandments:

1. The most imaginative beers are our crusade
2. We believe we are all in this together
3. We strive for honesty and integrity in our lives like you
4. Fresh beer is great, aged beer is better
5. Now that you have found us help us spread the message
6. There is good and evil in the world - our beers are good
7. Passion isn't something you can buy at the corner store
8. We believe an inspired life is worth living
9. Life is about choices, The Lost Abbey is a great choice
10. We are not perfect, but no one is