The DMT Atlas

THE DMT ATLAS

The Library — every source

The written corpus behind the Atlas: peer-reviewed studies, books, lectures, and community archives. Each note says what the source contributes and how much weight it can carry.

NLP / corpus study

Neurochemical models of near-death experiences: a large-scale study based on the semantic similarity of written reports (Conscious Cogn 69:52-69)

Martial C, Cassol H, Charland-Verville V, ... Tagliazucchi E, Laureys S · 2019

~15,000 Erowid reports across 165 substances vs 625 NDE narratives; ketamine most NDE-like, DMT lower. Tension with Timmermann 2018.

archive

340 DMT Trip Reports (attesting to contact with apparently independently-existing intelligent entities)

Peter Meyer (compiler); source reports compiled by 'Pup' · 2010 · source ↗

Meyer's curated corpus, assembled from anonymous DMT accounts 'Pup' posted to dmt.tribe.net (2005-2006); this is the 'Meyer & Pup' collaboration and the empirical backbone of Meyer's discarnate-entity thesis. Reliability class: community archive of self-reported anonymous accounts, not peer-reviewed; useful for base rates, not for ontology.

archive

Effect Index / Subjective Effect Index (incl. Autonomous Entity, geometry & DMT effect taxonomy)

Josie Kins (and contributors) · 2011 · source ↗

A community-built granular taxonomy of 200+ subjective psychedelic effects with definitions, subcomponents, and visual replications, including formal 'autonomous entity' and geometry classifications applied to DMT. Reliability class: structured community archive/taxonomy (systematic but not peer-reviewed).

book

The Fairy-Faith in Celtic Countries

W. Y. Evans-Wentz · 1911 · source ↗

Classic folklore ethnography of Celtic fairy belief (changelings, abductions, the 'good people'); a pre-psychedelic cultural precedent for the entity-encounter/abduction motif, cited as parallel by Luke, Hancock, and Vallee. Reliability class: historical folklore ethnography (cultural comparison, not evidence).

book

Mescal, and Mechanisms of Hallucinations

Heinrich Klüver · 1926/1966

Origin of the 'form constants': lattice/honeycomb, cobweb, tunnel/funnel, and spiral, observed across systematic mescaline self-experiments in bright, highly saturated colors. The foundational scientific taxonomy of visionary geometry; describes recurring forms, not a representative statistical sample.

book

Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism (1941); Jewish Gnosticism, Merkabah Mysticism, and Talmudic Tradition (1960)

Gershom Scholem · 1941, 1960

Founder of academic Kabbalah studies; primary scholarship on the Hekhalot 'palaces,' angelic gatekeepers, seals/names, and Merkavah ascent.

book

Psychology and Alchemy (Collected Works vol. 12)

C. G. Jung · 1944

Reads ouroboros/Mercurius/coniunctio as a projected symbolic language of psychic transformation and the mandala of wholeness; basis for the alchemy–psychedelic parallel (and its steelman).

book

Soma: Divine Mushroom of Immortality (1968); reports on Mexican teonánacatl / Mazatec mushroom ritual (from 1957)

R. Gordon Wasson · 1957–1968

Ethnomycologist. Proposed soma = Amanita muscaria and publicized living Mesoamerican psilocybin ritual. Both identifications are influential but contested.

book

The Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious

Carl G. Jung · 1959

Supplies the standard naturalistic framing for why unrelated strangers report similar figures (Mother, Trickster, Shadow). An interpretive lens; inherited archetypes are not empirically established.

book

Flying Saucers: A Modern Myth of Things Seen in the Skies

C. G. Jung · 1959

Reads UFOs as projected mandalas / archetypal wholeness-symbols from the collective psyche — the naturalistic frame for why strangers report similar sky-beings.

book

Shamanism: archaic techniques of ecstasy

Mircea Eliade · 1964

The three-worlds / axis-mundi cosmology reached by ecstatic technique. Standard reference, but criticized (Kehoe, Hutton) for over-universalizing distinct traditions.

book

The Psychedelic Experience: A Manual Based on the Tibetan Book of the Dead

Timothy Leary, Ralph Metzner & Richard Alpert · 1964

Deliberately maps psychedelic ego-loss/vision/re-entry onto the three bardos as a set-and-setting script; the bardo–trip fit is authored, not independently observed.

book

Passport to Magonia: From Folklore to Flying Saucers

Jacques Vallee · 1969 · source ↗

Argues fairy lore, religious apparitions, and UFO/abduction reports share a common structure across cultures and eras; the standard reference for the 'entity encounters recur trans-culturally' comparison in DMT discourse. Reliability class: individual comparative folklore/anomalistics (pattern-finding, not causal claims).

book

Life After Life

Raymond Moody · 1975

Coined 'near-death experience' and defined its canonical elements (OBE, tunnel, light, deceased, life-review, the border). Foundational but anecdotal by design.

book

The Invisible Landscape: Mind, Hallucinogens, and the I Ching

Terence McKenna & Dennis McKenna · 1975 · source ↗

The McKenna brothers' foundational theoretical text linking tryptamine states, shamanism, and their 'Timewave' I Ching model; historically important as origin of the hyperspace/self-transforming-machine-elf lexicon. Reliability class: individual speculative theory (the Timewave is not scientifically supported), primary-source for the DMT subculture's vocabulary.

book

The Way of the Shaman

Michael Harner · 1980

'Core shamanism' tunnel-journey to a Lowerworld 'teeming with beings,' built on Conibo/Jívaro ayahuasca apprenticeship. Criticized for decontextualizing diverse traditions.

book

Bwiti: An Ethnography of the Religious Imagination in Africa

James W. Fernandez · 1982

Standard ethnography of Gabonese Bwiti and the iboga initiation ordeal. NB: iboga's agent is ibogaine, NOT DMT — a different substance; cited for ritual-structure parallel only.

book

Vegetalismo: Shamanism among the Mestizo Population of the Peruvian Amazon

Luis Eduardo Luna · 1986 · source ↗

Luna's academic doctoral ethnography documenting mestizo ayahuasquero practice and the concept of 'plant teachers' (doctores); foundational anthropological grounding for entity/teacher motifs. Reliability class: peer-adjacent academic ethnography.

book

Haoma and Harmaline: The Botanical Identity of the Indo-Iranian Sacred Hallucinogen 'Soma'

David S. Flattery & Martin Schwartz · 1989

Argues the Indo-Iranian sacrament was Peganum harmala (Syrian rue, harmaline), against Wasson's Amanita — one competing position in an unresolved debate.

book

Ayahuasca Visions: the religious iconography of a Peruvian shaman

Pablo Amaringo & Luis Eduardo Luna · 1991

Primary visual record of mestizo ayahuasca cosmology — anaconda and jaguar spirits, plant/forest spirits, the 'plant teacher' doctrine.

book

Ayahuasca Visions: The Religious Iconography of a Peruvian Shaman

Luis Eduardo Luna & Pablo Amaringo · 1991 · source ↗

Ethnographic catalogue pairing Amaringo's painted ayahuasca visions with Luna's anthropological commentary; a primary iconographic record of vegetalista visionary content (entities, cities, serpents). Reliability class: scholarly ethnography + individual visionary art.

book

Food of the Gods: The Search for the Original Tree of Knowledge

Terence McKenna · 1992 · source ↗

McKenna's cultural/ethnobotanical history of psychoactive plants and the 'Stoned Ape' origin-of-consciousness hypothesis; influential on the DMT mythos. Reliability class: individual speculative synthesis (Stoned Ape hypothesis is unproven and widely disputed), valuable as cultural primary source.

book

Abduction: human encounters with aliens

John E. Mack, M.D. · 1994

Harvard psychiatrist who documented the abduction 'examination' script. Heavily criticized for hypnosis/suggestion methodology; presented alongside the skeptical counter-explanation.

book

The Cosmic Serpent: DNA and the origins of knowledge

Jeremy Narby · 1998

Proposes the cosmic-serpent = DNA hypothesis after Asháninka fieldwork. Evocative but untestable and criticized for confusing enthusiasm with evidence — flagged as speculation.

book

DMT: The Spirit Molecule

Rick Strassman, M.D. · 2001

Univ. of New Mexico clinical study, ~60 volunteers / ~400 doses (1990–1995). Source of 'they were waiting for me,' the high-tech nursery/lab realms, and the abduction-overlap observation. Clinical narrative, not a controlled frequency study.

book

The Antipodes of the Mind: charting the phenomenology of the ayahuasca experience

Benny Shanon · 2002

Oxford University Press. The most thorough systematic phenomenology of the closely related (same-molecule) ayahuasca state — serpents, royalty/palaces, temples, death/rebirth.

book

Supernatural: meetings with the ancient teachers of mankind

Graham Hancock · 2005

Argues DMT/ayahuasca animal-human hybrids are continuous with cave-art therianthropes and folkloric faeries — the 'ancient teachers.' Speculative thesis.

book

Abducted: how people come to believe they were kidnapped by aliens

Susan A. Clancy · 2005

The skeptical counterweight: sleep paralysis + cultural script + false-memory proneness + suggestive hypnosis explain abduction belief without aliens.

book

Sacred Vine of Spirits: Ayahuasca (rev. ed. of Ayahuasca: Human Consciousness and the Spirits of Nature)

Ralph Metzner (ed.) · 2006 · source ↗

Metzner's edited anthology of ayahuasca science, phenomenology, and first-person accounts, with attention to recurring visionary content; bridges DMT pharmacology and ceremonial context. Reliability class: edited scholarly + experiential accounts.

book

Inner Paths to Outer Space: Journeys to Alien Worlds through Psychedelics and Other Spiritual Technologies

Rick Strassman, Slawek Wojtowicz, Luis Eduardo Luna, Ede Frecska · 2008 · source ↗

Multi-author sequel to The Spirit Molecule framing DMT 'alien' worlds as inner-space phenomenology; Frecska contributes a serious (if speculative) quantum/biophysics chapter on non-local consciousness. Reliability class: mixed individual accounts + speculative theory from credentialed researchers.

book

The Brotherhood of the Screaming Abyss: My Life with Terence McKenna

Dennis McKenna · 2012 · source ↗

Memoir/ethnopharmacology by the scientifically-trained McKenna brother (later of the Hoasca ayahuasca study), documenting the 1971 La Chorrera experiment and the origins of the tryptamine mythos; the sober counterpoint to Terence's mythmaking. Reliability class: individual memoir by a credentialed ethnopharmacologist.

book

DMT and the Soul of Prophecy: A New Science of Spiritual Revelation in the Hebrew Bible

Rick Strassman · 2014 · source ↗

Strassman argues that his DMT volunteers' visions closely parallel Hebrew prophetic experience, proposing 'theoneurology' (the divine communicating via endogenous DMT). Reliability class: individual scholarly/theological interpretation by the original clinical DMT researcher; the comparative phenomenology is data, the theological model is interpretive.

book

Noumenautics: Metaphysics – Meta-ethics – Psychedelics (and co-ed., Philosophy and Psychedelics, 2022)

Peter Sjöstedt-Hughes · 2015 · source ↗

Academic philosopher (Whitehead/Spinoza/panpsychism) supplying rigorous ontological frameworks for interpreting psychedelic and 5-MeO-DMT unitive states without collapsing into literalism. Reliability class: peer-adjacent academic philosophy (argues about what the experiences could mean, makes no empirical claims).

book

DMT Dialogues: Encounters with the Spirit Molecule

David Luke & Rory Spowers (eds.); Anton Bilton, contributors incl. Strassman, Dennis McKenna, Hancock, Narby, Sheldrake, Metzner · 2018 · source ↗

Proceedings of the 2017 Tyringham Hall symposium where 20 researchers debated entity encounters, plant sentience, and DMT ontology; the fullest single collection of David Luke's entity-encounter framing. Reliability class: edited scholarly-but-speculative dialogue (mixes peer-reviewed researchers with frankly metaphysical positions).

book

Altered States of Consciousness: Experiences Out of Time and Self

Marc Wittmann · 2018 · source ↗

MIT Press synthesis by a leading time-perception researcher explaining the 'timelessness' and ego-dissolution common to intense DMT/psychedelic states via insular-cortex mechanisms of time and body perception. Reliability class: peer-reviewed-adjacent scholarly synthesis grounded in experimental psychophysics.

book

Alien Information Theory: psychedelic drug technologies and the cosmic game

Andrew R. Gallimore · 2019

Reframes hyperspace as a real, orthogonal, higher-dimensional informational reality and the entities as genuine intelligences. An explicit ontological hypothesis, not established fact.

book

LSD and the Mind of the Universe: Diamonds from Heaven

Christopher M. Bache · 2019 · source ↗

ADJACENT (high-dose LSD, not DMT): a religious-studies professor's systematic first-person record of 73 high-dose (500-600 µg) LSD sessions over 20 years, included for comparative cosmological/entity phenomenology. Reliability class: single detailed individual account, explicitly cautionary.

book

After / the Greyson NDE Scale

Bruce Greyson, M.D. · 2021

Fifty years of NDE research; source of 'realer than real,' memory stability, and the scale DMT is measured against. Empirically cautious.

book

Reality Switch Technologies: Psychedelics as Tools for the Discovery and Exploration of New Worlds

Andrew R. Gallimore · 2022 · source ↗

Gallimore's follow-up detailing how psychedelics interface with cortical dynamics to 'switch' the experienced world; strongest as an accessible account of receptor/brain mechanisms, weaker where it extends to 'genuine other worlds.' Reliability class: individual synthesis mixing peer-reviewed neuroscience with interpretive theory.

book

The Illustrated Field Guide to DMT Entities

David Jay Brown & Sara Phinn Huntley · 2024

A 25-entity taxonomy synthesizing the popular literature; provides structured entity categories (qualitative, not frequency-measured).

book (illustrated bestiary)

The Illustrated Field Guide to DMT Entities

David Jay Brown & Sara Phinn Huntley · 2025

Book-length visual bestiary of recurring DMT entity types (machine elves, tricksters, teachers, insectoids, and others), with AI-assisted illustration; draws on the Reddit-corpus entity statistics (3,778 reports, 45.5% containing entities) and community archives. Useful as a curated map of recurring types; not a primary study.

book/paper

Vegetalismo: Shamanism Among the Mestizo Population of the Peruvian Amazon; 'The Concept of Plants as Teachers Among Four Mestizo Shamans of Iquitos' (J. Ethnopharmacology); Ayahuasca Visions (with Pablo Amaringo)

Luis Eduardo Luna · 1984–1991

Anthropologist; foundational fieldwork on plant teachers (doctores), icaros and Shipibo/mestizo ayahuasca practice. Ethnographic documentation, not a claim of external reality.

clinical pilot (continuous IV infusion / DMTx)

Psychological and physiological effects of extended DMT (J Psychopharmacol)

Luan LX, Eckernäs E, Ashton M, Rosas FE, ... Carhart-Harris RL, Timmermann C · 2024

First extended-state DMT study; 11 volunteers, up to 4 dose levels, ~30-min bolus+infusion; entity encounters rose late, minimal ego dissolution, short-term psychological tolerance.

community

Hyperspace Lexicon (DMT-Nexus Wiki)

DMT-Nexus community · 2010 · source ↗

Crowd-built glossary formalizing the shared vocabulary and entity classifications of the DMT subculture (Chrysanthemum, Waiting Room, the entity taxonomy); distinct from the DMT-Nexus forum itself as a curated reference wiki. Reliability class: community lexicon (documents folk-phenomenological consensus, not evidence for it).

community

The Hyperspace Lexicon

DMT-Nexus community · n.d.

Crowd-authored glossary that names the territory (Hyperspace, Breakthrough, Waiting Room, Chrysanthemum, Carrier Wave, the Void, Hyperslap, Machine Elves/Tykes). Folk-phenomenology; some entries are one contributor's idiosyncratic coinages.

community archive

Shroomery Message Board — The Psychedelic Experience forum (threads incl. 'THE WHITE ROOM'; 'Aztec imagery during trips'; 'Seeing Egyptian/Mayan-esque hieroglyphs whilst tripping')

Shroomery community · 2004-2021

Long-running community corpus corroborating the white-room space and Mesoamerican/Egyptian visual motifs across unconnected reporters.

community archive

r/DMT subreddit recurring-place and entity threads (the corpus underlying Lawrence et al. 2022)

r/DMT community · 2009-present

Primary community archive for recurring-location reports: hives, councils, libraries, underwater realms, judgment spaces, familiar-room experiences.

epidemiological survey (Global Drug Survey)

Dimethyltryptamine (DMT): prevalence, user characteristics and abuse liability in a large global sample (J Psychopharmacol 28(1):49-54)

Winstock AR, Kaar S, Borschmann R · 2014

Lifetime 8.9% (n=1980), past-year 5.0% (n=1123); lowest urge-to-redose (1.3) of compared drugs.

essay / qualitative research writing

Encounters with negative entities

Jules Evans (Challenging Psychedelic Experiences Project / Ecstatic Integration) · 2023

Documents negative and frightening entity encounters and their aftermath — lasting fear, distress, and 'entity attachment' beliefs — from the Challenging Psychedelic Experiences Project's survey work and integration cases. Source for the integration-relevant dark-entity augment; journalistic-scholarly rather than peer-reviewed.

essay/blog analysis

samwoolfe.com essays: 'Why Do Jesters and Tricksters Appear in the DMT Experience?' (2019); 'Ancient Motifs in Psychedelic Experiences' (2013)

Sam Woolfe · 2013-2019

Synthesizes trip-report patterns on trickster/jester entities, their carnival-casino environments, and recurrent ancient-culture motifs (Egyptian, Aztec, Indian) across psychedelic reports.

essay/scholarship

'The Soma Question' and related Vedic scholarship (Harvard CSWR, Psychedelic Intersections)

Finnian M. M. Gerety · 2020s

Sanskritist; argues the Rigveda underdetermines soma's botanical identity and cautions against reading modern psychedelic phenomenology into the hymns.

field study

Intensity of Mystical Experiences Occasioned by 5-MeO-DMT and Comparison With a Prior Psilocybin Study (Front Psychol 9:2459)

Barsuglia J, Davis AK, Palmer R, ... Griffiths RR · 2018

DISTINCT COMPOUND 5-MeO-DMT (not N,N-DMT). n=20; 75% complete mystical experience; MEQ30 M=4.17.

lecture

True Hallucinations / The Archaic Revival / lectures

Terence McKenna · 1991–1993

Coined 'self-transforming machine elves,' 'tykes,' 'jeweled self-dribbling basketballs,' 'syntax-driving light,' and the visible-language / Logos themes. A vivid individual account, not a representative sample.

neuroimaging study

Human brain effects of DMT assessed via EEG-fMRI (PNAS 120(13):e2218949120)

Timmermann C, Roseman L, Haijen E, Carhart-Harris RL, et al. · 2023

N=20, 20 mg IV DMT; simultaneous EEG-fMRI; GFC increase, cortical-gradient compression, 5-HT2AR spatial correlation.

paper

Geometric visual hallucinations, Euclidean symmetry and the functional architecture of striate cortex (Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B)

Paul C. Bressloff, Jack D. Cowan, Martin Golubitsky, Peter J. Thomas & Matthew C. Wiener · 2001

Neural-field model deriving Klüver's four form constants from spontaneous symmetry-breaking pattern formation in primary visual cortex (V1), mapped to the visual field by the log-polar retinocortical transform. Explains why the same geometries recur across drugs, migraine and sensory deprivation.

paper

Ayahuasca Visualizations: A Structural Typology

Benny Shanon · 2002 · source ↗

Shanon's peer-reviewed structural typology of ayahuasca visual content (Journal of Consciousness Studies), a rigorous phenomenological taxonomy predating and complementing his book The Antipodes of the Mind. Reliability class: peer-reviewed first-person phenomenology (large personal + informant corpus).

paper

Discarnate entities and dimethyltryptamine (DMT): psychopharmacology, phenomenology and ontology

David Luke · 2011

J. Society for Psychical Research. Foundational typology of recurrent entity types (elves, mantis 'surgeons,' jewel-encrusted reptilians) across independent reporters.

paper

Hallucinogenic drugs in pre-Columbian Mesoamerican cultures (Neurología)

Francisco Javier Carod-Artal · 2015

Peer-reviewed survey of Mesoamerican entheogen iconography (mushroom stones, Xochipilli, teonánacatl) and the interpretive limits of that evidence.

paper

A Model for the Application of Target-Controlled Intravenous Infusion for a Prolonged Immersive DMT Psychedelic Experience

Andrew R. Gallimore & Rick J. Strassman · 2016 · source ↗

Frontiers in Pharmacology proposal (the intellectual seed of DMTx) arguing DMT's rapid onset and lack of acute tolerance make it amenable to anesthesiology-style target-controlled infusion to sustain the state beyond its ~20 min bolus duration. Reliability class: peer-reviewed pharmacokinetic modeling paper.

paper

DMT Models the Near-Death Experience

Timmermann, Roseman, Williams, Carhart-Harris et al. (Imperial College) · 2018

Frontiers in Psychology. Placebo-controlled comparison: DMT reproduces much of the Greyson NDE-scale profile; authors caution the contexts differ.

paper

The Breakthrough Experience: DMT hyperspace and its liminal aesthetics

Graham St John · 2018

Anthropology of Consciousness. Liminality framing; hyperspace as infinite cathedrals/machine-scapes/geometric abstraction; the 'Universal/Gaian Mind' perceived as God.

paper

The Breakthrough Experience: DMT Hyperspace and Its Liminal Aesthetics

Graham St John · 2018 · source ↗

Peer-reviewed cultural-anthropology companion to St John's cultural history (Mystery School in Hyperspace), analyzing the 'breakthrough' as a liminal aesthetic and social ritual rather than a pharmacological fact. Reliability class: peer-reviewed humanities/anthropology (Anthropology of Consciousness).

paper

The Experience Elicited by Hallucinogens Presents the Highest Similarity to Dreaming within a Large Database of Psychoactive Substance Reports

Camila Sanz, Federico Zamberlan, Earth & Fire Erowid, Enzo Tagliazucchi · 2018 · source ↗

NLP analysis of ~15,000 Erowid Experience Vault reports finding hallucinogen (incl. DMT/ayahuasca) narratives are semantically closest to dream reports. Reliability class: peer-reviewed computational corpus study (self-report data, but quantitative and reproducible).

paper

The Varieties of the Psychedelic Experience: A Study of the Association Between Subjective Effects and Binding Affinity Profiles of Tryptamines and Phenethylamines

Federico Zamberlan, Camila Sanz, R. Martínez Vivot, C. Pallavicini, F. Erowid, E. Erowid, E. Tagliazucchi · 2018 · source ↗

Latent-semantic-analysis of Erowid reports mapping subjective-effect language onto receptor binding-affinity profiles; quantifies which DMT-family effects track 5-HT2A vs other receptors. Reliability class: peer-reviewed computational corpus study.

paper

N,N-Dimethyltryptamine (DMT), an Endogenous Hallucinogen: Past, Present, and Future Research / 'facts and myths'

Steven A. Barker · 2018 · source ↗

The authoritative sober review of endogenous DMT: confirms DMT is naturally synthesized in mammals (INMT + AADC) and present in body fluids, but debunks the 'pineal-only / massive endogenous dose' folklore. Reliability class: peer-reviewed pharmacology review by the leading endogenous-DMT analytical chemist.

paper

Neural correlates of the DMT experience assessed with multivariate EEG

Timmermann, Roseman, Schartner, Carhart-Harris et al. (Imperial College) · 2019

Scientific Reports. N=13. Peak subjective effect 2–3 min after IV dose, elevated ~17 min; alpha-power drop and rising signal diversity.

paper

DMT Entities: not everyone gets machine elves (analysis of 149 Erowid reports)

Jennifer A. Lyke (Stockton University) · 2019

Quantifies how the folk vocabulary maps to actual report frequencies — the corrective that 'machine elves' (~2.9%) is rarer than 'feminine' (~24%) or even 'robot/machine entity' (~6.7%).

paper

Biosynthesis and Extracellular Concentrations of N,N-Dimethyltryptamine (DMT) in Mammalian Brain

Jon G. Dean, Jimo Borjigin et al. · 2019 · source ↗

Scientific Reports study showing rat cerebral cortex releases DMT at extracellular concentrations comparable to serotonin and other monoamines, with a further rise after experimental cardiac arrest. Reliability class: peer-reviewed neuroscience (rodent; human relevance and function remain open).

paper

Survey of entity encounter experiences occasioned by inhaled N,N-DMT

Davis, Clifton, Weaver, Hurwitz, Johnson & Griffiths (Johns Hopkins) · 2020

Journal of Psychopharmacology. N=2,561 — the largest DMT entity survey. Descriptor %, benevolence, fear, reality-alteration and belief-change figures. Some figures here drawn from the abstract + reputable secondary summaries where the full text was paywalled; treat exact decimals as approximate.

paper

DMT Alters Cortical Travelling Waves

Andrea Alamia, Christopher Timmermann, David Nutt, Rufin VanRullen, Robin Carhart-Harris · 2020 · source ↗

eLife EEG study (task brief dated it 2023; actual publication is 2020) showing DMT suppresses top-down alpha travelling waves and boosts bottom-up forward waves plus signal diversity, supporting the 'reduced precision of priors' model of the DMT world-building. Reliability class: peer-reviewed neuroimaging.

paper

An Encounter With the Other: a thematic & content analysis of DMT experiences from a naturalistic field study

Michael, Luke & Robinson · 2021

Frontiers in Psychology. n=36 breakthrough-dose field study — beings 94%, other-space 100%, the role/appearance/demeanor breakdowns, the realm taxonomy (lattice/circus/machine worlds).

paper

Phenomenology and content of the inhaled N,N-DMT experience

Lawrence, Carhart-Harris, Griffiths & Timmermann · 2022

Scientific Reports. Content analysis of 3,778 r/DMT reports — the source of the entity-phenotype and realm/geometry percentages. Samples people who self-select to post, so rates reflect that population.

paper

Psychological and physiological effects of extended DMT (DMTx pilot)

Lisa X. Luan, Emma Eckernäs, Michael Ashton, Christopher Timmermann, David Nutt, Robin Carhart-Harris et al. (Imperial College) · 2023 · source ↗

First empirical realization of the Gallimore-Strassman infusion model: continuous IV DMT sustained peak effects across ~30 min in healthy volunteers with heart rate habituating within ~15 min and low anxiety, establishing basic safety/tolerability. Reliability class: peer-reviewed clinical pilot (small N, placebo-controlled).

paper

An Encounter with the Self: A Thematic and Content Analysis of the DMT Experience from a Naturalistic Field Study

Pascal Michael, David Luke, Oliver Robinson · 2023 · source ↗

The 'middle' Michael/Luke/Robinson field-study paper (companion to 'An Encounter with the Other', 2021), analyzing self- and emotion-related themes in observed real-world DMT sessions (vaporized 40-75 mg). Reliability class: peer-reviewed qualitative field study (naturalistic, non-blinded).

paper

N,N-Dimethyltryptamine (DMT)-Occasioned Familiarity and the Sense of Familiarity Questionnaire (SOF-Q)

David Wyndham Lawrence, Alex P. DiBattista & Christopher Timmermann · 2023

Journal of Psychoactive Drugs. Mined ~30,000 online posts down to 3,778 unique DMT experiences; 227 mentioned familiarity. Key finding: 24.7% of familiarity reports came from FIRST-TIME DMT users and none attributed the feeling to prior DMT use - i.e., 'familiarity without recollection' (a deja-vu-like phenomenon). Grounds the recognition/repeat-visitation and veteran-vs-first-timer themes. Reddit-derived corpus, self-report; not a controlled clinical measure.

paper

An Encounter With Death: comparative analysis of naturalistic DMT experiences and the NDE

Michael, Luke et al. · 2025

Frontiers in Psychology. Quantifies the DMT↔NDE overlap AND divergence — life-review and deceased relatives are rare in DMT (~1–6%) yet central to NDEs.

primary text

Ezekiel ch. 1 (the chariot / ophanim vision)

Book of Ezekiel (Hebrew Bible) · c. 6th century BCE

'A wheel within a wheel,' rims 'full of eyes,' living creatures and throne — the founding vision of animate divine geometry and the seed of Merkavah mysticism.

reference

PsychonautWiki — Geometry, Drifting, Spontaneous tactile sensations, DMT (psychonautwiki.org)

PsychonautWiki contributors · 2013–

Community-maintained subjective-effect wiki paralleling the Effect Index leveling system, including Level 8A (semantic concept network) and 8B (inner mechanics of consciousness) geometry. Collaborative, non-peer-reviewed; useful for lay descriptive vocabulary.

report-archive

340 DMT Trip Reports (and 'Concerning the Nature of the DMT Entities')

Peter Meyer · 2005

Canonical early archive: 226 of 340 reports (~66%) mention apparently independent entities; argues their cross-report consistency makes them 'intersubjectively verifiable.'

report-archive

The Hyperbolic Geometry of DMT Experiences

Andrés Gómez Emilsson (Qualia Research Institute) · 2016

A six-level model (Threshold, Chrysanthemum, Magic Eye, Waiting Room, Breakthrough, Amnesia) and the argument that the geometry is hyperbolic, which explains its un-rememberability. An interpretive theory, not established fact.

report-archive

Experience Vaults (DMT)

Erowid · n.d.

Large archive of first-person reports underlying many of the secondary analyses.

study

Phenomenology of N,N-Dimethyltryptamine Use: A Thematic Analysis (Journal of Scientific Exploration 22:3)

Christopher Cott & Adam Rock · 2008

The first published qualitative thematic analysis of DMT use: 19 users, nine constituent themes including entity contact, familiarity, ineffability, and 'spirituality and learning about truths.' Small self-selected sample; foundational rather than representative.

survey

Dimethyltryptamine (DMT): subjective effects and patterns of use among Australian recreational users (Drug Alcohol Depend 111(1):30-37)

Cakic V, Potkonyak J, Marshall A · 2010

n=121; smoking 98.3%, ayahuasca 30.6%; psychospiritual insight 75.5%; anxiety/stress 10.9%.

survey

Survey of Subjective 'God Encounter Experiences': Comparisons Among Naturally Occurring Experiences and Those Occasioned by Psilocybin, LSD, Ayahuasca, or DMT

Roland R. Griffiths, Ethan S. Hurwitz, Alan K. Davis, Matthew W. Johnson, Robert Jesse · 2019 · source ↗

Johns Hopkins PLOS ONE survey (4,285 respondents across 5 groups) comparing non-drug vs psychedelic 'encounter with God/Ultimate Reality' experiences; the key comparison anchor for DMT entity-encounter surveys. Reliability class: peer-reviewed large retrospective survey (self-selected, retrospective).

survey / thematic analysis

Phenomenology of N,N-Dimethyltryptamine Use: A Thematic Analysis (J Sci Explor 22(3))

Cott C, Rock A · 2008

19 online reports; 9 themes; mean age 23, 95% male. Early systematic DMT phenomenology.

theory

Psychedelic Information Theory: Shamanism in the Age of Reason

James L. Kent · 2010 · source ↗

The essential skeptical counterweight: Kent argues DMT 'entities' are concrete, fully-immersive hallucinations generated by destabilized/oscillating perceptual control systems, NOT contact with autonomous beings. Reliability class: individual skeptical/neurological synthesis (20+ years, 200+ references; interpretive, not experimental).

theory

Alien Information Theory: Psychedelic Drug Technologies and the Cosmic Game

Andrew R. Gallimore · 2019 · source ↗

A computational neuroscientist's book-length speculative framework arguing the DMT breakthrough is perceptual contact with a higher-dimensional, information-encoded reality rather than hallucination. Reliability class: individual theoretical synthesis (grounded in real pharmacology but its cosmological claims are unfalsifiable and explicitly non-consensus).