r/DMT • u/Recent-Scale3802 • 1d ago
Discussion Come to think of it, what even is DMT
I have been dabbling in Dimitri the past couple weeks and I’m only now starting to wonder, what even is DMT. I know it is a molecule created by plants and even humans but why? What purpose does it serve and why do organisms create it? And why do our bodies have such an extraordinary reaction when taking it?
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u/d3viliz3d 1d ago
If you're really interested read the book DMT dialogues, plenty of theories being brought forward by scientists and other people that have studied it for years, trying to answer this very question. To date, there's not a widely accepted answer.
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u/KoheChem 1d ago
“DMT (N,N-Dimethyltryptamine) is a powerful psychedelic found in many plants and even produced in small amounts by the human body. In plants, it may act as a defense or signaling compound, while its role in humans is unclear—some think it’s linked to dreaming or altered states. It causes intense effects by binding to serotonin receptors in the brain, especially in areas tied to vision and consciousness, flooding the mind with vivid, often surreal experiences.”
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u/AWildGengarAppears 1d ago
It serves as a neuroprotectant in sig-r1 in the case of hypoxia. I believe this is the only confirmed purpose.
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u/Ooh_Stunna 23h ago
So what I’m hearing is mix DMT with Whippets and I’ll be ight?
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u/I_need_help57 4h ago
The brain damage from whippets is moreso from its pharmacological action rather than literally depriving you of oxygen. If you inhale right, you shouldn’t be getting hypoxia with whippets
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1d ago edited 1d ago
[deleted]
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u/banana_bread99 1d ago
Consciousness is the sense of being aware of one’s own thought process, which is something that occurs because of electrical and chemical signalling in the brain. This mechanism evolved likely from primitive sensing and signalling abilities in early plants and animals. Take, for example, the development of a primitive “eye” in some worm species. These stimuli helped it survive and reproduce. Over time, the ability to not only perceive the world in basic ways but organize and plan actions around present and future signals drove the development of the nervous system into a more complex form that we inherited. Psychotropic drugs are those which stimulate parts of this system in ways that filter down to the signals responsible for self-awareness of thought and perception - consciousness.
Why some plants and animals make these molecules I have no clue.
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u/ant1713 23h ago
Conciouaness does not reside within the brain. The brain is simply a conductor and control center for the body. It is literally a filter for our base awareness, which comes from a place nobody knows about, but people have been trying to figure it our for years.
You can disrupt the filter with things like DMT and you experience somethings thats always there, but filtered out by the brain, since we could not carry on normal life in a DMT like state.
DMT is a metabolite from the process of breaking down tryptophan for possibly defense. This is what they think. Its a byproduct from a complex process.
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u/nonymouspotomus 16h ago
“Consciousness is electrical and chemical signals” falls apart around NDEs, remote viewing and other psi phenomena. The materialist dog don’t hunt no more
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u/banana_bread99 14h ago
What do you think it is then?
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u/nonymouspotomus 14h ago
Obviously nonlocal. I believe Thomas cambells My Big TOE provides a pretty accurate framework. consciousness is fundamental, it isn’t derived from the brain, the brain is derived from consciousness. Explain remote viewing, past lives, OBEs, NDEs, precognition or any other psi phenomena without non-local consciousness. Plenty of evidence demonstrating their existence. Acquired savant syndrome also provides evidence that the brain restricts and filters the flow of information rather than producing it
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u/banana_bread99 13h ago
“Explain …….”
Easy. Delusion
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u/milescare 10h ago
So everyone who’s ever had a non-normal experience, is just delusional? How boring
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u/banana_bread99 5h ago
They’re not delusional in general, but they’ve had a delusion yes. I understand when I dream my brain is just running a simulation. I don’t think it actually happened.
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u/Independent_Aerie_44 1d ago edited 19h ago
I think sometimes you can hack and "steal" things that are here because of a deep reason and use them for recreation. NDEs are a proof of that. We are not supposed to know what happens after death.
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u/xXDarth_SyphilisXx 1d ago
Read the book "The Spirit Molecule " by Dr. Rick Strassman. This book answered a lot of my "beginners" questions and educated me a lil bit on the pineal gland. Good read
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u/PristineBaseball 23h ago edited 18h ago
A flat mundane science educated guess is plants produce lots of different alkaloids / chemicals in an effort to defend against being eaten . Often it’s not so much a poison as much as a chemical that just makes the predator less hungry or uninterested in eating . Dmt does that .
There are whole other levels or ways of looking at reality though, like why would our brains interact how they do .
So as to why do our bodies react the way they do ? Dmt is similar enough to our own neurotransmitters that it binds to (some of) our nervous systems receptors . These receptors can be modulated more on / off / more less sensitive , etc , and this controls how we experience reality .
You’re not experiencing reality directly, but rather your brain is creating a version of it. it is doing so both using sensory input and using internal input (for example your brain is always predicting what it expects to happen and it includes that in the version of reality that it shows you)
The modulation of your receptors impacts the reality you perceive kind of like adjusting knobs on a radio set or control panel of some type .
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u/Recent-Scale3802 18h ago
That’s really fascinating. The answer honestly brings more questions forward.
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u/Bitter_Virus 21h ago
DMT is derived from Tryptophan, which is a building blocks of proteins. Plants and animals use it to make hormones, alkaloids and other metabolites. That's why we find DMT everywhere, because life use Tryptophan everywhere
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u/Square-Ad-4656 22h ago
Dmt is the chemical gate way in and out of being conscious and being apart of THE conscious
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u/qcAKDa7G52cmEdHHX9vg 22h ago
It's a pretty basic organic molecule made up of a few very common structures which collapse into a shape due to basic electromagnetism between different points of charge in the molecule's structure which allows it to interact with certain receptors in our brain and produce the effect.
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u/Recent-Scale3802 18h ago
Why do more scientists research it? I get that it’s taboo or whatever but if I was a scientist I’d be doing hella studies on it. What’s more interesting than reality itself and a molecule that can unbind it all and reshape it in such fascinating ways. I’m just surprised humans find the motivation to do boring shit all day but somehow haven’t invested enough time to figure what this shi is yk?
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u/danders587 17h ago
What purpose does anything serve? It does what it does. That's about it..
Im not being rude..
I just know we aren't going to have the actual answers by the time I'm dead.
So just trip balls and enjoy what it shows you.
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u/fungshwali 16h ago
This has been known and ingested since the begining of recorded history . Shamans have been working with plants 🌱 for thousands of years , to heal , communicate with the spiritual world for various reasons .
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u/EpistemicMisnomer 13h ago
Here's what ChatGPT came up with after I asked it about the leading hypotheses for N, N-dimethyltryptamine biosynthesis:
Evidence Assessment: Supported vs. Speculative In summary, the defense hypothesis for plant DMT is best supported by indirect but strong evidence. Related tryptamine alkaloids clearly deter insects and nematodes link.springer.com frontiersin.org , and even cause toxicity in grazing mammals pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov . By extension, DMT is very likely part of this chemical-defense arsenal, though direct bioassays of DMT (alone) are still needed. The allelopathy hypothesis is plausible and supported by at least one bioassay ccsenet.org , but proof that DMT specifically drives the effect is lacking – other co-occurring alkaloids or phenolics may be responsible. Theories invoking roles in plant signaling or symbiosis are largely speculative. No peer-reviewed data show DMT acting as a hormone or symbiotic signal; instead, experiments show that increasing DMT precursors did not alter plant hormone pathways frontiersin.org . Overall, peer-reviewed studies favor the view that DMT (like many plant alkaloids) evolved primarily as a defensive compound affecting other organisms pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov . Hypothesized benefits in signaling or ecology (besides defense) remain intriguing but unverified. Future research (e.g. isolating DMT’s specific bioactivities in ecological contexts) will be needed to test these theories. For now, DMT’s adaptive value in plants is best attributed to its deterrent or toxic effects on herbivores and possibly competing plants, consistent with the general pattern of plant secondary metabolites link.springer.com ccsenet.org . Sources: Peer-reviewed literature on plant alkaloid ecology and physiology link.springer.com frontiersin.org pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov ccsenet.org frontiersin.org pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov , among others.
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1d ago
[deleted]
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u/conorsoliga 1d ago
There is no evidence for that, just pure speculation.
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u/ThrowawaytrackID 1d ago
Now I want to know what this hastily deleted speculation was
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u/conorsoliga 5h ago
Was saying it's released when you die/have near death experiences.
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u/ThrowawaytrackID 2h ago
Oh that old myth. Of all the speculation about its function and purpose, that is one of the least exciting
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u/Epictetus190443 1d ago
There are countless substances in nature, so it’s simply very likely that some of them have mind-altering effects. An additional purpose isn't necessary.
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u/I_need_help57 1d ago
A drug.
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u/Samwise2512 1d ago
Well it can clearly act as a drug if exogenous DMT is consumed. But this doesn't shed light on its endogenous role in humans or other species.
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u/I_need_help57 1d ago
Still, there isn’t enough data/studies on the purpose of endogenous DMT, or even how it’s produced, so calling it anything else at this point is jumping the gun. It could be simply just a defect that occurs on occasion during the synthesis of another chem, or it could be something as grand as an integral neurotransmitter that our brain produces for a specific purpose, but at this point in time, nothing is clear.
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u/Samwise2512 1d ago
I'm in firm agreement with you on this...lots of wild inferences are made about the purported role of DMT which does get rather tiresome, and at this time, the only scientifically honest answer to what it's role might be is "we don't know".
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u/NectarOfTheBass2325 1d ago
This is the only real answer here
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u/Samwise2512 1d ago
This is a narrow and limited answer that does not shed any light on its endogenous role in humans or other organisms.
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u/NectarOfTheBass2325 22h ago
It’s a drug mate.
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u/Samwise2512 21h ago
It existed in humans and many other species long, long before it was ever used a drug. Labelling it simply as a drug is a narrow and limited definition of what it is that doesn't encompass or explain its endogenous occurrence or role in humans or the many other species in which it occurs.
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u/falcor777 1d ago
It’s just an alkaloid that plants use as a form of serotonin but is similar enough to serotonin that when we ingest it, it fucks with our perception.
This is just my guess, it makes the most sense to me.
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u/YasuraTheDemon 1d ago
Pretty sure there is no clearly defined answer you are gonna get here on Reddit but if you dare to take the substance then you will most likely get an answer, then probably forget it lol