Amanita Muscaria -- With or Without Lemon Juice?

[Schahin92]

These questions have been answered above in the detailed and thorough paper shared by dreamer042, he even copied the relevant data and added his own analysis and thoughts. So what do you want more?

Well I am after various experiences concerning different preparation method, as there is alot of contradicting information online ranging from Ibotenic Acid is etxtremeley toxic to Ibotenic Acid is actually amazing medicinally.

I know the data, but I am after personal experiences regarding the different methods, the experience of dreamer042 is valuable but its not the only one, I appreciate various accounts to gain more insight.

 

[dreamer042]

Let's be absolutely clear here, ibotenic acid is a toxic excitatory neurocompound, it has no accepted therapeutic use. Anyone telling you it is “actually amazing medicinally” is wrong and feeding you information that is unfounded, easily disproven with even cursory research, and potentially dangerous.

Now at the same time let's not be melodramatic, this doesn't mean if you eat a gram of amanita you are going to immediately get a brain lesion. Ethanol is also a neurotoxin, a lot of things we encounter every day are neurotoxic, such as air pollution. That doesn't mean it's safe or smart to go downing bottles of everclear and sucking on exhaust pipes.

What’s actually happening here is not “confusion in the science,” it’s poor critical thinking about sources. A clinical toxicology report built on verified exposures, symptom patterns, and medical outcomes holds a little more weight than "Amanita Dreamer" an influencer with something to sell you that needs to put disclaimers on her website to prevent being held legally accountable for spreading misinformation: "Requests for mental health help, medication advice, natural alternative medication, any advice, will not be answered. In the US this is practicing medicine without a license and is a serious offense."

The study posted earlier is useful because it’s measurements under defined conditions: temperature, pH, time, and observed changes in ibotenic acid and muscimol. That kind of data is inherently more reliable than “someone in a group says boiling does nothing,” because the claim can be checked, repeated, and falsified.

Let’s use this as an opportunity to actively engage critical thinking: evaluating information quality, incentives, bias, and fallacy, and understanding why the scientific method and peer review exist in the first place. They exist to prevent anecdotes and belief from being mistaken for evidence when real risk is involved.

 

[PedroSanchez]

i don't have any stakes in this, but i do think it is important to get various experiences before we draw our own conclusions. there were papers that said that roundup was great for us once upon a time. amanita dreamer does have a lot to gain from making the mushrooms look safe, but we don't know what other gains there are to be had from making them look dangerous either. we have seen enough prohibitions to know better than to blindly trust perceived authority, and we know what kind of strings that perceived authority can pull.
i am not taking any sides or anything, but i can see why a person would be willing to listen to somebody who is a regular user of amanita muscaria even if the papers say otherwise. that said, you mentioned this is peer reviewed. i have not dived into this myself yet, but i will do if i find time or i intend to use amanitas without decarbing, but if there is heavy peer review then i am certainly more likely to believe the sources in question, but we have even seen many cases of biased peer review. these things are a minefield and to blindly trust scientific papers is potentially as dangerous as blindly trusting somebody online.

i know that is a taboo opinion and i think when it comes to choosing to put something into your body, until you are confident you can accept full responsibility for yourself you are better off not doing it at all, rather than trusting anybody, whoever they might be. if in doubt, don't put new things into your body.

be safe!


edit:
i just committed a moral crime and used AI to save some time i understand my results are probably completely wrong, but this is not something i want to spend much time on right now. but the AI bot identified a few papers that are exploring potential positive effects of ibotenic acid used in low doses, including cancer treatment.
as i said, this could be completely inaccurate as it came from AI, which is well known for being completely wrong. but it's also worth mentioning that just because something can kill you doesn't always mean there are no benefits to it. the dose makes the poison.

 

[blig-blug]

Too many contradicting information online.

That's why you should not take the purported "information" at face value, but look at the reasoning and/or sources for it (if any at all), and think for yourself. If I were to say that you need to mix Amanita muscaria with rat poison for best effects, I would be supposedly adding even more "contradicting information", but you and anyone willing to think critically would immediately discard such "information". Likewise when some Youtube guru says "eating neurotoxins is good for you, actually".

Also, how would getting even more opinions solve the problem of "too much contradicting information"? Are you perhaps looking for someone that says "yes, ibotenic acid is great"?

listen to somebody who is a regular user of amanita muscaria

Being a regular user does not mean you know better or at all what harm you may have caused to yourself.

to blindly trust scientific papers is potentially as dangerous as blindly trusting somebody online

In this case, what danger is there in fully decarbing the mushrooms? The opportunity cost of missing out on a presumed "wonderful medicine"? There will be less clear cases, but this specific one is a no-brainer.

 

[Varallo]

i don't have any stakes in this, but i do think it is important to get various experiences before we draw our own conclusions. there were papers that said that roundup was great for us once upon a time. amanita dreamer does have a lot to gain from making the mushrooms look safe, but we don't know what other gains there are to be had from making them look dangerous either. we have seen enough prohibitions to know better than to blindly trust perceived authority, and we know what kind of strings that perceived authority can pull.
i am not taking any sides or anything, but i can see why a person would be willing to listen to somebody who is a regular user of amanita muscaria even if the papers say otherwise. that said, you mentioned this is peer reviewed. i have not dived into this myself yet, but i will do if i find time or i intend to use amanitas without decarbing, but if there is heavy peer review then i am certainly more likely to believe the sources in question, but we have even seen many cases of biased peer review. these things are a minefield and to blindly trust scientific papers is potentially as dangerous as blindly trusting somebody online.

i know that is a taboo opinion and i think when it comes to choosing to put something into your body, until you are confident you can accept full responsibility for yourself you are better off not doing it at all, rather than trusting anybody, whoever they might be. if in doubt, don't put new things into your body.

be safe!


edit:
i just committed a moral crime and used AI to save some time i understand my results are probably completely wrong, but this is not something i want to spend much time on right now. but the AI bot identified a few papers that are exploring potential positive effects of ibotenic acid used in low doses, including cancer treatment.
as i said, this could be completely inaccurate as it came from AI, which is well known for being completely wrong. but it's also worth mentioning that just because something can kill you doesn't always mean there are no benefits to it. the dose makes the poison.

Im sorry Pedro but you’ve lost me completely here, I mean if we’re going to treat Facebook posts, Quacks and similar sources as being on the same level as the papers referenced here, then I don’t really see how the discussion can move forward in a meaningful way.

 

[PedroSanchez]

Being a regular user does not mean you know better or at all what harm you may have caused to yourself.


In this case, what danger is there in fully decarbing the mushrooms? The opportunity cost of missing out on a presumed "wonderful medicine"? There will be less clear cases, but this specific one is a no-brainer.

absolutely, i agree with you 100%. which is what i meant when i said "i think when it comes to choosing to put something into your body, until you are confident you can accept full responsibility for yourself you are better off not doing it at all". i would suggest a decarb if anybody asked me. would that be medical advice?

all i am saying is it is not so clear cut as to simply "trust the science". that concept has got us all in trouble many times before.

 

[PedroSanchez]

Im sorry Pedro but you’ve lost me completely here, I mean if we’re going to treat Facebook posts, Quacks and similar sources as being on the same level as the papers referenced here, then I don’t really see how the discussion can move forward in a meaningful way.

i didn't say that at all.
i know i am at risk of upsetting people here but the science is not always on our side. sorry if that offends you, but we do have a long history of examples. i am not saying to trust facebook posts. as for quacks, how do we even define a quack? plenty of histories most honored scientists were considered quacks in their day.
i'm not trying to personally attack you, i hope you can see that.

 

[blig-blug]

Im sorry Pedro but you’ve lost me completely here, I mean if we’re going to treat Facebook posts, Quacks and similar sources as being on the same level as the papers referenced here, then I don’t really see how the discussion can move forward in a meaningful way.

I think @PedroSanchez likely means something like this (and Pedro correct me if I'm wrong). When discussing psychoactives and toxicity, scientific sources will very often consider them just "toxic" and dangerous with complete disregard for doses, etc. As they aren't interested in the psychoactive uses (uses that very often they consider illegitimate), and often are writing and researching from a prohibitionist perspective.

As an example, this article states:

Muscimol is psychotropic (i.e., can produce acute changes in perception, mood, cognition, and behavior), while ibotenic acid is not. Both compounds are also highly toxic and can be fatal at high enough doses

That is very misleading, as it makes no difference whatsoever between the toxicity of ibotenic acid and muscimol, nor acknowledges that muscimol isn't toxic at low doses (although I suspect psychoactivity is considered a form of toxicity by the authors). The claim that ibotenic acid isn't psychoactive is also misleading, as it's a prodrug for muscimol but, again, the authors likely don't care about such details. Lastly, the claim "can be fatal at high enough doses" applies to absolutely anything including water.

There are many more examples of this when discussing psychoactive substances and toxicity. For example, there are many papers that warn agains the consumption of the toxic plant Peganum harmala. Which yes, it's toxic at high doses, but that qualification isn't made anywhere. So it could be conceivable that something similar could be happening with ibotenic acid, although in this case I doubt it. And "X youtuber plus Facebook groups say so" isn't an argument or a reason to believe anything.

 

[PedroSanchez]

I think @PedroSanchez likely means something like this (and Pedro correct me if I'm wrong). When discussing psychoactives and toxicity, scientific sources will very often consider them just "toxic" and dangerous with complete disregard for doses, etc. As they aren't interested in the psychoactive uses (uses that very often they consider illegitimate), and often are writing and researching from a prohibitionist perspective.

As an example, this article states:

That is very misleading, as it makes no difference whatsoever between the toxicity of ibotenic acid and muscimol, nor acknowledges that muscimol isn't toxic at low doses (although I suspect psychoactivity is considered a form of toxicity for the authors). The claim that ibotenic acid isn't psychoactive is also misleading, as it's a prodrug for muscimol but, again, the authors likely don't care about such details. Lastly, the claim "can be fatal at high enough doses" applies to absolutely anything including water.

There are many more examples of this when discussing psychoactive substances and toxicity. For example, there are many papers that warn agains the consumption of the toxic plant Peganum harmala. Which yes, it's toxic at high doses, but that qualification isn't made anywhere. So it could be conceivable that something similar could be happening with ibotenic acid, although in this case I doubt it. And "X youtuber plus Facebook groups say so" isn't an argument or a reason to believe anything.

yes that is a great example, thank you. i am also adding that sometimes these authors know that they are being misleading, which is why my point is a controversial one. we don't know what the facts are unfortunately. anecdotal evidence is not completely meaningless if we have enough of it.
kava kava is another great example, with the claims on liver damage coming from badly procured samples. maybe this was deliberate (not saying it definitely was) because there are high stakes involved with the anti-depression drug market and alcohol addiction etc.

 

[blig-blug]

yes that is a great example, thank you. i am also adding that sometimes these authors know that they are being misleading, which is why my point is a controversial one. we don't know what the facts are unfortunately. anecdotal evidence is not completely meaningless if we have enough of it.
kava kava is another great example, with the claims on liver damage coming from badly procured samples. maybe this was deliberate (not saying it definitely was) because there are high stakes involved with the anti-depression drug market and alcohol addiction etc.

Probably the clearest example of what you describe is the original study that claimed that LSD damaged chromosomes. That's why I mentioned the need to look at the reasons, the sources, and also that there will be less clear cases. And the LSD case was finally proven to be wrong. If the only evidence against it had been "Tim Leary said so", it would be best to assume that LSD does, indeed, harm chromosomes.

This is not one of those less clear cases. IIRC it was Robert Gordon Wasson who observed that the single time he didn't get awful side effects from A. muscaria was when they had been dried on a fire. Traditional Siberian practices did the same (plus the also fully decarboxylated muscimol in urine). No one stands to get anything from claiming that decarboxylation is much preferable. Dubious gurus do stand to get prestige by telling you "facts" that go against "common belief".