One of the more interesting — and controversial — uses of biodiversity, both wild and agricultural, is to cause altered states of consciousness. As luck would have it, there were three things sort of on this topic which caught my eye today.
First, a short article from the New Scientist appeared in my feed reader about how the UN Environment Programme has singled out for conservation a chunk of desert in Chihuahua, northern Mexico. The importance of this area comes from the fact that it is the home of the peyote cactus, source of the hallucinogenic alkaloid mescaline, and objective of an annual pilgrimage by the Huichol people.
Then there was a EurekAlert piece about funding for an attempt to breed new varieties of the opium poppy and of cannabis that could be used to produce useful bioproducts, but not illicit drugs. This is apparently all going to take place in an ultra-secure Canadian mine shaft. Maybe they could then store the resulting seed in another famous hole in the ground?
And finally, the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography has a cool interactive map where you can find out about famous British brewers.
Mescaline, dope and beer. In the words of Major T.J. “King” Kong, “Shoot, a fella’ could have a pretty good weekend in Vegas with all that agrobiodiversity.” Well, he almost said that.
Great link to British brewers … for some reason misses out the estimable Adnams family from Southwold in Suffolk. From the Adnams website comes this little gem:
Our History: 1872 – the Adnams brothers, George and Ernest, buy the Sole Bay Brewery. George finds he is not cut out for country life and goes to Africa, where he is tragically eaten by a crocodile. Ernest stays and forms a partnership with brewer Thomas Sargeant.
Admirably laconic. I’ll inform the ODNB of the gap in their coverage. Incidentally, have you read that beer is better than water?