This Is Your Mind on PlantsThe instant New York Times bestseller | A Washington Post Notable Book | One of NPR's Best Books of the Year “Expert storytelling . . . [Pollan] masterfully elevates a series of big questions about drugs, plants and humans that are likely to leave readers thinking in new ways.” —New York Times Book Review From #1 New York Times bestselling author Michael Pollan, a radical challenge to how we think about drugs, and an exploration into the powerful human attraction to psychoactive plants—and the equally powerful taboos. Of all the things humans rely on plants for—sustenance, beauty, medicine, fragrance, flavor, fiber—surely the most curious is our use of them to change consciousness: to stimulate or calm, fiddle with or completely alter, the qualities of our mental experience. Take coffee and tea: People around the world rely on caffeine to sharpen their minds. But we do not usually think of caffeine as a drug, or our daily use as an addiction, because it is legal and socially acceptable. So, then, what is a “drug”? And why, for example, is making tea from the leaves of a tea plant acceptable, but making tea from a seed head of an opium poppy a federal crime? In This Is Your Mind on Plants, Michael Pollan dives deep into three plant drugs—opium, caffeine, and mescaline—and throws the fundamental strangeness, and arbitrariness, of our thinking about them into sharp relief. Exploring and participating in the cultures that have grown up around these drugs while consuming (or, in the case of caffeine, trying not to consume) them, Pollan reckons with the powerful human attraction to psychoactive plants. Why do we go to such great lengths to seek these shifts in consciousness, and then why do we fence that universal desire with laws and customs and fraught feelings? In this unique blend of history, science, and memoir, as well as participatory journalism, Pollan examines and experiences these plants from several very different angles and contexts, and shines a fresh light on a subject that is all too often treated reductively—as a drug, whether licit or illicit. But that is one of the least interesting things you can say about these plants, Pollan shows, for when we take them into our bodies and let them change our minds, we are engaging with nature in one of the most profound ways we can. Based in part on an essay published almost twenty-five years ago, this groundbreaking and singular consideration of psychoactive plants, and our attraction to them through time, holds up a mirror to our fundamental human needs and aspirations, the operations of our minds, and our entanglement with the natural world. |
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LibraryThing Review
User Review - steve02476 - LibraryThingI really enjoyed the first two parts, about opium and caffeine. The last part, about mescaline was mixed, some good but a lot was hand-wavy and muddled with way too much dopey spiritual stuff. Read full review
LibraryThing Review
User Review - Castlelass - LibraryThingNot at all what I was expecting, this book consists of essays on each of three plants: a sedative (opium), a stimulant (caffeine), and a hallucinogen (mescaline). For each, the author becomes the ... Read full review
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Common terms and phrases
addict alcohol asked attention become began better body brain cactus caffeine called ceremony Church coffee consciousness culture decided dried drink drug effect exactly experience explained fact feel felt fire flower garden growing handful happened head healing Hogshire hold human idea important Indian Indigenous interest It's Judith kind knew learned least leaves less living look means medicine meeting mental mescaline mind molecules morning Native American nature never night offered opium poppies person peyote piece plant produce psychedelic psychoactive published question reason religion San Pedro seeds seemed sense sleep species spirit story suggested sure talk Taloma taste things thought tion told took turned Wachuma whole wondered write
Bibliographic information
| Title | This Is Your Mind on Plants |
| Author | Michael Pollan |
| Publisher | Penguin, 2021 |
| ISBN | 0593296907, 9780593296905 |
| Length | 288 pages |
| Subjects | › › Body, Mind & Spirit / Entheogens & Visionary Substances Science / Life Sciences / Ecology Self-Help / Substance Abuse & Addictions / Drugs |
| Export Citation | BiBTeX EndNote RefMan |