Darwin's Pharmacy

Sex, Plants, and the Evolution of the Noosphere

By: Richard M. Doyle

Narrated by: Gerard Allen

Are humans unwitting partners in evolution with psychedelic plants? Darwin’s Pharmacy shows they are by weaving the evolutionary theory of sexual selection and the study of rhetoric together with the science and literature of psychedelic drugs. Long suppressed as components of the human tool kit, psychedelic plants can be usefully modeled as “eloquence adjuncts” that intensify a crucial component of sexual selection in humans: discourse.

Psychedelic plants seduce us to interact with them, building an ongoing interdependence: rhetoric as evolutionary mechanism. In doing so, they engage our awareness of the noosphere, or thinking stratum of the Earth. The realization that the human organism is part of an interconnected ecosystem is an apprehension of immanence that could ultimately benefit the planet and its inhabitants.

To explore the rhetoric of the psychedelic experience and its significance to evolution, Doyle takes his listeners on an epic journey through the writings of William Burroughs and Kary Mullis, the work of ethnobotanists and anthropologists, and anonymous trip reports. The results offer surprising insights into evolutionary theory, the war on drugs, the internet, and the nature of human consciousness itself.

The audiobook is published by University of Washington Press.

©2011 University of Washington Press (P)2019 Redwood Audiobooks

Critic reviews

"Offers unique insights into the pleasures and desires that animate our relationships." (Women's Studies Quarterly)

Sprawling Content Nearing the Esoteric

Initially drawn in by the keyword "noosphere" in the title (like the flowers discussed at length), I found myself wandering with the author along a broad path of tangential content. With the eloquence of writing, a lay reader can soon get caught in the weeds along the path. It definitely reads like the trips described within. Be prepared to look past the dizzying vocabulary and absorb what your mind is ready to hear, there is plenty of content for multiple readings to provide new content.