http://ranprieur.com/#9a417fe513f58988c3b5b1e84cfc57397194a79b 2018-06-05T17:10:51Z Ran Prieur http://ranprieur.com/ ranprieur@gmail.com http://ranprieur.com/#15cb56ea778487bd7c0978feb5a3f0476d63e34e 2018-06-05T17:10:51Z June 5. More stray links. Michael Pollan on What It's Like to Trip on the Most Potent Magic Mushroom. He's a very good essayist and this has to be one of the best trip reports ever written. I'm envious. I microdose Psilocybe cubensis to clear the cobwebs out of my brain, but larger doses make me feel sick without any additional mental effects. I've also tried LSD, which gave me something short of the communion with nature that Pollan describes, and I've yet to have my first hallucination.

More weird stuff: a redditor interprets Terence McKenna's statement that the world is made of words.

And a thread, What's the most paranormal thing you've experienced? It turns out to be mostly about visits from dead people.

Every so often reddit will have a good confession thread, like this one, What is your secret? My favorite is from I_am_here_to_serve, who faked suicide to get away from a controlling family.

Two links confirming stuff I already suspected. Why Rich Kids Are So Good at the Marshmallow Test. The famous test seemed to show that kids who are able to delay gratification are more successful later in life. It turns out, kids from families that are already successful, are more willing to delay gratification because their world is more reliable.

Are Hit Songs Becoming Less Musically Diverse? Yes, because the process of creating popular songs has become more factory-like, with a larger number of writers on each particular song, but a smaller number of masterminds behind it all. "On the other hand, fewer barriers to entry means every aspiring artist has a chance to compete on originality, perhaps one day diminishing the outsized role of elite producers."

On that subject, my favorite band has a major new album, Big Blood - Operate Spaceship Earth Properly. It's not officially out until June 15, but the record company sent me the CD anyway, and I think it's their best album since Unlikely Mothers four years ago. They're continuing to push their music toward sharper edges around its ethereal heart.

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