Divergent States
Divergent States
Podcast Description
The Divergent States Podcast, hosted by "3L1T3"—founder of the Psychonaut subreddit with nearly 500k members—and co-hosted by Bryan, a USMC veteran passionate about psychedelics for therapeutic healing, explores the intersection of psychedelics, science, spirituality, and culture. Featuring guests like Hamilton Morris, Dr. Rick Strassman, and Dr. Rick Doblin, we blend cutting-edge research with personal stories to showcase how psychedelics transform mental health, creativity, and culture. Join us as we navigate the frontier of consciousness.
Podcast Insights
Content Themes
The podcast focuses on psychedelics, mental health, spirituality, and cultural implications, with episodes detailing topics such as the therapeutic use of MDMA for veterans, the legacy of the Shulgin family, and the evolution of the r/Psychonaut subreddit. Specific focus areas include community support, harm reduction in psychedelic use, and the intersection of science and spirituality in therapeutic contexts.
Divergent States cuts through psychedelic hype with grounded, curious conversations about what these substances actually do.
Hosted by 3L1T3, founder of r/Psychonaut, the world’s largest psychedelic harm-reduction community, and co-hosted by Bryan, a USMC veteran and advocate for psychedelic healing, the show brings together lived experience, science, and culture without losing its sense of humor.
This isn’t a spiritual podcast.
This isn’t a marketing platform.
No mysticism. No sales pitch. Just real conversations, harm reduction, and honest questions.
We explore how psychedelics shape mental health, creativity, and society, from underground use and peer-support communities to clinical trials, therapy rooms, and shifting public attitudes. Some episodes get serious. Some get weird. All of them are grounded in respect for the people actually taking these substances and living with the outcomes.
Guests include Rick Doblin, Reggie Watts, Leonard Pickard, Anne Wagner, Hamilton Morris, and Rick Strassman.
Divergent States is built on the same principles that made r/Psychonaut work at scale: curiosity without gullibility, openness without losing your footing, and safety without killing the joy.
If you’re looking for guru worship, this isn’t your show.
If you’re looking for thoughtful, funny, and grounded conversations about psychedelics and the lives they touch, welcome to Divergent States.
New episodes every two weeks.
In Part One of The Many Faces of Coca, 3L1T3 and Bryan sit down with Wade Davis to unpack the long history of the coca leaf and how a plant used for over 8,000 years became globally criminalized.
This conversation isn’t about cocaine. It’s about coca.
Wade walks us through:
- How coca was independently domesticated multiple times in pre-Columbian South America
- Why early 20th-century elites blamed coca for poverty instead of confronting inequality
- The 1949 UN commission that arrived with its conclusions already written
- The nutritional research that challenged decades of ideology
- How the modern international scheduling framework still treats coca as if it were fentanyl or heroin
- Why the recent WHO review maintained the status quo — and what that means
We also explore the deeper cultural reality: coca as ritual exchange, spiritual alignment, social glue, and daily sustenance in the Andes.
This episode lays the foundation for the series.
Next, we move into the ethnobiology with Dennis McKenna.
Then we examine sovereignty and lived realities with Manuela Picq.
If you’ve ever wondered why coca gets ignored while other plant medicines dominate Western discourse, this is where we start pulling that thread.
This isn’t nostalgia.
It’s about policy, ideology, and whether a plant can be separated from the story told about it.
Key Points
- Coca has been used for over 8,000 years in the Andes, distinct from cocaine.
- Cocaine is an extracted alkaloid; the leaf itself functions very differently.
- Coca was independently domesticated three times in pre-Columbian South America.
- The leaf contains significant nutritional value (calcium, vitamins, protein) and aids digestion at altitude.
- Early 20th-century elites blamed coca for poverty and social issues instead of structural inequality.
- The 1949 UN commission formed conclusions before conducting meaningful investigation.
- The 1961 UN drug scheduling framework still reflects that early ideological bias.
- Coca plays a central spiritual and social role in Andean cultures (ritual exchange, prayer, daily labor).
- Prohibition has fueled violence, displacement, and environmental harm in coca-growing regions.
- The core policy question is political, not pharmacological: can coca be separated from cocaine in law and narrative?
Chapters
00:00 – 8,000 Years of Coca
04:19 – What Is Coca?
08:22 – Traditional Use & Preparation
14:36 – The 1949 UN Commission
23:10 – Drug War Consequences
29:23 – Coca as Cultural Foundation
33:40 – Why There’s No Public Constituency
43:35 – Coca vs Cocaine Extraction
46:00 – DEA, Cartels & Prohibition Incentives
50:47 – If You Remember One Thing
53:10 – Reflection & Series Preview
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