Psychedelic Apes

Nuclear Dinos VS
Mushroom Deities

Psychedelic Apes -
From Parallel Universes to
Atomic Dinosaurs - The Weirdest
Theories of Science and History
by Alex Boese
Pan Books
ISBN: 9781509860524

Psychedelic Apes, advertised on the front of the book with the additional subtitle/strap line From Parallel Universes to Atomic Dinosaurs - The Weirdest Theories of Science and History, is one of those books I try and find every year which fulfils the criterion of a non-fiction book about something interesting that doesn’t have a filmic or comic book slant to it. Although, it has to be said, many of the theories which the book depicts in its entertaining fashion will be mostly taken, by the majority of readers, as not falling anywhere near the ‘non-fiction’ category either, I suspect. It is, as its cover spiel suggests, a look at some of the unorthodox and, therefore often entertaining, alternate theories put forward by scientists over the years. I think I saw this one fly by my Twitter timeline and, looking at it, the author Alex Boese has a few books on his CV, all with equally provocative titles which I shall probably have to look out for.

Okay... now I was pleasantly surprised when I started reading this, since I am inexplicably known to certain acquaintances as having somewhat unorthodox views about things myself, that Boese has really gone out of his way to not ridicule the various theories and hypotheses which he explores here. Instead... and he says as much in his introduction... he has allowed them room to breathe and brought in the arguments for and against the various ideas he’s chosen, out of the many wild theories that exist, treating them with a certain respect. In doing so, I actually found myself not only not being able to disprove many of the theories inherent in the book but, also, as I went along, began to have more of an understanding of certain branches of science. More on that in a minute but for now...

Following an introduction where, among other things, he makes clear to the reader what scientists mean by theories and hypotheses... one is supported by a set of evidence, the second is not (although I now believe, after having read this, that evidence may well be a subjective element of the equation). The book is nicely laid out in five big chapters called 1. Cosmological Conundrums, 2. A Pale Peculiar Dot, 3. It’s Alive, 4. The Rise Of The Psychedelic Ape and 5. Mushroom Gods And Phantom Time. Each chapter will then house a brief, one to two page introduction as to the thematic link of the chapter before then being split into seven subsections per chapter, each one detailing a theory in a few pages, most of which are doing exactly what it says on the tin, so to speak. However, one thing he also does is include one theory, in each chapter, which was ridiculed by the scientific community for many years/decades/centuries before certain articles of evidence (and perhaps fashion, who knows?) caused a major flip flop in thinking and those particular theories are now actually accepted as the true way of things.

So yeah, he covers quite ridiculous sounding ideas such as reality as a computer simulation, parallel universes (perhaps more popularly known these days, once again, as multiverses), an expanding planet Earth, the shadow world of hard to detect alien life forms on our planet, life on Mars, the ‘stoned ape’ theory (that argues quite credibly, in my opinion, that our hairy ancestors were driven by the ingestion of magic mushrooms which gave rise to humanity and various elements of an expanded mind such as speech), the systematic dumbing down of human intelligence from century to century (yeah, I think we can all see that one), the possibility that the dark ages didn’t actually exist, that Greek writer Homer was in fact a woman and that Christ was either Julius Caesar or, in one interesting theory, Jesus was actually a mushroom... among many others.

Perhaps my favourite one was an argument very hard to either prove or, indeed disprove, as it turns out, that certain dinosaurs did in fact have great intelligence and managed to wipe themselves out in a nuclear war. Yeah, this stuff sounds far fetched but, when you read why the people who explore these concepts (lots of these theories are come up with simultaneously by more than one person, often not in collusion), there are actually some very logical, sound basis for their conclusions.  

Now, okay, I found myself unable to argue with many of the theories on offer in here but, as various scientists have obviously argued vehemently against them... and considering they argued just as emphatically over the years against theories which they are now accepting as truth... I had to conclude that some of these theories were an actual possibility. Not only that, though... 

 As I was reading through it became abundantly clear just how many accepted ‘truths’ of science concerning history and the nature of our reality actually had as little or no evidence to support them either. My faith in science was completely rattled by this tome because it seems many of the theories we hold dear are just popular guesses. The fact that Boese pointed out that the entirety of chimpanzee history of the past is based on just three found teeth didn’t help restore any faith in the concept of scientific proof as I read through. Neither did his revelation (to me) that most of pre-history (and even closer history) is pieced together by guesses which are the equivalent of somebody trying to piece together the plot of a long lost movie with only a few frames of film to build up a picture from. It’s shaky at best and, frankly, it never seems to be at its best from what I can make out.

So yeah, all in all I’d have to conclude that Psychedelic Apes is a pretty entertaining but also somewhat enlightening, surprisingly. It’s not what I was expecting it to be and my already slightly open minded state is now permanently ajar for any rogue theory with any kind of corroboration which comes along, frankly. I can’t recommend this one enough, especially since it’s all done in ‘laymens’ terms and isn’t remotely clouded by scientific jargon or obstacles. I shall, indeed, be reading more of this guys work in the future.