Psychedelia as a molecular revolution: the agency of modes of thought and expression based on psychedelic experiences

Abstract

An interesting way to think about the contribution of so-called "psychedelic experiences" to philosophical thought is to look at it from the point of view of a "molecular revolution." The term, coined in the influence of the works of G. Deleuze (1925 – 1995) and F. Guattari (1930 – 1992), proposes a shift in perspective on the movements of transformation of the social and subjectivity, where the distinction between molar and molecular emphasizes the movements of micropolitical assemblages of desire. Becomings that are molecularly articulated, subjectivities constituting "groups" that, even though they are not molar structures, delirious the entire social field, producing new perspectives. The relationship between the body and psychedelic molecules forms a kind of agency, in which the ordinariness of perceptions linked to the molar structures of reality is called into question. This creates an opening in subjectivity for a kind of experience with becomings, understood as expressions of other modes of existence. The psychedelic experience demands expressive or enunciative assemblages from subjectivity, since the conventional representative schemes of consciousness are confronted with non-ordinary perceptions. By looking at the psychedelic experience in this sense, we hope to show the fractality of its production of meanings and social, political, aesthetic and subjective transformations.