Comment · Tue, December 11, 2012
What causes people to see such realistic hallucinations of scary animals/insects specifically while on deliriants like DPH?
Original post in this thread
[deleted] · 17 points
Most people claim to see spiders or sometimes people, and I saw dancing snakes behind my computer monitor while tripping once...
What causes them to be so realistic, and why do people see them in the first place?
Is it a primal fear that gets activated? Or just the way the brain malfunctions in perception?
What they were answering
Toodlum · 4 points
MDMA has been shown to have an affinity for muscarinic acetylcholine 1 (M1) receptors. The binding activity of MDMA on M1 might compete with acetylcholine and cause diminished acetylcholine binding.
However, conventionally it has been thought that MDMA's hallucinatory effects are from its agonism at 5-HT2A.
u/MisterYouAreSoDumb
I just thought of something. Perhaps the "mind blanks" some get on high doses of MDMA are due to it's affinity for the M1 and M2 muscarinic ACh receptors. I'm not sure if you've ever personally felt this effect, but you get forgetful at times while on high doses of MDMA. I never thought about it's effects on the acetylcholine system in that regard. Pure speculation though.