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mycology
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Lilliputian Lore: The Science and Mystery of Hallucinogenic Bolete Mushrooms
Pathway 01 — ethnobotany
Pathway 04 — MYCOLOGY
Pathway 05 — psychedelics & science
Lilliputian Lore: The Science and Mystery of
Hallucinogenic Bolete Mushrooms
Decades before psilocybin was known to science, a stranger mushroom was being reported across three unconnected cultures — one that makes you see tiny people. Colin Domnauer traces the mycological, ethnographic, and laboratory investigation of this long-overlooked phenomenon.
● 6 modules
● 20 lessons
● 40 minutes
● All levels
Colin Domnauer, PhD
Ethnobiologist
course overview
“Most people are familiar with psilocybin mushrooms. But what most don’t realize is that decades before psilocybin was known to the world, there were reports of a different kind of psychoactive mushroom — one producing visions of little people across three independent cultures. This course investigates whether that phenomenon has a real chemical basis, and what it might reveal about the human mind.”
what you will learn
Understand why hallucinogenic bolete mushrooms represent a potential third independent origin of psychoactive compounds in the fungal kingdom
Trace the ethnographic record of “mushroom madness” from 1930s Papua New Guinea through modern Yunnan and the northern Philippines
Evaluate the taxonomic challenge of identifying cryptic bolete species and why morphological convergence complicates the science
Understand the clinical pharmacology of Lanmaoa asiatica — including why its effects can persist for one to five days
Follow the field and laboratory methodology used to DNA-verify the species responsible across two independent cultural reports
Assess the current state of fractional analysis and what it means that the psychoactive compound remains unidentified
course sYllabus
free preview — Module 3 · Lesson 9
watch free
Marching Visions and Media Frenzies: Modern Reports on a Culinary Mystery
Colin Domnauer recounts how a man in Yunnan lifted a tablecloth to find hundreds of two-centimetre-tall figures marching like soldiers — and how this kind of testimony, documented independently across cultures, forced the question of whether a real chemical compound was involved. The lesson also covers the scale of hospital admissions, the media frenzy triggered when Janet Yellen ate these mushrooms in China, and why the science has lagged so far behind the cultural record.
aprox: 4 minutes
about the instructor
Colin Domnauer, PhD
Ethnobiologist
Colin Domnauer is a PhD researcher in ethnobiology at the University of Utah, where his work has centered on one of mycology’s most neglected puzzles: the hallucinogenic bolete mushrooms reported across Papua New Guinea, Yunnan, and the northern Philippines. His research spans three continents — collecting specimens in Yunnan mushroom markets, working with local guides in the Philippines, and conducting chemical extractions and mice bioassays in the lab. Through DNA sequencing, he identified Lanmaoa asiatica as the species responsible in two of the three independent cultural reports, providing the first rigorous molecular evidence that this phenomenon has a real biological basis. His work sits at the intersection of fieldwork, phylogenetics, and an unsolved pharmacological mystery.
Mycology
Ethnobiology
DNA Sequencing
Hallucinogenic fungi
Bolete taxonomy
this course in context
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