Tripping on Nothing

Ibogaine, a psychedelic compound found in plants native to central Africa, is notorious for the intensity of the trips it induces. Those who consume it are plunged into vivid hallucinations, often preceded by a loud buzzing noise, that last between 24 and 48 hours. In one case report, a 29-year-old woman from Gabon met her dead relatives, and later looked into a mirror and saw a woman crying and holding a baby. A middle-aged American man experienced himself from the perspective of a “Mexican little boy and I’m praying on the side of a road.” When he opened his eyes, one of the people in the room appeared to resemble “a big praying mantis.”

Late last year, Arthur Juliani, a 32-year-old research scientist at the , was decidedly not taking ibogaine, but was ingesting something similar. He had obtained tabernanthalog, a research molecule to mimic ibogaine’s chemical structure and potential effects on neuroplasticity,