I'm also absolutely fascinated by his work... i used to listen to Terrence Mckenna a lot and he really gave me a sorta crash course on mycology... but listening to Stamets is just so fun for me. I really like fungi, i consume psilocybin about 3 times a year and always thoroughly enjoy the experience.
I've seen the cordyceps and i love it, lol. some people are afraid... nonesense. Its attacks insects. What i love about it is that it's the fungal/plant assassins. For instance if a species of leaf eating ants is getting to aggressive feeding in a certain area, the mycelium network together with the plants will send out the cordyceps to fruit, send spores and ultimately kill the predator.
Fast forward to humans... we have all these diseases you know brain degenerative tissue, disease, viruses, bacterial infections, cancer. And science has shown some of the diseaes that plague Humans are bacterium, viral and fungal. I'm suggesting we are being killed in the same manner the ants are. I see the diet of a typical person.. yeast sugar salt toxins. that's about it. and then they get a fungal candida or cancer and die. Well maybe because the may the mycelium network sees it (that person) is a threat to the planet... (Well why is that?) Because if 1 person of 7 Billion consumes 'industry food' they contribute directly to the unsustainable agricultural practices of the last 80 years. Once Humans are eating self-grown sustanable community gardens. replenishing the earth with good things it will be okay.
Think of all the deforestation we've done to the planet, we all know that hemp could do everyting a tree can do and more... And they tell us global warming is from cars and us and this and that. c'mon it's cause we cut down all the damn trees across the whole planet.
Back to topic anyway lol... So we have to figure out fungi's that are harmless to mammals birds lady bugs bees butterflies ect... for outdoor indoor we can operate differently. If we can attract the bugs to the substrate and kill them... you know whatever makes life easier we're trying to make medicine here. At the end of the day (We) our pets, children, the wildlife is subject to what actions we chose to do. When dealing with Fungals, it needs to be done right. Because none of us want to die! Or you know someone else or have something go wrong and fungus starts appearing all over the place.
I have this unsettling fear at the back of my mind that something terrible could happen if We (humans) don't get the bio-revolution right. Because if you walk around my city there's garbage everywhere, i don't know about your city. But let's say that was all... hemp bio-degradable... it's not a fossil fuel plastic bottle anymore that decomposes via metal oxides and gases... no know we would be littering a bottle that decomposes via fungal bacterium insects. I just hope we don't go giving fungal organisms some kind of evolutionary boost, who knows what kind of illness's the future could hold?
I have some research to do into 1 fungal genus, for starters, that will promise effective as an insecticide. I always start things 1 at a time lol. Plans are to use organic compounds synergistically to attract and then kill the desired insect. For instance, the hope is i can apply mix compounds in such a manner: deter specific organisms (bees, butterflies, ladybug) attract specific organism (caterpillar, aphids, thrips) If necessary mask poisonous fungal scent that would signal danger to the predator. In the case that the fungus was of no harm to bees and didn't have a (scent) to warn the predator then the fungus could simply be used as is. So much research needs to be done... and i know where i'm starting. With Paul Stamets's work.
