So... I need to ask ya'll a question.
What drugs (legal or illegal) out there can cause one to have a hallucination that one wouldn't really be able to tell it apart from a dream? As if, recalling the previous' night's adventures one would have trouble knowing what was real and what wasn't? Not a hallucination per se, but moreso a very realistic dream.
Are you asking if there is a chemical out there that influences dreams in such a way to make one think they were real, or a chemical that makes one hallucinate in such a way to make one think it is real / indistinguishable from a dream?
If the latter, then the deliriants, such as
Datura stramonium, have an effect similar to the one you are asking about.
Datura is legal as far as I know. This plant has some common names that you may have heard of - Jimson weed, loco weed, angels/devils trumpet. It is a common plant in the Nightshade family. Native Americans from central America have used this plant in religious ceremonies, as you might imagine, but it is extremely, extremely dangerous to do. The indians no doubt had the exact safe dosage to take down, because they used it mainly in vision quest / coming of age ceremonies that often lasted for days on end.
In the United States there was a particularly famous use of
Datura during Bacon's Rebellion, where the British soldiers that were attempting to suppress it were drugged with
Datura and went insane for over a week. I don't remember the specifics, so I don't know if they were deliberately drugged with it or if they inadvertently ate it themselves.
The effects of deliriants are qualitatively different than the effects of hallucinogenics. Deliriants cause one to hallucinate vivid images that are indistinguishable from reality, whereas hallucinogenics cause one to experience perceived alterations / distortions of reality. The reason why this plant (and most other deliriants) is so dangerous to ingest is because it contains atropine, scopolamine, and hyoscyamine - all anticholingergic chemicals that block acetylcholine in the central and peripheral nervous system. As one might imagine, there are a host of deadly side effects at high dosages including cardiac and pulmonary failure. Contrast this with the primary mode of action for traditional tryptamine / phenethylamine psychedelics, which only bind reversibly and transiently to serotonin receptors in relatively safe low dosages.
I myself have never attempted a journey on Datura. But a close friend of mine has. He spent 3 days experiencing life in a vivid, dream-like delirium during which time he could not distinguish reality from hallucinations. He saw dead relatives walking around and people that weren't there. He had a discussion with a man in an elevator only to turn around and find him gone. He saw potted plants sitting in the middle of streets and walked to avoid them. And after the first day he experienced an intense sickness, constant myoclonic jerks while fully awake, and nausea no doubt related to cardiovascular side effects. After that day, he experienced bouts of profound nausea and was on anti-nausea medication for six months. This persisted periodically and I suspect it was related to acetylcholine synapses in his brain attempting to regain homeostasis.
In summation, I would not recommend this. On Salvia, or Ayahuasca, you also have no idea that you are hallucinating because you are immersed in another world entirely. But these are short-lived and safe experiences, and the individual is typically immobilized for them. Datura is dangerous to yourself and to others.
