Apple pioneer Bill Atkinson was the secret evangelist of the “God Molecule.”
It was Bill Atkinson A computing pioneer who made Apple computers usable by ordinary people in the 1980s by converting code into Windows, menus, and graphics.
But few people know that later in his life he was a secret advocate of what is widely considered the world’s most powerful psychedelic: 5-MeO-DMT.
The hallucinogen, also called the “God Molecule,” is a compound found in the venomous secretions of the Sonoran Desert Toad. Insilius Alvarius (commonly called Bufo Alvarius) and has been known to cause breathlessness, complete dissolution of the senses, and euphoria of existential connection, all in a roughly 20-minute journey. Atkinson, who died of pancreatic cancer on June 5 at the age of 74, was a member of a private, close-knit online community of 5-MeO-DMT enthusiasts called OneLight, which went by the nickname “Grace Within.”
Several of Atkinson’s friends and psychiatrists tell WIRED that their “beloved” Atkinson played a key role in helping people gain access to smaller doses of 5-MeO-DMT, which can be made synthetically, because he believed it maximized the potentially dangerous drug’s benefits while minimizing harm. “The same creative mind that profoundly influenced personal computers influenced human evolution through its efforts to make the bufo miracle safer and more manageable,” says friend Charles Lindsay, an artist working with the SETI Institute. “He really pushed the boundaries. It requires a willingness to consider what might easily be considered ridiculous.” Or, he adds, “dangerous.”
Many people have reported mental health benefits from smoking 5-MeO-DMT, and biotech companies are preparing advanced trials to test the drug as a treatment for depression and addiction. Former heavyweight champion Mike Tyson, longevity guru Brian Johnson, and podcaster Joe Rogan have recounted transcendent and life-changing experiences under the influence of this powerful drug.
But 5-MeO-DMT is illegal in the United States, and while there are underground options, people often go to legal facilities and retreats in Mexico to take strong doses.
According to friend James McNiven, founder of popular Silicon Valley restaurant Buck’s of Woodside, Atkinson took “hundreds” of 5-MeO-DMT trips. “No one hits it harder than Bill,” he says.
The experience of 5-MeO-DMT, with its terrifying death that awaits within seconds of smoking the molecule, can be shattering, and a sometimes difficult period afterward can lead to serious instability and lasting trauma. Comedian Chelsea Handler had a “scary” trip that she says left her “feeling as sick as I’ve ever felt.”
