Psychedelics and science

[Trolsk]

I recently asked you to help make MDMA a medicine. I was a bit surprised about the comments, many seemed to be unaware of the current research on psychedelics.

In the US, John Hopkins university has a Center for Psychedelic and Consciousness Research:

Quote

Researchers will focus on how psychedelics affect behavior, mood, cognition, brain function, and biological markers of health. Upcoming studies will determine the effectiveness of psilocybin as a new therapy for opioid addiction, Alzheimer's disease, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), post-treatment Lyme disease syndrome (formerly known as chronic Lyme disease), anorexia nervosa and alcohol use in people with major depression. The researchers hope to create precision medicine treatments tailored to the specific needs of individual patients. 

This article is a pretty good overview of some of the promising research going on.

I encourage you to read Michael Pollan's book How to change your mind. He's a very well known and respected journalist, that decided to write about the research on psychedelics and try it himself. The book got a lot of attention when it was released. Joe Rogan has of course interviewed him, if you want to get a quick overview of what the book is all about. Pollan has even been invited to Google to talk about his book.

Some are starting to think that psychedelics might be something like antibiotics for the mind. Polland argues that the benefit of psychedelics will be greater the older you are. He had some previous experience with psychedelics in his youth, and back then it was a good trip, but as he's older he finds it to be a reset of his mind, or something along those lines. I'm pretty sure he talks about it with Rogan.

In Canada, they just allowed people dying of cancer to do psychedelic mushrooms to alleviate the fear of dying.

In Wales a police boss wants magic mushrooms reclassified and used to treat mental health problems.

The list goes on.

Psychedelics might turn out to be powerful medicine.

[Kitrinos]

MDMA is not a psychedelic drug btw. 

[Padmapani]

On 8/16/2020 at 6:21 PM, Kitrinos said:

MDMA is not a psychedelic drug btw. 

not in a strict sense, but it does also bind to the same receptors as lsd, mushrooms or mescaline and has a certain psychedelic component to it.

[Trolsk]

Here's another story about psilocybin as a treatment for addiction and anxiety.

Please note that this is written about all over the media, not some small obscure psychedelic magazines, the above article is from CBS.

 

[Trolsk]

On 8/16/2020 at 6:07 PM, AstralSphinx said:

I dig your enthusiasm.  At the same time I can't help but wonder how your recommended videos on youtube looks like.  What I really would like to know though, can psychedelics save the human race and our planet, or are we doomed? 

 

*oh and btw, my youtube recommended videos is kinda funny  it's like 50% horror movies and 50% music production related stuff. Which is nice I guess. 

My youtube recommendations aren't all that exicting, I have my viewing history turned off, so I only get recommendations based on the channels I follow; none of which are related to psychedelics and science. Btw, if anyone of you know of such a channel, please reply! :-)

Psychedelics will play an important role in saving (or rather rewriting) our civilization, and that's why it's so important to get solid scientific evidence for the long term benefits of psychedelics. If I remember correctly, Rick Doblin claims that if the FDA trials are successful, the FDA can't prevent MDMA from being classified as a medicine, and if it gets classified as a medicine it will no longer be classified as a schedule I drug. Science overrules politics.

Psychedelics have been influencing western culture and science ever since they were introduced back in the 50's/60's. The most well known examples being the discovery of the DNA molecule and advances in computer science.

I highly (no pun intended) recommend you to read Tom Wolfe's great book The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test. It tells the story of how the CIA wanted to know the effects of LSD and therefor gave it to volunteers at Stanford University. This CIA operation was known as MK Ultra. The CIA hadn't tried LSD themselves and were unaware of the life changing effects it can have on people. One of the volunteers was Ken Kesey. He was so amazed by the experience that he wrote his world famous book One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest. He then used the money from the book to travel around the USA and preached the gospel of LSD. That tour kickstarted the hippie era, and the parties he threw are pretty much the precursor to rave parties. I'm sure most of you are familiar with this story. If you want to read a shorter version of this story, here's an article. But I encourage you to read the book, and spend lots of time looking at old footage at youtube and wikipedia, it makes an already great book even better.

[johnb820]

I am all for psychedelics becoming a topic of interest in relation to mental health in people. I too believe they can do enormous good on this planet in the way they can make one re-examine themselves and their place in the world. For those who suffer from being too in the limelight, psychedelics might be a good retreat away from society long enough to realize that their lot in life is not so bad.