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True enough, but his health declined in his late 80s. David Nichols is still going strong in his late 70s, Albert Hofmann died at 102, Ram Dass died at 88. I do
by dspearson 4y ago
True enough, but his health declined in his late 80s. David Nichols is still going strong in his late 70s, Albert Hofmann died at 102, Ram Dass died at 88. I don't see psychedelics, and their use, as being particularly risky to physical health and longevity. Especially since many of us already consume red meat, tobacco, alcohol, etc.
- patrec 4y ago> I don't see psychedelics, and their use, as being particularly risky to physical health Maybe if you don't count frying your brain as a risk to your physical health.
- antihero 4y agoIs it really fried though? If I didn't want to "fry my brain" I would opt not to participate in this clusterfuck we call modern life.
- netizen-936824 4y agoCan you please explain the neuronal mechanisms involved in this frying? If you have citations I would love to read more.
- an-allen 4y agoSo yea you put the neurons in a hot cast iron skillet, with a nice mix of butter and onions and viola - fried neurons. You can use this to baste most white meats like chicken, pork, or fish. Just please be aware that some nervous system matter has been shown to transmit prion type diseases -> so you want to make quadruply sure you got your fried neurons from a reputable dealer who has strict health controls.
- patrec 4y agoHere's a citation for a drug Shulgin is famous for: > MDMA provides an immediate enjoyable feeling by stimulating the release of neurotransmitters, such as dopamine and serotonin in the brain. Unfortunately, abnormal regulation of the brain neurotransmitters, as well as the increased oxidative stress causes damage to the brain neurons after the MDMA exposure. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7878040/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7878040/
- netizen-936824 4y agoAll of those studies are either in rats or mice or are in vitro. A lot of the mice and rat studies can't be translated to humans because they have significantly different metabolisms and researchers use entirely different dosages than humans do in the wild >MDMA has been administered to approximately 1,700 human subjects with only one serious adverse reaction. https://maps.org/mdma/ https://maps.org/mdma/ There are currently human studies of MDMA. These would probably not be moving forward if they found "brain frying" although I appreciate your willingness to read abstracts
- eurasiantiger 4y agoOverdosing on MDMA can cause serotonin syndrome, which can cause neuronal death due to excitotoxicity.
- netizen-936824 4y agoOverdose on many substances is bad and can damage neurons if it crosses the BBB. That's not saying anything special about entactogens/empathogens/psychedelics
- eurasiantiger 4y agoI agree.
- Terry_Roll 4y agoAnd thats the come down after popping a pill or two at some rave in the middle of field in Essex. Fortunately the body doesnt stop making new brain cells provided one's diet is adequate. I was surprised to learn the US Military resurrected MDMA in the 50's and then in the 70's Prof Alex Shulgin got hold of it. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3931692/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3931692/ Other country's handled it differently. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6435835/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6435835/ But it does lend credence to the conspiracy theory that the British security services started flooding the football terraces to reduce the football hooliganism that was blighting the British isles, as "documented" by later films like Football Factory starring Danny Dyer and many more. Still without it, would the world have what the US call EDM and what others call the Rave culture?
- dspearson 4y agoModern society does a pretty good job of that already. How many prescriptions for antidepressants do we issue in the western world? tl;dr, I consider them lower risk than horse riding, or working in a startup.
- grapeskin 4y agoMost 78 year old men who aren't dead don't really have the mental faculties to clearly lecture a university at 78. A soda a day rots far more brains than an occasional trip.
- esperent 4y agoOr even a lot of trips, judging by all the famous old psychonauts who were still lecturing in their 70s, 80s, 90s, and even 100s.
- spacemanmatt 4y agoAnd the less-famous old psychonauts now training your EMS/fire staff, running software departments, working as school principals, etc. Don't forget about the rank and file!
- dr_dshiv 4y ago100%. Here’s a book of interviews of elderly psychonauts. https://books.google.nl/books?id=wL5G8s3xpxwC&lpg=PR11&ots=wk6201bV39&dq=info%3Ajoy0aNvqqKUJ%3Ascholar.google.com%2F&lr&pg=PR11#v=onepage&q=2cb&f=false https://books.google.nl/books?id=wL5G8s3xpxwC&lpg=PR11&ots=w...
- ASalazarMX 4y agoLove how pretentious the term "psychonaut" sounds. Edit: I'm not a smoker, I'm a toxicnaut.
- spacemanmatt 4y agoWhen the DARE officer said stuff like this to us as 7th graders, we laughed. It's maybe less funny today but ridicule remains the appropriate response.
- dkarl 4y agoThe DARE officer said drugs would fry your brain, and the kids taking and selling drugs said it was a lie to stop people from having an easy harmless good time. Considering the drugs that kids were taking at my high school, I wouldn't say either side covered themselves in glory.
- spacemanmatt 4y ago> I wouldn't say either side covered themselves in glory. heh. that's mostly fair, though DARE waged a propaganda campaign entirely unmatched by teenage druggies, who are mostly just people trying to get by.
- an-allen 4y agoIsn’t his partner like 92 and still spreading the good word? Folks want to link his chem experimentation to negative health outcomes to justify their own “drugs are bad mkay” beliefs. In the end, he literally cataloged all the chems and lived to 88… if I were going to choose a single case to illustrate this hypothesis-> this psychonaut would not be it. In fact, I probably wouldn’t even want him in my sample if I were going to try and prove the hypothesis.
- ASalazarMX 4y ago> Folks want to link his chem experimentation to negative health outcomes to justify their own “drugs are bad mkay” Drugs, prescription or not, can be very bad when used in excess or ignorance. These people know what they're putting in their bodies, and have the knowledge and means to test or even make them, but the majority of drug users don't.
- svnt 4y agoWell, we have made most interesting exploratory drug use illegal for most people, so that historically most people who use drugs are those with nothing left to lose. The best way to advance may be to let more smart people try drugs without artificial consequences.
- dr_dshiv 4y agoLike, “a license to trip” kind of thing? Love it.
- SpodGaju 4y agoTerrance McKenna died at 53. Dose is probably important in all this but it’s hard to say with such a small, probably biased, sample size.
- esperent 4y agoHe died of glioblastoma and there's absolutely zero evidence that it was related to drug use. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glioblastoma https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glioblastoma
- SpodGaju 4y agoI know that. There’s also zero evidence that any of the drugs that these people have taken have extended their lives. They’re absolutely zero studies that show that these compounds are either safe or dangerous. Anyone saying that they’re either has a bias. And there is no evidence that McKenna’s drug use did not cause his brain cancer. Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. The best we can say is that we do not know.
- pmoriarty 4y ago"They’re absolutely zero studies that show that these compounds are either safe or dangerous." There are lots of studies on the safety of psychedelics.
- zasdffaa 4y ago> They’re absolutely zero studies that show that these compounds are either safe or dangerous. Anyone saying that they’re either has a bias. Your ignorance does not indicate lack of research in the real world. <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Nutt https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Nutt> In 2007 Nutt published a controversial study on the harms of drug use in The Lancet.[17] Eventually, this led to his dismissal from his position in the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs (ACMD); see government positions below. Subsequently, Nutt and a number of his colleagues who had subsequently resigned from the ACMD founded the Independent Scientific Committee on Drugs, which was later re-named Drug Science.[18] (read: the uk government didn't like what he had to say, that drugs weren't totally appalling meritless things, so they sacked him) from that wiki page <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:HarmCausedByDrugsTable.svg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:HarmCausedByDrugsTable.sv...> <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Development_of_a_rational_scale_to_assess_the_harm_of_drugs_of_potential_misuse_(physical_harm_and_dependence,_NA_free_means).svg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Development_of_a_rational...> But the next time drugs comes up you'll doubtless post the same thing.
- BTCOG 4y agoI'm fairly certain that sitting at a computer working 8-10 hour days of physical inactivity is far worse on the human body than moderate use of psychedelics.