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Psychedelics Could Trigger A 'Paradigm Shift' In Mental Health Care

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Re: Psychedelics Could Trigger A 'Paradigm Shift' In Mental Health Care

#61

Post by MichaelGG »

Alex3917 wrote: post #58
tptacek wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Since we don't have reliable screening for basic mental illnesses, I find it implausible that we have "reliable" screening for these kinds of vulnerabilities. I must be missing something; any thoughts?

> I must be missing something; any thoughts? Since the beginning of the era of modern psychedelic research, no one has developed any serious longterm mental illness as the result of taking psychedelics in a research setting. And this is out of thousands of people. I think part of the reason is that it's actually a lot easier to determine if someone is predisposed to mental illness than it actually is to determine if…

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LSD_and_schizophrenia

Look in the references: "Four additional studies found post-LSD psychotics with prior psychosis but also patients in whom the drug precipitated psychosis without a prodrome ... One group reported cases of psychosis following a single dose, suggesting a peculiar vulnerability to the drug in certain individuals. A review of this problem concluded that prior illness was evident in many, but not all, psychoses following LSD "

Your general gist seems to be correct (that it's a rather low risk for people without history), but "no one" seems to be incorrect. Which makes sense - LSD's a powerful medication. And for comparison, this happens with stuff they give to kids, like Ritalin and speed.

Re: Psychedelics Could Trigger A 'Paradigm Shift' In Mental Health Care

#62

Post by Nursie »

codeshaman wrote: post #6

They can trigger a paradigm shift in many other areas, not just mental health care. Except it's so hard to explain this to a 'normal' person, who's never taken any. "If God were to permit you a brief voyage into the divine process, let you whirl for a second into the atomic nucleus or spin you out on a light-year trip through the galaxies, how on earth would you describe what you saw when you got back, breathless, to…

I swear, one of the most import pieces of research that needs to be done on them is their capability to induce a false sense of the profound, and make people believe psychedelics will fix everything about the world.

Yes, they can be useful, they can make you see yourself differently and see people differently. But they can equally be a pretty blinkenlight show that makes you giggle for hours with friends. Or be distressing for people.

More than that, nobody has yet been able to tell me how this post-acid utopia is going to function any differently from what we have now.

There's a reason that the majority of post-summer-of-love communes failed.

Re: Psychedelics Could Trigger A 'Paradigm Shift' In Mental Health Care

#63

Post by adrusi »

throwupaway1138 wrote: post #25
chippy wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the key word was "longterm" with the assumption that psychois is more associated with short term episodes.

Yes, but the dividing criteria is completely arbitrary. The medical term would be chronic. To me psychosis means a form of mental illness, so it looks like the GP doesn't have a clue.

Thats like saying heart palpitations is an illness and therefore when someone takes a large dose of cocaine and gets an irregular heartbeat, they have a heart problem.

Any definition you're thinking of that places any psychotic episode as a definite indicator of mental illness is completely irrelevant as soon as the subject is under the influence of a mind-altering drug.

Re: Psychedelics Could Trigger A 'Paradigm Shift' In Mental Health Care

#64

Post by MichaelGG »

DennisP wrote: post #57
tptacek wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Since we don't have reliable screening for basic mental illnesses, I find it implausible that we have "reliable" screening for these kinds of vulnerabilities. I must be missing something; any thoughts?

It's not my specialty, I was just pointing out something mentioned in the article, by a researcher in the area. If you have references that contradict his claim, I'd be interested in seeing them.

No, that's not what the article says. It says they can carefully screen for "people with active psychotic disorders or a strong predisposition for such disorders should not receive these treatments".

Take note of active and strong predisposition. They're saying if someone is obviously having problems, or seems like they might (e.g. many family members have had issues), they can find those folks out.

It is not in any way suggesting they can detect psychotic dispositions in general.

Re: Psychedelics Could Trigger A 'Paradigm Shift' In Mental Health Care

#65

Post by Alex3917 »

MichaelGG wrote: post #61
Alex3917 wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I must be missing something; any thoughts? Since the beginning of the era of modern psychedelic research, no one has developed any serious longterm mental illness as the result of taking psychedelics in a research setting. And this is out of thousands of people. I think part of the reason is that it's actually a lot easier to determine if someone is predisposed to mental illness than it actually is to determine if…

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LSD_and_schizophrenia Look in the references: "Four additional studies found post-LSD psychotics with prior psychosis but also patients in whom the drug precipitated psychosis without a prodrome ... One group reported cases of psychosis following a single dose, suggesting a peculiar vulnerability to the drug in certain individuals. A review of this problem concluded that prior illness wa…

When I said since the beginning of modern psychedelic research, I meant since Rick Strassman began studying DMT in 1991. In the 50s and 60s there were lots of cases like this, but that's not really analogous to modern research. (In many cases back then they were actually purposely trying to cause mental illness.)

Re: Psychedelics Could Trigger A 'Paradigm Shift' In Mental Health Care

#66

Post by Retra »

knowaveragejoe wrote: post #45
Retra wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here's one: it's not actually much of a leap. Save for the fact that your brain has a bigger language center, you're no better than any other ape.

There are numerous ways in which we're similar to apes and other organisms, and then there's also numerous things that have nothing even close in the animal kingdom(that we're aware of, anyways). So if nothing but a larger language center explains that, then it's a far bigger difference than you make it sound: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hrCVu25wQ5s

If you're looking to say humans are categorically different from every other animal -- that is, that we have something none of them do -- then you're operating with such a level of granularity that it's necessary that you overlook small differentiating factors. The issue is not "why are humans unique, just like every species is unique" but "why are humans unique in a way no other species is?"

And if you take a human and ignore their facility for language, you will essentially have a regular ape. If you take away our capacity for culture and technology, you don't have an animal that rules the world uncontested. Whatever other differences we have are moot in comparison. (Take Stephen Hawking as an example.)

Re: Psychedelics Could Trigger A 'Paradigm Shift' In Mental Health Care

#67

Post by carapace »

MichaelGG wrote: post #21
codeshaman wrote: post #6

They can trigger a paradigm shift in many other areas, not just mental health care. Except it's so hard to explain this to a 'normal' person, who's never taken any. "If God were to permit you a brief voyage into the divine process, let you whirl for a second into the atomic nucleus or spin you out on a light-year trip through the galaxies, how on earth would you describe what you saw when you got back, breathless, to…

Eh this sounds like exactly what was wrong with the early LSD promoters. Psychedelics are the mythical "love bomb"? I do not think the evidence supports that. While I think the world would be far better off if everyone had tried it, I don't think it'd stop wars or anything. At best, it might get people to sit up and think a bit, and turn to rationality for explanations. But in real life, seeing as how one's predispos…

These chemicals are tools, no more and no less. They should be investigated with intelligence and caution. Take drugs soberly, if at all. I know a few people who have basically ruined their lives though what I would call "abuse" of drugs including MDMA, LSD, cannabis, and nitrous oxide(!) (as opposed to the more obvious drugs like crystal meth, heroin, and crack.)

That said, I know of a few people who had cancer, and no longer have cancer, and the treatment plan they followed involved copious quantities of a kind of goo or tar made from cannabis plants. Those three items are facts: They had cancer, they no longer have it, they used ganja and not chemo or radiation.

I have no interest in arguing with anyone about this, nor am I attempting to condone or evangelize anything. I offer the above as (admittedly anecdotal) data points for consideration. If you want to know more about this please do your own homework online, no one is hiding this sort of thing from anyone (but themselves.)

Re: Psychedelics Could Trigger A 'Paradigm Shift' In Mental Health Care

#68

Post by noahdesu »

I just finished reading "Acid Test: LSD, Ecstasy, and the Power to Heal" by Tom Shroder. It was parallel tour of the history of influential people (primarily Rick Doblin of MAPS), and a Iraq veteran suffering from PTSD that was treated later in the book with MDMA. http://www.amazon.com/Acid-Test-Ecstasy-Power-Heal/dp/014751...

Re: Psychedelics Could Trigger A 'Paradigm Shift' In Mental Health Care

#70

Post by WorldWideWayne »

MichaelGG wrote: post #21
codeshaman wrote: post #6

They can trigger a paradigm shift in many other areas, not just mental health care. Except it's so hard to explain this to a 'normal' person, who's never taken any. "If God were to permit you a brief voyage into the divine process, let you whirl for a second into the atomic nucleus or spin you out on a light-year trip through the galaxies, how on earth would you describe what you saw when you got back, breathless, to…

Eh this sounds like exactly what was wrong with the early LSD promoters. Psychedelics are the mythical "love bomb"? I do not think the evidence supports that. While I think the world would be far better off if everyone had tried it, I don't think it'd stop wars or anything. At best, it might get people to sit up and think a bit, and turn to rationality for explanations. But in real life, seeing as how one's predispos…

> we'd probably end up with a lot of people thinking they now know the answers.

People thinking that they know things that they actually don't is definitely a problem. I find that it happens way more often in people who have never tried LSD though. People use false assumptions and self-lies all the time to survive this world. Here's an example:

> It's why a lot of pro-LSD people are simply not taken seriously, because they forget it's just a molecule messing with brains' perceptions.

How do you know that? Science doesn't even know what consciousness is, so what does it mean that you're "messing with perception"? Based on that - I think that you simply don't know and you have no proof of what you're saying.

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