Psychedelics Promote Structural and Functional Neural Plasticity • Hacker News Board

Re: Psychedelics Promote Structural and Functional Neural Plasticity

#41

Post by ChristianBundy » Sat, Jul 21, 2018, 6:10 PM UTC

arkades wrote: post #34

rufugee wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's entirely possible that LSD uncovered or accentuated an underlying flaw in your friend's psyche...

I don’t understand this common response at all. If I prescribe penicillin to a patient with a pcn allergy, the fact that I “uncovered an underlying flaw” is irrelevant. Pcn is dangerous to them and should not be prescribed to them. This is true, in one sense or another, of the majority of adverse effects people have from medications given in therapeutic ranges. It’s basically what having an adverse effect -means-. It…

The difference is that penicillin allergies can only be triggered by penicillin (or maybe penicillin-adjacent analogues). Mental illnesses and psychedelics don't work the same way.

Psychedelics bring these issues to the forefront, but they don't necessarily cause mental health issues, as the same issues could happen without LSD. I understand what you're trying to express with your example of penicillin, but it's not the same thing.

In my opinion, it would be more accurate to compare psychedelic drugs to activities like meditation and fasting, which also have a risk of anxiety, discomfort, and bringing out dormant mental health issues in some people.

Re: Psychedelics Promote Structural and Functional Neural Plasticity

#42

Post by solipsism » Sat, Jul 21, 2018, 6:19 PM UTC

tranchms wrote: post #7

I’m a huge proponent of safe psychedelic use, specifically LSD. I was massively depressed and suicidal growing up (I had family problems, and two of my best friends killed them selves at 13 and 17). I dropped out of high school. I experimented with LSD and mushrooms around 17/18 years old. And while I didn’t realize it then, my life massively changed for the better. Maybe I grew up. Maybe I took responsibility for my…

I believe it needs to be adopted as a therapeutic alternative to current psychiatric therapies which are toxic and destructive and deadening by comparison

There are people who have rosy anecdotes about each of the therapies you call toxic and destructive. There are also people with horror stories about LSD. You are inappropriately extrapolating your own personal experiences to everyone else.

It's ironic to say this to someone who's advocating mind expansion, but... you need to be a bit more open minded.

Re: Psychedelics Promote Structural and Functional Neural Plasticity

#43

Post by lightcatcher » Sat, Jul 21, 2018, 6:20 PM UTC

rufugee wrote: post #20

cageface wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I watched a good friend freak out in front of me on a bad trip. Almost thirty years later he's still not the same and needs antipsychotic medication to function. This kind of thing isn't common but it can definitely happen.

It's entirely possible that LSD uncovered or accentuated an underlying flaw in your friend's psyche...

This isn't a useful distinction unless you can reliably identify the flaw before the negative impact of LSD. Without a detection mechanism, this is as actionable as "LSD does bad things to some people"

Re: Psychedelics Promote Structural and Functional Neural Plasticity

#44

Post by techbio » Sat, Jul 21, 2018, 6:22 PM UTC

api wrote: post #25

cageface wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I watched a good friend freak out in front of me on a bad trip. Almost thirty years later he's still not the same and needs antipsychotic medication to function. This kind of thing isn't common but it can definitely happen.

I've seen this too but not from just one trip. I've seen heavy users kind of never come back. I suspect your friend had latent psychotic tendencies. Would be interesting to look at family history. These are powerful drugs that seem capable of both helping and doing harm. They should definitely be used with care, studied, and not abused. Of course what the war on drugs did was to ban the scientific study of these thin…

The existence of undiagnosed disorders and the potential presence of effective coping skills/supportive stable home environment/unstressed personality/late-onset symptoms would preclude reliance on prior indicators of determining fitness for a given psychedelic.

Family histories are not always clearly diagnosed. That hypothetical uncle you've never met and no one talks about? Unknown mental health flag.

Self-diagnosis of a mental/emotional state that calls for drug-taking is itself a clue that not all is so normal in the individual's mind--or is it something wrong in the world the person wants to relate to better? Who can know but the one supposedly experiencing an unnaccepted state? Observing/deciding/dosing by the selfsame suffering/diagnosing/tripping individual sounds risky, because if the downside is a long future of some degree of insanity, it is only a variety of Russian Roulette.

To allow scientific studies, fund them, possibly create therapies is to also conquer the stigmas involved in substantial ways and that process is tectonically, multi-generationally slow (or impossible).

Re: Psychedelics Promote Structural and Functional Neural Plasticity

#45

Post by sev » Sat, Jul 21, 2018, 6:27 PM UTC

psychedictic wrote: post #31

rufugee wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's entirely possible that LSD uncovered or accentuated an underlying flaw in your friend's psyche...

This is the common response from proponents of LSD. To them, it's never the LSD, and instead the adverse reaction must be because the person had a mind that was predisposed to some sort of mental illness. Even if it's true that someone has some kind of latent / dormant condition that is ultimately triggered by the LSD, then the act of taking the LSD itself was the catalyst, and the person would have been far better o…

Care should be taken, like with any substance we ingest. However, I disagree with your premise.

We do not know if LSD was in fact the catalyst. We don’t know if the people who got ruined after taking a single tab of LSD actually took LSD or some research chemical (which are quite commonly sold off as LSD).

Re: Psychedelics Promote Structural and Functional Neural Plasticity

#46

Post by vitro » Sat, Jul 21, 2018, 6:29 PM UTC

I cannot find the author of the quote, nor the quote itself, but it was something like this: "You should take psychedelics and then work hard to experience the same, but without psychedelics itself".

I remember one guy posting about his experience with psychedelics and then with long period of yoga and meditation. Interesting thing was, that he described something similar. On psychedelics it was as if you would take a jet plane and got somewhere really fast. Yoga and meditation, on the other hand, take you same place but you have a time to look around during the process. It takes a lot of time, though, but also is safer.

Interesting may be combining meditation and yoga with microdosing, which should still keep you on the safe side.

Re: Psychedelics Promote Structural and Functional Neural Plasticity

#47

Post by samatman » Sat, Jul 21, 2018, 6:30 PM UTC

tranchms wrote: post #37

tibbon wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’ve seen a friend become semi dependent and kinda disassociated from reality after multiple times a week use of various research chemical psychedelics. It seemed to bring out some underlying bipolar like condition. Anyway; also a strong proponent, but I’ve seen the potential harm as well. On the balance it seems worthwhile for many people, and good for many people to try a little LSD at least once.

Research chemicals are dangerous. They’re mostly all synthetics derived from amphetamine class of drugs like MDMA. 2CE. 2CB. 2CI. Etc. and countless others. No one taking them know what it truly is. They are dangerous. And more ubiquitous than LSD-25. You can never be sure what you’re getting. You can OD and have a psychotic episode. I do not classify them as therapeutic psychedelics, and always advise against. If yo…

This is an idiosyncratic opinion to say the least.

2C-E, 2C-B, and 2C-I are what they are, single compounds, just as LSD-25 is. They are phenethylamines, related to mescaline, the substance for which the term "psychedelic" was coined.

They are synthetic, as is LSD, and have a wide therapeutic index. Being less potent by weight, it is easier to measure a specific dose than with LSD, which is commonly put on paper or taken in liquid form.

Getting "puddled" from a bottle of LSD is a more likely route to a psychotic episode than anything 2C-I or 2C-B have to offer; 2C-E is a different beast.

It's fine that you have these opinions, I guess. It's just that most of them are wrong and I wouldn't want others to be mislead.

Re: Psychedelics Promote Structural and Functional Neural Plasticity

#48

Post by Pica_soO » Sat, Jul 21, 2018, 6:30 PM UTC

psychedictic wrote: post #31

rufugee wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's entirely possible that LSD uncovered or accentuated an underlying flaw in your friend's psyche...

This is the common response from proponents of LSD. To them, it's never the LSD, and instead the adverse reaction must be because the person had a mind that was predisposed to some sort of mental illness. Even if it's true that someone has some kind of latent / dormant condition that is ultimately triggered by the LSD, then the act of taking the LSD itself was the catalyst, and the person would have been far better o…

I agree, it only should be available to those, who are already in danger by pre-existing conditions like chronic depression or other similar serious mental conditions.

Re: Psychedelics Promote Structural and Functional Neural Plasticity

#49

Post by telchar » Sat, Jul 21, 2018, 6:31 PM UTC

psychedictic wrote: post #31

rufugee wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's entirely possible that LSD uncovered or accentuated an underlying flaw in your friend's psyche...

This is the common response from proponents of LSD. To them, it's never the LSD, and instead the adverse reaction must be because the person had a mind that was predisposed to some sort of mental illness. Even if it's true that someone has some kind of latent / dormant condition that is ultimately triggered by the LSD, then the act of taking the LSD itself was the catalyst, and the person would have been far better o…

What's your evidence that those people are worse off having taken the psychedelics? You can't know the counterfactual isn't that those people who respond poorly to the drug would have had a similar mental break without it. Until the drug is studied rigorously all we have to go on are conflicting anecdotes. That said in the face of a lack of reliable information caution is warranted.

Re: Psychedelics Promote Structural and Functional Neural Plasticity

#50

Post by marmaduke » Sat, Jul 21, 2018, 6:42 PM UTC

tranchms wrote: post #7

I’m a huge proponent of safe psychedelic use, specifically LSD. I was massively depressed and suicidal growing up (I had family problems, and two of my best friends killed them selves at 13 and 17). I dropped out of high school. I experimented with LSD and mushrooms around 17/18 years old. And while I didn’t realize it then, my life massively changed for the better. Maybe I grew up. Maybe I took responsibility for my…

> psychedelics open the mind in ways that only radical life experiences can

This is a good translation of the title of OP: neural plasticity is always active but never nearly as much as during major life events. Psychedlics are a shortcut to that sort of plasticity.