11–20 of 28 posts
The speculative stuff around this is super fun. Proceed at your own risk. How does an animal stumble on the existence of geometry? Impaired sensory input creates feedback loops that yield periodic patterns. How does it begin apprehend the scope of something greater than its senses? Impairing those senses and seeing the edges. How do ancient people hear supposedly divine messages? Inhaling smoke from burning plants th…
> so perhaps it is little wonder that the permanently sozzled intellectuals of the Middle Ages were prone to magical thinking.
What? Drinking alcohol adulterated water remained a common practice until the late 1800s. And we don't have reason to believe people were hammered all the time. Generally drink was lower in alcohol content then and it was usually cut with water.
> It’s unclear from the book (and from my subsequent Google searches) whether the spider was given the arachnid equivalent of a single cappuccino or a more Balzacian dose, which makes the comparison with other drugs less helpful, but Pollan’s point is that caffeine changes us more than we realise.
Is there even an equivalent? Spiders barely have what we consider a brain. I'm not sure much other than cellular science is translatable from spiders to humans.
> societies tend to ban those plants that appear to pose a threat to the social order.
That seems pretty suspect. Western societies after all have tolerated alcohol, probably one of the most destabilizing drugs there is, for centuries. It seems to me, they ban what is unfamiliar or rather, they ban anything that hasn't reached large usage among the power class of that society.
This review is much like Pollan's own writing, loose with the facts and wild with conjecture and speculation. > so perhaps it is little wonder that the permanently sozzled intellectuals of the Middle Ages were prone to magical thinking. What? Drinking alcohol adulterated water remained a common practice until the late 1800s. And we don't have reason to believe people were hammered all the time. Generally drink was lo…
> That seems pretty suspect. Western societies after all have tolerated alcohol, probably one of the most destabilizing drugs there is, for centuries. It seems to me, they ban what is unfamiliar or rather, they ban anything that hasn't reached large usage among the power class of that society.
Enforcement of anti-drug laws falls pretty heavily on the lower classes of society, particularly minorities. The ruling classes can pretty much get away with doing whatever drugs they want, rarely with any serious legal repercussions.
Psychedelics and cannabis were very strongly associated with the counterculture, religious and sex cults, social justice and antiwar movements, and with dropping out of the mainstream culture in the 1960's and 70's. This, along with wide-eyed sensational reporting of drug-related tragedies caused a full-blown moral panic that led to their being banned.
Alcohol never had a history of use that was even remotely close to this and it was widely used among all classes in society (including the ruling class). It too was banned in the US in the early part of the 20th Century until Prohibition was recognized to be much worse than allowing alcohol to be legal.
I would love to hear what you all think about addiction, or at least a lack of addiction. I’ve always seemed to have a very low pain tolerance, and over the counter meds just don’t do much for me. On a few occasions I’ve been given stronger drugs like oxytocin and codeine — and the first thing people say is to watch out for their addictive properties. I…don’t seem to crave them, or anything else for that matter. Don’…
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rat_Park
This review is much like Pollan's own writing, loose with the facts and wild with conjecture and speculation. > so perhaps it is little wonder that the permanently sozzled intellectuals of the Middle Ages were prone to magical thinking. What? Drinking alcohol adulterated water remained a common practice until the late 1800s. And we don't have reason to believe people were hammered all the time. Generally drink was lo…
> > societies tend to ban those plants that appear to pose a threat to the social order. > That seems pretty suspect. Western societies after all have tolerated alcohol, probably one of the most destabilizing drugs there is, for centuries. It seems to me, they ban what is unfamiliar or rather, they ban anything that hasn't reached large usage among the power class of that society. Enforcement of anti-drug laws falls…
Are you kidding? People used to get drunk and riot all the time in major American and European cities. Have you ever read about the gin craze?
What is banned is certainly affected by the sensationalistic stories and the perceived scariness of it. But IMO the actual result of what does get banned has more to do with the cultural status quo, in group power and out group xenophobia.
The repeal of alcohol prohabition is good evidence of this. Alcohol was traditionally accepted in Western culture for one. It's use was widespread and sometimes even seen as a "right of a passage" among the enfranchised class. America tolerated all kinds of other policy which lead to violence before, during and since prohibition. What got it repealed was that FDR and a lot of other politicians liked to drink. A lot of their voters liked to drink. They saw it as American to drink. They came from an alcohol tradition. Tobacco and caffeine are both intertwined with American middle and upper class identity, especially in the mid 20th century when these bans are really coming down. And of course, they weren't banned.
Psychedelics may have been used by in-group white kids but they were banned before their use could become wide enough to integrate them to the culture. Native support didn't matter because they are such a tiny population and so thuroughly locked out of power.
I would love to hear what you all think about addiction, or at least a lack of addiction. I’ve always seemed to have a very low pain tolerance, and over the counter meds just don’t do much for me. On a few occasions I’ve been given stronger drugs like oxytocin and codeine — and the first thing people say is to watch out for their addictive properties. I…don’t seem to crave them, or anything else for that matter. Don’…
check out the work of Dr Gabor Maté.
addiction is much less an intrinsic property of a substance and has much more to do with a combination of personal factors like upbringing, ACEs (adverse/traumatic childhood events), modeling, and some genetics.
it is not uncommon at all for someone to try an “addictive” substance like, say, cocaine, and never feel a pull to ever take it again.
I tried salvia divinorum a few times, and the biggest insight I got from it was that the human brain is a machine, and is designed to do a specific thing, but if you throw a bunch of chemicals into it you can convert it into a machine for doing other random things like generate visual garbage and noise. I felt like my working memory had been reduced to only persisting for a half second, and my thoughts were reflected…
your experience sounds like that which can happen when salvia divinorum is smoked.
the traditional method of consumption by the Mazatec people (who have used this plant medicine in ritual for thousands of years) is sublingual.
creates an incredibly different effect than smoking it. tends to be much more pleasant and easier to integrate.
I do know several folks who quite enjoy smoking it. They are in the minority, however.
Tim Ferris's recent interview of Pollan is excellent, definitely check it out: https://tim.blog/podcast/ I think I might finally have the motivation to read his earlier book How to Change Your Mind