There is so much psychedelic research happening right now. But when will it reach patients outside of trials?
Move to California. Order mushrooms from literally thousands of local websites and surprisingly reputable proprietors.
Psychedelic scientist sends brains back to childhood
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Re: Psychedelic scientist sends brains back to childhood
#42Anybody have a tl;dr? I don't want to read about the seashell collection on the researcher's desk.
Research seems to prove that psychedelics can be a tool for opening up the so called critical periods. Critical periods are, in my understanding, the highly receptive periods of learning - brain wiring and rewiring.
Childhood is abundant in these periods, but they open up in adulthood naturally after trauma, e.g. stroke as high plasticity periods, which go away quickly and possibly are too short.
Totally subjective take: future result might be able to explain /why/ psychedelics have profound effect. Interestingly the life-changing traumatic experiences have similar effect, creating these critical periods - body responds to extreme conditions with risky high brain plasticity periods.
Re: Psychedelic scientist sends brains back to childhood
#43The Doors of Perception by Aldous Huxley is pretty accessible and although not scientifically rigorous, provides an ahem ergonomic framework for thinking about psychonautics (which I have, of course, never engaged in)
Re: Psychedelic scientist sends brains back to childhood
#44There is so much psychedelic research happening right now. But when will it reach patients outside of trials?
Beginning of my MD PhD program a guy who was big in that field and tried small scale trials gave a whole schpill about how big pharma was unfairly blocking this. Then I spent over an hour talking to him about it. This field has a huge challenge finding a consistent and reproducible outcome to aim for. When I pressed the guy he was pretty clear that there were participants in these studies that has pretty bad outcomes and would have been in bad shape if there wasnt a medical team on hand.
Im sure we will find a use for this someday but research has to do more than prove it is sometimes good for people. We need to know how to consistently identify those people who need it and the outcome desired.
Re: Psychedelic scientist sends brains back to childhood
#45There is so much psychedelic research happening right now. But when will it reach patients outside of trials?
When they create a synthetic derivative that can be patented.
Exactly like happened with ketamine as esketamine.
Re: Psychedelic scientist sends brains back to childhood
#46"There is, of course, a catch. For mice, having a critical period open for too long causes neural disruptions. Some experts fear that, for people, carelessly flinging wide the doors of personal development could put the very core of their identity in jeopardy by erasing the habits and memories that make them them. A critical period is also a time of vulnerability. While childhood can be filled with wonder and magic,…
> An adult who undergoes this kind of treatment to heal PTSD could, in the wrong hands, end up traumatized further.
There's a lot of variables there. I can only speak to my experience. I started seeing psychedelics getting talked about in veterans circles and was curious about them. My trauma stems from many sources, but what's common is a lost of innate trust, and the end result is that trust is easier to tear down quickly than build up. Not great for healthy relationships, communication, and a number of life's necessities. I decided to wait on trying them and went about doing things like CBT to change my behavior and focus on getting out of this anxiety riddled loop I was in.
Fast forward a decade and I was really at a point where I just needed help letting go of my trauma. I'd dealt with it, there was nothing more to be done, yet still the door would not shut. If you're at a place where the metaphorical door won't shut, psychedelics can be a helpful tool. You're really going to already need to be in a place where you can be mindful (present) and focus on what you want to change. After you've tripped you really need to unpack where your mind went and why; that's to say separate the garbage from the work to be done.
Not everyone should do psychedelics just because they're seeking healing. They can provide that, but you need to be in the right place and willing to do the work. Being triggered in the middle of a trip is a good way to really re-traumatize yourself in the way that reading about trauma identical to yours can be traumatizing.
Re: Psychedelic scientist sends brains back to childhood
#47"There is, of course, a catch. For mice, having a critical period open for too long causes neural disruptions. Some experts fear that, for people, carelessly flinging wide the doors of personal development could put the very core of their identity in jeopardy by erasing the habits and memories that make them them. A critical period is also a time of vulnerability. While childhood can be filled with wonder and magic,…
Sounds like the reason why there's a backlash against exposing kids to all of these controversial topics in the "culture wars" in the West.
Nah. That would be because one political party sustains itself by keeping it's voter base on a treadmill of fear and outrage, is moving strongly towards authoritarianism, and has a large contingent specifically intent on implementing a flavor of religious fascism called Dominionism (cf. "Seven Mountians Mandate").
These latest "topics in the culture wars" are simply that, the latest usable tools that can be used, along with exaggerating and flat-out lying about the topics, to maximize the outrage of their voter base to drive turnout.
Meanwhile, it also helps the authoritarian causes to maximize the demonization of these same "other" minority groups, and trans groups are both easy and fresh targets. (Nevermind the facts: there are essentially zero cases of people in drag being any kind of threat to children, while there are literally thousands of cases of religious 'leaders' from the very same sects, sexually abusing children, with new cases every day.)
Stop trying to normalize marginalizing people.
Re: Psychedelic scientist sends brains back to childhood
#48DISCLAIMER: all advice given here is given under the assumption that you did your research, and that you have good reasons why you're interested in psychedelics as a tool. They're a powerful tool, and powerful tools cut both ways. Turning into a new age woo head is a real risk, I've seen it happen to the staunchest of sceptics, no one is immune. Do your research, people, test your drugs, and be careful. I think this…
> I felt smarter, and overall pretty great. I felt like I was making all these brilliant connections. And here I thought the whole point of micro-dosing is the dose is too small to feel anything at all. AIUI what you're calling microdosing is still in the realm of macrodosing, and no shit your working memory and time management was affected. What you were feeling were low-key hallucinations.
Well, I guess what do you mean by feel? I've taken micro-dose amounts, 10-20ug, and have definitely realized I had taken something, but only if I really focused on it. It's certainly not the same as taking 50ug, but you can feel your body working a little differently. Maybe you have to get into amounts even smaller than that? Or maybe it's just placebo? I don't know, hard to say.
I do agree with the GP though, sometimes the thing you need is to just jump into a full on 100-150ug trip and hang out in it for the day. Let yourself regain some of that open state and change up the habitual patterns you may not know you're locked into over the course of the next days and weeks. I personally end up doing it about once a year, give or take, and it always ends up being a positive experience (if sometimes difficult).
Re: Psychedelic scientist sends brains back to childhood
#49Earlier quoted context omitted.
Sounds like the reason why there's a backlash against exposing kids to all of these controversial topics in the "culture wars" in the West.
Can you expand on this? I find it hard to understand what similarities you see to what children today are being “exposed” to and Charles Manson drugging people with LSD and convincing them to kill other people.
I think they're suggesting that young children--in their critical (mental) periods--can somehow turn gay or transgendered due to exposure/normalisation of gay and trans people.
Except there's no science to back this up. All the scientific articles I've ever seen on the topic of gender and sexuality seem to indicate that the critical period for those attributes develop in the womb and not during childhood.
The most likely reason for such deviations from what conservatives would consider, "normal sexuality" is endocrine-distrupting pollution. The kind that causes amphibians to change their sex, for example.
Re: Psychedelic scientist sends brains back to childhood
#50I use LSD for similar reasons. I actually ordered a lifetime supply of acid and got into big trouble from that. Really good stuff, makes me joyous.
How do you keep a lifetime supply of LSD? Isn't it an unstable molecule with a limited shelf life?
The plan was to order 350 tabs to Finland.
The 300 tabs letter was scanned with lights and got caught.
The 50 tabs letter actually arrived but was obviously lost because customs began their investigation.
In Finland, LSD happens to be "an extremely dangerous" substance and 350 tabs gets "offensive / serious drug crime" (349 would not necessarily). I didn't know this; kind of funny.
However, this was all calculated in the sense that with all probability I will not go into prison nevertheless. Simply cannot try again any criminal activity in Finland / ever / for a long while.
LSD will last long time stored properly. Putting those small bags that packages use to remove moisture into airtight plastic bag and that into dark place where tempest doesn't vary lots.