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Regarding Michael Pollan’s New Book This Is Your Mind on Plants

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Re: Regarding Michael Pollan’s New Book This Is Your Mind on Plants

#11

Post by tayo42 »

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #4

This seems like a weird spat over an author deciding to omit an admission of illegal activity from his published works. It’s quite amazing that Harpers went so far as to commit to defending him and financially compensating him to extreme degrees (including the value of his house, if seized) in the unlikely event that he was prosecuted. It’s strange that Pollan would turn around and try to shift blame rather than simp…

I'm surprised by this view of how to change your mind. Most of his personal experiences in the book mentioned there were no major changes. I also thought the book was level headed compared to the typical stuff you read about psychedelics. His history section was really neutral and all of the trips were done under supervision of a therapist. If you came away from that book expecting miracles I think you just hear what you want to hear.

Re: Regarding Michael Pollan’s New Book This Is Your Mind on Plants

#12

Post by elevenoh »

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #4

This seems like a weird spat over an author deciding to omit an admission of illegal activity from his published works. It’s quite amazing that Harpers went so far as to commit to defending him and financially compensating him to extreme degrees (including the value of his house, if seized) in the unlikely event that he was prosecuted. It’s strange that Pollan would turn around and try to shift blame rather than simp…

>I wish we had a more engaging alternative writer to reference about the realities of psychedelics and other drugs. Someone who was more interested in delivering realistic, albeit necessarily less boring, descriptions of the realities of this space.

Was pollen really all that disingenuous in the reality of psych use/effectiveness at treating medical conditions?

Seems his claims were pretty in-line with the research overall. If anyone has a quote of pollen overstating benefits, feel free to post the quote as I, for one, would like to see it.

Re: Regarding Michael Pollan’s New Book This Is Your Mind on Plants

#13

Post by leephillips »

hcrisp wrote: post #6
PragmaticPulp wrote: post #4

This seems like a weird spat over an author deciding to omit an admission of illegal activity from his published works. It’s quite amazing that Harpers went so far as to commit to defending him and financially compensating him to extreme degrees (including the value of his house, if seized) in the unlikely event that he was prosecuted. It’s strange that Pollan would turn around and try to shift blame rather than simp…

He does seem to be sliding down hill. A decade ago I picked up his book The Botany of Desire not knowing what kind of writer he was or his fame. It was a very interesting read, especially the part about apples and the history of their variety. It led me to try other, more delicious varieties than I had known. It also included a more surprising section on cannabis. He recounts a time when he grew it in his garden (whi…

I haven’t read his more recent writings, but The Botany of Desire is a fascinating book. It will show you how interesting the history of plants and their relationship with culture can be. I read it many years ago, but I still find myself going “did you know...” to people before recounting something I learned there.

Re: Regarding Michael Pollan’s New Book This Is Your Mind on Plants

#14

Post by IgorPartola »

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #4

This seems like a weird spat over an author deciding to omit an admission of illegal activity from his published works. It’s quite amazing that Harpers went so far as to commit to defending him and financially compensating him to extreme degrees (including the value of his house, if seized) in the unlikely event that he was prosecuted. It’s strange that Pollan would turn around and try to shift blame rather than simp…

It’s almost as if taking cannabis (and a few other things) off schedule 1 would allow for publicly funded research into the dangers and benefits of these drugs so that we all could be better informed.

Re: Regarding Michael Pollan’s New Book This Is Your Mind on Plants

#15

Post by LargeWu »

steve_adams_86 wrote: post #7

Interesting. I listened to this on the Tim Ferris podcast and, foolishly in retrospect, just took it at face value. I generally enjoy Pollan and I suppose I assume he has integrity, or is trustworthy in his writing and podcasting. Regardless, this seems to potentially fall into the category of misremembering or simply having a different frame of reference at the time. Diverging points of view are common enough, espec…

One of the reasons I stopped listening to Ferris’s podcast is that he’s a totally uncritical interviewer. His guests are allowed to blatantly self promote

Re: Regarding Michael Pollan’s New Book This Is Your Mind on Plants

#16

Post by Animats »

pmoriarty wrote: post #9
PragmaticPulp wrote: post #4

This seems like a weird spat over an author deciding to omit an admission of illegal activity from his published works. It’s quite amazing that Harpers went so far as to commit to defending him and financially compensating him to extreme degrees (including the value of his house, if seized) in the unlikely event that he was prosecuted. It’s strange that Pollan would turn around and try to shift blame rather than simp…

'I've read many anecdotes of people who sought psychedelics after reading his book with the expectation of life-changing experiences or psychedelic treatments for their conditions, only to be disappointed when they didn't experience the miraculous experiences and transformations he describes." Now this sounds at least as interesting as anything Pollan himself writes about. I'd be interested in hearing the details of…

See "Surely you're joking, Mr. Feynman". Feynman was convinced by Dr. Timothy Leary, in the 1960s, to try LSD. Feynman then thought he'd solved some problem he was working on. But when he went to give a talk on the problem, he realized that he had not solved the problem. He had only hallucinated that he had solved the problem. After which Feynman didn't try LSD again. "I like to think. I don't want to break the machine", he wrote.

Re: Regarding Michael Pollan’s New Book This Is Your Mind on Plants

#17

Post by ramraj07 »

steve_adams_86 wrote: post #7

Interesting. I listened to this on the Tim Ferris podcast and, foolishly in retrospect, just took it at face value. I generally enjoy Pollan and I suppose I assume he has integrity, or is trustworthy in his writing and podcasting. Regardless, this seems to potentially fall into the category of misremembering or simply having a different frame of reference at the time. Diverging points of view are common enough, espec…

Not to invoke Godwin’s rule, but this scenario seems a bit too far off from acceptable for “that’s now how I remember things going down” to just let it slide, blaming someone else with a clearly different storyline in a fundamental sense seems a lot more deliberate on the persons part. Just because you didn’t care enough about he involved subjects to walk away from a podcast doesn’t mean the truth can just be twisted any way?

Also is it possible to walk away from a podcast offended at all? The explosion of this medium and the way everyone seems to consume it suggests you can’t afford to emotionally involve with what you’re listening to anymore.

Re: Regarding Michael Pollan’s New Book This Is Your Mind on Plants

#18

Post by teknopaul »

tayo42 wrote: post #11
PragmaticPulp wrote: post #4

This seems like a weird spat over an author deciding to omit an admission of illegal activity from his published works. It’s quite amazing that Harpers went so far as to commit to defending him and financially compensating him to extreme degrees (including the value of his house, if seized) in the unlikely event that he was prosecuted. It’s strange that Pollan would turn around and try to shift blame rather than simp…

I'm surprised by this view of how to change your mind. Most of his personal experiences in the book mentioned there were no major changes. I also thought the book was level headed compared to the typical stuff you read about psychedelics. His history section was really neutral and all of the trips were done under supervision of a therapist. If you came away from that book expecting miracles I think you just hear what…

If someone is really trying to do you a favor, and all you see is conspiracy theory, that is bog standard reaction to too much acid. It doesn't matter _how_ you do it, or how much, if you get to the stage where, as well as opening your mind, you close your mind to the good intentions of of others, you have done too much. All too common I'm afraid. Bad things happen in the world, someone offering to underwrite your losses because they respect you as a writer is not one of them.

Re: Regarding Michael Pollan’s New Book This Is Your Mind on Plants

#19

Post by ramraj07 »

LargeWu wrote: post #15
steve_adams_86 wrote: post #7

Interesting. I listened to this on the Tim Ferris podcast and, foolishly in retrospect, just took it at face value. I generally enjoy Pollan and I suppose I assume he has integrity, or is trustworthy in his writing and podcasting. Regardless, this seems to potentially fall into the category of misremembering or simply having a different frame of reference at the time. Diverging points of view are common enough, espec…

One of the reasons I stopped listening to Ferris’s podcast is that he’s a totally uncritical interviewer. His guests are allowed to blatantly self promote

Not to mention the blatantly self indulging attitude as well. Of course, he’s talking to people who are at the least millionaires if not more, so that’s expected, but some episodes just reek of tone-deaf “I’m smart and rich and have no idea how insensitive my hobbies and activities might sound to a Normal person” sense.

But he does talk to a lot of smart people, and there’s often much interesting to learn about, so I put up with their egos and extract the information by listening.

Re: Regarding Michael Pollan’s New Book This Is Your Mind on Plants

#20

Post by elevenoh »

Animats wrote: post #16
pmoriarty wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

'I've read many anecdotes of people who sought psychedelics after reading his book with the expectation of life-changing experiences or psychedelic treatments for their conditions, only to be disappointed when they didn't experience the miraculous experiences and transformations he describes." Now this sounds at least as interesting as anything Pollan himself writes about. I'd be interested in hearing the details of…

See "Surely you're joking, Mr. Feynman". Feynman was convinced by Dr. Timothy Leary, in the 1960s, to try LSD. Feynman then thought he'd solved some problem he was working on. But when he went to give a talk on the problem, he realized that he had not solved the problem. He had only hallucinated that he had solved the problem. After which Feynman didn't try LSD again. "I like to think. I don't want to break the machi…

"I like to think. I don't want to break the machine"

The 60s had some quite negative urban legends regarding LSD's effect on the brain:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Urban_legends_about_drugs#Lyse...

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