Earlier quoted context omitted.
It is true that LSD can mess you up if taken under certain circumstances, however, you shouldn't intimidate the inexperience. If all you ever heard about LSD is that it could mess you up, then there is a higher probably that it will harm you. Instead, I would recommend the following to all those who are inexperienced: Make sure you understand it's effects and try to find someone who has experience with LSD to guide y…
The paradoxical thing about LSD is that you simply cannot understand its effects until you've already tried it.
LSD, Reconsidered for Therapy
81–90 of 182 posts
Re: LSD, Reconsidered for Therapy
#82Earlier quoted context omitted.
You seem particularly motivated to discount the awakening effects of LSD. I never mentioned seeing problems in society, so as far as I'm concerned that's a strawman. Are people wrong to feel profundity in the mundane? Is there another way to interpret the belief that LSD or access to altered states could change society?
I have no evidence such awakenings exist, and nobody can ever really define what they mean by them. What do you mean, exactly? Nobody is wrong to feel profundity in the mundane, but LSD can have you feeling a profound connection to a piece of cheese, or suddenly realising that all humanity's problems would go away if we just wore more purple. As for the problems with society, it very relevant to people who talk about…
This is what usually happens to my friends who drop acid. I'll always remember my best friend's deep connection to some lamp post, and how he "figured out why that lamp post is there, mans. I know it now". I'm sure this isn't what happens to everyone. What I think happens is that true profundity happens to people who are sort of on a good path to find it already.
Re: LSD, Reconsidered for Therapy
#83My mother suffered from cluster headaches recently (the worst pain you can endure in life they say). Apparently mushrooms and LSD are unofficial treatments. When asked, her doctor encouraged her to use mushrooms ... Apparently a non-psychedelic version of LSD could be made but it's difficult to justify spending millions in research with the official stance regarding drugs. I'm glad change seems to come, albeit slowly…
Did the mushrooms help?
Re: LSD, Reconsidered for Therapy
#84Earlier quoted context omitted.
Alcohol is probably much worse than weed or coffee over the long run. It's exceedingly hard to slowly poison your liver and brain over the course of a lifetime by smoking herb. It's easier than you think to do it drinking alcohol. I'm not a teetotaler by any means. I drink a couple of glasses of something pretty much every other day. But that's about the limit of what a healthy, adult male should be drinking. Any mor…
I agree with you on alcohol, but what's the problem with coffee? I'm curious because I drink it by the gallon.
There have been conflicting and sometimes contradictory reports on coffee's effects on cancer, cardiovascular disease, etc. Many studies suggest coffee has anticancer properties; other studies suggest it promotes certain types of cancer. Same thing with arteriosclerosis.
In terms of dependency, caffeine has been shown pretty conclusively to be habit-forming and dependence-forming. Almost anyone who's been a longtime coffee drinker and quits cold turkey will experience the side effects. But it's not clear whether coffee is doing you long-term harm, long-term good, or some combination of the two that nets out to being positive, negative, or neutral.
For my part, I've been drinking coffee every day since junior high. My stance is that it's been a net-positive in my life, regardless of what price I may pay later on. But that's one man's opinion. Not a scientific observation.
Also worth noting: coffee, marijuana, and alcoholic beverages are complex substances. There are active compounds in coffee other than caffeine. There are active compounds in alcoholic drinks other than ethanol. There are active compounds in weed other than THC. Studies that isolate the effects of any of these compounds aren't necessarily indicative of the effects of the substances themselves.
Re: LSD, Reconsidered for Therapy
#85Earlier quoted context omitted.
The paradoxical thing about LSD is that you simply cannot understand its effects until you've already tried it.
This makes me incredibly curious and eager to try it.
Re: LSD, Reconsidered for Therapy
#86It's interesting that society has long been comfortable pushing drugs that have the opposite effect, resulting in poor compliance by patients who complain of feeling "dead" or "not there."
Re: LSD, Reconsidered for Therapy
#87Earlier quoted context omitted.
"LSD - My Problem Child" is also well worth a read IMHO. It's by Hoffman and it tells the story of its discovery, also giving a few of his thoughts on what happened afterwards. Personally I'm not a huge fan of the "wonder drug that will cure all ills and open your EYES man" theories that abound around psychedelics. They can certainly induce a sense of the profound but I'm not sure they actually produce profundity. Th…
They can certainly induce a sense of the profound but I'm not sure they actually produce profundity. What's the difference?
E.g. A fact about yourself - realising that you love someone.
A fact about the world - realising that all matter is energy condensed.
At least taking the "open your EYES man" statement at face value. But a profound experience on hallucinogenics is realising that ... ? What's the mechanism even meant to be to entangle the experience to the reality it supposedly represents?
Of course, there is the other meaning of the word; great, intense. Profoundly in love, profound hatred - and so on. Certainly drugs can induce that sort of profundity.
Re: LSD, Reconsidered for Therapy
#88I'm glad the taboos around psychedelics research, especially as tools for therapy, are slowly falling down- there's some fascinating stuff in there. To people who have never experienced drugs, grown up in a culture that demonizes them all indiscriminately, have a hard time wrapping their head around what they are/do exactly but are curious about them, I recommend this article by Sam Harris, a great neuroscientist[0]…
[0]: http://www.amazon.com/The-Electric-Kool-Aid-Acid-Test/dp/031...
[Edit to fix run-on sentence]
Re: LSD, Reconsidered for Therapy
#89Earlier quoted context omitted.
They can certainly induce a sense of the profound but I'm not sure they actually produce profundity. What's the difference?
A profound revelation, I would imagine in this sense, is being defined as being based on experience that corresponds with some fact about yourself or the world as it actually is. E.g. A fact about yourself - realising that you love someone. A fact about the world - realising that all matter is energy condensed. At least taking the "open your EYES man" statement at face value. But a profound experience on hallucinogen…
Re: LSD, Reconsidered for Therapy
#90Earlier quoted context omitted.
What sort of changes? Why do you think LSD would necessarily bring about more humanistic or compassionate values?
While some people do seem to be less of an asshole after doing LSD, I've seen some very hate filled and bigoted people remain convicted of their prejudice even after using multiple times.
Using LSD with intentions to not be bigoted, prejudice, etc.
Taking LSD with the intention to introspect, experience spirituality, etc
Taking lots of medium dose LSD over time (years, decades) till the character of the experience gradually evolves for them in such a way as to reduce bigotry and prejudice
When people say LSD can have profound effects on people what often gets left out is that one may need to take it more frequently and in higher doses than most recreational users tend to do. Intentions matter, too.