Author of the book under review here. AMA!

One thing I thought would be helpful is to link to the YouTube video described in the opening paragraph: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UMF-cyHAaSs

It's from a 1957 CBS documentary series called "Focus on Sanity" that featured interviews with Aldous Huxley and Gerald Heard, among others. I found it fascinating and my questions about it were actually one of the motive forces for why I wrote the book.

I believe the recording was first brought to public attention by Don Lattin, whose books The Harvard Psychedelic Club (2010) and Distilled Spirits (2012) are both great.

This is the book of Hacker News's own https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=benbreen!

All: please let's discuss the specifics of this article—there's a lot there, and it will be much more interesting than the nth generic thread about psychedelics. Specifics beat generics on HN.

Recently read a description of 1960's ideology. The claim being that its all propaganda, and what we know as 60s ideology (peace love etc) actually never really happened for a real duration of time. What did happen was that those that prescribed to that line of thinking either moved to communes, or they dropped so much acid they were societally irrelevant. There werent many people actually out and about that were pushing those lines of thinking, the ideology died within a year or two, but mass media keeps it alive.

Weird to think about how media can amplify a set of ideas, that itself didnt last very long. We keep having this renewed consciousness of ideas, like a microphone blowing it into everyones ears. Even funnier is to think that an ideology that hates mass media (anti corporate 60s culture) may actually just be a product of mass media, much like mickey mouse.

Worth linking to the story of the FOIA that forced the CIA to release the documents for MKULTRA on its website in 2018: https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/otm/segments/ken-keseys...

Referenced in the article, Michael Pollen's 2018 "How to Change Your Mind" book is wonderfully written [1]. I read this right after reading Gabriel Maté's "Chasing the Scream" [tl;dr: addiction is a mental problem, not judicial]. Pollen's level-headed approach to the silly topic of entheogen exploration reminded me that I am just a simple chemical meatbag.

Reading the article, I am reminded of my humanness.

[1] Check out Pollen's "Botany of Desire" about plants (THC included) controlling humans. IMHO it's the author's best title.

I take psychedelics a few times a year. I'm good with LSD once a year and I'm ok skipping it. I enjoy low (not micro) doses of mushrooms a few times each summer.

Both have been very good for my sobriety. They aren't for everyone though.

Great to see this becoming mainstream. Sad to see the number of charlatans and the industry has popped up around it.

I hope that we're able to safely get these substances to those that need them.

I'm curious to see how many people have access to mushrooms these days. For my 20s and 30s it seemed impossible to get, now all of a sudden I can get them no problem. I have a friend who is not into drugs at all but grows them, weighs them, and has a pill making machine to make pills so he can accurately micro-dose to address severe depression. I have other friends who love drugs and can get the literally anytime they want. It's shocking that they are so available now compared to even 5 years ago. Anyone else experiencing this?

This thread has degenerated at warp speed into the kind of generics that dang steered against in the first post. Not surprised, but that was fast.

Depending on how you define America, use of psychedelics goes back a bit further than the 20th century, or the arrival of Europeans. For example, here's a nice overview of the history of mescaline, the active ingredient in peyote cactus:

https://medicalhealthhumanities.com/2019/09/17/from-the-dese...

America was introduced to LSD via CIA's MK-ULTRA program.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MKUltra

'to channel youth dissent and rebellion into more being and non-threatening directions' - FBI internal memo

I was suffering from really bad loneliness and depression. I caught wind that friends I wasn't particularly close with were having an LSD retreat. I was raised that all 'hard' drugs were bad and potentially addictive. But I decided to join them and to try it.

It turned out to be an transformative experience for me. And it wasn't from the LSD itself, the dose was too low to impact my brain in a lasting way. But it's helped me connect with others better in a more 'intimate' setting and build more meaningful relationships. It's been over a year and I've done it a few times since and each time it's been a great experience with others. That's the TLDR of my experience.

I've never dropped acid.

Net-net, what's best in your (whosoever is reading this) opinion?

1. To never drop acid.

2. To try it out a couple times and never do it again?

3. To add it as part of one's regimen as and when one needs it?

I used to do psychedelics frequently and tried really hard to get something out of them. Up until the last time I dropped acid, I just got high and came down.

The last time I ever did a psychedelic, I dropped acid and was reading this book called "Be Here Now" by Ram Dass. There's a part of the book that talks about drug induced psychosis. There's some illustration of lightning hitting a tower. I remember turning the page, seeing it, then hearing this super loud thunder outside that shook the house

I stopped doing them after that point because it was some kind of sign. When I started doing them I wasn't able to believe in God, after that experience I could

Dang I thought this was gonna be about tripping on LSD-like substances in rye bread in Salem before getting burned at the stake for witchcraft in the 17th century.

I recently ran out of gummies. Thanks to things being legal now, I just went to the handy Eaze website to do an order.

$70 of goods + $30 in taxes and fees.

Is this what libertarians mean by "taxation is theft?"

paywall blocked