|
|
||||
Free sample!
|
Credit: iStockphoto Cycling home from the Sandoz Pharmaceutical Laboratories in 1943, the Swiss biochemist Albert Hofmann found himself on the trip of his life. The familiar route had unexpectedly been transformed into an undulating boulevard like a Salvador Dali painting, fringed by buildings that yawned and rippled, "as if seen in a curved mirror". This was not a fantastical dream, but the result of a rather unorthodox experiment. Five years earlier, in a search for novel therapeutic agents to treat migraines, Hofmann had combined an ergot alkaloid, lysergic acid, with a diethylamine building block to create the 25th molecule in a series of lysergic acid compounds. At the time, pharmacological assessment of the new molecule, lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD), had revealed nothing of interest. Hofmann did not realise he had stumbled upon a compound with mind-altering properties that would change both the scientific and social world until he resynthesised the substance on April 16, 1943 and accidentally absorbed some through his skin. Intrigued by the effects he experienced, Hofmann ran a series of experiments on himself, starting with the famous bicycle 'trip'. He took 0.25 milligrams of LSD — which he believed to be a miniscule dose. Today it is known that one-thousandth of that amount is enough to produce psychedelic effects. The first experiment immersed Hofmann in an enchanting world of perceptual distortions in which objects morphed into surreal images, and sounds transposed into colourful kaleidoscopic visions. But the inner distortion of his mind reached such frightening proportions that Hofmann feared for his sanity and his life. "Familiar objects and pieces of furniture assumed grotesque, threatening forms. Every attempt to put an end to the disintegration of the outer world and the dissolution of my ego, seemed to be wasted effort," Hofmann wrote in his 1980 seminal work, LSD: My Problem Child. "A demon had invaded me. I jumped up and screamed, trying to free myself from him… my body seemed to be without sensation, lifeless, strange. Was I dying? "Another reflection took shape, an idea full of bitter irony: if I was now forced to leave this world prematurely, it was because of this lysergic acid diethylamide that I myself had brought forth into the world." Hofmann had not only brought forth a new drug, he had given birth to a new field of scientific research — psychedelic medicine — which scientists and physicians of the day embraced with great enthusiasm. Barely able to believe Hofmann's reports of the drug's vivid effects, Ernst Rothlin, the director of the pharmacology department at Sandoz at the time, and two colleagues, conducted similar self-experimentation using one third of Hofmann's dose. Rothlin too found himself plunged into a world that the Beatles famously described as full of "tangerine trees and marmalade skies". His experience included frightening demonic twists and turns of his mind They agreed that LSD, the hallucinogenic effects of which can last for 6 to 12 hours, had extraordinary potency. Believing LSD could be of great value to psychiatry, Sandoz made the drug readily available to scientific and clinical investigators for medical research under the trade name Delysid. THE FLURRY OF RESEARCH that ensued suggested that LSD might encourage the release of memories or reveal the unconscious in psychoanalysis; or help psychotherapy patients to reach new levels of self-awareness. Many psychiatrists were encouraged to take the drug to enable them to subjectively understand schizophrenia or share psychedelic experiences with their patients. Patients were given LSD for conditions ranging from anxiety disorders, obsessive-compulsive disorders, depression and bereavement to sexual dysfunction. The early literature even describes attempts to fix what was termed 'frigidity', using LSD to release repressed memories of abuse, while noting that the compound accentuated anxiety in some patients. Inevitably, LSD escaped from the lab. As the drug counter-culture gathered momentum in the 1960s, the boundary between scientific inquiry and the quest for 'spiritual enlightenment' began to blur — and the scientific community distanced itself from the drug. One of the best-known catalysts in this transition was Timothy Leary, a doctoral psychologist from Harvard University, who turned LSD from a scientific interest into a cult. Recruiting Harvard students as disciples, Leary's clinical LSD experiments at Harvard in the 1960s attracted more willing participants than could be accommodated, creating a black market for the drug on campus among those who missed out. By 1967, Leary had abandoned any pretense to scientific research. To a gathering of 30,000 hippies at the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco, he prescribed the catch phrase, "turn on, tune in, drop out". As LSD became increasingly associated with drug abuse, student riots and anti-war demonstrations, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) moved swiftly to classify LSD as a Schedule 1 drug under the Federal Controlled Substances Act of 1970. Worldwide prohibition followed in 1971.
Readers' comments
|
COSMOS newsletter!Receive regular updates highlighting the latest in science from COSMOS. Latest News |
||
Arguments against LSD research don't make sense
If those are the best criticisms that people can come up with, then I find that pretty reassuring.
LSD causes long-lasting psychoses? The risk is only 1 in 50000 of a "psychosis lasting longer than 48 hours", and we have good treatments for that. And they seldom occur in people without preexisting mental disease, which can be screened for.
Flashbacks could be caused by subtle brain damage? Or, they could not. Let's do the research. Are flashbacks all that harmful, compared with the side effects that other drugs can cause? (Weight gain, word-finding difficulties, rash, osteoporosis, immune suppression, seizures, etc.) Nobody ever died from a flashback. Some people even like them.
It would be a brave ethics committee that would approve the use of a drug that could cause harm? Well, I guess Tylenol's out, then. And penicillin. In fact, any prescription drug can cause harm. That's why they're not over-the-counter.
Batey can't see the benefits of being forced to hallucinate? Maybe he should ask then why other people DO see the benefits. Maybe there's something about it he's missed. In any case, cluster headache sufferers benefit from a sub-hallucinogenic dose, so it's an irrelevant comment.
Published data is only anecdotal? This is actually an argument in FAVOR of randomized placebo-controlled trials.
If it's as good as its protagonists suggest, it would have been taken up by the drug companies long ago? What, a drug long out of patent that only needs to be taken once every three to six months? Sounds like a real moneymaker to me, and we all know that drug companies have patients' best interests at heart. That's why they're rushing to develop vaccines for tropical diseases that only Africans get.
In the case of cluster headache, there are compounds that act in a similar mechanism without the risk of flashbacks? True; they're called "psilocybin" and "lysergic acid amide". Not a good argument against psychedelics.
You'd have to control the dose extremely carefully because the drugs are potent in microgram amounts? Sure, and so's thyroid hormone, and I don't notice any problems dosing THAT. Modern technology has solved the problem of dosing things precisely.
There's absolutely no role for any substance that causes hallucinations? We'd better ban prednisone, then. And antiparkinsons medications. And benzodiazepines. Methysergide causes hallucinations in higher doses. It's easy to make a list of commonly prescribed drugs that cause hallucinations. There are a lot of them.
Despite the hype and propaganda, LSD is actually pretty safe, given appropriately in a controlled environment.
Flashbacks ? What flashbacks ?
Whats the scientific evidence that flashbacks are more than just a convenient myth for propaganda like this article?
Where's all these flashbacks ? I've never had any and I've never met anyone who has. Even if you meet someone who has, how do you know what they took was really acid ? Unless they are supported with rigorous research, such claims are merely myth.
I have actually had a few flashbacks
I can confirm that flashbacks do actually occur. I did LSD Several times, in college, over 13 years ago and I've had 3 flashbacks since. While they are not a myth, they also weren't threatening in any way. Not one lasted for more than a few minutes and none were anywhere close to a real "trip". In every case it was just trails from a light source or the hallucination of a wall or mirror bending. Quite fun, over quick, and no damage done. The last time I was driving and I saw the trails of the taillights of the cars in front of me for a few seconds which did not impare my driving in any way. They are making a mountain out of a molehill.
what flash backs
i have done lsd a few times it seems to make me a little more aware of what is going on around me , i have never had any horrible flash backs . the most i have seen on acid is thing bleeding into other things this overwellming jolt of happiness racing through my body i never once thought that i was going to die just dont eat to much youll freak youself out. LSD is a wonderful drug it makes you open up the only down fall is your fears seem to be 10X more scarrier than what they are that is why you need to be around the people that you most trust and care for to be there to enjoy it with you . just give LSD a chance in this world it is not a drug to kill yourself on that is why you shouldnt give it to certain people like crazzy pepople . i dont know what everyones proplem with LSD is , it is just a peace making drug that makes you feel good and relaxed .
Spiritual Use of Psychedelics
Not only are psychedelics like LSD and psilocybin useful as theraputic medicin a recent study done at Johns Hopkins University has shown that psilocybin can induce genuine spiritual or religious experience that has lasting beneficial effects.
It is no wonder that religions like Matrixism that promote the use of psychedelics are gaining in popularity.
psychedelic medicine, additional leads
The cluster headache research Wilde mentions and over a dozen other diseases and conditions for which psychedelics show promising treatments are described in "Psychedelic Medicines: New Evidence for Hallucinogens as Treatments" co-edited by Michael Winkelman and me. The 2-book set was published in June 2007 by Praeger/Greenwood. "Psychedelic Horizons" (2006) presents the speculation that powerfully positive emotional experiences (peak experiences, mystical experiences) sometimes caused by psychedelics may boost the immune system. The research has yet to be done on this. -- Tom Roberts
The acid test
I've had cluster headaches (CH) for around ten years. Every Autumn for ten weeks I used to average about 60 of these 'headaches' - about 150 hours of pain allegedly worse than childbirth. Since I'm a bloke I can't verify the childbirth bit but can't argue with the consultant who calls them the most painful thing we can suffer from.
Since I came across the clusterbuster website for CH sufferers that has done so much work in the use of psychedelics as a treatment all that has changed. For the first time I've missed an Autumn cycle, something 'prescribed' medicine just hasn't do for me in the past.
If anyone's in doubt as to what a CH attack is like search youtube, it's not pretty. The sooner this approach is taken more seriously for CH the better.
Cool Test done in the late 1950's (ART)
http://analogik.com/acid_trip/acid_trip.html
Yea, it has nothing to do with treating chronic/fatal illness, but still kinda interesting.
hysteria
This article reflects the irrational hysteria surrounding all drugs. It is natural for people to fear things they don't understand and have no experience of. Sadly, it is also natural for politicians and vested interests to take advantage of this fear to push their own interests - increasing their power and control.
Of course there are risks with drugs, as with all human activities. However, many drugs, such as LSD, have tremendous potential to benefit mankind when they are respected and used sensibly.
We don't legislate to prevent people eating too much junk food and watching too much TV, yet the societal and individual health consequences from such poor lifestyle choices dwarf even the worst case scenarios of allowing full individual freedom with regards to drugs. Such irrationality is driven by the 'War on Drugs' propaganda and the vested interests making money and increasing their control over people through the promotion of this "threat". Even with the most dangerous and addictive drugs, it is prohibition that causes most of the harm, not the drugs themselves.
It should be remembered that on any objective scale, LSD and MDMA are relatively safe (despite the lies generated by the anti-drug propaganda machinery). Nothing in life is completely without risk, but as adults we all have a right to make the risk/reward judgements for ourselves.
LSD
It's barely been a decade, since Timothy Leary was laid to rest, yet still the Western world, America particularly, remains in denial about this magical-molecular quantum leap, just as important as the discovery of DNA.
Just last year, John Hopkins U. studies showed that psilocybin can afford an enhanced spiritual awareness, not unlike the discoveries made in private by millions of people in the 1960-70's, and by the hundreds who tripped under the guidance of Leary & Alpert in Millbrook, NY. Smaller LSD revivals surfaced briefly in the early 1980's and 90's.
Psychedelics in general, manifest an awareness of the dual nature of man, the spiritual & the sexual, and as such tap into the basis of our humanity and cultural creativity. Leary & guests re-christened the moniker `LSD' to stand for `Let's Strip Down', in knowing anticipation of the inevitable, impending sexual arousal. Psychedelics allow the suspension of the ego, and thus an ability to sustain ecstatic sexual arousal for hours, in effect a `chemical Tantra'.
Only psychedelics have this inherent potential for awakening the unfettered ancient aspects of man. Pity they are not in accord with the desires of the religons and governments that enslave human consciousness, and deny us our most fundamental psychic rights, to maintain their power over us. Perhaps one day, far into the future, we shall overcome.