By Oliver Burkeman — 2018
Pollan’s illuminating history of hallucinogenic drugs reveals that their mystical and medical benefits are indivisible.
Read on www.theguardian.com
CLEAR ALL
In the world’s largest study on psychedelics and the brain, a team of researchers from The Neuro (Montreal Neurological Institute-Hospital) and Department of Biomedical Engineering of McGill University, the Broad Institute at Harvard/MIT, SUNY Downstate Health Sciences University, and Mila—Quebec...
The drug lowers brain barriers, allowing distant regions to talk and thoughts to flow more freely.
How magic mushrooms expand consciousness.
2
Once considered the quintessential party drug, MDMA (also known as “ecstasy,” “X,” or “molly”) is now experiencing a surge of interest in a completely different area: psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy.
LSD, or lysergic acid diethylamide, is a synthetic drug with potent psychedelic properties. Commonly known as acid, it was originally derived from compounds found in ergot, a fungus that grows on rye.
Have you ever had the feeling of your mind being outside your body—maybe looking down, or up, or across the room at yourself? About 10 percent of people report having had an out-of-body experience at least once.
Psychedelic drugs are making a quiet comeback, as a smattering of recent studies have demonstrated their medicinal potential. The latest finding suggests it is time to revisit LSD as a treatment for addiction.
In the 1950s a group of pioneering psychiatrists showed that hallucinogenic drugs had therapeutic potential, but the research was halted as part of the backlash against the hippy counterculture.
Risky pursuits like BASE jumping offer a buzz better than any drug. New technologies provide the same rush without the danger.
For a long time, research into flow states was subjective—researchers had to rely on people’s self-reported experiences to understand altered states of mind.
1