Related: Hypercard was inspired by an LSD trip which Bill explains in an interview (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bdJKjBHCh18)
HyperCard and Timothy Leary's Mind Mirror would be a match made in heaven!
Timothy Leary's Mind Mirror (1985) (usc.edu)
https://scalar.usc.edu/works/timothy-leary-software/index
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32578683
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9oabRxvjf9k
I extracted all the text and data from the Apple ][ floppy disk:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37486524
https://donhopkins.com/home/mind-mirror.txt
https://github.com/SimHacker/lloooomm/tree/main/00-Character...
> His open-source approach democratized psychedelic exploration, shifting power away from costly retreats and elite gatekeepers toward broader accessibility.
No surprise that, in keeping with the hacker spirit, Bill wanted to democratize information that is otherwise accessible only to "high" priests.
If you have ever had the experience you will want to share with the world and give everyone the opportunity to experience it.
Is this different from regular DMT?
Yes. Regular DMT is N,N-DMT, Atkinson's Jaguar is 5-MeO-DMT. They have been referred to as "the power and the glory" respectively. 5-MeO-DMT is regarded as one of the most powerful and profound psychedelics, even when compared to N,N-DMT.
- [deleted]
Off-topic, but I have to...
(From the photo caption) "Bill ... with his iphone prototype"
Nope. That's a Sony Magic Link, built by Bill (and others, myself included) during his time at General Magic. I feel General Magic is another one of Bill's endeavors that isn't widely understood or appreciated.
Hi there. I will correct the iPhone prototype reference. Thanks for the heads up. - Axle / www.patternproject.ca
There was a great documentary on Magic Leap! https://www.generalmagicthemovie.com
That is a great documentary, but it's about General Magic, not Magic Leap.
Yep. I can be seen briefly in one scene, listening intently in the background while Marc Porat waxes poetic.
This is my favourite documentary on tech! If you know more please let me know
Who are you sir? I am a big fan of the general magicians
My name is Jay. I guess I was one of the "lesser" magicians. I worked on the Telescript side, doing infrastructure for the Telescript engine. But I got to interact with both Bill and Andy, and Phil and Tony, who I followed to further ventures. My experience at General Magic was certainly eye opening and super educational.
I am on the fence with these topics because I have years of fear drilled into me. These topics are a taboo and I have rarely ever tried anything at all. The experiences did not ruin me, they made me more curious about my brain in a positive way. But the social taboo lingers.
What surprises me the most is that we have accepted sugar, alcohol, cigarettes and a ton of mass manufactured food which are harming us. I am struggling with high blood glucose for 12 years. Yet, the substance which I can grow in my* own backyard and may actually not be as harmful is just brainwashed out of my limits.
edits: you to me
As a similar "Boy Scout" of sorts, the fear is/was real. I didn’t experiment with so much as nicotine or alcohol until I’d tried “stuff” with the supervision of an experienced "sitter"; I ended up having some of the best times of my life in the safety and context of home and friendships. Combined with my own life experiences with drug abuse and addictions, I was able to build a healthy relationship with those substances that didn't result in dependency or abuse.
In the time since, my views have changed dramatically on these substances, and I'd like to try more of them. However, my personal moral compass prevents me from using substances outside of a legally permissible setting, at least at present - and that's something I'm fine with.
Ultimately, the taboo side of things is something the individual has to grapple with on their own. I can only commiserate with your frustrations, not help overcome them unfortunately. My only other advice would be to use any substance only to amplify good vibes, never to cope with bad ones.
If all you do is chase a lost feeling, you're missing out on what's in front of you now.
Is there that much of a social taboo? Maybe it's just the people I hang out with and work with, but most people are open to psychedelic use and a lot have at least tried some.
Some people’s conception of “normal people” is people on the bus or train.
Some people’s conception of “normal people” is people at a church ice cream social.
Different perspectives, I think.
Yes, it’s your bubble. There are American states still charging people over marijuana. Having grown up Christian I personally know people in their 30s who view psychedelic and heroin users similarly. Those people would have the opposite view of you.
Years back, my friend’s parents asked me to stage an intervention for him after they found out he regularly took LSD. He was 19 at the time.
Growing up my friend’s dad was a conservative christian and a frequent caller into conservative talk radio shows. There was a state referendum to legalize marijuana, so I asked what he thought. “Of course it should be legal. It says right there in Genesis—God said: I give you every herb bearing seed upon the Earth. What could be more clear-cut than that?”
- [deleted]
- [deleted]
I live in a Republican state where marijuana is illegal
Farm bill and delta-8 really flipped that whole table though
Yeah, but our legislature banned that too
Texas? :(
I used that exact same image for ma Atkinson Dithering Algo Learning Page https://atkinson.franzai.com/
Ok, where is this psychedelic community found?
I must sample their handles for videogame character names.
> Ok, where is this psychedelic community found?
Bit like asking where all the beer drinkers are! People who are into psychedelics come from all walks of life and we're everywhere :) Start talking about fringe stuff with people and eventually you'll stumble upon others.
The article mentions Erowid
There are some decent communities in Discord, for both research oriented but also hobby oriented communities of psychedelics.
Burning man and other festivals are a good resource
Bill disliked the expensive retreat hurdle.
Visit your local Hobby Lobby and ask around.
Is the world's most powerful psychedelic the personal computer, or is it 5-MeO-DMT (Jaguar)? Not having tried the latter, and therefore speaking from a position of ignorance, I'm inclined toward the former. I think Timothy Leary agreed with me.
Having experience with a lot of psychedelics it's completely ridiculous to put the personal computer in that category.
Timothy Leary might've drawn a parallel on the psychological impact of computers (I have no idea on the exact quote or it's context), which is enormous, but computers are just not psychedelic.
We need to push to make this stuff legal. I wouldn't go so far as to say lets sell it OTC vape pens at gas stations but a middle ground where you can go to a doctor to have this treatment performed.
I personally have never taken DMT though from everything I've read and heard on podcasts it's not something to be taken lightly. I think having a sort of "DMT Clinic" that you can go to would be the best middle ground of allowing the public access to these substances while also ensuring that there is a trained professional there to guide you through the process.
Saying "trained professional" in this context feels wired because this stuff has been underground for so long but I think it's starting to bubble up into the mainstream enough that we need to start bringing all that "into the light". Lets have training programs that teach people how to administer this stuff properly, how to deal with the negative side effects, etc.
One of the things that while I find understandable is ridiculous is the fact that Bill had to use a pseudonym in the community. I feel like if were at the point where you have C-suite types at Apple taking this stuff, it's time to think about making it available to the broader public.
N,N-DMT is very intense and not to be taken lightly - but you could say the same with LSD, psilocybin, etc. Personally, I am much more wary of large doses of LSD/psilocybin than DMT, in part to the substantially longer duration of the former. Ego death and the complete dissolution of reality makes it harder to have a bad trip
I'd generally agree with you, but:
When time stops until the end of this universe gives way to the beginning of this universe and the snake eats it's tail, "longer" doesn't hold much meaning...> substantially longer duration of the formerTrue, I should have qualified "actual" duration, not perceived duration!
"I think having a sort of "DMT Clinic" that you can go to would be the best middle ground "
Well, Ayahuasca (with DMT as the active ingredient) retreats seem more and more common and are for some reasons tolerated more and more in europe. Technically it is illegal, but I can still book them online.
But I won't, as I don't trust the competence of the average new age "shaman".
I dislike the idea of potential life threatening toxicity, the constant vomiting, the feeling like shit for days.
Ayahuasca trips seem to be like edging with poison. But maybe the documentary I saw was biased.
"But maybe the documentary I saw was biased."
Seems like it.
I did it one time and there was no vomitting and feeling great the day after.
But that maybe was, because the plant that was used was apparently not so strong. So yes, it is from natural plants, that can have very different concentrations. I suppose this is what the documentary means with life threatening poisening? Getting a plant that had a unusual high concentration?
But I never heard of those horror stories from people who do it regulary. (Vomitting is quite normal, though) Otherwise I have limited knowledge in that area, but I do know with mushrooms for example, you can use different ones of the same species to mix them to average out concentration differences. I assume the same can be done with Ayuahasca. But like I said, I would not recommend the commercial retreats anyway.
(I did it when I was invited into a ceremony in a remote place by people who were not frauds)
Fwiw, "DMT" usually refers to nn-DMT, which is a lot different than 5-MeO-DMT (or bufo).
The state of Oregon is experimenting along these lines:
https://www.oregon.gov/oha/ph/preventionwellness/pages/psilo...
"A client may only access psilocybin at a licensed service center during an administration session in the presence of a trained, licensed facilitator."
Oregon had gone with a broader decriminalization as of February 1, 2021, but rolled that back in 2024: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_Oregon_Ballot_Measure_110
Agree, but the proponents of "Big Reality" really really really fight against its disruption.
Could you explain what you mean by that? Who are the proponents of “big reality”? How do they fight against its disruption?
Psychedelics challenge the post-Enlightenment project of "rational" adulthood. Western civilization has a deep myth: the myth of necessary order - a yoking of rationality, order, and progress together into what forms the basis for modernity. Psychedelics cannot have intrinsic value outside of rationality, so, they must either be accepted on the basis of rationality and order or face rejection. We express this using the rational basis of improved mental health. The contradiction of course is obvious; psychedelics provide us with profoundly irrational experiences that don't obviously fit into our cultural value system.
The point is that western civilization values rationality, order, and progress in a self-justifying way. The values that our culture provides to us form a feedback cycle of myth and virtue. Every argument that assumes this basis, reinforces its truth.
"Order is obviously preferable to chaos", is one of many subjective perspectives. Why should it hold more truth than "Plurality of perspectives are obviously preferable to the fragility of one perspective for the sake of objectivity"? The apparatuses of the state[1] all rely on the same cultural myth and promote it in a way that crowds out all possible alternatives. Thus the myth of necessary order has become synonymous with reality.
Like all deeply rooted cultural myths, this is something that's going to appear obviously true which coincidentally serves as a way of shielding it from honest critique. If there's one thing that I've learned, it's that questioning foundational myths feels like a cultural violation. René Girard’s theory holds; when a community is anxious or unstable, it lashes out most viciously at people who somehow threaten its central, but unspoken, truths or anxieties. The greater the received response that a cultural axiom obviously true; the more certain I am that it reflects a core cultural myth than any semblance of reality.
1. See Louis Althusser, Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses, 1970.
The sheer existence of established and (partially) self-reinforcing sets of cultural standards doesn't strike me as a good basis to explore the fundamental complement of it all, or to describe it altogether as something assuredly misleading and "bad". This should be especially apparent if you've ever tried creating something that is self-justifying (it's usually a hard, valuable, and sought after effort).
Put differently, while an idea being established and self-justifying doesn't necessarily mean it's exclusive in these traits and should be bolted in, sure, an idea being fringe also doesn't necessarily mean it's unjustly fringe at all, or that it's being unfairly discriminated against. To claim so without evidence is little more than conspiratorial thinking and self-victimization.
It further sounds really quite self-serving to paint e.g. me as some misguided sheep part of some malicious cabal for this. It's a little more than just a variation on the all too common ill faith ways of argumentation; mixing in the semantic specifics of psychedelic experiences, name dropping people, movements, and quotes, and deferring to a "specific" culture's particularities serves at most as a distraction from this.
It's a joke. People often have conspiracy theories about Big Pharma trying to prevent access to novel drugs that could disrupt their cash cows. The parent was jokingly talking about "Big Reality" as an imaginary group of people who hate to see "reality" disrupted by psychedelic experiences.
When someone has a profound psychedelic experience that shows them the arbitrary nature of many social constructs, or reveals possibilities for consciousness that mainstream science doesn't acknowledge... that's genuinely disruptive to systems built on those constructs.
The resistance is real, systematic, and rational (from the perspective of maintaining current power arrangements). Not a joke.
I'm curious whether you think that resistance is genuinely adversarial or more based on ignorance and institutional inertia.
For example, someone might have insights about the interconnectedness of all life and wants to transition to regenerative agriculture or communal land use, but face zoning laws that enforce individual property ownership. Or someone might experience ego dissolution and wants to create more egalitarian workplace structures, but runs into rigid corporate hierarchies.
Moloch devours breakthrough potential not through conspiracy but through everyone rationally optimizing for their individual/local situation while collectively producing suboptimal outcomes.
Individual insight doesn't map to institutional action. Systems can't integrate experiences they can't measure or systematize.
I do think that there are some truths to government desire for narrative management, too. It is unwise to be a hugger in a knife fight, and you don't want the populace to get high, see God, and deteriorate national security.
All in all though, it all boils down to life being complicated. The resistance isn't adversarial - it's structural. Which makes it both less intentionally evil and harder to overcome.
As RAW wrote in Cosmic Trigger: "Why does the gnosis always get busted?"
I took it as being a joke in the way "the matrix" was "a movie"
That’s an amazing sentence…
A wise legalization might help with access & harm-reduction... but legalizations are sometimes bungled.
In the SF bay area – & plenty of other regions around the world – the criminal enforcement against hallucinogens is, de facto, a very low priority as long as you're not flagrantly endangering or inconveniencing others.
Last year I underwent treatments for my treatment-resistant major depression using Ketamine. It was a clinical setting, where you'd get wired up to blood pressure, pulse-ox, and other monitors while you were monitored by an RN via video camera. This was IV Ketamine, so not the inhalants that are available now. According to the clinic, the inhalants (which they also offered) are also generally less effective than IV, and the IV was safer in my case because I have other medical conditions where being able to "shut it off" was a good thing - you can turn an IV off, but once you inhale, you're on your own.
So... this clinic was not entirely unlike what you're proposing w/ DMT.
FWIW, the results were incredible. I was effectively "cured." But unfortunately my insurance changed, and it became no longer covered, and I couldn't afford the $2000 every six weeks for the treatment anymore. And it's not super convenient to take two hours off from work to go to the trip-sitter's to get the treatments.
I hope that they figure out what it is in psychadelics that make them effective at treating stuff like depression and PTSD and make it more accessible because it seems like there's so much potential there.
(Also: fuck Elon Musk for making Ketamine a punchline)
I like the potential healing value of Ketamine.
But that doesn't make replacing every instance of ketamine with "horse tranquilizer" any less funny.
"wired" -> weird
immediately jogged my memory for one of my favorite stupid Simpsons moments:
"why, there's no magazine called 'Weird' is there?" [0]
[dead]
I hope research with psilocybin, DMT, and other psychedelics continue and that some of these possible discoveries pan out.
Example that just came across my news feed: "psilocin, a byproduct of consuming psilocybin, the active ingredient in psychedelic mushrooms, extended the cellular lifespan of human skin and lung cells by more than 50%."
https://neurosciencenews.com/psilocybin-longevity-aging-2942...
I have not used 5-meo, but for n,n DMT the vape is without a doubt the most convenient method.
I've done it a few times. Unlike DMT, you don't have to vaporize it.
It's active intranasally and well as buccally/sublingually.
Effects-wise, it feels roughly identical to DMT but with a longer duration.
As someone who has done a lot of both (as well as drank ayahuasca several hundred times), they are completely different animals especially at the full-dose levels.
Several hundred times? There's a story there…
Maybe, maybe not. It's just life when you work at a center :)
To me it feels like a completely different drug compared to nnDMT. 5-meo-DMT also feels very different depending on the roa from my experience (vaped vs IM)
Ah, a fellow "I've IM'ed tryptamines" person.
I made this mistake exactly once, with 4-AcO-DMT.
That was the last time I ever did such a thing.
Can you expand on this? I just so happen to have evrything to try this, but never even considered it.
I dissolved 20mg of 4-AcO-DMT in 1mL of bacteriostatic water in a sealed, sterile vial and then injected it intramuscularly into my glute.
(If you do this, make sure you inject the upper-outer quadrant. The closer to your midline you go, the further the risk of you hitting a nerve.)
If you're very experienced and want to do it for novelty's sake, go for it; I'd warn you, but anyone considering this should know what they're likely in for.
Nearly immediately after injection, I became so filled with vibrating, psychedelic energy I thought my soul was going to be ripped from my body. I had to clutch the edge of the sink, trying not to vomit while staring at the exploding fractals swirling in the metallic reflection.
It only lasts about 2 hours. I'd not particularly rate the experience as "good".
Thank you for this, astral traveler
Expand on roa effect difference?
I found it significantly less visual. As in, about as immersive, but somewhat lacking visual depth/detail to things. But everyone's different anyway.
I'm skeptic about psychedelic. Is there enough unbiased research about these stuffs? I myself is interested in it too but so far it is in general illegal in Canada, and I don't consider myself knowledgeable enough to try it out.
there are plenty of psychedelics legal in Canada, I know of a few chemical suppliers that specialize in this. It's been at least a decade since I last ordered from them, but they are still in bussines.
However you said that your not knowledgeable and I guess that you doesn't have access to a milligrams scale, so your better to stay away and learn the theory first. A lot of psilocybin analog (alpha-MethylTryptamine was one of my favorite and it's still available) from Thikal are still legal in Canada so that book is a good place to start learning.
There is not enough research because, at least in the US, there was a blanket ban on any research since 1970 when most psychedelics were placed on "Schedule I" - meaning they had "no accepted medical use" and "high potential for abuse."
"Big Reality" was either terrified of everyone becoming drooling monkeys, or people seeing behind the curtain of society, depending on who you ask.
Not a big fan of the ongoing productisation of transcendental, possibly brain-scrambling experiences. Keeping them somewhat less accessible tends to filter out people who don't do their homework to understand the substance and who consider it just another novel experience to try on a whim, which increases the risk of negative outcomes.
I disagree. Every time I've seen someone get a "bad trip", they're people who read a lot and worked themselves into a state of anxiety over the fact that something could go wrong. If they had just approached it like "ooh lets get high and have fun" rather than "I have to do X, Y, Z or else it's going to be horrible!", they would have probably been OK. Hallucinogens have way too much gatekeeping and mysticalization around them for what they are.
Understanding the risks of buying potentially adulterated or counterfeit products is another thing entirely, which would be helped greatly by increased commodification and legalization.
I know two people who had prolonged psychotic episodes, as in, for weeks they were in their own world. These were both people who had many fun/enjoyable experiences beforehand.
I myself have had bad / hell like experiences a small percentage of the time, despite literal hundreds of good experiences prior.
Becoming a father many years ago significantly altered my trip experience.
Dosage also plays a strong role..
These things are generally less toxic than alcohol and it is criminal to punish someone for having them or using them.. But they are also extremely powerful, and despite potential amazing experiences, do carry risks.
And they are definitely not for everyone.
Also worth noting that persistent negative effects do not require a bad trip. You can have a wonderful time and still have long lasting issues.
Can you explain how it changed after being a father?
I tripped a lot in my early 20s, a whole lot, and never had a bad time. Well, I had some uncomfortable experiences, but not what I can now call a bad trip.
One of my first times after, in my experience, I literally went to hell. I was convinced I was on the outskirts, all the people at the party around me were demons, I was about to be tortured forever, and I was never going to see my son again and he was going to grow up without me..
I convinced myself I was in that position because I had wrecked and killed someone, and my punishment was forever replaying the experiencing of a life where I would grow up to have a son, only to have him ripped away from me, reminded of what I did, and then tortured for some nearly eternal amount of time....
Any conversations people had with me at the time, I heard the words they were saying but completely twisted the meaning of the words to fit whatever crazy narrative was going on in my head.
This has happened 4 or 5 times. Despite being familiar with the experience, in my mind it just reinforces that I am in a "loop" at the time, about to be tortured again..
It's happened with LSD, Mushrooms, and surprisingly even ketamine. *edit it also happened during an intense changa experience with a shaman in Tijuana, which was my most intense experience with anything to date..
You'd think I would not take this stuff anymore =p I have at least slowed down considerably...
Regarding your trip to hell, I'm interested to know if you have a lifelong belief in heaven and hell, or if it came by itself during the trip.
As an atheist with no supernatural beliefs (that I know of), I wonder if a trip on LSD for me would just be boring, or if these supernatural things become real during a trip even if you don't truly believe in them.
You don't need religion or other beliefs - LSD has a strong body high, it feels good even if you don't get strong visual hallucinations. I gather that there are strong conditioning effects that determine what people see when they do hallucinate though - you won't encounter anything you had no concept of in the first place.
It's unlikely you'd find it boring simply because you're an atheist. The experience is typically quite intense, although it's dose-dependent as well as setting-dependent. I'm agnostic but my own experience was a heightened sense of panpsychism which went away later, because my rational, scientific mind didn't find the idea highly plausible.
I am definitely influenced by Christianity..
Regardless of your beliefs, whatever your experience, I highly doubt you would find it "boring".
I can't even imagine that really, it would take a very boring person.
I've heard a lot of acid stories, but never "I was just kind of bored"
Whilst that might true as per your observations, I've also seen people do zero research, take a substance in the wrong place/frame of mind, and subsequently had a more turbulent experience than they were expecting
Yes to both.
We often attract certain types of people, and have a wealth of experience with that type.
We probably all take this as obvious knowledge. But only when I uncomfortably enter a group of people unlike me -- and feel totally alienated not just by their norms and assumptions, but their misunderstandings of my own -- only then do I truly confront the implications in a visceral, non-academic sense :)
That's true with anything, though.
I have a family member who jumped off a balcony on LSD and needed extensive reconstructive facial surgery. I'd call that a pretty bad trip. It's kind of kept me away from anything more than mushrooms.
I suppose this is a dangerous counterargument to make, especially as I'm not a substance user at all myself, but... what's wrong with wanting to seek out novel experiences? I'd much rather folks who wish to do this be able to do so safely, with good sources of information about those risks and with a support network that is allowed to talk about it. I feel like the taboo nature of substances in general causes folks with this interest to hide it from their peers, exactly the people who would otherwise be first in line to spot problems and offer assistance. Shouldn't it be okay to talk about it?
Four entered the garden: Ben Azzi, Ben Zoma, Acher and Akiva. One looked and died. One looked and was harmed. One cut down all the trees. And one entered in peace and departed in peace.
I didn't know this story, but thanks for pointing this out. It's scary how people in this thread talk about hallucinogens like they could not ruin your life.
Citing Sam Harris:
“Ingesting a powerful dose of a psychedelic drug is like strapping oneself to a rocket without a guidance system. One might wind up somewhere worth going, and, depending on the compound and one’s “set and setting,” certain trajectories are more likely than others. But however methodically one prepares for the voyage, one can still be hurled into states of mind so painful and confusing as to be indistinguishable from psychosis.”
“This is not to say that everyone should take psychedelics. As I will make clear below, these drugs pose certain dangers. Undoubtedly, some people cannot afford to give the anchor of sanity even the slightest tug.”
Lemme guess, Ben Zoma was the peaceful one?
Nope! Rabbi Akiva, who, as the story goes, was an illiterate shepherd until he started studying in his 40s, and went on to become one of the most renowned scholars of his era. This is why some Jewish tradition teaches that for mystical study, one should wait until the age of 40
They are totally OK as long as healthcare is not socialized.
There's angles to socialization. If a person with brain issues gets free doctor visits and a medicine, that is at cost to society.
If they are safe to be around and are able to hold a job or have children, then there's societal benefits gained. One could consider the treatment costs as investments.
If that person was untreated and they did something unpleasant or bad in public, or ended up in prison, that also has a cost to society though it might be more complex to quantify.
You are assuming treatment benefits, but the comment was about "recreational" use and its consequences.
Does that line of reasoning extend to things like fast food and motorcycles in your eyes? Not trying to undermine your point, just genuinely curious.
I think motorcyclists should pay more for health insurance insurance considering they will use it way more often no matter how well a driver they are, the risks are simply always present.
If they die more often in accidents, and their organs are harvested from that, they should pay less though, right?
I was going to say that but apparently motorcyclists only make up a small percent of organ donation
> things like fast food and motorcycles in your eyes?
motorcycles...? in... my eyes?
What wizardry is this? First "computers in my brain", now this. I'll have the singularity that you're smoking pls :)
EDIT: was at first genuinely confused, and then tickled by my own misunderstanding
I don't see why not. Maybe no need to ban altogether, but a heavy tax on both might be useful. For motorbikes maybe just exclude accidents from coverage.
I guess they aren’t very widespread anymore, but should this cover police who ride motorbikes? Or farm/ranch workers (they might ride ATVs)?
I guess we could do something like:
But I think we will have trouble puzzling out the last term!<normal coverage> - <adjustment for risky behavior> + <adjustment for pro-social outcomes>One has to draw the line somewhere. What you are doing is called a slippery slope fallacy.
I’m not sure it is a slippery slope. With a slippery slope we expand the scenario through a sequence of “if X, when what’s to stop Y,” right?
Motorcycle cops are an obvious subset of people who ride motorcycles. It isn’t an extension at all to include them in your logic.
ATVs might be more of an extension. But, I bet if we wanted to we could find all sorts of jobs that are more dangerous than motorcycle riding.
(Edit: just to be specific, you say we have to draw the line somewhere. Well, then where?)
There's a long list of topics where this particular reasoning could draw a line somewhere. It is unfeasible and pointless to cover them all unless they are all banned or all allowed (this essentially is the current state +- AFAIK).
I'd say it is worth looking at redrawing that based on the maximum effect achieved. Drugs would be at the top of this list, followed by motor vehicle use and unhealthy foods. There is probably not enough justification to go beyond the 3.
I’m not clear on what the effect actually is. If it is cost reduction, not sure where motorcycles should be on the list (they are probably more costly for life insurance agencies than for health insurance ones…).
I guess I’ve been beating around the bush, but my point is that targeting drugs specifically for this sort of thing would seem kind of, I dunno, puritanical to me (as someone who doesn’t partake). I’d rather just insure everybody and hope they don’t hurt themselves, just out of their own self interest.
Puritanical is just a label here that you slap on the idea you don't like. In the US drug overdoses are the top cause of death under 35. I have no idea how to properly estimate severe harm that does not result in death but if you take say war as the first approximation, you can 4x the deaths to get non-fatal severe cases.
- [deleted]
That has been various governments approach to drugs for literally decades and it got us nowhere.
The problem isnt that this still is casually available. Drugs have been casually available since forever.
The problem is that pushing drug usage to the fringes makes it less safe for people who haven’t done their homework. Ironically the exact opposite of that you claimed.
You're right. I'm all for across-the-board decriminalisation btw. But I don't really know where a responsible balance would be for psychedelic availability, my intuition is we shouldn't be aiming at OTC disposable DMT vapes etc.
Perhaps administration of the drug from a professional? Make the treatment an affordable and legal option.
The difficulty here is professional skill entails money, money entails risk management, risk management entails legalities.
The only way in the US is to have a powerful lobby that can fight to ensure broad waivers stand up in court, like the NRA: you can buy a gun and literally shoot yourself in the foot.
But if transaction, money, service, profession are all removed, then under a co-op / non profit this might work. Of course, those structures are also vulnerable to well-funded legal opponents.
Some European countries do provide a framework for this but it's more from a public health perspective and to eliminate the raison-d'être of criminal drug organizations.
That sounds awful. I'll stick to my home and nature
I think with psychedelics it's fine. The problems you're talking about are with addictive stimulants.
With psychedelics the risk profile is very different. Firstly, people can do harmful things during the trip. Second, a more vague, difficult to measure and predict concern around long term psychological effects to some people.
Right, my pronoun is dangling here. "It" was meant to refer to the status quo of making them inaccessible without a lot of difficulty and breaking the law.
The thing that bothers me the most are the companies out here trying to get psychedelics to a state where they own the tech and can try to make as much money as possible off of it. Not so much the part where it becomes more available with consistent quality for more users.
I was getting ads for MindMed's clinical trials of their LSD analogue a few months back and was considering signing up for it, as I'm totally down with more scientific research on these compounds. However, the idea that a corporation with a patent on an analogue that is lobbying to make it so their version is the one that is approved is kinda the worst. We already have LSD, it's cheap and it's amazing, yet here we are marching down the road of some patented version being the one that's approved for use. I get that these companies want to fund research, but this isn't the way.
Welcome to the USA. Psychedelics are just the tip of an iceberg here. There's shit like highly effective cough medicines or antidepressants available in other countries which show promise in saving lives but nope mired in patent stuff and corrupt regulation...
https://lfpress.com/news/local-news/european-cough-medicine-...
> do their homework to understand the substance
Is that actually the common thing to do amongst recreational psychadelics users (i.e. is there research backing this up)?
And how do these folks "understand the substance(s)"? We (humanity) know very little about how the brain works comparatively as far as I'm aware, and psychadelics research is further relatively lacking due to regulatory and funding constraints. Most resources I hear of just seem to be compilations of anecdata, frequently muddled with subjective remarks.
I can only speak for my own circle that I know about where test kits are the norm. Anecdata isn't ideal but it does seem to be valuable as long as the reader considers both positive and negative reports equally and understands the risks rather than just yoloing. I still consider Erowid a great harm reduction resource, TripSit wiki is also fantastic, and I very much support the approach taken by the Subjective Effect Index website.
I see, fair enough. I'd be just hesitant to say "xy keeps yz from doing zx" without data, cause it sounds like a claim (or even a fact) rather than an opinion/anecdote, and it's pretty hard to pick up on this difference.
We were able to clarify it and we're both being decent sports about the topic, but you can imagine how well this might go over in less careful and open minded situations. Or even desperate ones.
It also makes doing your homework a lot harder. If I want to buy alcohol, I can go to a shop and can get something that’s correctly labeled with an alcohol percentage and is highly unlikely to contain methanol.
If I go buy some psychedelic, chances are it is diluted or laced, so I would have to know how to test that what they sell me is what I asked for.
There are jurisdictions where it's legal, and shops that will ship it virtually anywhere. The product is pure, tested, and consistent.
Of course you have to find such a shop (hint: try Canada), and it's still a lot of hassle for something that should be perfectly legal, and is, in many places.
Incidental gatekeeping by leaving it on the black market isn't the way to keep it safe, quite the opposite - that poses a lot of dangerous risks.
Bringing it into the light under thoughtful consideration and openly discussing and encouraging harm prevention is the only way to make this safe. Everyone should have the right to to exploring this if they want to, and there should be plenty of open discussion, research, and education. I really appreciate the open-source approach here, the spirit of this movement feels like the right thing for humanity.
I'm of very two minds on this topic. On one hand, it's widely accepted that most (not to say all) drugs leave a permanent mark on brains that are not yet fully developed, so teenagers who are often most curious about these things. Gated access is highly desirable in this context, especially as you can't take self regulation for granted. On the other hand, many of these substances show great promise in many clinical trials for a wide variety of issues, and decades of hostile legislation has kept all of that on the back foot. Openly sharing information about these topics can help people make more informed choices whereas those who came before them often had to go it blind.
I'd be interested in seeing specifics on brain development. When are they "fully developed" or what is a sufficient point that they could be considered to be. What other things do we practice that should be gated around brain development?
Yeah - I feel like we need a little bit more of a stripped down approach to drugs in the US. If you’re 18 or under, there need to be a lot of restrictions because we know for a fact that a lot of these things have a profound negative impact on brain development, and we also know that we don’t even fully understand the extent to which various mind altering substances can impact development. It’s just safer to say “no” until then as much as I am loath to endorse anything remotely akin to prohibition culture.
Teens will always get their hands on things so it’s up to parents to teach kids how to be safe around drugs and alcohol, but I know I personally will be really trying to communicate to my kids that they need to wait until they’re 18 to really start exploring all this stuff. I know they will before that, but as long as it’s a little experimentation here and there and not regular use I’ll consider it a success.
Once you’re past 18 or so, it needs to be all about education and general availability for most substances. Safe usage and community protections (such as not driving while intoxicated) should be the #1 goal.
> I know they will before that
I'm curious in what demographic/location context you're in to say that. As a teen I wasn't aware of anyone in my social circles experimenting with drugs and would estimate usage to be <10% and from very particular kinds of people.
Teenagers (in the US) before they go to college pretty typically at least try weed and alcohol at some point. Whether or not they tell their parents is a different story entirely
I was on a student exchange in the US at age ~15 and was offered both weed and alcohol. Funnily enough, weed seemed to be easier to get since dealers don't care about your age. For alcohol you needed to find someone older than 21 who'd buy it for you.
> Keeping them somewhat less accessible tends to filter out people who don't do their homework
I strongly disagree. Your circles might be different, but in my experience, wanting to do your homework makes it less accessible, because it tends to put you at odds with the people who are otherwise eager to grant you access. They want people with a certain mindset and an up-front faith in the process. They want people who aren't careful about ingesting psychoactive substances, are eager to put their mental health in the hands of some guy they barely know, and are going to blame their own baggage or spiritual shortcomings if it doesn't go well.
These drugs, and many others, are already pretty accessible if you are willing to take that heedless approach.
In contrast, the approach described in the article is expressly tailored for people who want to be careful and do their homework. It's for people who have access to the drug and implicitly already have access to cruder ways of using it, but who want to put in extra effort for a more controlled experience.
> Keeping them somewhat less accessible
I agree this is important, which is why psychedelics should be legalized so there is at least some sort of control instead of the current approach where 14 year olds can easier get their hands on it.
I’m fine with ‘less accessible’ - I am not fine with ‘criminal.’
Basically this. Many times I've gotten too casual with them and then been reminded that they are not a party drug. Persistent HPPD(ok, redundant) and long lasting anxiety and/or motor issues(tics).. inability to focus. It's great that there are people who can gobble psychs like candy and not have issues(that they're aware of anyway) but they need to chill on trying to get everyone to trip out. I get it. I felt that "everyone should try this" vibe. But seriously, no. Don't take people's psychology lightly.
The high horse of HN generally suggests that every person on the planet does empirical research on every step of their journey through life. I've personally seen several, otherwise normal people, one-shot their brain into purgatory with hallucinogens.
I feel similar about this productisation but for slightly different reasons. Psychedelics can provide a sacred experience, at least they have for me, and I treat each psychedelic experience I have as a sacred ritual. It’s a sacrament. So forcing them into the materialist, capitalist system we currently have just feels so wrong. It’d be like a company coming out with pre-blessed Eucharist cookies. But worse because what you are shown so often reveals how insidious capitalism is, and how there is so much more than the material realm. I know this is just my personal view and experience. Anyway, I don’t feel so bad about LightWand as the whole point was the open source, sharing nature.
- [deleted]
What if "dissolving the ego" is bad though?
That's what the ego would say.
Psychedelics are not some harmless cure-all. They can provide remarkable experiences, life affirming experiences and being quite effective against depression. They can also cause some pretty scary and bad times. So they need to be treated with respect. But I think they're well worth exploring.
Thousands of years of Buddhist practice says it isn't
For the technological context and result:
https://www.folklore.org/Joining_Apple_Computer.html
Still very sad that HyperCard got sidelined and that even its successor, Livecode abandoned the idea of being available to everyone --- though it looks as if folks are still working that:
This is off-topic, we are discussing drugs here.
It's not off-topic, it's the intersection of two things that Bill Atkinson was extremely passionate about.
which the link in question references:
>Inspired by a mind-expanding LSD journey in 1985, I designed the HyperCard authoring system that enabled non-programmers to make their own interactive media.
Hypercard was inspired by an LSD trip.
Perhaps the gp's comment was written and posted whilst being smashed, and that's just one of the effects.
- [deleted]
thinking that our own judgement is better than a doctor judgement, supported by a vast community and shared knowledge, is epistemically interesting. Beware that I'm not saying that doctors, or the scientific community, can't be wrong, everyone can be wrong, even ourselves.
Personally, I'd rather have a proper doctor prescribe me said medicine than take it myself.
In an ideal world maybe, but in the real world, most doctors are conditioned by US propaganda and the War on Drugs. Their views are compromised.
Furthermore, I've had mixed experiences with health professionals. It took me 10 years across multiple clinics and states to get diagnosed with gout that I've had since at least my late teens. Laughed out of multiple doctor's offices because I'm a "healthy young male" even though each day and night was filled with excruciating pain and drastically reduced mobility. "Full test panels" that specifically did not test my uric acid, because no healthy young male has gout.
No mention of gout ever to me, of course. I had to self diagnose as the disease progressed due to lack of treatment. Got my diagnosis confirmed by a physician's assistant, because both doctors at that clinic were on vacation at the same time for like the third time that quarter. He ordered a uric acid test, and was surprised that I'd never been offered one.
Both doctors had literally laughed me out of the office over the previous months. But I was persistent and it turns out the physician's assistant there was both more thorough and more knowledgeable than either doctor, helping me finally begin a path to treatment. I was damn near about to kill myself from a decade of extraordinary pain. From my discussions with older, typical gout sufferers, my case is extraordinarily bad and most of them only experience mild pain.
It's equally as silly to place 100% trust in doctors as it is to place 0% trust in them.
Isn't every medicine a drug, since a drug with medical application in the right dose is just called medicine?
No.
When there's millions of doctors, not only are there going to be more mediocre doctors than anything, but there has to be a bottom of the barrel as well.
It took me years to be diagnosed with PTSD, a problem I knew I had. Because I am not a vet, I had to go through every other diagnosis first -- schizo, bipolar, borderline -- each with a new set of pills to take. Some of the shrinks who diagnosed me wouldn't do anything but open my file, make some remarks, and fill out a prescription, with nary any eye contact.
Finally got a very expensive doctor who wasn't under the thumb of insurance companies. Her first question, upon hearing my issues, was "how is your sleep?" "I don't, really" was my reply. Screened me for PTSD and I clocked 76/80 pts. She set me up with the proper therapy, and within a year, I was screening at 30/80 pts. All it took was asking me one question that wasn't loaded towards the doctors favorite diagnosis & prescription.
With things the way they are, it's not hard to be more knowledgeable about a condition than your doctor. Doctors have to know about all the possible conditions people can have, I only have to know about the one I have, so I've spent more time researching it than the doctor.
If you don't know what's wrong with you, then a doctor is absolutely the way to go. But if you already have a diagnosis, you can go spend time researching it, the doctor isn't going to do that.
I'd say it's irrelevant. Doctors typically have no exposure, interest nor knowledge about these things. So they are not the ones to have an opinion about it.
We should fix that then. (Timothy Leary was in fact a doctor. Perhaps though his overly zealous enthusiasm for LSD makes him not the ideal example in this case though.)
Not sure tbh. This is still in its infancy and not "stable" enough for a bigger adoption rate. So while we're still researching I feel like it's ok that we don't get it out to the masses.
After seeing someone I love tortured for weeks at a hospital primarily because every one of the doctors was convinced they knew better than her -- I'm very much on the 'we can do just fine on our own' train. Do some research, use good sources, let docs stop you from bleeding out if it comes to that.
> thinking that our own judgement is better than a doctor judgement, supported by a vast community and shared knowledge, is epistemically interesting.
The medical community is concerned with physical health, mental health, ect.
The Psychedelic community is more like a religion; it is "vast" and there is a lot of "shared knowledge" if you go looking. The thing is, western medicine's purpose really isn't to do the kind of thing that psychedelics are for.
It's probably better not to conflate the two communities, because they use drugs for very different purposes.
A different way to say it: Don't confuse the pharmacy and the liquor store.
This is absolutely /bullshit/.
That medical doctor doesn't even know how most of the medications work, or why!
If it was just about "health" a lot of things with our modern medical care would be different.
Isn't this what the years-long studies and rigorous state examination is for? How would they selecting medication, when they wouldn't know the mechanism of action?
Congrats, you just described mental healthcare.
And a bunchhhhh of other things.
I agree with you for the most part. But the same medical establishment that pumped opioids everywhere, demonized fat instead of sugar, claimed tobacco was fine, overprescribed mental health drugs, etc is perhaps not a slam-dunk example of why we should trust the "expert consensus" on emerging treatments and techniques.
Compounding the issue is the eye-rolling hypocrisy that in the so-called "Land of the Free", a healthcare system controlled by the gatekeepers of big pharma and for-profit companies gets a blind pass... but putting certain plants (that you can grow yourself) into your own body is considered a serious felony...?
There's at least a sliver of daylight here that mean YMMV (which I'm sure you and I would agree on) - but if you lack the freedom to choose anyways, then it doesn't matter. And the people who decide for you are clearly part of a system that is compromised by regulatory capture, political polarization, and the insatiable greed of American healthcare.
Given that the current regime is bringing back measles, appeals to authority are becoming fraught.
People talk about getting out of software and doing woodwork Now this... I've actually done DMT one time was crazy and instant the effects but brief. I did it at a dining room table with wooden grain and concentric ring placemats. I remember seeing my arm like wtf is that. And then the grain/rings moving. Even closing my eyes I'd see colors but was over in a couple minutes.
What I had my friend made. Bought some root, had to use naptha to separate it in a fridge then put it (powder) on top of something flammable and smoke it like weed.
Further thoughts:
On a side note/comparison, weed for me it's like. Day to day you're driven by a known process/system. You have to get to work at 9 AM, go to this, then that. Smoking weed you stop and are in the moment, suddenly focused on how vibrant this red shrub is that you normally ignore. I don't smoke weed anymore because it makes me super paranoid like afraid cops are going to arrest me or I can't interact with people as I already have social anxiety. The other thing is it would enforce my delusions thinking some idea was great/fixate on some design (I was trying to use it to come up with ideas to make money).
DMT is like losing steady state/reality, solid things start to move. The colors were not solid for me, it's like when you push your eyes (while closed) and you see flashes of light. This was a long time ago I did it so might not be remembering as well, it was intense though and brief.
I have not done acid or shrooms as I have bad repressed childhood memories and I don't want to get stuck in that for hours.
Did K one time, I just sat on a couch throughout a party doing nothing/sipping on a cup of water.
K2/Salvia that stuff was whack, I felt like I was sinking into a couch when I smoked it in a shed with a buddy and I felt dumb like I couldn't talk correctly.
C and Addy, amazing. I mean if you could operate life like that all the time you'd probably die just because you'd do crazy things like do a jump that you normally wouldn't just because of the overconfidence. But yeah the ability to sit down/cram 12 hrs of work and pass a test, amazing or nail every note on a guitar. The weight loss is great but I found my p would shrink so much it was crazy. At one point started to defecate blood (was just a fissure) so yeah that was a problem. I would use A for times when I couldn't get sleep and would just do these overnighters at a data-entry job.
Also did M before (fake addy) and yeah, that's great for drinking, you can just pound beers/liquor and not feel it. The bad thing is the come downs, you are drained of happiness, can't do anything and it is hard to recover. A way to recover is to jerk off a lot. But yeah I don't do that anymore just because the sadness is crazy.
Note that 'DMT' isn't a shortened name for '5-MeO-DMT'. While related, 'DMT' and '5-MeO-DMT' are different compounds, with different effects:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/5-MeO-DMT#Effects
https://qualiacomputing.com/2020/07/01/5-meo-dmt-vs-nn-dmt-t...
I don't partake anymore, only drink nowadays and even that try to only do a day a week since it costs money but also I don't actually enjoy the taste of alcohol. I use it for the social aspect but then I do too much of it and do dumb things like climb buildings or try to fight people, go to strip clubs drop money I don't have. (I spent $1.2K one time it's bad since I go out to try and meet women)
My other drug of choice is adrenaline from driving fast my car currently tops out just under 160mph and I'd go even faster if I could but maybe thankfully I can't. Fear is funny too, I don't fear this but I fear talking to people ha.
I'm trying to stop this because the tickets part, I only screw around on highways when I'm alone and day time, I don't do swimming/cutting people off but yeah.
The speed thing is easy get an old ZR1 it can go 200 but going in a straight line can be boring. It's the acceleration. Recently been watching this guy drive an Elise down roads in Switzerland that's pretty fun and not that fast. I know you can track too but idk.
Without rigorous science and licensed professionals it would be insanity to take these drugs. They can potentially PERMANENTLY traumatize your brain possibly even _literally_ ruining your entire life. I guess that risk is worth it for some people
Your concern is warranted, but a tad hyperbolic. Getting into a[n even minor] car crash, and thereafter recovery, can have equally devastating effects, as can being attacked by a dog.
I used to be very active in the hippy music scene. Permanent effects are exceedingly rare. I know people who trip fairly frequently and beyond some dreadlocks or tie dyed shirts off the clock, they are perfectly normal well adjusted people. You are being extremely hyperbolic.
I mean, so can alcohol.
[flagged]
Can you please express your substantive points without getting personal? I'm sure you didn't intend to cross into personal attack but this comment is a step in that direction.
[dead]
the first pic looks like Jobs and Bill Watterson
I can’t tell you the number of times I’ve thought that what this country needs is more druggies running around.
More people like Bill Atkinson? That sounds good to me.
Drug culture had a big influence on the creation of modern desktop computing. https://www.amazon.com/What-Dormouse-Said-Counterculture-Per... is the best-researched book I've seen on this, but after living in the bay area for 35 years and talking to lots of people, there is a lot more drug use that impacts technology than most people would expect.
these are the 'good' type of drugs though
More people like Bill Atkinson and Steve Jobs sounds great to me!
How can you look at this and think "druggies"?
I'm developing a much more advanced digital device (like bicycle to spaceship compared to this). I'm currently blocked by chemistry issues.
Am I the only person who read the article like this: "blah blah BOTH BILL ATKINSON AND STEVE JOBS DIED FROM PANCREATIC CANCER blah blah"?
Steve Jobs tried to treat his cancer by eating apples and ignoring the diagnosis until it was too late… not sure if that’s really connected to psychedelics
While DMT definitively has its merits (and is produced naturally in the human body), know also that Psilocybin allows for an increases of the human lifespan of over 50%, which is absolutely massive. [0]
It's entirely natural, easy to do, has no side effects, costs next to nothing, and can even be "fun". As usual, the media will not talk about this discovery, as it is too much of a game-changer for our current systems.
[0] https://neurosciencenews.com/psilocybin-longevity-aging-2942...
I assume this comment is trolling. But to be clear to readers, the link states psilocybin 50% increase in lifespan of human skin etc. not human lifespan.
"[...] extended the cellular lifespan of human skin and lung cells by more than 50%"
If we assume that the effect is the same for all types of cells, it follows that the life is extended by 50% (when keeping "all other factors" constant, as usual).
That's not a safe assumption.
It has to also down-regulate cells divisions, else it could be quite problematic.
I feel like someone is trying really hard to push public perception of psychedelics towards "acceptable". I don't know who it benefits, but this is a really weird Overton window.
I wouldn't say a word if it weren't nth article about psychedelics that appears on HN frontpage. I was quiet the last n-1 times.
If you google psilocybin right now, you can see articles that state how it "slows ageing" and "cures depression". There probably is some truth to it, but only in very specific sense and specific circumstances. Most people will NOT benefit from taking the drug (as with any drug).
So it hurts my soul when I see words like "legalize" being thrown in this context. We know very very little about effect of such drugs. And the goal should not be to legalize, but rather to expand our knowledge on how it works, and create safe medicine that actually helps people.
Rant is over now. Thank you.
It’s a lot easier to study if it’s legal. It’s also pretty hard to come up with a convincing placebo. The experience is also highly colored by “set and setting”, and the clinical environment or office space is probably not ideal for this knowledge expansion..
An article just came out showing that psilocybin extends life in aged mice, so that’s why you’re seeing it a lot. Yet we have no idea what causes this lifespan increase. Is it a result of “hallucination” experience itself , a purely chemical effect, or something in between? (aka will a ‘bad trip’ give the same effect on lifespan?)
> Most people will NOT benefit from taking the drug (as with any drug)
Now you’re just making things up.
> So it hurts my soul when I see words like "legalize" being thrown in this context. We know very very little about effect of such drugs.
That seems like exactly when we should legalize it. The default is legal, and without definite knowledge of serious harm, that should be the status.
The burden of proof should be on the people who want it to be legal, and by your comment, their case seems pretty weak.
Sure, just let people use any weapon, we don't know for sure, if any particular bullet is mortal, maybe they don't cause any harm that time.
[dead]
- [deleted]
That's something I'm really worried about, especially when SV is pushing it. And it is difficult to prove that research is unbiased.
One of the commenters of your post says "If we legalize it we can better research it". Allow me to be rude -- this is BS. If we follow this logic we should legalize pretty much everything!
I think it is polite to be rude to such dangerous thoughts. Downvote me as you see fit.
I think a blanket ban under schedule 1 stating that it has no acceptable use is dangerous. It's a clearly false designation and doesn't have evidence to back it up. This isn't a simple matter of a dangerous substance. This is a hard-core human rights violation.
But following your logic everything would be illegal! There's a whole lot we don't know about how aspirin works, for instance.
Governments should not be in the business of banning things unless there's a clear and present danger. Citizens should have the autonomy to do risky things if they want to.
Aspirin mechanisms is known since the late 1970s, it's a COX inhibitor.
Acetaminophen is the one that still mysterious, there are credible theories but they don't explain everything the substance does. The latest one I know of is that one : https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2413811122