Psychedelics are back! As readers of Scientific American know, scientists have recently reported that psychedelics show promise for treating disorders such as depression, post-traumatic stress disorder and anxiety in terminal cancer patients. This weekend, researchers and other enthusiasts are gathering in New York City for a two-day celebration, "Horizons: Perspectives on Psychedelics," sponsored by the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies, or MAPS, along with other groups.
Overall, I'm thrilled by the psychedelic revival. I've had good trips, which gave me first-hand evidence of the drugs' therapeutic potential. But like many other people, I've also had bad trips, which left me feeling alienated from, rather than blissfully connected to, the world. In fact, it's worth recalling that the godfather of psychedelic research—the chemist Albert Hofmann, whom I interviewed before his death in 2008—occasionally harbored doubts about these potent drugs.
In 1943, when war wracked the world, Hofmann was in Basel, Switzerland, working for the pharmaceutical company Sandoz. On April 16, he was investigating a compound related to ergot, a toxic extract of a fungus that infects grain-producing plants. Hofmann hoped that the ergot compound, which he had originally synthesized five years earlier, might have potential for stimulating blood circulation.
During his experiments, Hofmann was overcome by what he recalled later as "remarkable restlessness, combined with a slight dizziness." He guessed that he had absorbed the ergot compound through his skin. Three days later, to test his theory, he dissolved what he thought would be an extremely small dose of the chemical—250 millionths of a gram, or micrograms—in a glass of water and drank it. Within 40 minutes Hofmann felt so disoriented that he rode his bicycle home.
When he arrived at his house he spotted a female neighbor, who looked like a "malevolent, insidious witch with a colored mask." Inside his house "furniture assumed grotesque, threatening forms." Hofmann feared he was losing his mind or even dying. He was tormented by the thought that his wife and three children would never understand "that I had not experimented thoughtlessly, irresponsibly, but rather with the utmost caution."
Gradually, "the horror softened and gave way to a feeling of good fortune and gratitude." This sense of well-being persisted through the following morning. When Hofmann walked out into his garden after a rainfall, "everything glistened and sparkled in a fresh new light. The world was as if newly created."
Thus did Hofmann discover the psychotropic properties of lysergic acid diethylamide, LSD. Hofmann's psychedelic research continued. In the late 1950s he showed that psilocybin and psilocin are the primary active ingredients of Psilocybe cubensis, a "magic" mushroom consumed as a sacrament by Indians in Central and South America...
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John Horgan @'Scientific American'
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