'Good', 'Bad', 'Clean', ACID

[Ismene]

I know sometimes on acid I have felt slightly odd in my body, sometimes a my muscles might feel stiff, or my stomach may be a bit unsettled.. is this due to bad acid?

No, LSD can have a vast range of effects depending on whether you had a good nights sleep the previous night, whether the suns shining, whether you're in a nice place, whether you had an argument a few days ago.

If you took the same acid another week when you were in a better mood then the same acid that made you feel slightly odd would give you the effects you ascribe to "clean acid".

It's always worth mentioning the old Owsley story. He made up a batch of acid and then placed it on blotters with different coloured food dyes. Sure enough the word on the street afterwards was "The green acid is righteously mellow, the red acid is a bummer and the yellow is spiritual". The acid was exactly the same on all the blotters.

A tiny "ineffective" amount of ImpurityX could well be enough to synergize with or alter the effects of MainSubstanceY, by messing with how it interacts with receptors, or supressing the effects of a bodily enzyme just enough for the main chem to be absorbed significantly faster.

Not if it's in the presence of a substance as ferociously potent as LSD. It would be like trying to taste a few droplets of orange in 1000 pints of water. The human brain simply isn't that sensitive.

 

[DwayneHoover]

A tiny "ineffective" amount of ImpurityX could well be enough to synergize with or alter the effects of MainSubstanceY, by messing with how it interacts with receptors, or supressing the effects of a bodily enzyme just enough for the main chem to be absorbed significantly faster.

Not if it's in the presence of a substance as ferociously potent as LSD. It would be like trying to taste a few droplets of orange in 1000 pints of water. The human brain simply isn't that sensitive.

Youre offering your speculation as established fact. Its entirely pharmacologically feasable that a small enough volume of a contaminant to fit on a blotter could theoretically alter the subtle subjective effects of LSD to cause it to feel a little "dirty" Were not talking RADICALLY divergent effects like seizures or heart attacks, just a vague slightly "off base" feel... the brain and other parts of the human nervous system are tremendously equisitely sensitive. Did you realize experiments have shown the retina in our eyes are able to detect SINGLE PHOTONS??? Go look it up if you dont believe me, but dont proclaim your beliefs and guesses as established scientific fact.

 

[Ismene]

True, we're both only offering our theories. Mine is based on a more established fact based evidence tho. The fact is LSD is one of only a tiny number of drugs that are psychoactive in the microgram range. The drugs you're talking about, if they exist, would need to be psychoactive at even smaller doses than LSD. Not only psychoactive, they would need to be so incredibly psychoactive that they can overwhelm a bigger dose of LSD.

I've personally never heard of the existence of such a drug. If I was a betting man I'd bet my house that variations like "clean" and "dirty" are simply down to the vast range of effects that LSD can create.

 

[Dondante]

I'm with psood0nym and Ismene 100% on this issue.

The argument that impurities in LSD synthesis cause differences in subjective effects has never been substantiated, nor is it biologically plausible IMHO.

Also, I have seen no evidence that LSD analogues have been widely circulated, though it's certainly possible that they're out there and have not yet been analyzed.

 

[SKL]

The GC/MS that I posted was from a widely circulating, well-known perforated blotter that was in vogue approximately a year and a half two two years ago.

 

[demon66]

Some blotters are more heavily dosed, some less. That is what I've come to expect from LSD.

Obviously LSD feels different at varying dosages

Good, bad, clean are intrepetations of ones trip. It would be nice if they had a testing site for blotter like they do for pills. People could identify the strength of their blotter, and etc

 

[Tunnelfission]

I've heard that the "metallic" feeling and alot of tension is from less than pure LSD, but i've almost always had SOME discomfort and just call it part of the comeup usually, LSD is harder to connoisseur than MDMA caps, especially with accuracy.

 

[Dondante]

The GC/MS that I posted was from a widely circulating, well-known perforated blotter that was in vogue approximately a year and a half two two years ago.

I'm no analytic chemist. What is the substance?

After doing a little research, I'm going to recant my statement that it is biologically implausible that impurities could contribute to subjective effects. I'm still skeptical, but some of the intermediates may have equal or higher affinity for certain receptors. For example, ergotamine has 10-20x higher affinity for alpha-adrenergic receptors. That said, the affinity is still presumed to be too low for LSD or ergotamine to exert effects on adrenergic receptors in the typical dose range (<250 mcg).

I still think it is more likely that the perceived difference between "clean" and "dirty" acid is psychological rather than pharmacological. If there are indeed impurity-mediated peripheral effects with some samples, I'd guess that they are a small minority.

 

[psood0nym]

Youre offering your speculation as established fact. Its entirely pharmacologically feasable that a small enough volume of a contaminant to fit on a blotter could theoretically alter the subtle subjective effects of LSD to cause it to feel a little "dirty" Were not talking RADICALLY divergent effects like seizures or heart attacks, just a vague slightly "off base" feel... the brain and other parts of the human nervous system are tremendously equisitely sensitive. Did you realize experiments have shown the retina in our eyes are able to detect SINGLE PHOTONS??? Go look it up if you dont believe me, but dont proclaim your beliefs and guesses as established scientific fact.

It's true that biological sensory systems react to very subtle physical events in the environment in some cases (olfactory nerves in dogs, for example), but even there that does not mean those reactions elicit a reliable conscious experience for humans (see Weber-Fechner law for related discussion). With the retina example you're referring to a one-to-one correspondence between photon absorption and a conformational change in a protein, whereas supported models of conscious experience hold that something so complex as an impression of "dirtiness" is a systems level phenomenon consisting of innumerable interacting bioelectrical patterns. Signals from tiny physical events naturally get lost in the clash and synthesis of these signals. It's like trying to hear how a mosquito's buzzing on stage harmonizes with the sounds of a symphony.

Not to mention we get experiential impressions of things like dirtiness without the presence of psychoactive drugs, so why not assume those experiences on the drugs are simply an amplification and distortion of those independent impressions rather than that they're are direct productions of the innate properties of minuscule amounts of non-LSD chemicals, some of which (as with iso-LSD), we have evidence, are inactive at dosages as high as 500 ug?

If you were to slip even 10 mg of a known psychoactive like DPT in my drink, or 1 mg of 2C-E, while I was tripping on LSD, I am certain if you asked me if I was dosed with something additional I would not be able to say so correctly at a rate higher than chance.

 

[ChemicalSmiles]

currently on a low dosage of very pure lsd and 2cb.... it compliments the 2cb nicely.

Don't want to de rail, but thank god clean, somewhat strong acid is making its rounds for decent prices..... For a quarter hit of lsd my mind is sure playing tricks on me.... but basically for the cost of a candy bar my screen is moving... thats the way it should be.

 

[SKL]

I'm no analytic chemist. What is the substance?

Nor am I. However, my friends who are more famiiar with the hard science in this arena, can confirm that whatever it is is most definitely not LSD, nor is it any of the more popular substitutes. It's hard to precisely tell what it is becaue the sample came off blotter which leads to artifacts,but it is most likely either LSP, or LSB (n-pentyl or n-sec-butyl lysergamide)

 

[DwayneHoover]

Thanks. It just bugs me when people pull the statement "LSD is the ONLY known substance active in that dose range" outa their butts, like they have any scientific knowledge to back that up. It's just something they heard somewhere once and have decided to "believe" but is very likely not true.

 

[Ismene]

So you don't think most psychedelics that are psychoactive at LSD dose levels would have been explored and reported on?

 

[DwayneHoover]

Of course not! All possible isomers and offshoots that could potentially arise during sloppy synthesis, and un-removed by time-saving insufficient purification steps, the number of possible unknown thus undocumented compounds we are not even aware of could be large. How would we know? LSD itself was an accidental discovery. I wasn't referring to deliberately synthed molecules but ones that are accidental related offshoots from the main synth process resulting from all sorts if things gone not quite perfectly etc., but since they would by definition related to LSD might be in a similar range of potency enough to make otherwise proper LSD feel "dirty".

Look at all of the closely related phenetylamines that are all psychoactive, and all the closely related sub-variants of the 4 and 5 substituted tryptamines that are all psychedelic. Why should LSD be the ONLY ONE of multitudes of similar molecules to be psychactive? And could not some of those be made accidentally and added to the final product by various factors during a rushed underground synthesis?

What makes you assume every possible molecule that is psychoactive in that range has been determined and tested by humans? I dont know any logic that would give that conclusion. An infinite number could exist hypothetically, right? Why not? The number of possible molecules in existence in the universe far outnumbers the ones we have catalogued and experimented with, dont you think? And if they were, we're not talking about the beautiful perfect clean LSD-like psychedelic ones, but the icky body-load or mental-cunfusion-promoting ones that even of they were discovered would be quite likely to just be abandoned as "Yuck" and never properly catalogued.

You seem to be assuming chemistry and chemical production is some platonically ideal process in which unintended or unknown consequences never occur, and I'm saying they probably do occur and could well lead to otherwise good LSD feel dirty. That's really all I'm trying to point out. Of course, Im not a chemistry expert, so maybe theres things about the process that I am confused about, but it just seems a presumption of IMperfection and accidental results in the process are more logical than assuming 100% perfection and 100% controllability.

 

[psood0nym]

^There are a finite number of practical synthesis methods for creating LSD, and at each step chemical equations can be used to predict possible reactions. If a highly potent psychedelic were produced as an unintended byproduct of synthesis wouldn't we assume someone would jump on it as a legal alternative to LSD? Why not sell it and not risk being arrested then? I think Ismene is just asking you to ask yourself what the likelihood is that some potent non-LSD psychoactive is made by chance during the synthesis process which hasn't been exploited for profit yet. He's not assuming that unintended chemical are not made, just that those chemicals are unlikely to, by chance, have an order of magnitude higher psychoactive potency than the already uber-potent LSD (which is what would need to be the case since we know iso-LSD isn't psychoactive and it and a few other known compounds are what make up the bulk of impurities per dose, i.e. any other proposed "dirtying" psychoactive compound would need to be active at single microgram levels to affect subjective experience).

 

[DwayneHoover]

"I think Ismene is just asking you to ask yourself what the likelihood is that some potent non-LSD psychoactive is made by chance during the synthesis process which hasn't been exploited for profit yet."

^Why would someone trying to turn large quick profits by cooking up and selling LSD on the black market go thru all the time and trouble to isolate something whose main property is to alter the brain's reaction to LSD and make it feel "dirty"?

They would finish their synth process, test it, see that it gave some sort of trippy buzz, and even if it was not quite right, even if it gave an uncomfortable dirty body buzz and a weird headache, not wanting to waste all that time and money, they would just proceed to sell it anyway.

I am not saying that the adulterants I suggest might exist are, on their own, multiple times more potent than LSD. On their own they might do nothing. Maybe all they might do is just SYNERGIZE with the LSD and make it feel "yucky." I am just saying it is within pharmacological precedent that EXTREMELY tiny amounts of a compound can, while not having much if any effect on their own, cause a CHANGE in the properties of another compound administered at the same time.

True, with respect to "dirty LSD" this is just hypothetical speculation by me from pure reason. But so is the claim that "All forms of acid body load and undesired side effects are NOT REAL and are just some sort of placebo effect cause by set and setting," THERE IS NO OTHER POSSIBLE EXPLANATION DUE TO blah blah blah... followed by the completely baseless hypothesizing, by pharmacology neophytes, that it is "totally impossible" for there to be any other adulterant that might make the LSD feel dirty. Anyone who makes such a claim is just pulling it out of their ass... totally inventing it out of thin air, in order to serve their apparently religious faith that anything and everything on a blotter must by irrefutable definition be ONLY 100% pure LSD and nothing else. Absurd poppycock! No one has any "proof" or evidence backing up that sort of claim!

Even more absurd is the claim that "So you don't think most psychedelics that are psychoactive at LSD dose levels would have been explored and reported on?" This is just utterly laughable. So you think that out of the INFINITE number of possible molecules that could potentially exist, there is some necessity that proves that man is likely to have already discovered all of them that are psychoactive? Highly unlikey. What are you smoking?

Speaking of which, I can immediately disprove your silly belief-by-faith. Salvinorin-A, the active constituent of Salvia Divinorum is active at 200 micrograms. It was only fairly recently isolated.

What makes you assume mankind already knows about all possible psychoactives active at such doses? Given that there are an infinite number of possible molecules that can be devised, logic dictates that there is probably a HUGE number of possible molecules that fit this qualification of being psychoactive in this dose range. What sort of thought process leads one to conclude absolutely that there is LSD... discovered by accident by the way... and that there cannot possibly ever be any others that we do not already know about. Huh? Ridiculous and completely lacking any logic.

 

[invert]

Of course it's possible. But there are plenty of other explanations that don't require the existence of a (definitely possible, but - in practice - not commonplace, right?) chemical for which a dose of a small number of micrograms would have a subjective effect on the user. On balance, until there is direct evidence for the dirty LSD hypothesis, I think I find the explanation in terms of confirmation bias and other effects of user expectancy (phenomena well-evidenced and general to humans) simpler (and requiring fewer additional assumptions) than the one that depends on the existence of a (possible, but not evidenced, and not particularly likely) highly potent psychedelic modulator chemical specifically to be found among the limited set of possible synthesis byproducts of LSD.

And of course the psychological explanations for the perceived differences can account for, among other things, independent agreement among users about the qualities of different batches of blotter. The visual characteristics of the blotter could have predictable effects on subjective experience (just as red and blue pills produce different stimulation/relaxation ratings, consistently, regardless of their actual chemical content). Effectively, their independence is compromised: they've all received information about the quality of the acid from the blotter art.

Or, if it were non-coloured, non-patterned blotter or whatever, still in fact the users wouldn't be fully independent because, in the end, they are all connected by a chain of purchases to the original producer, so they may have all bought his patter, as well as his blotter.

 

[DwayneHoover]

I am not effected by the color or picture on the blotter. If you insist on telling me that I am then, well, go fly a kite.

There are ABSOLUTELY differences in whats on many blotters. EXTREMELY different sensation. You seem to be ignoring SomeKindaLove's post:

Nor am I. However, my friends who are more famiiar with the hard science in this arena, can confirm that whatever it is is most definitely not LSD, nor is it any of the more popular substitutes. It's hard to precisely tell what it is becaue the sample came off blotter which leads to artifacts,but it is most likely either LSP, or LSB (n-pentyl or n-sec-butyl lysergamide)

So go ahead, have whatever fundamentalist believe you like. The "minimalist analysis" is NOT that "in the absence of evidence of exactly what it is, it is most correct to assume it is pure LSD, and users reports of very significant differences in effect should be completely dismissed as some mental placebo effect".

The minimalist analysis is to take all the varying impressions seriously and until we have a GC/MS, assume "its probably something NOT LSD based on the reports of effects but we just dont know what".

All this hypothetical logic-free and scientific-evidence-free posturing and theorizing is ridiculous. Science remains neutral until it has proof; neutral does not include throwing subjective reports into the trash

Users reports of effects ARE hard scientific evidence when you are dealing with pharmacology, medicine and psychoactive substances, and it is incorrect to just ignore them all and assume they tell you nothing about the substance, wad them up and throw them in the trash.

To do so is evidence that you are entering into the discussion with some hardcore bias toward a conclusion reached without evidence and purely via some non-scientific "philosphical deduction" which is pure BS.

 

[Ismene]

There are ABSOLUTELY differences in whats on many blotters. EXTREMELY different sensation. You seem to be ignoring SomeKindaLove's post:

And you are absolutely sure that different sensations from LSD are purely down to what's on the blotter?

It's got nothing to do with your mood, whether the suns shining, your health, how you've been sleeping, whether you're tired, whether the place you're tripping is clean or dirty, the company you're in, how often you've been tripping?

Does a "dirty" trip stay "dirty" all the time? Say if you're in a messy house and you go outside into a beautiful nature spot do you think you'd still feel "dirty"? Could a "clean" trip feel "dirty" if you went and sat in a public shithouse that reeked of putrid shite?

 

[invert]

I am not effected by the color or picture on the blotter.

If you think you can know that (without having conducted appropriately controlled trials), then you misunderstand the nature of the effect. It is an effect that occurs in humans generally and that is not accessible to conscious report.