I'm starting to see where you guys are coming from. Dissociative is an informative term, so no sense getting rid of it, but kappa agonist doesn't do much to tell the end user what they're in for, unless they've already experienced a drug in that class.
So what's a good alternative? How about dissdysphorics for dissociative dysphorics (or dysdissociatives :D) Or maybe I should let the creative types come up with the nomenclature.
Yes, "dissociative" is a fine term -- there's no need to get rid of it. I just think there's more communicative utility, in terms of discussing psychoactive phenomenology, in thinking about it foremost as representing drugs whose effects are characterized by NMDA antagonism, and having a new phenomenologically oriented term for kappa agonists. If we had a group of experienced poly-drug users go into a sensory deprivation tank, and then asked them to put a check next to the drug-class on a multiple choice list that they felt best mimicked sensory deprivation, they'd all check the NMDA antagonist box. After all, we can understand why John Lilly elected to use ketamine to enhance the effects of the sensory deprivation tank. The reason this class best mimicks sensory deprivation is presumably because they block a neurotransmitter that is hugely implicated in communications between the brain and body, broadly speaking.
So far our candidates for the proposed new term include: oneirogens (dream-inducers), makyoleptics (from Zen makyo, "illusion" + Greek -lepsis, "fit/spasm"), dissphorics, and [I'm changing my suggestion a bit] sui-mutagenics (roughly Latin for "generators of self-change"). Of course, I'm partial to my suggestion, though I'm open to a more eloquent selection of root terms. The reason I choose it is because, in terms of phenomenological effects, the way kappa agonists alter the user's relationship to their self-concept (e.g. reports of "becoming wall paper" or "living the entire life of another individual") is to my judgment the feature that sets them most strikingly apart from the effects of other psychoactive classes. It would be better if the term included the Latin or Greek for "remake," instead of just "change," but I'm not sure what that is. Another, maybe more clinically appropriate, alternative might be something that translates to "mimicker of dissociative identity disorder".
I imagine lots of people reading this and shaking their heads while muttering "god damned drug nerds have too much time on their hands," heh. But honestly, if we believe that understanding consciousness/self-awareness/subjectivity is important, then I really do think the argot for discussion needs to be richer when it comes to fleshing out the effects of the most powerful tools we have for manipulating these things. It's just that a lot of these newcomers to the menagerie of possible human experience are literally years old and are given an intellectual cold shoulder because they're considered deviant forms of consciousness (which is absurd). Obviously we can't add terms to the dictionary, but I'd argue these are concerns worth considering for those who actually could.
