Psychedelic drugs can unlock mysteries of brain - David Nutt

You beat me to it! I love the way they banish him but he just keeps coming back!

 

No problem, i knew the email would be full of jargon but i thought i'd do it that way for sake of brevity, and only expand on stuff if you wanted me to . Have a good one man!

 

With a name like Professor Nutt what could go wrong? Haha

I think without LSD and Mushys my whole view on life and world as I knew it would have never changed, and that change was for the better. When I am frying the world seem like such a wonderful amazing place and same goes for the universe, except comprehending how amazing our universe is always overwhelms me. Such an amazing experience life is.

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01nkw0l

Prof Nutt on 5Live at 1h:55m

(available until 7/11/12)

 

Does he just talk for five minutes? What's the gist of what he says?

 

Yep, it's only 5 mins. He says that by banning drugs like MXE, the government is stopping research into new therapies and treatments. He wants the Royal College of Psychiatrists to join his protest against the blanket banning of new analogues.

 

I just listened, thanks very much for the link.

 

He is spot on, like when the cathinone ban came in they have put restrictions on drugs which don't even exist or haven't been investigated for medical utility.

In this case I'd say it' s much worse, the arylcyclohexamines most certainly DO have medical utility and NMDA receptor antagonists are currently the bleeding edge of antidepressant research.

 

But it's not stopping research, is it? If someone wants to do serious research they can get a license, like Keith Allen.

 

It impedes research because of all the red tape and expense involved, when with an uncontrolled substance like a simple small amine molecule it could simply be produced onsite, on demand.

 

Yeah I agree really, I just don't think the argument is very strong. If someone really wants to do research they can, they just need to jump through the necessary hoops.

You should know this, IT security man! Would you let people connect devices to your network without going through the correct procedures?

 

getting funding for research is difficult enough for scientists, research involving controlled substances is even more difficult to fund, this is why Proff Nutt ended up getting money from channel 4 to do his ecstasy trial.

 

getting funding for research is difficult enough for scientists, research involving controlled substances is even more difficult to fund, this is why Proff Nutt ended up getting money from channel 4 to do his ecstasy trial.

Hey Ceres, do you happen to know if theres a big difference between getting funding to do research on animals versus humans? My background is in experimental psychology and neuroscience so i'm fairly well versed in terms of the scope of research going on, however i do not really know too much about funding. My hunch is that its probably not too costly to set up a study with a bunch of rats in skinner boxes just to research the rapidity of dose escalation of MXE, though obviously thats not really gonna make us much the wiser on the "mysteries of the human mind front". Do you think this is a fair assessment or do you think that animal studies get hit just as hard by the politically controversial nature of the banned substance involved?

 

Most people who take DMT think they have met God? Are you sure?

How much of this is down to their preconceptions, or what they have read prior to the experiments?

 

Thanks for answer fixingahole, and nice post. I like what you say about philosophy as it reminds me of the dark ages in psychology, between about 1920 to 1960, known as behaviourism. 40 years of hard data took us to a place so wrong (Skinner's "verbal behaviour") that the rival theory that came and surpassed it (chompsky's "universal grammer" and the ensuing cognitive science/psychology revolution) basically gave it the equivalent of a 20 nil thrashing.
I also like your point about self experimentation and the potential for collecting data on forums like this. Unfortunately i also have to agree with your statement about how many others seem content to feel like they've seen god ( or that they felt a "one-ness / interconnectedness" or some other vague or vacuous concept) without seeming to be able to elaborate on the experience any more than that. Its just such a waste considering the tools we have at our hands, namely, a vast range of of near pure substances, the truly immense intellectual and scientific insights that have been accumulating since the very first word was written down, and the ability to send practically instant electronic mail to anyone almost anywhere on the globe.

 

^
No, sometimes I'm really not there, I'm nae good at explaining it in typed word - possibly what the hippies call ego death?

Is that what you mean?

 

FROM Cameroon.

[email protected]

Negotiable prices.

Cocaine "pure" .....................$80 per gram
Heroin....................... ..........$120 for 8 balls(3.5 g)
Hydrocodone .........................$3 for 5mg pill
MDMA(ecstasy) ....................$20 per 8mg pill
Hashish.................................$15 per gram
Morphine...............................$15 per 100mg pill
PCP......................................$11 a tablet
$20 for a gram of powder
$200 for an ounce of liquid
Crystal meth..........................$70 per gram
OxyContin.............................$40 per 80mg pill
Ketamine...............................$25 per gram
Mephedrone...........................$8 per gram
Amphetamine(white)...............$10 per kg
Purple kush............................$200 per kg
LSD.......................................$3 per blotter tab
Methcathinone(Cat).................$45 per gram
Dexedrine...............................$4 per 5mg pill
Phenazepam...........................$20 per gram
Activis Promethazine Codeine Cough Cyrup.$30 per 16 ounce bottle.

 

I loved the article. Not only scientists,everyone should be allowed to buy them :D
Thinking of becoming a pharmacist

 

I think it's quite significant that he said methoxetamine was developed as a 'safer' ketamine. Or was I just hearing things...

 

I know that it costs a lot less to do research on animals, so I would imagine that getting the funding is infinitely more simple. There are very few restrictions (but a few) on getting mice for experimentation.
The mysteries of the human mind should be approach as a double-pronged attack of philosophy and experimental science, I think. Those who leave out the philosophy part of what they are trying to achieve end up making lists of numbers and binding affinities; and remove all interest from an interesting subject. One thing to consider is that through discussion boards such as this, human data is gained with far less effort, and in a far-shorter time than the traditional stages of drug research. When people are willing to ingest any drug that affects the receptors that you may be interested in, what is the point of killing mice?
People are also able to do research on perception/dose etc. at home; though few people would 'waste' their drug experiences studying the connection between sound and vision, for example. DMT seems most suited to such personal experimentation, though few people would be interested in the results! I actually find this unfortunate, since having spent many years studying the state, and reading philosophy, and setting up experiments with optical equipment and synthesizers to probe the nature of my perception, I realize that most other people who take the drug are content to believe in their delusions of having met God!

 

Are you sure?

No, but I can only go by what I read on a dedicated forum, to see the general consensus. My conclusion is that the level of common sense is pathetic.