• Psychedelic Drugs Welcome Guest
    View threads about
    Posting RulesBluelight Rules
    PD's Best Threads Index
    Social ThreadSupport Bluelight
    Psychedelic Beginner's FAQ
  • PD Moderators: Esperighanto | JackARoe |

Steve Jobs & LSD

Changed said:
I wonder how many other businessmen took LSD and were successful?
Click to expand...
You seem to be implying "not very many"??? Inuendo with nothing to back it up, based on the bias evident in the rest of your post. Anyway I dunno any percentages, I bet quite a few to be honest. When I was in Engineering college there were MANY MANY students pursuing degrees in all sorts of highly technical, professional, as well as business oriented fields who were known to have had a phase of experimenting with hallucinogens. I was pals with alot of then and also acquaintances (sorry my spell check quit working!) with alot on campus here and there and in the dorms. And I bet ALOT of them ended being businessmen and successful professionals. Some pretty damn driven individuals.

Changed said:
Sounds like a lot of psychedelic users are jumping on the "Jobs was a visionary because he used psychedelics" bandwagon to feel a little better about themselves...
Click to expand...

That wasn't my intention in posting. I have never said anything of the kind, nor have I seen anyone else. "a lot of psycedelic users jumping on the bandwagon" doing what you accuse? WTF? Where do you get that? I think you are making up some kind of hypothetical stereotypical strawman for yourself to enjoy knocking down.
 
Last edited:
^To be fair, I think that the percentage of successful business people who use/used psychedelics would be really small, probably small enough to be irrelevant.

I must admit, I don't quite understand the point of this thread.
 
Purpose of thread - Historical anecdote related to current events possibly of interest to users of PD? Perfectly valid topic-concept, right?

Percentage of business people who ever tried psychedelics, probably very small.

Percentage of people who ever used a psychedelic drug who at some point ended up successful businesspeople or successful professionals in their field? Probably a decent number, oh say 50%?

Percentage of them who would say the psychedelic experience was an important part of who they are (as did Jobs)? Probably also a decent amount I would think.

But so what. Just an interesting anecdote. No grand "point" of any kind. That's just reading something in that wasn't intended. So, whatever.
 
dwaynehoover said:
That's just reading something in that wasn't intended.
Click to expand...

Yeah, you did do that, didn't you? ;)

Honestly, I don't think that anything I've taken from psychedelics has inspired me in a business-way. Quite the opposite, I've more seen the futility of trying to make more and more money which, ultimately, people like Steve Jobs focused on. I am untrusting towards capitalism.
 
I heard albert hoffy sent a mail to Steveey J asking for some donation money to go into psychedelic research. Steveey J said "No.".

For that, there is no forgiveness.
 
^ I don't blame him for not spending his money on psychedelic research. He could have had any of a number of reasons for declining the request -- maybe he thought that the current stigma against psychedelics would prevent the research from having any significant impact?


Also, I don't think that this thread simply serves as an "interesting anecdote". It shows us that psychedelic drugs can potentially have applications in technological innovation and creativity, and that the drug isn't only an inspiration to artists and philosophers and psychologists.

Of course, you can't ever prove any relationship between Jobs' LSD use and his innovation. It could be that, had he not dulled his intellect with the drug, his contribution to personal computing would have been tenfold. But, as I said in a previous post, not unreasonable to suppose that it contributed to his success.
 
Do we really know that any of his business ideas were actually inspired directly by LSD? I have to be honest (and labour the point I guess) but ideas of money and consumer products seem really distant from the LSD experience. I'm not naive enough to think that LSD only inspires growth in spiritual/personal areas, but I find it hard to apply any psychedelic knowledge or wisdom to realms as concrete and earthly as business and/or money. In fact, the thing that I treasure about psychedelics/LSD is the flattening of unrealistic desires for completely instable and ultimately hollow, yet shiney accumulation. It makes life easier in one sense.

I'm also not naive enough to argue for total emancipation (or any at all) in regards to wealth, but a sense of the relative uselessness of billions of dollar is most likely obvious to anyone with a brain.
 
kingme said:
not really an apple product fan, but i must admit this guy was indeed a visionary an an overall really smart guy. i dont know how much he actually did in the design or technical aspects of the products he backed, but he had instincts and knew how to promote. he also seems to have been really hard working and ambitious...

doubt the lsd had anything to do with it really....
Click to expand...

Could not agree more. I personally feel that Steve Jobs made computers shiny, changed the whole face of the marketing industry and inadvertantly, whether intentional or not (probably not), took credit for other peoples creative thinking. He was not the brains of apple, he was the CEO of apple, not really any different from any other CEO. }
And just quietly I think he's done more robbing the world blind with disgustingly inflated prices, rather than changing the world for the better.

Keep in mind these are just my opinions, don't take anything I'm saying to heart like every one else seems to whenever I say Steve Jobs wasn't the reincarnation of Jesus.
 
willow11 said:
Do we really know that any of his business ideas were actually inspired directly by LSD? I have to be honest (and labour the point I guess) but ideas of money and consumer products seem really distant from the LSD experience.
Click to expand...

Well, LSD may flatten your desires for material wealth, but it could affect other people differently. If the accumulation of wealth remains your primary goal, then a drug like LSD may be applied to creatively solving the problem of extracting money from consumers -- which of course is not an easy thing to do, else a lot more people would be rich C.E.O.s!

Plus, if you have any interest in providing the world with any genuinely useful and applicable technological innovations (giving back to your brethren rather than robbing them blind), you simply can't ignore money: it often takes an enormous amount of money to fund the research and design and engineering and testing processes necessary to produce the technology. So, even if you take drugs and realize that money has no intrinsic value and is ultimately a shallow reason to live your life, you would still be wise to observe the utility of money in giving you the power to make the changes you want to see in the world (especially when it comes to a material industry).
 
Last edited:
TheAppleCore said:
So, even if you take drugs and realize that money has no intrinsic value and is ultimately a shallow reason to live your life, you would still be wise to observe the utility of money in giving you the power to make the changes you want to see in the world (especially when it comes to a material industry).
Click to expand...

Very good, intricate, and "deep" thoughts, AppleCore, thanks! Hmmm.... "AppleCore" eh... did you ever work for/with Apple perchance, or just be a fan?
 
^ I wish! :) Actually my name has nothing to do with Apple Inc. But I would consider myself a fan of their products.
 
Whatever Steve Jobs got from LSD it certainly didn't make him any better a man. Apple were "employing" slave labour in their Chinese factories - making 15 year olds work 80 hours a week for 52 cents an hour. Apparantly they were banned from taking a piss or a shit during their working hours (15 hour days). While that sack of shit Steve Jobs was sat at home with 6.5 billion in the bank. What a caring, compassionate man.

If acid was what made Steve Jobs the man he was then god help us.
 
^I've been thinking a similar thing (maybe not as brutal though). I honestly very little that is positive in a company like Apple; the idea that they create their products to "give" something to the world is really quite naive. Its about money, nothing more.

I don't blame him for not spending his money on psychedelic research. He could have had any of a number of reasons for declining the request -- maybe he thought that the current stigma against psychedelics would prevent the research from having any significant impact?
Click to expand...

I don't blame him either. In fact, I would be shocked if he did donate money to Hoffman. We can't know the reasons, but I'd say his declining would be related to both financial and political fear. And money. ;)
 
willow11 said:
Its about money, nothing more.
Click to expand...

I'm not so sure I can agree there... paraphrasing a previous post of yours, anyone with half a brain can see that money is totally worthless in and of itself. Your bank account is really just a number.

I would wager that there are few very people who have an interest in simply accumulating money. Some probably do -- they find a great pleasure in simply racking up the numbers, like points in a video game. But how many people are so fascinated with their own "personal high score" that they're willing to spend their LIVES on it? Most don't care about the money. They care about the utility of the money -- the power that the money grants them.

For these people, the particular application of money that interests them can vary greatly. For some, it's the power to afford them a nicer home. For others, it's the power to afford their children a better education. For others still, it's to afford them the rare and expensive collectors' items that they covet. Etc., etc.

Now, assuming Jobs was of the latter category rather than the former, and had some greater motive to his pursuit of wealth than simply watching the numbers rise, what purpose could money have served him? After you achieve a certain level of wealth, earning more money can't possibly serve to enhance your own personal life, and Jobs was pushing products WAY past that point. How pricey a home do you really want? How expensive a car do you really want? You don't need 6.5 billion to do it. I think it's at least theoretically possible that Apple's function was something beyond Jobs' own personal sphere of reality.
 
Ismene said:
Whatever Steve Jobs got from LSD it certainly didn't make him any better a man. Apple were "employing" slave labour in their Chinese factories - making 15 year olds work 80 hours a week for 52 cents an hour. Apparantly they were banned from taking a piss or a shit during their working hours (15 hour days). While that sack of shit Steve Jobs was sat at home with 6.5 billion in the bank. What a caring, compassionate man.

If acid was what made Steve Jobs the man he was then god help us.
Click to expand...

Good people can do acid and have bad ideas. Bad people can do acid and have good ideas. And vice-versa and verse-vica. I wasn't trying to say liking LSD made Jobs either a good person or a good businessman, and Ismene's points about Jobs/Apple profiting hugely from horrifying 3rd world labor conditions is actually an excellent one. Most business people, even for businesses with ostensibly lofty principles, seem to have ended up in a place where ANYTHING they can do to increase profits is OK because, I dunno, others are doing it so it won't create THAT much additional harm if they do it too???

Anyway my reason for posting had more to do with exploding the myth that "the acidheads" are all a bunch of washed-up starry-eyed fairy-tale dreamer slacker do-nothing hippie idiot-children that is usually shoved down the public's throat by the DEA-controlled (not really haha) media. As I said, I knew MANY drug-head/acid-head types in Engineering college that were also VERY success driven and not the slightest bit hippie dork layabout types, and probably also became very successful, either of the "good" flavor or the "evil" flavor. Point is, regardless of what "the powers that be" want the public to think, ALL SORTS of people ALL ACROSS THE SPECTRUM of society have done and LOVED psychedelic drugs... AND have felt they benefited from the education obtained thereby, not just "losers" or some other dumbass invalid stereotype.
 
Last edited:
Oh yea, heh, actually meant to post this but got all carried away, haha:

Read the Never-Before-Published Letter From LSD-Inventor Albert Hofmann to Apple CEO Steve Jobs

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ryan-grim/read-the-never-before-pub_b_227887.html

Also contains the letter Hoffman wrote back to Doblin, asking, "Is that about what you wanted?"

So... Rick Doblin of MAPS knew Hoffman, and got Hoffman to write a letter to Jobs begging him to contribute a pile of money to MAPS, because he read that interview where Jobs said he tried LSD and thought highly of the experience.

Obviously Doblin was trying a little mind manipulation on Jobs, figuring another well known and revered 'genius' in the science/tech fields could succeed in convincing Jobs to contribute, while a lowly fairly unknown medical researcher wouldn't stand a chance.

And maybe it was obvious to Jobs that Doblin facilitated the plea by pressuring a sweet aged nice old Hoffman, and figured "Hell if the guy doesn't have the balls to ask me himself, and feels he has to bug this 100 year old guy out of retirement to pen this long letter to beg for him, then I don't think he deserves my money."

Can't say I blame him. I sorta think it was a creepy approach myself.
 
Last edited:
I smirked a bit, Albert's line about LSD being his problem child; he really likes(liked) that...;)

Its only just now that I've really though about Albert Hoffmans first name. Albert...ALBERT. His name was Albert.

Albert.

edit: please excuse me, I ate a bit of acid a few hours ago. Seriously though, Albert.
 
Last edited:
he didn't eat enough to do the job

If Jobs did eat LSD, he sure as hell didn't eat enough to experience Ego Death. Fail.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top