{"id":6434,"date":"2014-05-01T08:10:30","date_gmt":"2014-05-01T14:10:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=6434"},"modified":"2014-04-30T16:33:08","modified_gmt":"2014-04-30T22:33:08","slug":"after-decades-legitimate-lsd-therapy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=6434","title":{"rendered":"After Decades, Legitimate LSD Therapy"},"content":{"rendered":"

Long, long ago, in other words, the 1960s, some psychiatrists and others were interested in the therapeutic potential of LSD, after the Central Intelligence had pretty well decided that it was useless for making spies confess<\/a>.<\/p>\n

There were two approaches to LSD back then. One was more cautious \u2014 it should be distributed quietly to artists, intellectuals, opinion-makers, etc. for a gradual transformation of society. Aldous Huxley<\/a>, author of Brave New World <\/em>and The Island<\/em> was in that camp.<\/p>\n

The other approach was epitomized by psychologist Timothy Leary<\/a>: Give it to everyone, now! Turn on, tune in, drop out!<\/em><\/p>\n

We all know which approach won out and what happened. One result of the subsequent legal crackdown was that serious research with LSD became impossible.<\/p>\n

That has changed.<\/p>\n

On Tuesday [March 4,2014], The Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease<\/a> is posting online results from the first controlled trial of LSD in more than 40 years. The study, conducted in the office of a Swiss psychiatrist near Bern, tested the effects of the drug as a complement to talk therapy for 12 people nearing the end of life . . . . The new publication marks the latest in a series of baby steps by a loose coalition of researchers and fund-raisers who are working to bring hallucinogens back into the fold of mainstream psychiatry. Before research was effectively banned in 1966 in the United States, doctors tested LSD\u2019s effect for a variety of conditions, including end-of-life anxiety.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Read the rest in the New York Times.<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

Kind of related: a short article, “Beyond Castaneda: A Brief History of Psychedelics in Anthropology \u2013 Part 1\u00a0 1859-1950.<\/a>” (Part 2 has not yet appeared.)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Long, long ago, in other words, the 1960s, some psychiatrists and others were interested in the therapeutic potential of LSD, after the Central Intelligence had pretty well decided that it was useless for making spies confess. There were two approaches to LSD back then. One was more cautious \u2014 it should be distributed quietly to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[30,8,173,101],"class_list":["post-6434","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-anthropology","tag-entheogens","tag-medicine","tag-psychology"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6xQTg-1FM","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1013,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=1013","url_meta":{"origin":6434,"position":0},"title":"Albert Hoffman, 1906-2008","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"April 29, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"He will always be remembered for a certain bicycle ride: Albert Hoffman has died. He was the first chemist to synthesize LSD, in 1938.MAPS has a tribute page up. Here are his obituaries from the Telegraph and from Gaia Media.","rel":"","context":"In \"entheogens\"","block_context":{"text":"entheogens","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=entheogens"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":7166,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=7166","url_meta":{"origin":6434,"position":1},"title":"Ancient Precedents for a Norwegian’s Pro-Psychedelic Campaign","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"May 6, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"A campaign to legalize LSD, MDMA, and other psychedelics in Norway reaches for ancient precedents. Didn't the Sami (Lapp) shamans maybe use entheogens? What about those Viking who allegedly chewed on Amanita muscaria? (Via law-blogger Ann Althouse)","rel":"","context":"In \"entheogens\"","block_context":{"text":"entheogens","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=entheogens"},"img":{"alt_text":"berserkers","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/berserkers.png?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/berserkers.png?resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/berserkers.png?resize=525%2C300 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":4746,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=4746","url_meta":{"origin":6434,"position":2},"title":"Entheogens for Good and Evil","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"November 28, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"Probably most people who have taken MDMA (Ecstasy, Adam) have felt that it can be a very \"psychological\" entheogen, enabling you to look at your thoughts in a dispassionate and sort of therapeutic way. Now a new study shows that it can be useful in treating war veterans with post-traumatic\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"entheogens\"","block_context":{"text":"entheogens","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=entheogens"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":4235,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=4235","url_meta":{"origin":6434,"position":3},"title":"Timothy Leary Floated Here","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"May 18, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"To raise money for the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies\u00a0 (MAPS), the organization is auctioning off a floatation tank used by Timothy Leary near the end of his life. MAPS raises money and lobbies for research in using psychedelic (entheogenic) drugs in mental-health treatments. I donate to them and have\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"entheogens\"","block_context":{"text":"entheogens","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=entheogens"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":442,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=442","url_meta":{"origin":6434,"position":4},"title":"Taos Notes","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"May 23, 2005","format":false,"excerpt":"M. and I got in the new Jeep, headed up the \"secret cutoff\" and came over the mountains and down to Taos for a couple of days.There is always a nostalgia component for me here, dating back to the summers in college when I worked on what you might call\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"New Mexico\"","block_context":{"text":"New Mexico","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=new-mexico"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":13059,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=13059","url_meta":{"origin":6434,"position":5},"title":"The Passing of Christian R\u00e4tsch, Magical Ethnobotanist","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"September 23, 2022","format":false,"excerpt":"I heard Christian R\u00e4tsch (1957\u20132022) speak in person only once, at a conference in England in the 2000s, shortly after I had bought a book he co-wrote, Witchcraft Medicine: Healing Arts, Shamanic Practices, and Forbidden Plants. I also treasure a recorded lecture of his on henbane beer and such topics,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"ethnobotany\"","block_context":{"text":"ethnobotany","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=ethnobotany"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/Ratsch-300x211.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6434","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6434"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6434\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6440,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6434\/revisions\/6440"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6434"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6434"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6434"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}