Just found this in the paper.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/co ... t/asection (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/07/10/AR2006071001304.html?nav=rss_print/asection)
Drug's Mystical Properties Confirmed
36 Area Adults Took Psilocybin in Study; Many Called Experience Spiritual
By David Brown
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, July 11, 2006; Page A08
Psilocybin, the active ingredient of "magic mushrooms," expands the mind. After a thousand years of use, that's now scientifically official.
The chemical promoted a mystical experience in two-thirds of people who took it for the first time, according to a new study. One-third rated a session with psilocybin as the "single most spiritually significant" experience of their lives. Another third put it in the top five.
The study, published online today in the journal Psychopharmacology, is the first randomized, controlled trial of a substance used for centuries in Mexico and Central America to produce mystical insights. Almost no research on a psychedelic drug in human subjects has been done in this country since the 1960s. It confirms what both shamans and hippies have long said -- taking psilocybin is a scary, reality-bending and occasionally life-changing experience.
The researchers say they hope the experiment opens a door to the study of a class of compounds that alter human perception and erode the boundaries of self -- at least in some users. They hope it will provide new insight into how the brain works and what neurochemical events underlie moments of mystical rapture.
If the generally positive effects of the drug are confirmed by other studies, the research is likely to raise the question of whether people should be allowed access to psilocybin for self-improvement or recreation.
Rigorous study of these substances has been shunned since the 1960s, although it is not legally prohibited. Research on them was a casualty of the muddled mix of science and advocacy by people like Timothy Leary, the LSD guru and former Harvard psychologist once called the "most dangerous man in America" by President Richard M. Nixon.
"Our study has shown we can conduct a study of this type safely, and that the effects produced are really quite interesting," said Roland R. Griffiths of Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, who ran the experiment. "There is a clear neuroscience agenda to understand those effects, and clear clinical applications that could be pursued."
Other brain researchers hailed the experiment as much for the fact that it was done at all as for its findings.
"These are some of the most potent compounds we know of that can change consciousness," said David E. Nichols, a professor of medicinal chemistry at Purdue University who has studied the effects of psychedelics on rats and cultured cells. "It's kind of peculiar they have just been kind of sitting on the shelf for 40 years. There is no other class of biologically active substances I am aware of that have been ignored like that."
The study, which involved 36 middle-aged adults from the Baltimore-Washington area, was conducted over five years. The subjects were chosen from 135 people who answered newspaper ads. All said they were members of a religious organization, practiced meditation or took part in other spiritual activity.
The study was designed to minimize the effects of anticipation and group enthusiasm, which might color a person's response. It also sought to examine the delayed, as well as immediate, effects of the drug.
The volunteers were randomly assigned to take either 30 milligrams of psilocybin (chemically synthesized, not extracted from mushrooms) or 40 milligrams of methylphenidate, the stimulant sold as Ritalin. The sessions lasted eight hours in a room where a person could listen to music, relax on a couch with eyeshades or talk with two monitors always in attendance. Each subject then took the other drug in a different session two months later.
Of the 36 people, 22 had a "complete" mystical experience as judged by several question-based scales used for rating such experiences. Two-thirds judged it to be among their top five life experiences, equal to the birth of a first child or death of a parent. Two months after a session, the people who had taken psilocybin reported small but significant positive changes in behavior and attitudes compared with those who had taken Ritalin.
One-third of the subjects, however, said they experienced "strong or extreme" fear at some point in the hours after they took the hallucinogen. Four people said the entire session was dominated by anxiety or psychological struggle.
Nichols thinks that last finding should give people pause.
"I think these drugs are potentially very dangerous," he said. "I would be very disappointed if in any sense these results were used to encourage recreational use of these compounds. I wouldn't want to take responsibility for anyone under unmonitored conditions coming up with those feelings."
Alan Leshner, who headed the National Institute on Drug Abuse for seven years and now leads the American Association for the Advancement of Science, was both wary and excited about psilocybin's reported effects.
"If it is ultimately shown to be benign but enriches people's lives, who could object to that? But I don't have that level of confidence at this point, given the paucity of research on it," he said.
A scholar of mysticism, G. William Barnard of Southern Methodist University, suspects that most mystical traditions would not object to the idea that a chemical could allow a person to tune into a preexisting state of consciousness, usually ignored, just as fasting, prayer, yoga and other activities can. But there is less enthusiasm for the idea that this kind of research will unlock the mechanism of mystical insight.
"Most people I suspect would say that the neurochemistry is not the full cause of these experiences," he said.
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That pretty much says it all, imo. Aspects of my religion are still against the law. And THAT shouldn't be legal, as far as I'm concerned.
guild rep #13
This is wonderful news and a step towards victory for friends of the mushroom. It was also reported in our daily paper here in New Zealand and here's the link that's been the chatroom topic today:
http://news.google.com/news?q=psilocybin (http://news.google.com/news?q=psilocybin)
Yeah, seems quite interesting by first glance.
I don't have much time atm, but i noticed something that sounded a bit weird:
QuoteThe study, which involved 36 middle-aged adults from the Baltimore-Washington area, was conducted over five years. The subjects were chosen from 135 people who answered newspaper ads. All said they were members of a religious organization, practiced meditation or took part in other spiritual activity.
The study was designed to minimize the effects of anticipation and group enthusiasm, which might color a person's response. It also sought to examine the delayed, as well as immediate, effects of the drug.
How does religion and routined religious practises, like e.g. yoga, not colour one's response?
This doesn't really fit in. Why they chose the persons they did, I am not sure, but it definetly has nothing to do with minimizing colouring of response.
But anyway.. seems like the experiences people had ranges from mystical, good, and difficult struggles.
Good to see a research like this out.
Yea, I had some similar comments in regard to Dr. Strassman and how he selected subjects in his DMT studies. Also the set and setting was all wrong in both studies. IMHO. That part about the subject having the option of headphones with classical music could completely change the expereince between participants.
Some comments from the researchers.
http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_re ... silocybinQ (http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2006/GriffithspsilocybinQ)
This one addresses the question. Sort of explains the reasoning but not how they reached their conclusion - I would say people who have been raised with "engagement in churchgoing" probably are the least prepared to understand serious entheogenic experiences.
-----------------------
Q 6: Why did you use volunteers who have active spiritual practices? Didn’t that help assure the results you got?
Psilocybin and similar compounds have been reported to sometimes bring about experiences called spiritual, religious, mystical, visionary, revelatory, etc. Such experiences may be difficult psychologically and emotionally. We felt that volunteers who had some engagement with prayer, meditation, churchgoing, or similar activities would be better equipped to understand and consolidate any mystical-type experiences they might have in the study."
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Good article here:
http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_re ... 11_06.html (http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2006/07_11_06.html)
Actual Paper:
http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_re ... ocybin.pdf (http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2006/GriffithsPsilocybin.pdf)
it is true that it may have 'coloured' the results,
but it was just as likely a problem of ethics..alot of the time studies like this cannot recruit naive users.. i havent read the study so can comment on the design and any bias there.
i think it is an important step for research with these sorts of compound in battling things like addiction, the user will come 2nd as i see it, its not just 'lack of evidence' that they arnt harmful, as a chemical, but social opinion and dogmas which stop movements proceeding more quickly to a more liberal system of personal choice...
i think religious groups may be appropriate if they were also looking at legitimate use as a sacrement, as who better to judge religious experience than religos?
just my 2cents..
vb
I would have to say, that sometimes people that are not religious at all, is the best to judge religious experiences. All too many times, I have seen people intrepreting their shallow visual experiences into something WAY more than it really is, because they are religious. A person not religious or searching that form of experience, might be more honest in that sense . I am aware of the fact that the person, not being religious also can just simply deny an experience like that, as being mere bullshit in his head. But often, a genuine deep mystical experience transcends even the bullshit.
As for the ethics. What is a "naive" user?
And yes, I do not disagree with the fact, that this is very important, but it is not without its questions and doubtfulness. Discussing like this, may help us in the future talking about this.
very interesting topic.
i think that to debate such issues, we'd first have to agree, or at least personally define what excalty we mean by "religious" experiences or behaviours.
it seems to me that non religious people could have so called "religious" experiences, yet they do not define them as such. to them it might just be something else than "religious", it might be explained by reductive science (another type of religion), or it might just be...
it is clear that religious folks have their experiences influenced by their religion. ie, a buddhist who surrounds itself with buddhist iconography and texts, might have buddhist inspired "visions", as a catho, a pagan, or whatever religions people might be into.
there is no avoiding having the type of things surrounding us every day influencing our trips and the meanings we will give them. also, the way we will understand our trips will be relative to our ways of understanding the world.
in the excellent and highly recommendable book DMT by Strassman, what fascinated me most was the numerous array of various experiences. it clearly shows to me that DMT is only a small part of the trip, another part is the individual and what it brings into the trip.
also about settings, i always thought that the "experiment setting" being surrounded by people watching and monitoring you, is not the ideal setting, since the being watched must of course affect the trip. then again, what would not affect a trip;)
a bit like the "reality show" tv concept, which has nothing to do with reality, since subjects are lab rats in a cage setting.
for many cases, i dont think the religious experience is much different than the non religious experience. to me, its just another set of words/intents which the user then decides to put onto its experience. but if one can look past the words used, and look a what the words point to, i think there is more common ground between so called religious and non religious experience that we would like to think.
i agree with Satori that a true and deep mystical experience transcends all the bullshit, ie, the fashion created by various religions; hence why when i read mystics, i find them to all point to similar spaces, whether they be cathos, jews, hindus or fluff balls. the very nature of mystism being to transcend the momentarely images/words used by the popes and fashion makers.
for you nerds out there, check ut the ethymology of the word religion. it can be to bond together, but also to bind, as a jail. from religia, to join together. the word is actually a fantastic one, and its sad to see how misused it has been by various egos.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religion (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religion)
i think there will always be some folks that get mystic type experiences, and also some that just have a good time on the chemicals. i think both experiences are equally valid.
to finish this, i dont think its so much about the chemicals, but rather about the persons. hence, chemicals dont bring mystic experiences, but some poeple are more open to such experiences than others, it is part of their process at that time/space being in their personal lives...
note: read The Good friday Experiment, by Houston Smith in the great book Hallucinogens. the experiment was designed to see if "hallucinogens could induce a genuine mystical experience".
in the experiment Walter Pahnke, a harvard psychiatrist gave psilocybin to 10 students and a placebo to 10 others.
oh crap, i wrote more than a couple lines about somewhat serious stuff!!!!
:D :D :P :P :P
LOL! You know what? I think I volunteered for this very study a couple of years ago, but they screened me out because, of, uh, 'previous experience', as they put it. Darn!
j :P
I suppose it's a good thing that the scientific community is finally taking these compounds off the chemical shelf and testing them out once again.What I find to be generally unsubstantiated and dangerous is the authority these types of people have over entheogens.In our modern cultures we replace the shaman with the scientist and we then end up losing our right to open the chemical doorways induced by these marvelous substances due to the very fact that those individuals who have complete authority over them in our culture have close to no actual experience with the mystical state and the other worldy presence locked away in our psyche.Our culture has elluded itself into believing that our own bodys and nervous systems are the property of the state,not of ourselves.Who's to say any individual who wishes to explore different aspects of their mind should need any overarching validation for doing so by an outside political democracy?Indeed even if an individual wished to take any entheogen merely for kicks,they should feel free to do so without having to stand before the government as a child before his parents begging for permission to do so.It's rediculous and is the single most ethically currupt ideology of our society today.This issue is not about convincing the poiticians and their hitmen that our motives for indulging ourselves with these sacrements is pure and justified,it's about demanding reclamation of our own minds and souls.The subject matter is so intimate and personal in its nature that to even place moral judgement on ones usage of chemical compounds which allow him to explore the limits of his own mind is absurdity of the highest sort.
In a way this issue is not even about chemical compounds,it's about what fields of information we are allowed to access and extrapulate knowledge from.We havn't as a population gained enough wits to standup to this curruption of political power and demand full authority over any and all experiences we may stumble upon within our mind,and so now the freedom to any and all experience has been sacrificed for what?
I'm sure if we were to have created some sort of virtual technology which enabled us to contact this other reality withut these substances in the same society with the same monotheist mindest that is dominant to this day,we would have un into the same political oposition as we have now.Imo it's not about drugs it's about self-awareness.To theopposition being aware and awake,thinking according to experience rather than a set of rules defined by a culture in which you are imprisoned and engulfed in is more dangerous than any terrorist threat or nuclear weapon.You see if an individual becomes aware of a higher purpose which holds more truth to it than teh empty set of beliefs governed by our modern society the individual will cease to play the game according to that society and be of no use to that operating system.He would cease to be a number,the participation in that system would dwindle and eventually cease to exist.
Well said!
Don't get me wrong- it is great to see psilocybin/psilocyn gaining legitimacy in the mainstream scientific community and getting research approval from the US government. However, that being said, the institutional setting and 'necessary' constraints of any such an experiment are enough to largely invalidate its conclusions .
It really doesn't matter what percentage of the participants had 'mystical' experiences - any religious experience is by its nature subjective, and a scientific study of its merit is irrelevant - the believer needs no confirmation of faith and the nonbeliever will find no evidence compelling (enough) without direct experience. Essentially, all that money and time was spent to say "Hey look, mushrooms work". To my mind, the experiment was very safe: "Lets take a phenomenon that thousands of years of human experience have shown to be a reliable trigger for momentary encounters with the divine, and recreate it with predictable results in a laboratory setting." Understandably, you've got to start somewhere and I applaud the efforts of the researchers, but the press coverage read with an appropriately sardonic to the tune of "so, those hippies were on to something all along...well du."
The bottom line is that the experiment only brought the illusion of validation to a phenomenon that shamans, anthropologists and psychonauts have known irrrefutably with the confidence of direct experience. The catholic preacher does not consult the physicist, the buddhist monk does not compare notes with the biologist, and in the same vein, it seems unnecessary for the bemushroomed to subject their entheogenic exeriences to the scrutiny of objectivist science in this fashion.
I'm not opposed to psychedlic research, particularly that which could lead to a better understanding of consciousness and the neurochemical basis for spiritual experiences, but I'm underwhelmed by all the research that I've encountered. After reading Strassmann's book, I suffered similar disspointment. I learned about the (absurd ) hoops that one must jump through to conduct psychedelic research in our free country, and gleaned some insight from the manner in which he framed his experiment. But on the whole it seemed like the only thng that came out of the process (besides a book deal) was a very general wishy-washy deconstruction of major DMT trends and motifs that could just as easily have been summarized from erowid trip reports. Was this just a dry run to help pave the way for more interesting possibilities ahead, or is the subjective entheogenic experience doomed to be scientifically understood only by means of post-experiment evaluation questionaires that rank sustances by the qualities they engender on a scale from one to ten?
One last rant - It really got my goat the way Nichols says with false authority from the high pillars of science, "I would be very disappointed if in any sense these results were used to encourage recreational use of these compounds. I wouldn't want to take responsibility for anyone under unmonitored conditions coming up with those feelings.."
Oh please, we can only have a spiritual encounter when supervised by the high priests of science? Don't presume any exertise about the conditions by which anyone should be altering their own consciousness, for reasons of recreation or otherwise... Do you tell the Catholics how to take communion or the Shakers how to sing and dance? I'd take the environs of the shaman's hut over your whitewashed, fluorescent cell any day of the week... How can an individual involved in psychedelic research discount our inalienable right and responsibility to pursuing cognitive liberty?
By the way, in case you can't tell I couldn't agree with you more StrikinglyKontroversial - and well put indeed.
peace,
atreyu
MAPS.org is a great site in this same direction.