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Gorgeous
Not a bad innings...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7374846.stm


g.
am_Unition
My good friend told me about this earlier today. Obviously LSD has no serious negative physical effects on the body, as I'm sure Dr. Hofmann dosed up quite a few times in his life wink.gif

So what do the forum frequents of physorg think about LSD?? As you probably know, it was banned under the accusations of causing irreparable psychological damage to some users, being responsible for murders, suicides, etc.


Here's an interesting quote from the wikipedia article on the infamous MK-ULTRA experiments -

QUOTE
LSD was eventually dismissed by MK-ULTRA's researchers as too unpredictable in its effects.[1] Although useful information was sometimes obtained through questioning subjects on LSD, not uncommonly the most marked effect would be the subject's absolute and utter certainty that they were able to withstand any form of interrogation attempt, even physical torture.
uaafanblog
My limited personal experience with LSD tells me that trying to get information out of somebody who was tripping would be a difficult if not impossible task. The worst side effect I ever had was sore stomach muscles from laughing so much. Sex was INCREDIBLE though so maybe if you got me tripping and dropped Milla Jovovich into my lap I'd spill the beans and tell you what you wanted to know. I'd had no idea beforehand how dramatic the "body rushes" could be. No doubt it is a very powerful drug.

I never really experienced any "hallucinations" but then again I was out and about being socially active the few times I ingested it. My second trip was a fairly intense experience. The first one had been pretty mild and so the next time I procured the drug I took a double dose figuring I'd improve it. I found out later that the stuff I took the second time really was already twice as good as the stuff I tried the first time. So in essence it was like 4 doses. I did have some serious "tunnel-vision" and a couple of instances in a club when I wasn't quite sure I was "real".

The "bang for the buck" ratio was certainly the best of any mind altering substance I've ever used. 5 bucks for 8-10 hours worth? Impressive.

I don't have what you'd call any penchant toward addictive behavior as I'm halfway through my life and have never been an "aholic" of any sort. That said ... I doubt that anyone would or could become addicted to LSD so I'd have to rank it as having little threat to society.
kjw
i recently finished the book world as laboratory - experiments with mice, mazes and men and it made many references to the MK-ULTRA, but was generally concerned with the huge amounts of funding, provided mainly by the CIA, into the development of brainwashing, interrogation techniques and remote control of human behavior using drugs such as LSD, amongst other techniques.

i doubt whether any recreational user of LSD would simultaneously subject themselves to the other psychological assaults that were described in this historical account (unless of course you are a hardcore psychonaut). Under these conditions, basically all LSD does is completely dissolves the subjects sense of self, which gives rise to the
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utter certainty that they were able to withstand any form of interrogation attempt, even physical torture.


QUOTE (->
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utter certainty that they were able to withstand any form of interrogation attempt, even physical torture.


trying to get information out of somebody who was tripping would be a difficult if not impossible task.
true, but LSD can be used in a more sinister way. after the information is extracted by any means possible, LSD, given in the correct dose for the correct amount of time can completely erase the persons knowledge of ever being interrogated in the first place see psychic driving but it is something like being administered LSD for 20 hours a day for 15 days, while being in total sensory deprivation ie you do not even hear yourself scream

QUOTE
The "bang for the buck" ratio was certainly the best of any mind altering substance I've ever used. 5 bucks for 8-10 hours worth? Impressive
from LSD is certainly a potent psychoactive drug, something like 50mg when taken orally will do it.





Gorgeous
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Sex was INCREDIBLE though so maybe if you got me tripping and dropped Milla Jovovich into my lap I'd spill the beans and tell you what you wanted to know.


Sounds like you'd be spilling more than just your 'beans'! laugh.gif




As with all things, I think there are 'good' and 'bad' elements. Similar effects can be attained from quite Natural substances. I also think the Human mind has to be in a state of desperation before taking any substance that 'tips' it to a point of suicide. A bit like turning up the heat on a pan that is already boiling!
Many other creatures ingest similar hallucinogens, such as Reindeers that eat Fly Agaric mushrooms, but we do not observe any of them committing suicide! (Or lying about 'war crimes', for that matter!)




g.
Sapo
QUOTE (kjw+May 1 2008, 05:07 AM)
LSD is certainly a potent psychoactive drug, something like 50mg when taken orally will do it.

ohmy.gif I trust you meant 50 mcg. If I had taken 50 milligrams back in the day, I'd still be watching the refrigerator breathing. tongue.gif There was once... Never mind.
BigDumbWeirdo
Dude! Acid rocks, man! blink.gif biggrin.gif J/K
It's one of those rare drugs that doesn't do a great deal of plysiological damage to the body when taken in moderation, and one of those rare psychotropics that don't engender a dependancy. While I cant' exactly say I'm "all for it" I don't see why it need be illegal. Besides which, it's one of the easiest drugs to get on the streets. If the government wanted to keep it under control, they'd legalize it, so they could regulate it.
Besides which, a generation of hippies-turned-proffesors has shown that it can be of great help to certain people, such as Aspies.
Tripping and trolling (extacy and LSD) parties were one of the ways in which I managed to socialize with any proficiency when I was younger. Nobody care's how socially awkward you are when everybody in the room is a giggling idiot.
At the same time, if you feed acid to a person unknowingly, you run the risk of many unforseen consequences, including violent or self destructive behavior. I remember reading an article about a patient suffering from Lesch-Nyhan syndrome, who was given acid, and ended up killing himself. He literally ate himself to death over the course of several hours, chewing on his lips and -after freeing them from restraints- his fingers, hands and arms until he bled to death. That's not pleasant, but then, there was an underlying condition there.
Also depressed people need not experience the effects of it without supervision and (IMO) a group of peers, lest they too end up having a 'bad trip'.
kjw
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Sapo Posted: Yesterday at 11:37 PM 
QUOTE (->
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Sapo Posted: Yesterday at 11:37 PM 
QUOTE (kjw @ May 1 2008, 05:07 AM) LSD is certainly a potent psychoactive drug, something like 50mg when taken orally will do it.
I trust you meant 50 mcg. If I had taken 50 milligrams back in the day, I'd still be watching the refrigerator breathing. There was once... Never mind.

laugh.gif ah yes it should be 50mcg, my bad.
wcelliott
QUOTE
As you probably know, it was banned under the accusations of causing irreparable psychological damage to some users,


I'm "experienced" myself, but I must add that one of my brothers took acid after taking speed, and went into a total paranoid schizophrenic episode that lasted at least 18 months.

It's certainly powerful, and it certainly opens some of the "doors of perception" that are otherwise kept closed to most people who've never tried it. I do believe that in my own case, it added a lot to my IQ, and made my understanding of quantum mechanics a lot easier to visualize than my "straight" classmates could.

I'd say that used in moderation in a comfortable environment, with an experienced guide, it would usually be a beneficial experience. But as anything that's as powerful as LSD, extreme caution is warranted.
yor_on
As far as I know acid do not enhance your IQ, rather the opposite if we are talking physics/mathematics..
That said it seems to have a very weak addictiveness.
I don't remember how many trips the guys in Beatles are said to have done but I believe it was more than a thousand.
Anyway it belongs to the Hallucinogens and depending on your mental stability and mood it can be very dangerous and scary or absolutely mind glowingly good :)
Also one should be cognisant of its actual addictiveness based on your inner belief of its non addictiveness combined with the kicks it can give you.
When you wrote about people eating themselves you made me think of pcp and angeldust.
I know one guy that come into the hospital with a hole in his skull, he had taken angeldust and then decided to relieve the pressure he felt inside his skull with the help of a drill.
Ánd the cops absolutely hated people that was high on those substances as their threshold for pain sort of disappeared at the same rate as their sanity. You could break their arms and they wouldn't notice it

The link here is to the guys/gals that I consider to be the pioneers of LSD in America..

And if you're considering it you better read this first too
Indio Sanchez
Ello,

Ees very bad, he creates great drugga for me, what a feelthy shame he die.

Indio.
am_Unition
QUOTE (yor_on+May 4 2008, 09:13 PM)
As far as I know acid do not enhance your IQ, rather the opposite if we are talking physics/mathematics..

Are you sure about that? I'd be interested to see some data... maybe the years of testing through MK-ULTRA yielded something?

I definitely agree though that your experiences rely very heavily on the person you are and the mood that you're in before taking the drug.

I don't think any .gov site's description of LSD will put you in a favorable state of mind for taking LSD. I recommend reading people's first-hand experiences on Erowid.org, and also the general information page. That said, use discretion when reading the first-hand accounts!



Since I perceived my last post in this thread to be fairly neutral and then received negative feedback, maybe I should spell it out for people who process information differently - I am not recommending LSD use, nor claiming to hold it in high esteem.

Thank you. smile.gif
yor_on
I can put it like this. I used to travel a lot when young and had the luck to meet a lot of interesting people. A few of those I found to be into acid. There isn't the 'normal' addictiveness to it but as I said before some few will 'fall' for it. Those guys minds weren't tuned into math or learning it.. On the other hand they were creative and often very friendly and open minded people..

But if you want to do both :) I strongly recommend to study math first before doing acid as what one already know hopefully will stay with one never mind what one do, reasonably so i mean.. That doesn't mean that those guys were stupid in any way just that the experiences collected from their 'addiction' made them not very interested in doing mathematics, as for discussing physics :) That's a totally different matter as well as philosophy.

That is my personal recollections though.
soundhertz
LSD bought since the late '70's has not been dependable and that's an understatement. If you ingested 100% LSD you WOULD hallucinate. In the late '60's to mid '70's, LSD was true. Sugar cubes, Orange Sunshine, Windowpane, these disappeared by mid '70's. I gave up dosing at that point for the express reason that 'it' no longer worked, because 'it' wasn't true. The only dependable source post '70's was the inner loop of Dead bohemians. Most people who dosed post '70's weren't feeling effects of LSD, but any of the myriad useless alternatives.
I know several people who dosed literally thousands of times in their teens/twenties. They are 50's now and you wouldn't know they ever did. I also know one person who dosed once and has remained in a mental hospital for the last 35 years because of it. It comes down to you, not the substance. If you have baggage and are not emotionally stable, stay away from anything hallucinogenic. If you panic when you get lost physically, you'll panic when lost cerebrally.
LSD's greatest virtue was in psychological therapy. It worked like nothing else, and this valuable tool was no longer available past '65 due to illegality.
I think it's most prudent to say that no one should ever buy LSD today. There are far safer alternatives like mushrooms (NOT Amanita!). Psilocybe Cubensis is an extremely identifiable shroom found in cow pastures in the Southeast. The farmers with shotguns are far more dangerous than the steers and wild pigs though unsure.gif . Psilocybe Cyanescens (and Psilocybe Baocystis to a lesser extent) are identifiable shrooms in the Pacific Northwest, and these two are very potent.
It's an interesting idea that LSD may increase IQ. I never considered that, but because of how LSD/Psilocybin(actually Psilocin) works - by taking the hypothalamus out of the loop - and because we know little of the complete process of cognition, we still really don't have a complete grasp of how/what can be, depending on the person. For me, it was never a 'spiritually enlightening" experience or an increase in perception or cognition. It was a mental amusement park with endless humor. It's different things to different people.
Sapo
My emphatic agreement on early vs. late, sir. It is stupid these days, unless you have your very own glassware.

I may have had an epiphany or two while 'entertaining' myself, but only as the seed. The fruit is borne by careful introspection afterwards. There's a danger in too much omphaloskepsis under the influence, though.

And the other path: I have gone free-climbing, alone, and done some things that would kill me if I tried now. 200mcg and a granite mountain, blue sky and 6 hours later, another climber made his way to me and asked if I was the one he'd seen ropeless, doing a grade IV climb in a 150' chimney! He said I had made the ascent at 5.8, and it was listed at 5.6

No more! I'm too old! laugh.gif
Gorgeous
QUOTE
It's an interesting idea that LSD may increase IQ.


Surely it would be more likely to be the experience itself, rather than the substance? There is also a phrase "Travel broadens the mind" which may be relevant...having to deal with whole new situations pushes our thinking processes to the limits, thus 'expanding' the mind...

The LSD experience is such a radical departure from what we expect 'everyday life' to be, it would require some rapid 'expansion' indeed! - Perhaps it just reveals options we hadn't yet dreamed of, exposes our 'everyday' limitations?


g.
soundhertz
QUOTE (Gorgeous+May 6 2008, 11:51 AM)

Surely it would be more likely to be the experience itself, rather than the substance? There is also a phrase "Travel broadens the mind" which may be relevant...having to deal with whole new situations pushes our thinking processes to the limits, thus 'expanding' the mind...

The LSD experience is such a radical departure from what we expect 'everyday life' to be, it would require some rapid 'expansion' indeed! - Perhaps it just reveals options we hadn't yet dreamed of, exposes our 'everyday' limitations?


g.

Yes I would think so. I hardly expect L to actually physically create more neuron connections; it is our own forays into anything that builds onto the network, and our own use of 'what we've got' that strengthens it. And, yes, like Mike Pinder said, "Thinking is the best way to travel"! laugh.gif
QUOTE
And the other path: I have gone free-climbing, alone, and done some things that would kill me if I tried now. 200mcg and a granite mountain, blue sky and 6 hours later, another climber made his way to me and asked if I was the one he'd seen ropeless, doing a grade IV climb in a 150' chimney! He said I had made the ascent at 5.8, and it was listed at 5.6

Omygod hertz says as he bows to you! biggrin.gif I've been shot at by the farmers with those shotguns, been chased by wild boar, gators, and bear, pulled myself up to a cliff ledge to come face to face with a timber rattler, free-climbed waterfalls, was swept OVER waterfalls twice (not too badly hurt), you get the picture, but I would NEVER be caught on a granite chimney without a rope!!! I haven't the courage... sad.gif



Sapo
It wasn't courage at that point, it was complete and timeless detachment. Crystalline and pure.

I was climbing in West Virginia once and had a mouse or somebody run across my higher hand after I released the other from a jam to make the next pitch. I screamed like a girl! laugh.gif
DancingDays
Whoa there boys and girls!!!Just stumbled onto this site and my spellcheck is ON!!!You will soon learn how much smarter you all are than I.....
Talking LSD??? I did that a bunch!!!I liked it.!.!.and a low level recount of a drug induced,surge of IQ could look like this......
As a member of the United States Army in Germany, 1969, i engaged in the the process of "Earning Your GED"!!!I had graduated High School but never passed on a chance to"Get Over"...Who's going to check a phony dropout????Easy,good times for a month!!!!
This process took four weeks,three days a week for four subjects...English was the subject studied and tested the last week(my WORST all though school)...A test would follow two days of study on Fridays that consisted of 100 question!!!!That morning,due to anxiety,I took a grand little hit of Yellow Sunshine,the only time I ever did that the morning of a work day, had my breakfast and went to school and then started to get off!!!!
When the test started I was "Zipadedoda" and ready to go!!!!
The test was but a way to slip right back to ever moment I sat in a English Class paying the attention of a totally,distracted,Dolt....A Dolt that astoundingly was unknowingly aware and retained every bit of information that was presented class after class in my Public School career????Each and every question was answered correctly????All One Hundred was presented to as me a question on paper with the concrete, correct answer stored and available!!!!To Have it was just to be asked!!!!
When I learned of the results I wasn't surprised because at the completion I knew it was aced!!!!!What distressed me is why I had always struggled when now I had seen how damn simple it was???
I hope this recount can be mean something to anyone who tries to "get it"....
Thanks for Reading!!!
NEU-FONZE
I wrote this letter to Bruce Eisner a while ago, ......... thought it was relevant to the topic of discussion:


Back in the halcyon days of the 1960s I experimented with LSD. I took windowpane acid 40 times or more and marveled at the ecstatic visions it presented to me. I read Huxley, Leary, Burroughs, Ginsberg et al. and delved into Eastern mysticism through Watts, Hesse and the I’Ching. Everything was fine and wonderful and I started to believe that psychedelics could solve all the world’s problems, and that these marvelous chemicals were, in fact, the keys to the kingdom.

Then, in 1974, my whole world turned upside down: my wife abandoned me for another man and left me alone to look after our two year-old daughter. I had just moved to Ottawa to start a new high-powered job. I had no friends or family in town – I was devastated. Night after night, while my daughter slept in the adjacent bedroom, I sat alone in my apartment wondering what to do. Many nights I cried. I even considered suicide- but who would take care of my daughter…..

Out of desperation I turned to my psychedelic bag of tricks for inspiration and enlightenment. With my daughter safely at a baby-sitter's house, I swallowed a whole tab of windowpane and waited for the show to start. Yes, I saw the usual dance of light, the synesthesia of sounds and colors but, powerful as the drug was, it could not ease my sorrow. Instead, for 12 hours, I wrestled with doubt and fear. Even as the drug propelled me across a kaleidoscopic ocean of inner space and time, it could do nothing to dispel my anguish and my pain. There was no enlightenment, only darkness and doubt. There was no gratuitous grace, only suffering and despair….

That was the last time I took LSD, and in all my subsequent readings on the subject, I have never heard any one discuss LSD as a means to end emotional suffering. But perhaps this should not be seen as an indictment of LSD. I believe there is no drug that can free someone from La Condition Humaine. Nor should there be. For man’s condition is to be aware of the reality of his existence. If that reality is poverty: no drug can make that go away. If that reality is abuse: no drug can make that go away either. If that reality is loneliness, fear, humiliation, sorrow, depression: no drug can make these things go away. There are, of course, the drugs that temporarily shut down reality like opium and its derivatives. These may ease emotional suffering, but they do not end it. This is not to say that these drugs have their uses. Certainly, I do endorse drugs that relieve physical pain or sooth shattered nerves. But I am looking for something more permanent, more profound: something to end emotional suffering.

However, as long as we live in a world of corporate greed, some of us will go hungry. As long as we live in a world of brutality and oppression, some of us will live in fear. So let us not create an elitist haven for those who are fortunate enough to be sheltered from the harsh realities of life. Let us not support elitist groups who fill their heads with high-tech brain foods, while others lack the very staples of existence. Let us support the production of simple low-tech stomach foods to fill distended bellies. As long as the supply of even natural foods and drugs is in the hands of an elitist, dare I say fascist, governmental/military/industrial mafia, we cannot expect high-tech foods and drugs to be freely available to the masses. Yes, we would all love a little soma, whether it be ASB, 2C-B, BZ or XYZ! But first we must find a way to end emotional suffering, not just on an island – for no man is an island – but everywhere.
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