The magic of mushrooms forces us to rethink what intelligence means
prospectmagazine.co.uk
prospectmagazine.co.uk
That's an interesting quote from the article. Mushrooms are pretty amazing, Paul Stamets blew my mind with his Ted talk years ago, they are something else that is for sure!
Never lists these possible "dangers" while downplaying "rudimentary" evidence...
Much of what we have is anecdotal.
I am not sure your comment is accurate, the effects and benefits are definitely not anecdotal.
Re Depression treatment: https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C24&q=dep...
That does mean there are certain assurances of neutrality we simply can't have. It doesn't mean that efficacy and safety can't be studied: they can.
Also, dosing matters. Can the apparent positive effects occur at low doses where possibly it isn’t very perceptible? This is important and a double blind approach is warranted.
I don't think it's as important for the attending scientists, who are also going to have a pretty accurate guess. What's more important is that they have some training in 'trip sitting' and that the experimental environment be appropriately designed, DMT: the Spirit Molecule has a number of stories about how things go poorly when this aspect is neglected.
Doesn't help: any normal person can tell the difference between a full dose of psilocybin and a low dose of amphetamines.
"You'll be given either a psychedelic or a stimulent, followed by x testing" - then knowing which drug you're getting doesn't mean you know if you're in the placebo group or not?
Psilocybin is well known to be one of, if not the single safest psychoactive compound known to man, in terms of physical toxicity. Obviously, mental harm can be a possibility.
https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6...
https://www.americanscientist.org/article/the-toxicity-of-re...
Important tangent, mushroom’s ability to absorb elements of its environment is a strong case for eating only organic mushrooms from known sources. Heavy metals like lead and mercury have been found in edible mushrooms from questionable sources.
We can only dream of the wonders we'll find on other worlds.
"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, Than are dreamt of in your philosophy."
Perhaps you ought to read The Society of Mind by Minsky.
I think the parent's point is that this idea is already taken for granted, rather than a "rethinking". After all, our intelligences are the product of neurons and chemical signalling. That intelligence is an emergent phenomenon seems like a given.