Psychedelic drugs hurt few and could help many. California must decriminalize | Hacker News Reader

Psychedelic drugs hurt few and could help many. California must decriminalize

sacbee.com

40 pointsfailTide35 comments

  This bill would make lawful the possession, obtaining, giving away, or transportation of, specified quantities of psilocybin, psilocyn, dimethyltryptamine (DMT), ibogaine, mescaline, lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD), and 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA), (MDMA) for personal use or facilitated or supported use, as defined, by and with persons 21 years of age or older.

It's great that this is an attempt at real decriminilization rather than sentencing reform or some form of deprioritization that doesn't change the criminal law.

It would be nice if one of the facilitated uses is to give the legislators the option to experience some of these substances so that they can make better informed law. But probably not when in session.

I think the definition of "hurt" is relative. I've heard so many people describe their experiences on psychedelics as, to paraphrase, seeing more of reality, seeing the true nature of reality, expanding their minds, etc. In reality, they make you hallucinate, i.e. perceive things that are not real; the feelings of expansion are just part of the brain-meddling they cause. If people can separate their experiences from reality, then sure, I have no problem with them (just don't do them alone, in case you have a bad trip). But because so many people don't seem to be able to make that distinction, it's kind of a major problem.

Watching TV makes you perceive things that are not real. Some religious sects ban reading of novels and such for reasons including this. Yet TV, novels, propaganda are somehow more OK? Oh, yes, and dreaming while asleep, which seems to have benefit for the basic function of our brains.

And psychedelics give you the ability to re-perceive prior events in differenr ways. That is a super-important fact for therapeutic purposes.

Personally, it just sounds likewe should accept that things which are enjoyable can be useful and vice versa.

I think you missed my point. Perceiving things that are not real isn't the problem. Perceiving things that are not real, and then thinking they are real, is the problem. If someone watches Moon Knight, that's fine (and also a great show, imho); if someone watches Moon Knight and now believes the Egyptian gods are real and giving people superpowers, that is NOT fine. And no, I don't think religion or propaganda are okay, either, for the same reason.

"And psychedelics give you the ability to re-perceive prior events in different ways. That is a super-important fact for therapeutic purposes."

It is... as long as the new perception aligns with reality. If it doesn't, then regardless of its potential therapeutic properties, it is harmful.

"Personally, it just sounds like we should accept that things which are enjoyable can be useful and vice versa."

Anything can be enjoyable to someone, and many things can be useful. It's about balancing the benefits against the harms and not ignoring either side.

You seem to have a strong belief that reality has objective definition, and that yours is it.

Much of the value of psychedelics is in unseating us from assuming that what we have always thought was real necessarily is. In most cases it mostly is not. Yes, rocks are hard, and fog is soft, but the ways the world works are very different from what we picked up as children. It is extremely rare for people to have rethought everything in light of later experience, so most cling to falsehoods they have not examined.

Psychedelics do not convince you that falsehoods are true. They help you question things that often enough turn out not to be true.

Afterward you still might believe things that are not true, but that was where you started.

"You seem to have a strong belief that reality has objective definition, and that yours is it."

No, I have a strong belief that reality has an objective definition, and that empirical evidence shows what that definition is. Because, though this may come as a surprise to you, empirical evidence is the very definition of looking at what the universe does to figure out what the universe does.

"Much of the value of psychedelics is in unseating us from assuming that what we have always thought was real necessarily is. In most cases it mostly is not. Yes, rocks are hard, and fog is soft, but the ways the world works are very different from what we picked up as children. It is extremely rare for people to have rethought everything in light of later experience, so most cling to falsehoods they have not examined."

This is... well, a vast generalization. While it's true there are some things that turn out to be not quite as we thought, the way to discover those inaccuracies is through empirical evidence. Thinking that hallucinogenics are the way to discover what is not true and what is true is basically saying "my perceptions are more real than everything around me is, and if I just think about things in the right way, I will discover the truth, even if it contradicts the evidence".

You don't find truth by distorting your perceptions and then thinking hard about what you've perceived; you find it by looking at the world outside your own brain and listening to what that world shows you through empirical measurements.

The scientific method is designed specifically to counteract the many ways in which our perceptions already fool us, and it has worked exceptionally well at discovering the truths of the universe (the computer you're using right now is one tiny bit of proof of that). Relying on our perceptions is already problematic, but distorting those perceptions and then relying on them as a source of truth? That's just hubris.

Basic laws of physics, sure. But how to process the loss of your trust in humans because of the specifics of the abuse you received from your abusers at the ages you received it (schoolmates on the playground, older sibling, anonymous assailants on the street) isn't all that well handled yet by science and the few practitioners that exist.

How to refashion your wants to fit within the reality left after someone ran you over on the way to your wedding and you lost your legs? That's personal.

It doesn't seem you have an idea what a trip can do to you. A trip could allow you to dig up memories that you hadn't been able to access for many years.

It could enable you to perceive things things you've never considered, the unknown unknowns. The kind you _couldn't_ have ever considered because they just don't enter the human consciousness in the normal state.

It could teach you how much of what you assumed "facts" is strongly shaped by your emotions, and if those emotions are changed you are able to see things in a different light.

I suppose you wouldn't prove P /= NP when on a trip, but it could show you how narrow, warped and preconceived your your idea had been what "reality" is even about.

Have you actualy tried magic mushrooms? I don't get the impression that you quite get what a psychedelic experience is really like.

Most of the falsehoods that most people believe, yourself most likely included, are things that they had not even noticed that they believed, so would never have thought to "test empirically", or even wonder whether they might not be true.

Your personal offense at the suggestion is characteristic of people who have been disinclined to discover their blind spots, and who stand to benefit most from an experience.

I have not seen people come away believing even more falsehoods than they went in with, although very large numbers can be hard to compare. It can take a long time and hard work to whittle that number down, but the best time to start is usually now.

There does seem to be a population whose mental grounding is flimsy enough to retain the idea that Egyptian gods are real after the experience is over (Moon Knight is an excellent reference point), and to believe they can actually fly during the experience. The latter are the most concerning above the ground floor, immediate bodily harm. I'd really like credible statistics on all of these, and somehow adjusted for the "lizard people" factor (4% or so, of Americans at least, believe in the race or races of lizard people supposedly among us or underground, for example). To balance, we'd want the coefficients.

Have you ever tried these compounds? At lower doses, there's really no significant visuals or hallucinating at all. It's more like it gives you different perspectives, different ways of thinking, strategies for being happier, strategies for dealing with difficult issues in your life.

With the trends of microdosing, I think the lower dosage trips will be much more popular.

With that being said - it's not for everyone, and could be bad for some people. I'm all for the personal responsibility aspect and being able to decide for myself.

I'm all for microdosing, if done in a controlled environment with a (medical) professional present. The problem with it being available for anyone to just "try as they want" is that most people don't know what the proper safe dosage is. I don't think it should be illegal, but certainly controlled.

I don't mind some common sense controls, as long as it doesn't end up in jail time for anyone. The bill doesn't make the substances legal to sell - that part can be determined later. I think just being able to grow one's own personal supply legally is a fair compromise.

> I think just being able to grow one's own personal supply legally is a fair compromise.

And we disagree here, for the reason I mentioned before about how most people don't actually know what a safe dose is, i.e. what dose leads to distortions as opposed to just the benefits.

I think a better compromise than "everyone should be able to have all the psychedelics they want" would be "treat it as a controlled substance and allow for microdosing clinics, or prescribed doses, all of which have supervision by a medical professional".

Requiring a visit to a clinic defeats the purpose, unless that clinic takes steps to create a warm, organic type of environment.

I don't believe other people should be in charge of my medical treatment. The system has been doing an abysmal job with all related topics, what makes you think top-down control is what we need here too?

Society, "the system", has a huge superiority complex. Society is the most entitled thing ever created by humans. "We know what's good for you" - said nobody with a truly kind heart.

> I don't believe other people should be in charge of my medical treatment. The system has been doing an abysmal job with all related topics, what makes you think top-down control is what we need here too?

If anything, the opioid crisis shows that there hasn't been enough control on drugs that alter people perception and/or feeling. In countries were more control over the usage of these compounds is mandatory (eg: Europe, where doctors have to justify each dose they prescribe and where stats are made about who prescribes more than usual), usage is possible for the people who actually need them, and no one is talking about widespread abuse. Countries were not enough control was imposed (eg: US, where you can get you hand on some by talking to the right doctor for very minor symptoms), usage exploded.

And although psychedelic tend to be less addictive than opioids, they definitely can be abused in a similar fashion because of the similar "escape on reality" they provide.

Maybe you think you'd be better off if no one was keeping in check with your drug usage. But history shows that society as a whole wouldn't.

> And we disagree here, for the reason I mentioned before about how most people don't actually know what a safe dose is,

Then the main issue would just be education (i.e. people learn to start at a low dose and build up), and we all have the internet at our fingertips. Nobody should ever be in jail because they wanted to feel better and never hurt another person. That's cruel and unusual punishment, IMO. Isn't the pursuit of happiness kind of a big deal here?

But I do understand there's people who disagree, and would like to see people like me in jail.

My spouse is cancer patient, and it helped her a lot to go through the times of intense stress with only microdosing liberty cap psilocybin mushrooms. It also helped myself as well, the only regret I have - why we haven't discovered it earlier.

This is insane.

The solution is to study the drugs and permit limited usage under medical care -- i.e., for the federal government to lower the schedule and fund research.

California decrimininalizing would open the floodgates to abuse, of the weak by the powerful. Imagine companies with billions at stake selling high's to anyone who's troubled. The decriminalize-now push is not for medical reasons, but for an industry to make money off people's pain. None of the bill's "protections" -- "for personal use" "over 21" -- are effectively enforceable.

Microdosing has been shown to be indistinguishable from placebo in its short term effects (i.e., it has no real effectiveness), but that doesn't mean full doses or regular use is safe. Unlike marijuana, there's a lot of evidence that brain and psychological damage from bad trips is permanent. Anecdotally, I'm old enough to know people who died, and others who never really came back, after using psychotropics. To me decriminalizing psychotropics is about as socially beneficial as dropping napalm on villages in Vietnam.

Finally, this will definitely sink Democrats nationally. It's inexplicable to anyone outside hyper-liberal enclaves why you would permit big business to fry the brains of troubled people.

This here ^. While it could have a lot of benefits for some folks, I have also seen the negative effects in the city of Portland, OR.Portland has a severe mental health crisis and not enough mental health workers or police expertise to deal with it . As a result walking through downtown and SE seems like an episode of the Walking Dead. This might be be beneficial to some health cases but it’s also going to attract a lot of unchecked drug use without enough support or studies to deal with the side effects .

Are you sure you can tie those problems in Portland to abuse of psychedelic drugs?

Given that connection, are you sure that decriminalization is what caused increasing abuse rates in Portland? IIRC, that was instituted in 2020, and the pandemic mucked up a few things since then.

Sending people to jail for growing personal-use quantities has probably ruined many more lives than psychedelics. It's sickening.

This bill (sb-519) goes to the Assembly Appropriations Committee tomorrow - I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billStatusClient.xh...

Psychedelics can be extremely helpful for most people.

But don't ever give LSD to somebody fighting schizophrenia. It will not turn out well. But I have seen MDMA lead them to believe actual treatment is possible, and find it.

"With regard to self-treatment, a harm reduction approach should be adopted. Low-risk psycholytic self-treatment protocols could be developed for future use in public health care systems." https://doi.org/10.1016/j.psycr.2022.100029

Defacto legal in the Bay Area and it hasn't collapsed yet.

You been to SF recently?

You're likely observing the fallout from meth and opiod addiction, not psychedelics

I live here and have lived in many other cities on other continents. It's honestly fine.

The TL is in terrible shape as is the mid-Market area but most of the city is fine. And tbh, pre Zide Door and the Ayahuasca places (which I haven't been to) it was the same.

Everybody want to replace SSRI with LSD and psilocybin.

A business opportunity.

I’m all for psychedelic therapy especially for those with a terminal illness and in a controlled environment with a sitter or an experienced psychonaut, but psychedelics are a double edged sword and need to be treated as such. So many going fully mentally ill after taking them.

80% or 0.03%? How do you arrive at your estimate? What is your definition of mentally ill?

I concur that it gets treated with respect. Societies have typically codified this respect as "ritual".

By mentally ill I mean it can cause extreme paranoia. Obviously not in all cases. It depends on set and setting. Imagine taking shrooms at a death metal concert and seeing demons for example. I’m all for the ritualistic set and setting, and eating well beforehand and maybe making a mixtape of good music to listen to whilst tripping. You don’t take these things going in blind.

That is really rare, especially for mushrooms and baby woodrose. We approve meds with far higher rates of serious side effects.

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