Chain reaction

July 9, 2009 11:53 AM

A year before his passing at the age of 102, LSD discoverer Albert Hofmann pens a letter to Apple CEO Steve Jobs (who had remarked publicly about his own use of the hallucinogenic as a creative factor) asking for Jobs' support for further research into the use of LSD in psychotherapy. In the remainder of the article, Ryan Grim touches briefly on the use of LSD by scientists and computer programmers who have transformed the world through novel discoveries and inventions.
posted by Blazecock Pileon (64 comments total)

But the government told me drugs are bad. They wouldn't lie, would they?
posted by educatedslacker at 12:17 PM on July 9

Wow, trippy. I just got done reading that piece.

I wrote Steve a letter too. I asked to borrow a couple million. He didn't respond. And just like with Doblin he didn't cut me a check.

The comments on that article are pretty anti-drug.
posted by cjorgensen at 12:18 PM on July 9

I can fly!
posted by It's Raining Florence Henderson at 12:23 PM on July 9

From the author's twitterfeed he links to this video discussion Ryan Grim did on CNN.

And I don't read Gizmodo either.
posted by cjorgensen at 12:25 PM on July 9

Those who find the article interesting might wish to donate to MAPS, the organization mentioned in Hoffman's letter. MAPS funds much of the research done on the therapeutic potential of psychedelics and marijuana. Their studies of MDMA therapy for PTSD are particularly groundbreaking.

It's too bad Jobs wouldn't put his money where his mouth was, but MAPS could still use your support...
posted by vorfeed at 12:38 PM on July 9 [3 favorites has favorites]

I gave at the office.
posted by It's Raining Florence Henderson at 12:39 PM on July 9

*cough*
posted by It's Raining Florence Henderson at 12:39 PM on July 9 [2 favorites has favorites]

Well, that explains the Newton.
posted by loquacious at 12:47 PM on July 9 [1 favorite has favorites]

This gives me another opportunity to plug Ryan Grim's book, This is Your Country on Drugs: The Secret History of Getting High in America. There are excerpts from it all over, including some of the pieces already linked in this thread. He's a great writer, with a fascinating topic to work with. I've been pushing this book on everyone I know lately.

If you want more on computers and LSD, try What the Dormouse Said.

And, yes, send MAPS money, and no, I don't work for them.
posted by gingerbeer at 12:52 PM on July 9 [2 favorites has favorites]

One of my favourite parts of the show Fringe is how LSD use is offhandedly noted as crucial to the plot and the development of several of the characters. In fact, the main character does it twice on screen.
posted by mek at 1:12 PM on July 9

Oh LSD. You reach the age where you decide it's probably a sound idea to NOT do anymore drugs, and then you come along and read something like this and figure that others probably made that decision later in life than you did...
posted by PuppyCat at 1:12 PM on July 9 [2 favorites has favorites]

I think Jobs is more interested in funding immunosupressants.
posted by benzenedream at 1:18 PM on July 9

Jobs, according to legend, was big into acid in his pre-Apple days. There's a story on Folklore about how when interviewing a real stuffed-shirt type, Jobs started asking him questions like "how many times have you taken LSD?" and "when did you lose your virginity?", just to fuck with him, then eventually grew tired of the guy and just started making duck quacking noises until the guy got the picture and left.
posted by DecemberBoy at 1:20 PM on July 9

Taking LSD (in the right circumstances, with the right people) made me a better person, I think. I may have shaved off a few IQ points and moderately impaired certain modes of cognition, but I'm more empathetic and self-aware as a result. A++, would dose again.
posted by BitterOldPunk at 1:26 PM on July 9 [1 favorite has favorites]

I've been pushing this book on everyone I know lately.

Someone call the cops! Call the DEA! We've got a blatant pusher here! You know what might happen if innocent kids read this book? They might learn stuff! And we can't have that!
posted by rtha at 1:28 PM on July 9

Don't even go near the stuff. There are better ways to make yourself psychotic, and better ways to expand your consciousness. Blockheaded, 2-dimensional, autistic numbers crunchers without a shred of imagination or sympathy for other people may possibly... possibly... discover that there are pretty colors out there beyond their flat, dumb, inert brains by taking LSD. But normal, happy, imaginative people really, really, really don't need it.
posted by Faze at 1:33 PM on July 9 [3 favorites has favorites]

Speaking of chain reaction: In a Q&A interview published in the September, 1994, issue of California Monthly, Mullis said, "Back in the 1960s and early '70s I took plenty of LSD. A lot of people were doing that in Berkeley back then. And I found it to be a mind-opening experience. It was certainly much more important than any courses I ever took."[18] During a symposium held for centenarian Albert Hofmann, "Hofmann revealed that he was told by Nobel-prize-winning chemist Kary Mullis that LSD had helped him develop the polymerase chain reaction that helps amplify specific DNA sequences."[19]
posted by Mental Wimp at 1:49 PM on July 9

Don't even go near the stuff. There are better ways to make yourself psychotic, and better ways to expand your consciousness. Blockheaded, 2-dimensional, autistic numbers crunchers without a shred of imagination or sympathy for other people may possibly... possibly... discover that there are pretty colors out there beyond their flat, dumb, inert brains by taking LSD. But normal, happy, imaginative people really, really, really don't need it.

One of the things that taking LSD reinforced for me is that absolutism is a complete mugs game.
posted by Divine_Wino at 1:57 PM on July 9 [24 favorites has favorites]

I may have shaved off a few IQ points

I'd argue the opposite. LSD very much opened my mind in all manner of ways, making room for a bunch more IQ points.
posted by philip-random at 1:57 PM on July 9 [1 favorite has favorites]

Developers write bad enough code without being on LSD at the same time…
posted by schwa at 2:02 PM on July 9

From the Ryan Grim touches briefly link:

And according to reporter Alun Reese, Francis Crick, who discovered DNA along with James Watson, told friends that he first saw the double-helix structure while tripping on LSD...

The Nature paper announcing the co-discovery of the double helix structure was published in April 1953.

In his candid and authoritative 2006 biography, Francis Crick, author Matt Ridley writes that Crick: "was introduced to LSD about 1967" through a connection via one of his artist wife's models.

Ridley found no evidence at all for the 1953 DNA acid trip story:(
posted by Jody Tresidder at 2:19 PM on July 9

Faze, I'll admit to not having read all the links yet, but is someone really saying that "normal, happy, imaginative people" need LSD? I myself wouldn't say anyone necessarily needs LSD, but your little rant seems a bit extreme. I say this as someone who has experienced a really horrible, horrible trip. In fact, I'd say that even that experience has improved my outlook on life in the long run.
posted by zoinks at 2:25 PM on July 9

Bah, I'm sure some scientists have used LSD to okay effect. But the real drugs of choice for mathematicians and sciencey types are amphetamines. Paul Erdos, for example, couldn't do math worth a damn unless he was all cranked up on meth. (Well, okay, I'm sure he could still do math about a billion times better than most of us, but he couldn't do math worth a damn compared to Paul-Erdos-On-Speed).

This is not to advise budding scientists to develop a speed habit. But things are never as cut and dried as "THIS DRUG IS BAD".
posted by Justinian at 2:57 PM on July 9

Regardless of whether or not LSD specifically is a potentially interesting medicine, I'm still baffled by how educated people still fall into the false moral trap of "but LSD is a DRUG and normal people don't need it." People take drugs all the time every day, from the morning perk-up of a cup of coffee to the ibuprofen for a headache, all the way up to opiate painkillers for serious illness/injury and long-term courses of SSRIs and such.

We are a drug-saturated society, clearly. We simply hope that the drugs we take are beneficial and helpful, not destructive; but it's the way that we use them that makes a particular drug good or bad. I am just so baffled that in a world of such ubiquitous, obvious, regular drug use among nearly all adults, that some drugs are still such boogeymen in people's imaginations that they are ALWAYS BAD NO MATTER WHAT.

Read the (admittedly limited) science: nearly all of our "illicit" or "recreational" drugs have demonstrated clear medicinal benefits, and LSD--psychedelics more broadly--have shown some possibly significant medical and therapeutic uses, and those should be explored by scientists post-haste.

Stop with the ridiculous, knee-jerk moralizing already. If someone says they took LSD and it was a positive, life-changing experience (assuming they're telling the truth), how on earth is that a bad thing?
posted by LooseFilter at 2:58 PM on July 9 [11 favorites has favorites]

...I'll admit to not having read all the links yet, but is someone really saying that "normal, happy, imaginative people" need LSD?

Nah. He's just repeating what his D.A.R.E. officer told him. He calls joints "marijuana cigarettes" too.
posted by Thorzdad at 2:58 PM on July 9

Also (according to the article) it's too bad that Jobs is still (as of 2007) in the Leary/Alpert mode of 'just give it to everyone and the whole world will become enlightened!' It only got them fired from Harvard, and ultimately relegated what could be powerful medicine to mere recreational status. It's a shame he's perpetuating that.
posted by LooseFilter at 3:01 PM on July 9

In a Q&A interview published in the September, 1994, issue of California Monthly, Mullis said, "Back in the 1960s and early '70s I took plenty of LSD. A lot of people were doing that in Berkeley back then. And I found it to be a mind-opening experience. It was certainly much more important than any courses I ever took."

I love LSD as much as the next guy, but I wouldn't use Mullis to support any claims:

Mullis wrote in an introduction to Duesberg's Inventing the Aids Virus (1997), "No one has ever proven that HIV causes AIDS. We have not been able to discover any good reasons why most of the people on earth believe that AIDS is a disease caused by a virus called HIV." [wiki]
posted by benzenedream at 3:08 PM on July 9

Paul Erdos, for example, couldn't do math worth a damn unless he was all cranked up on meth.

Heh.

His colleague Alfréd Rényi said, "a mathematician is a machine for turning coffee into theorems", and Erdős drank copious quantities. (This quotation is often attributed incorrectly to Erdős himself.)[7] After 1971 he also took amphetamines, despite the concern of his friends, one of whom (Ron Graham) bet him $500 that he could not stop taking the drug for a month.[8] Erdős won the bet, but complained during his abstinence that mathematics had been set back by a month: "Before, when I looked at a piece of blank paper my mind was filled with ideas. Now all I see is a blank piece of paper." After he won the bet, he promptly resumed his amphetamine habit.

posted by Mental Wimp at 3:09 PM on July 9

One of the things that taking LSD reinforced for me is that absolutism is a complete mugs game.

Amen amen.
posted by kosem at 3:10 PM on July 9

I love LSD as much as the next guy, but I wouldn't use Mullis to support any claims:

Yeah, he's a little bit wacky. But then, Sir R. A. Fisher didn't believe there was any proof that cigarettes cause lung cancer, but we aren't throwing out all of his statistical theory.
posted by Mental Wimp at 3:12 PM on July 9

We are a drug-saturated society, clearly.

Some would argue that all mankind is a drug-seeking species.
posted by Mental Wimp at 3:14 PM on July 9

Some would argue that all mankind is a drug-seeking species.

That's nothing more than an excuse druggies use to justify their mental crutches. Now excuse me, I have to go have my seventh cup of coffee today.
posted by Justinian at 3:16 PM on July 9

Faze: Don't even go near the stuff. There are better ways to make yourself psychotic, and better ways to expand your consciousness. Blockheaded, 2-dimensional, autistic numbers crunchers without a shred of imagination or sympathy for other people may possibly... possibly... discover that there are pretty colors out there beyond their flat, dumb, inert brains by taking LSD. But normal, happy, imaginative people really, really, really don't need it.

Divine_Wino: One of the things that taking LSD reinforced for me is that absolutism is a complete mugs game.

I think it's important to note that there's a user who favorited both of these comments. Now THAT's non-absolutist :)
posted by naju at 3:23 PM on July 9 [1 favorite has favorites]

Reality is for people who can't handle drugs.
posted by Pronoiac at 3:45 PM on July 9 [2 favorites has favorites]

There was a period of about a decade when I couldn't turn around without having LSD present itself to me. It was simply inescapable. Random people visiting would happen to have some for sale. That party I was attending had a tripster attending. Person X happened to bring over person Y... It was surreal. I must have taken over a hundred people on their first psychedelic experience during those years, and really developed an excellent trip regimen which guaranteed a splendid time for all.

Ah, I miss those days. Most of my companions have moved on, but I still find that nothing achieves that excellent "hard reboot" feeling of insight, creativity, and clear motivation. Shrooms seem to be strangely haunted for me, but LSD is clean and pure and joyous.

We did put up the Total Information Awareness blocker, right?
posted by hippybear at 3:52 PM on July 9 [2 favorites has favorites]

Developers write bad enough code without being on LSD at the same time…

I'd guess that the real value of LSD in coding is not the actual coding that you might do while you're out there in the "beyond within", it's the outside-the-box thinking that occurs and the fresh patterns/connections/insights/breathroughs that may assert themselves.

Then, by lucid light of day, fueled by coffee perhaps, you get to work applying these breakthroughs etc in a more "down to earth" matter. Certainly, that's how it's worked for me as an "artist" (for lack of a better term as I could never be absolutist about anything, even anti-absolutism).
posted by philip-random at 3:58 PM on July 9 [2 favorites has favorites]

hippybear, i just had this wonderful 'hey koolaid!' moment thanks to you...

i wish a giant tab of blotter would kick down the walls slap everybody's tongue like it used to do in the 60s and 70s.
posted by artof.mulata at 4:00 PM on July 9

There was a period of about a decade when I couldn't turn around without having LSD present itself to me. It was simply inescapable. Random people visiting would happen to have some for sale. That party I was attending had a tripster attending. Person X happened to bring over person Y... It was surreal. I must have taken over a hundred people on their first psychedelic experience during those years, and really developed an excellent trip regimen which guaranteed a splendid time for all.

Ah, I miss those days. Most of my companions have moved on, but I still find that nothing achieves that excellent "hard reboot" feeling of insight, creativity, and clear motivation. Shrooms seem to be strangely haunted for me, but LSD is clean and pure and joyous.

I think you might be me.

The point I would add is that much as I loved my psychedelics (LSD in particular) I have definitely moved beyond them over the past ten or fifteen years, and not by conscious choice. I've just gradually stopped them doing them. Part of it this is no doubt due to the aging of my network (30 and 40 somethings being way less likely to be "holding") but I think the larger part is more along the line of graduating. Enough of the Invisible University, on with life itself.
posted by philip-random at 4:06 PM on July 9 [2 favorites has favorites]

Excuse my ignorance, but does LSD really cause flashbacks? That would be my biggest concern--sounds so disorienting.

I'm not anti-drug (I take way too many Rx drugs to indulge in that kind of hypocrisy), just naive. Since I've never even smoked pot, I really have no basis for reference on the whole LSD issue. I was very much raised in the "Say No to Drugs" environment and had a sheltered childhood.
posted by misha at 4:51 PM on July 9

One time I was doing LSD and suddenly got this idea: I booted up my laptop (my big plan was to listen to some specific music I had on the laptop while tripping), and I somehow managed to get vi running. I had my trip buddy try writing about all the wonderful ideas we were having, knowing that he was completely ignorant of vi, and the very concept of a modal text editor for that matter. The results were, as you may predict, totally mindblowing for both of us.

By the way, the best reason to trip and do computer programming is it really enhances the syntax highlighting. Even when you have syntax highlighting turned off.
posted by idiopath at 5:03 PM on July 9 [5 favorites has favorites]

misha: you ever have that thing happen where you think you see somebody in the corner of your eye, but it was just a shadow moving? All of my flashbacks are like that, but more vividly like a person, and sometimes maybe there wasn't even a shadow that moved.
posted by idiopath at 5:05 PM on July 9 [1 favorite has favorites]

LSD is marvellous. But it might be bad if it were slipped into municipal water or something like that because people learned to block unpleasantness of their life to some extent and it would be quite a shock if all was revealed.. Just saying.
posted by rainy at 5:16 PM on July 9 [3 favorites has favorites]

idiopath: my best time using Vim once was on pot. I could really think ahead half a dozen commands and then type them in precisely. I'd be all like "18j12lR355esc2}cw22" - that's what I need to do and then I'd just type it in without pausing to think. Really neat. Only lasted half an hour though, then I got bored.
posted by rainy at 5:20 PM on July 9

Hallucinogens did not significantly impair my ability to do my calc III homework or physics problems. I had expected to review my work and see a mash of uncoordinated symbols, an odd scribble or two, etc., but instead it was just plain ole homework. Accurate, too. No mistakes.

I haven't tried programming on LSD. Maybe I'll give that a shot. The closest I came is taking Ambien and getting an odd coloration out of my previously white screen before I napped out.
posted by adipocere at 5:33 PM on July 9

LSD is like a movie trailer, where the movie is enlightenment.
posted by mhjb at 5:41 PM on July 9 [7 favorites has favorites]

... well, seeing as how we're singing praises at this point in the thread.

1. I've never played better Foosball than I did once when extremely high on LSD; it all just clicked. I was an okay player who was suddenly unbeatable. And this just wasn't in my mind. It was verified later by the lucid light of day.

2. I've never skied better than I did once when moderately high on LSD; somehow it allowed me to find the absolutely knife edge of my ability, and I was already a pretty good skier. Again, this was verified later.

I hope this doesn't sound like bragging; just reporting. The key point to me is that the phrase "Everything You Know Is Wrong" is never more relevant than when applied to the mystery that is the psychedelic experience in general, and LSD in particular. That said, this also applies to the absurd notion that psychedelics are somehow harmless, good time drugs.

Anything but.

That day of skiing I just reference? That's also the last time I ever skied as I managed to crack the lamination in both my skis that day, just pushing the physics of what they could bear to the absolute edge. This stuck me with the dilemma of coming up with hundreds of bucks for new ones, or not. I chose not.
posted by philip-random at 6:03 PM on July 9 [1 favorite has favorites]

But the government told me drugs are bad. They wouldn't lie, would they?

Of course not.
posted by homunculus at 6:45 PM on July 9

I may have shaved off a few IQ points and moderately impaired certain modes of cognition

I sincerely doubt this. There certainly haven't been any reputable studies that I know of correlating LSD use and impaired cognition, at least not in any long term way (you might have some trouble with math on 250 mics, or even trouble talking on 500 [and, of course, these numbers vary for everybody]).

I'm more empathetic and self-aware as a result.

That's definitely the case for me.

I took a lot of acid in late high school and throughout college. I always thought that I should wait until I was older, but after taking mushrooms and tripping out like a madman, I figured the door was pretty much already cracked, so I started dosing pretty much as often as possible. It got to the point where I was pretty convinced that I was psychologically dependent on it. Not like I had to take it every day, but maybe once a quarter.

I graduated from college, and became more distant from my acid taking buddies. I took two or three years off. Every now and again I thought "hmm, maybe I should dose and dust out the ole cobwebs," but the urge never coincided with access. I was getting older, getting more serious about my career, and while, unlike a lot my tripster friends, I never said "I'll never drop acid again," but I figured I didn't really need it anymore, and I certainly wasn't going looking for it.

Then about a month ago, a buddy dropped a small amount of whistle-clean L on me at a show. I had almost forgotten how much I love that stuff. I worked through months worth of issues in an hour or two. Nothing super serious. I didn't see God. I didn't cure some long-standing maladaptive condition, but I thought a lot about recent patterns of behavior, and which ones were good for me and which ones I needed to change. Over the past month, I've felt genuinely better, mildly more positive and self-aware.

I've heard it said that psychedelics can open doors, but once they're open, you don't need to just keep slamming the screen door open over and over again. For the big kind of mind-opening stuff, I don't know if repeated dosing helps, but it's great for slightly tweaking the knobs of your own mind.

LSD is an immensely powerful psychological tool, and while it's easy to abuse, I will always be an advocate for responsible use.
posted by solipsophistocracy at 7:02 PM on July 9 [16 favorites has favorites]

it's the outside-the-box thinking that occurs and the fresh patterns/connections/insights/breathroughs that may assert themselves.

Maybe it'll help come up with great ideas for software. But as for improving the quality of the engineering necessary to build the software - I don't think LSD will do shit. Writing software isn't an artform.
posted by schwa at 8:52 PM on July 9

Paul Erdos, for example, couldn't do math worth a damn unless he was all cranked up on meth.

benzedrine != meth
posted by anagrama at 4:47 AM on July 10

"Everything You Know Is Wrong" is never more relevant than when applied to the mystery that is the psychedelic experience in general

I have always thought that this is the underlying cause of the unreasonable hatred of LSD, and drugs in general, by a major portion of the population. They fear that something that might make them realize how pointless their lives are, and recoil in terror.
posted by Enron Hubbard at 6:44 AM on July 10 [1 favorite has favorites]

Writing software isn't an artform.

Actually, it's only been the past, say, 5 years where this has really grown to not be necessary. Writing software used to be like a very involved puzzle, sort of like mixing needlepoint, knitting, and math. Especially "back in the days" which a lot of the LSD use here happened, when machines had 128K of memory.

Nowadays with disk space and memory nearly as cheap as sand, it's hard to remember that there was a time when programmers had to account for every single byte, and sometimes had to use them all in VERY creative ways in order to achieve what was desired.

So, yeah, I could see how LSD would help a programmer with the engineering necessary to build the software. Insights into how to reuse and compact one's code down into a teensy space could easily be discovered whilst tripping.
posted by hippybear at 8:43 AM on July 10

I have always thought that this is the underlying cause of the unreasonable hatred of LSD, and drugs in general, by a major portion of the population. They fear that something that might make them realize how pointless their lives are, and recoil in terror.

I had exactly the same thought, but on reflection, I don’t think it’s true. The hordes are fearful of psychotic breaks and flashbacks and all the usual bogeymen that get trotted out. They should be afraid of enlightenment but they don’t know enough to be.

I don't mean that entirely unsympathetically. Psychedelics turn therapy into a roller coaster ride. One you can't get off for hours. Not everybody is up for that.
posted by Durn Bronzefist at 9:56 AM on July 10

They fear that something that might make them realize how pointless their lives are, and recoil in terror.

If you fear that something might make you realize how pointless your life is, you probably already fear that your life is pointless on some level. I sincerely doubt that anyone ever thinks "hmm, I'd better not do drugs, because then I'll learn how insignificant I am. In my drug free state, I'm the shit!"
posted by solipsophistocracy at 10:49 AM on July 10 [1 favorite has favorites]

Writing software isn't an artform.

I disagree. It's not NECESSARILY an art form, but it can be. Different people approach it in different ways.
posted by flaterik at 11:23 AM on July 10

Psychedelics turn therapy into a roller coaster ride. One you can't get off for hours. Not everybody is up for that.

By contrast, anti-anxiety and anti-depression drugs turn all of life into one giant flat tarmac. Huge giant flat tarmac that continues forever in any direction. Takes weeks for it to take hold, takes weeks for it to wear off once you stop taking the pills.

Not everyone is up for that.
posted by hippybear at 11:24 AM on July 10

By contrast, anti-anxiety and anti-depression drugs turn all of life into one giant flat tarmac. Huge giant flat tarmac that continues forever in any direction.

I've got some of that stuff. I call it "desk job".

I can hook you up.
posted by Durn Bronzefist at 11:43 AM on July 10 [1 favorite has favorites]

benzedrine != meth

You've got to be kidding me. Benzedrine is a racemic mixture of amphetamine salts. In a purely technical sense it is true that benzedrine isn't methamphetamine since it lacks the methyl group. In any useful sense, getting hopped up on benzedrine every day is no different than getting hopped up on methamphetamine.

I'm kind of tired of the its not methamphetamine its dextroamphetamine I give my chiiiiildren!!! Now I think I'll just call it "meth" whether it is amphetamine, dextroamphetamine, or methamphetamine.
posted by Justinian at 12:48 PM on July 10

Not to get into this in any real depth, but the subjective experiences are quite different between any of those forms of speed you have listed.
posted by hippybear at 12:59 PM on July 10

Not in my experience they aren't. The dosages required are different, however.
posted by Justinian at 2:00 PM on July 10

Not to get into this in any real depth either, but the subjective experiences of anti-anxiety and anti-depression drugs vary a lot too. Me, I'm happy to be able to leave my room and actually create art and do science, rather than sitting in a corner crying for hours at a time! And to be able to feel the full range of emotions, instead of different gradiations of apathy and despair!
posted by ubersturm at 9:20 PM on July 10 [2 favorites has favorites]

I'm kind of tired of the its not methamphetamine its dextroamphetamine I give my chiiiiildren!!! Now I think I'll just call it "meth" whether it is amphetamine, dextroamphetamine, or methamphetamine.

Yes, do that. I'll be over here, calling Vicodin heroin.
posted by solipsophistocracy at 4:08 AM on July 11

And I'll be over here, calling caffeine Coke.
posted by Pronoiac at 10:44 AM on July 11 [1 favorite has favorites]

"...it's the outside-the-box thinking..."

What box?
posted by Mental Wimp at 3:42 PM on July 11