Changing Minds

The title of Michael Pollan’s How to Change Your Mind sounds like a self-help book of a type much needed in an age when we are far too apt to make a virtue of being closed-minded toward opinions that differ from our own. In a sense it partly is, but not in the way one might think. The subtitle explains the change the author intends: What the New Science of Psychedelics Teaches Us about Consciousness, Dying, Addiction, Depression, and Transcendence. Pollan’s book is an informative compendium of the modern history and current state of psychedelics.

It has been 80 years since Sandoz chemist Albert Hoffmann synthesized lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD), which he called his “problem child.” It is 50 years since LSD became illegal in the US. It is classified by the Drug Enforcement Administration as a Schedule I drug, which by definition is a drug that has a high potential for abuse, has no accepted medical use, and is unsafe to use even under medical supervision. Possession and sale are federal crimes and penalties can be severe. (Marijuana is still a Schedule I drug, by the way, though the feds at present are choosing to ignore intrastate sales in states that have legalized the substance at the state level.) A thing is not so just because government officials say it is, of course. LSD does have medical uses, though the nonmedical ones are just as intriguing.

Pollan didn’t initially intend his research for this book to become personal, but, perhaps unsurprisingly, it did. His inquiries into the history, chemistry, and applications of psychedelics led to his own supervised (not officially supervised, but supervised) trips on LSD, psilocybin, and 5-MeO-DMT (toad venom). The lengthy chapter on his trips is the least interesting section since such experiences are by their nature personal and difficult to communicate verbally except in banalities. (My own short story on the subject, however, can be found at Brown Acid.) The reaction to these substances is highly context-dependent and is also dependent on the predispositions of the user; religious people are likely to interpret their experiences as religious, for example, while secularists are more likely to speak of a more generic “one with the universe” sensation. The chapter is still useful, however, for understanding the author’s own mindset and biases.

Timothy Leary was the face and voice of LSD in the 1960s, but according to Pollan he did psychedelia no favors. His antics merely scared the straight establishment into outlawing the substances. The more interesting First Wave research, some of it notoriously for the US military, was done not at Harvard by Leary in the 60s but by others in the 40s, 50s, and 60s. Civilian researchers included Humphrey Osmond, Abram Hoffer, and Al Hubbard. Osmond supervised Aldous Huxley’s experiments with mescaline in 1953; Huxley wrote the influential The Doors of Perception the following year and later would experiment with LSD and befriend Timothy Leary. Studies conducted up through the early 60s showed real promise in treating alcoholism, drug addiction, and depression, mostly by changing the perspective of the subjects. LSD binds to serotonin receptors in the brain, which is what SSRIs (selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors: standard pharmaceutical treatments for depression) do, though the effects are more radical. Bill Wilson, co-founder of Alcoholics Anonymous, credited his insights to a 1934 experience with belladonna (which has hallucinogenic properties) and he experimented with LSD in the 50s. Research largely halted, however, with the Schedule I designation.

Leary was certainly antic, but there is no denying his popular influence, much as Pollan would prefer not to dwell on it. So, I will make one point regarding his most famous dictum, even though Pollan doesn’t, since it relates to the change of perspective at the core of the therapeutic and transcendental uses of psychedelics: “The only way out is in. Tune in, turn on, drop out.” He was not urging people to crank up the stereo, drop acid, and give up. As he explained whenever asked, he meant that the way to personal freedom is through inner space: tune into yourself, expand your mind (yes, he advocated psychedelics to help with that), and drop out of the rat race so many of us mindlessly run. Be free instead create your own destiny. That’s not the same as saying “be a lump on a couch,” though I suppose one’s destiny could be that; some people achieve that destiny without psychedelics. Some past users are very hardworking indeed. Steve Jobs attributed his creativity in part to his experience with LSD. He gibed Bill Gates for not having tried it, though Gates said he in fact did.

Since 2000 there has been a renaissance of experimental research into psychedelics (psilocybin and LSD in particular) at legitimate facilities, including at NYU, Columbia, and Johns Hopkins. (Even Schedule I drugs can be grudgingly granted legal exceptions for some experimental studies.) Once again the substances are proving useful in combatting addiction and depression. They also are proving valuable for relieving anxieties in terminal patients. Whether the trips of the dying are felt as spiritual or simply as the loss of ego, they seem to help bring peace of mind.

Substances as powerful as these can be dangerous (as is alcohol), of course, and the risks must be acknowledged. They expand most minds but have been known to shatter a few. That is reason enough in the minds of many to continue to outlaw them. So, it is anyone’s guess whether they ever will regain a legal status even if just for (non-experimental) therapeutic uses. It seems unlikely, but back around 1900 the notion that it could be any business of government to restrict at all what people chose to put in their bodies also seemed unlikely: cocaine and laudanum (opium and alcohol) could be bought over the counter at the time. Times change. Perhaps Hoffman’s problem child may again be allowed to come out and play.

Original Broadway Cast: Walking in Space