Progress Toward a Safer Psychedelic Drug to Treat Depression and Addiction

npr.org

65 points·marz0··6 comments

Previously discussed: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25369552

"Olson's team selected ibogaine because it seemed to have the most daunting side effects, including hallucinations and potentially fatal heart problems. It's also increasingly hard to find the plants that naturally contain ibogaine, and synthetic versions of the drug have been difficult to make in large quantities."

"These obstacles make ibogaine "the Mount Everest of psychedelics," Olson says."

Another candidate would have been datura and related plants.

Datura is some scary shit. Way back in the days of "experimentation" jimsonweed was investigated by friends. In 2 of those cases they were literally hallucinating for over 24 hours -- not walls breathing stuff, literally living in a different universe.

Obviously there was recklessness involved, but it certainly made an impression on me.

Hallucinations are one thing.

If they took datura your friends most likely experienced delusions (aka distorted perceptions or thinking - and you believe it is real).

It's a really reckless thing to mess around with under almost any circumstances.

It was reckless, and ill-informed to boot.

Would love this. Psilocybin is the only thing I've found that knocks me out of my depression for a week or two when I'm too low to function. But I wish I could get those benefits without having to commit a full day to the psychedelic aspects of it (as I've gotten older it can feel less exciting and more like a chore).

Reply on news.ycombinator.com