Ayahuasca Substance Abuse

Chapter six talks about stimulants, like coffee (caffeine containing plants for the most part), cocaine, tobacco, and amphetamines. Many people would not consider coffee a drug, but those are usually the people that cannot go a day without it. Chapter seven talks about depressants, like alcohol, sleeping pills, narcotics, general anesthetics, and antianxiety drugs. Like coffee, many people would not consider alcohol a drug; it may be because it is legal but, when it is abused it has potential to cause more damage than many other drugs to one’s self and outsiders. Depressants depress the nervous system, reducing sensitivity to outside stimulation but in small doses they tend to make people relaxed and happy. The eighth chapter is about psychedelics, which are claimed to have the lowest potential for abuse of any of the psychoactive drugs. This chapter discusses drugs like LSD, morning-glory seeds, mushrooms, ibogaine, DMT, peyote, and ecstasy. People have been using hallucinogens since the beginning of time and most of these plants are concentrated in North and South America. The ninth chapter covers one drug only, marijuana. It is not a depressant or stimulant but has features of both, and some people even consider it a light psychedelic. The experienced high from marijuana can differ from person to person.

The article discusses research on the use of hallucinogens for medical therapies applicable to cancer, drug addiction, and psychological problems. Studies being undertaken at Johns Hopkins University are discussed. Johns Hopkins' research on hallucinogens includes assessment of the drug's psychospiritual effects among volunteers and its use in easing psychiatric and behavioral disorders in those so affected.

LSD has potential medical and therapeutic uses. Even though LSD 's illegalization caused a drastic

Throughout human history people have sought experiences that somehow transcend every day life. Some sort of wisdom that might progress their knowledge of self and of the world that they live in. For some reason they believed that the tangible world just could not be all there is to life. Some believed in a greater force that controlled them, some believed of invisible beings that influenced their lives, some of an actual other world that paralleled their own. Many of these people also believed that it was possible to catch a glimpse of these forces, beings, or worlds through a variety of means that propel individuals into altered states of consciousness. These techniques include

These substances are in turn broken down in the body into a great many more

The systematic scheduling of drugs in the United States is arbitrary which leads to a discriminative social injustice. Some psychedelic substances such as Psilocybin are schedule 1 drugs, while alcohol and nicotine are legal. According to the National Institute of Drug Abuse (NIDA) both alcohol and nicotine are proven to be harmful and addictive (2017). Conversely, Psychedelic substances have not been proven to be addictive. This equates to a social injustice that discriminates over someone who may prefer the effects of psilocybin to nicotine, even under the science that has shown nicotine and alcohol have a higher potential for abuse. Unfortunately, many political factors come into play regarding the legal status of drugs and industries such as the pharmaceutical, tobacco and alcohol industries, who harbor the most money and have an influence in the legality of drugs whether they are safe or not. While legalizing psychedelic substances would most likely cut into profits for these large industries they would bring about economic benefits as well.

“Psychoactive substances exert their their effects by modifying biochemical or physiological processes in the brain.” Psychedelics are taken out of context to be for recreational use only, when they can be taken to enhance spiritual journeys.

The researchers conducted their study at the alcoholic unit of the New Jersey Neuro-Psychiatric Institute at Princeton, New Jersey. Participants were recruited by offering patients admitted to the institute the opportunity to take part in the experimental LSD program. A total of 28 alcoholics were admitted to the program, and their results were compared to that of a group of 34 alcoholics who took part in a standard comparison program provided by the Alcoholic Unit. Details about the patients were recorded such as their ethnic background, age, and marital status. Subjects were placed into groups of four. The first week was structured as an orientation week, and at the end of the week, two of the members were randomly chosen to be administered

There are many substances in this world that are used and abused in order to achieve pleasing psychoactive effects. Two substances of such nature that are abused in today’s society are alcohol and LSD. Alcohol is a liquid that is derived from the fermentation of grains and/or fruit (7). LSD is an ingestible form of lysergic acid which is derived from a fungus called ergot. Both of these drugs are drastically different with minimal similarities, primarily because alcohol is classified as a depressant and LSD is classified as a hallucinogen. Even though these drugs differ in many ways, they are commonly used in unison.

The purpose of this research paper is to examine the different effects of different types of hallucinogenic drugs on the human brain. The paper will focus specifically on LSD, DMT, and Shrooms as they are amongst the strongest types of drugs in their category. The chemical structure of the different drugs and the way they alters chemicals in the brain will be examined as well. This topic is worth investigating because if you or anyone you know is interested in trying LSD, DMT, and Shrooms, it is important to know the effects they will have on your brain if you are unaware or don’t

Hallucinogenic mushrooms have been around for many years. The earliest recording of people using these mushrooms is from 7000 B.C. rock paintings in the Sahara desert (www.magicmushrooms.net). Psychedelic mushrooms were a revered tradition in native Central American cultures at the time of the European invasion, and have been in continuous use up to the present. Named teonanácatl ("flesh of the gods") in Nahuatl, they may have been employed for healing, divination and for intercession with spirits. Since the beginning of the Latin American colonial era, their use has been hidden due to persecution by the Christian church, which branded all native religious practices as "pagan"(wikipedia.org). According to the BBC(British Broadcasting Corporation), the first documented use of psychedelic mushrooms was in the Medical and Physical Journal: In 1799, a man who had been picking mushrooms for breakfast in London's Green Park included them(psychedelic mushrooms) in his harvest, accidentally sending his entire family on a trip. The doctor who treated them later described how the youngest child "was attacked with fits of immoderate laughter, nor could the threats of his father or mother

For thousands of years people have spoke of all types of visions. Whether the visions were from religious groups, Indian tribes, or self proclaimed prophets; all types of people have seen things. This was more than likely occurring with the help of different types of hallucinogens. Hallucinogens have been around since the beginning of time. Some mushrooms, cactus flowers, and even different types of mold are all able to produce hallucinogenic effects. However, it was only within the last century that man actually started to produce his own. LSD, or lysergic acid diethylamide-25, is a relatively new substance in society. All known effects show LSD, or acid, as the harmful drug most people know it as. There are people who believe

One of the first areas of LSD experimentation was in treating alcoholism (Dye, 1992, p.36). After extensive research, it was concluded that LSD was not effective on treating alcoholism and the research was discontinued.

An individual’s behavior and emotion becomes chemically altered often resulting in dependency, aggression, onset of diseases and poor judgement. This poses a dangerous threat to the neurotransmitters since they have multiple jobs in different parts of the brain. Drugs of abuse are able to exert influence over the brain reward pathway either by directly influencing the action of dopamine within the system, or by altering the activity of other neurotransmitters that exert a modulatory influence over this pathway. These drugs are often powerful and have been known to trigger schizophrenic behavior and can also cause a person to cease breathing, for example hallucinogens such as LSD, mescaline, and psilocybin are able to artificially stimulate the serotonin receptor (Sapolsky, 2005).

It is no secret that drug use has the ability to completely alter a person’s state of consciousness, whether it be through extreme euphoria, increased hyperactivity, pain relief or psychedelic hallucinations. Although many drugs are used for medical purposes, the global issue of recreational drug use is now being fronted as an extremely serious matter that is steadily on the uprise. Recreational drug use is often associated with negativity, addiction and as having serious physical and mental repercussions. One of the few class of drugs that is often associated with both positive and negative connotations are hallucinogens, otherwise known as “psychedelics”, which have powerful altering effects on ones sense of perception, brain function