Scientist Haunted by Misuse of Drugs He Invented

[darkwolfunseen]

Okay, so this is pretty basic but:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_sci_haunted_scientist

Honestly, I'm amazed as to how he reacts to a few deaths when thousands can die from FDA approved things each day and no one bats an eye.

I swear I hate fluff pieces that just try to put the words psychedelic and poisonous in the same sentence.

 

[sidefx]

the brain is a technology we dont understand enough, and psychedelics, used responsibly of course, are keys we can use to understand ourselves and our world better. And when enough locked doors are opened, who really knows what we could achieve.
we could move mountains.

Rest in peace, Albert Hoffman...

 

[IJesusChrist]

I was going to post this.

The only sentence I really cared for in the whole article talks about a drug "that is so powerful I simply had to end the research immidiately in order to not allow any of it to reach the streets"

I'm sure the guy wears sweater vests and lives in an all-white suburb with a 2 car garage and a small dog.

 

[spice]

fr. wiki-

David E. Nichols (born December 23, 1944) is an American pharmacologist and medicinal chemist.

Presently the Robert C. and Charlotte P. Anderson Distinguished Chair in Pharmacology at Purdue University, Nichols has worked in the field of psychoactive drugs since 1969. While still a graduate student, he patented the method that is used to make the optical isomers of hallucinogenic amphetamines. His contributions include the synthesis and reporting of escaline and the coining of the term entactogen.

He is the founding president of the Heffter Research Institute, named after German chemist and pharmacologist Arthur Heffter, who first discovered that mescaline was the active component in the peyote cactus. In 2004 he was named the Irwin H. Page Lecturer by the International Serotonin Club, and delivered an address in Portugal titled, "35 years studying psychedelics: what a long strange trip it's been." Among pharmacologists, he is considered to be one of the world's top experts on psychedelics. Nichols's other professional activities include teaching medicinal chemistry and molecular pharmacology at Purdue University in West Lafayette, IN, and teaching medical students at the Indiana University School of Medicine.

Nichols is still carrying out legitimate research on the chemistry of psychedelics. He has published approximately 250 scientific reports and book chapters, all describing the relationship between the structure of a molecule and its biological effects (often referred to as a Structure-activity relationship, or SAR). Although his research mostly uses rats, a number of compounds included in Shulgin's PIHKAL were actually first synthesized in Nichols's lab. His lab also first developed [125I]-(R)-DOI as a radioligand. Nichols is one of the few people who has published legitimate research on the chemistry and pharmacology of LSD in the last 20 years, and first reported that several LSD analogues, including ETH-LAD, PRO-LAD, and AL-LAD, were more potent than LSD itself. Their human effects are described in TiHKAL. He also improved the synthesis of psilocybin so that it would be accessible for several recent clinical studies.

Other notable research he helped carry out includes extensive studies of the structure-activity relationships and mechanisms of action of MDA and MDMA, during which he helped to discover many novel analogues including such compounds as 5-methyl-MDA, 4-MTA and MDAI. Nichols has said that "he believes gray-market chemists used information from papers he published on 4-methylthioamphetamine (MTA) in the 1990s to synthesize the drug, which they sold in tablets nicknamed "flatliners" as a substitute for MDMA (Ecstasy).

More recently, Nichols has become one of the world leaders in research on dopamine, and his team has developed several notable dopamine receptor ligands, including the selective D1 full agonist compounds dihydrexidine and dinapsoline which have been researched for the treatment of Parkinson's disease, and a number of other subtype-selective dopamine agonists derived from dinoxyline. He co-founded DarPharma, Inc. to commercialize his dopamine compounds; several of his team's compounds are now being studied in clinical trials for the treatment of Parkinson's disease and the cognitive and memory deficits of schizophrenia.


Dave Nichols may wear a sweater vest and live in the burbs, but he's been working with Shulgin since your dad was a kid.


Be respectful.


http://www.erowid.org/culture/character ... phy1.shtml



This isn't some Percy wringing his hands, it's a guy that's in the mix in a way any of us aren't.



I imagine he knows a dangerous drug when he encounters one

 

[5tr4t0]

One chemical was so potent that "I just stopped and said, 'We're not going to study this one. This stuff would hit the market big-time,'" he said.

So there's a more potent chemical than bromo-dragonfly and TCB-2? :shock:

 

[IJesusChrist]

Apparently, yeah.

In one of PIHKAL's entries shulgin talks about how a single molecule of one certain drug, coupled with a normal diet would have the potency of some microgram quantities of another.

It was all theory in a perfect world, but interesting none the less.

 

[adam_phinel]

Well, I would be a slight hippocrit by agreeing with him due to the amount of illegal drugs I have tried.

But I can't help thinking that what he says is really correct. I mean, it's a matter of luck when any drug becomes popular quickly like MDMA for example or more recently Meph. By it's nature, nobody knows the long term effects or risks until it's too late.

Maybe it's just luck that a disaster like he imagined hasn't really happened yet?

On the other hand I also don't think that it's morally right that important research like that could be impeded for that reason when you think how many lifes could be improved or saved in the future.

If you think about it the real reason for potential problems is prohibition. And if it was legal to produce recreational drugs they would be better tested just like legit pharmaceuticals are and these problems wouldn't potentially be of such magnitude.

 

[zezt]

I emailed this old geezer about two weeks ago. I found out he was 'testing' animals with psychedelics and I emailed my protests about it, and he just pushed this article that justifies torturing animals, and I responded and ....you cannot get through to these people, they have lost their soul. They see animals as machines that are there for them to abuse. IF members here agree with that I am not going to debate it because I will get very fukin angry. I am just mentioning it because I saw this about this old shit.

 

[spice]

Oh there's no doubt that he doesn't DO psychedelics, you'd be hard-pressed to do them and have such things on your conscience, unless you're just a caveman at heart.....unfortunately, some of us are just that.


Read about the regret Shulgin expressed long ago in sacrificing a rat, you can tell that it was the beginning of his experiencing things from a heightened, psychedelically-heightened perspective ( I do not mean the transient sensitivity of a trip, but the 'real' sensitivity borne of psychedelic experience, the empathy.....)



I agree in principle, animal torture is wrong, it shouldn't be done.


But tell me, sir, how will you convince a race of beings that are willing to send their OWN OFFSPRING off to die over oil, that killing a rat is wrong?

 

[zezt]

Oh there's no doubt that he doesn't DO psychedelics, you'd be hard-pressed to do them and have such things on your conscience, unless you're just a caveman at heart.....unfortunately, some of us are just that.


Read about the regret Shulgin expressed long ago in sacrificing a rat, you can tell that it was the beginning of his experiencing things from a heightened, psychedelically-heightened perspective ( I do not mean the transient sensitivity of a trip, but the 'real' sensitivity borne of psychedelic experience, the empathy.....)

Could you link me to the source about Shulgin? I didn't know that!

I have also challenged Rick Doblin founder of MAPS about using animals to test psychedelics etc, and he replied they had to so as to be taken seriously by medical science, etc. So it would be the same story--in other words--like the other animal abusers claim, that it is 'for the good of humanity what they do to animals'. But how come then anciient peoples have known about and taken entheogens and didn't find the need to make captive animals take them involuntarily? How come the South American Ayahuesceros discovered what plants to use for Ayahuasca brew---a feat which astonishes western scientists who depend on the scientific method. When the medicine men say the plant teachers told them they cannot fathom how that can be true!
I was shocked when it dawned on me that people promoting psychedelic healing also were part of animal 'testing' and vivisection, Like you I see psychedelics as inspiring empathy, so it freaks me out to know that they could be part of that shit. I also have tried to ask people who are against animal vivisection what they feel about this aspect, and you know it is strange but I have not had one reply about it. It is almost like it is taboo! question Usually when people go quiet on you you've hit a taboo nerve

I agree in principle, animal torture is wrong, it shouldn't be done.


But tell me, sir, how will you convince a race of beings that are willing to send their OWN OFFSPRING off to die over oil, that killing a rat is wrong?

I am doing my bit (see my other thread post-40023.html?f=12&start=30 ) which is to explore propaganda and how it works and to speak out about it, because what propagandists depend on is people not realizing what they are doing. You learn that what has been created is a mechanistic 'reality' where animals and humans are supposed to be machines. For example philosopher Rene Descartes claimed animals were machines and that their cries of pain when he tortured them were just like noises of an engine! So 'thinkers' like him are CHOSEN by the rich to push this propaganda. Next in the 19th century in Germany was the philosopher and psychologist Wilhelm Wundt who said humans were animals and thus were machines, and he influenced Pavlov, Watson, etc and their ideas were pushed into children's minds via an enforced 'education' system.

Regarding war propaganda, you know what happened with Iraq--as it is still fresh and going on. They lied it was about WMD not oil, and about spreading democracy. One typical propaganda trick they use is showing the leaders (the fucks) with the troops with their jackets off for photo calls, the TV news, etc, and sleeves rolled up. It is just blatant crap people buy, because they are so dumbed down by propaganda. So much so, like you say, they even will send their children off to be maimed physically and psychologically for life, or dead. So propaganda is fukin serious shit and needs great respect regarding researching it so as to uncover it!

 

[adam_phinel]

Good point. I can't understand why he doesn't feel for the rats if he is so concerned about people possibly self harming themselves when they are smart enough to understand the risks and choose to do it.