This thread is old.

BUT isn't it true that THC stays in your body for up to a month?

i think the shark thing would be relatively painless. you'd be in so much shock and have so much adrenaline flowing through u that you probably wouldn't even feel much pain in the few seconds it would take for it to finish u off.

and besides, having ur cause of death being a shark victim is FAR more cooler than the usual ways of going out.

"The fool who realizes his own stupidity is in fact wise, while the fool who thinks himself wise is a fool indeed."

-siddhartha gautama
AKA the buddha

Even though I don't smoke ciggies, I think I will blow a lungful of smoke into the air in the hopes that AT LEAST one molecule of the smoke gets blown all the way from thailand into Neoform's lungs. =p

And ya I was obviously being sarcastic about banning drinink in bars (especially since drinking is to bars what food is to restuarants) but it's nonetheless a reality that stupid behavior due to alcohol is a major negative consequence of going out. Some typical examples include: being attacked by over-aggresive drunk ppl over stupid reasons (like hitting on a girl that the drunk person just so happened to be hitting on too), getting BARFED on, or just the all-too-typical case of having some random dude with foul alcoholic breath yelling some incoherent, babbling nonesense three inches from my face.

ravewave has become useful!

I think they should ban drinking in bars. I hate going to a bar and having to deal with all the drunk people there.

ps. does the no-smoking ban only apply to cigarretes or to meth as well?

I agree with this, and that's why buying from a reliable source is a much better way to ensure high quality. But even if you buy a shitty, heavily cut pill, its exetremely unlikely to be dangerous, since the dealers will cut their pills either with cheaper drugs (ephedrine, caffeine, etc) or with an inactive substance (ex. sugar). The only reason why a dealer would deliberately choose a harmful substance to cut their product with, is if they are trying to poison their customers, which I maintain is very unlikely.



Every substance has both positive and negative effects. It is the responsibility of the person who is considering drug use to inform themselves of the drug's risks, and to make an appropriate decision. I beleive this is true regarding the voluntary consumption of all potentially dangerous substances, whether a drug or an artery-choking Big Mac. On the other hand, it is the responsibility of the drug supplier to be honest regarding their product.

I'm not suggesting that use of MDMA or speed is harmless or "safe". Obviously, both these substances have side-effects ranging from the possibility of addiction to neurotixicity and so forth. However, the risk of buying MDMA/speed and it turning out to be some kind of poisonous drug that will cause instant death is pretty close to nill. In fact, a heavily cut and weak MDMA pill is probably alot safer than a pure MDMA pill, because you're then consuming less of the drug!

Of course its impossible to identify the contents of a pill by its appearance, but suggesting the existence of so-called "bad pills" that will kill you is just another anti-drug myth. The simple reality is that drug dealers/chemists don't make money from poisoning their customers! If you buy a random pill from a stranger, of course it might be a "fake" and contain nothing more than caffeine or some other cheap drug, but the chance of the pill containing dangerous ingredients is infinitismal.

Pheonix, since I know you smoke pot I'll remind you of another anti-drug scare story: the "pot laced with crack" myth. Just like the "lethal pills" myth it doesn't survive common sense, since drug dealers make more money selling crack as crack than selling it as pot. Similarly, drug dealers aren't trying to poison their customers.

And I find it funny that you interpret the order to "not place a stumbling block in front of a blind man" to mean not take drugs. I interpret it as meaning, well, not to place a stumbling block in front of a blind man.

try [ autotaxi.com ]

The rave scene has never been about super-star DJ's...thats always been the domain of clubs.

ze'ev: i'm doing good..thailand is the shit :)

lone star: 5-htp is about as much of a drug as a multi-vitamin pill is.

do a search on PIHKAL

it will have everything u ever wanted to know about phynethylamines :)

speedy u should try eating sushi WHILE listening to hardtek

If you do take ecstasy, an easy and healthy way to avoid the come-down is to take 5-htp the morning after, and for a few days later. Its a natural way to replenish your serontonin, and you can buy 5-htp at many health food/vitamin stores. However, its best not to take ecstasy any more than once a month.

I know u guys like to joke around, but this is a serious subject.

Next time you are tempted to NOT smoke a joint, consider the consequences and long-term effects. Side effects of NOT smoking marijuana have been known to include: restlessness, increased aggression, boredom, excessive motivation, reduced appetite (commonly known as "not-munchies"), and reduced appreciation of music.

Everday, there are instances in which people have engaged in unprotected sex, got into car wrecks, and even gone on murderous rampages, immediately after NOT smoking a joint. So next time you are tempted to NOT smoke a joint, think about how it will affect your future.

Neoform i'm particularly concerned about you, as i've heard that you've NOT been smoking alot of joints recently. Plz be safe

In Thailand, there's an amusement park where, for an exchange charge of 10$ (on top of admission), you can touch real snow.

bwahahah.

The analogue act only exists in the United States.

Basdini: the 2c's are actually classified as phenethylamines, and are structurally similar to mescaline and MDMA

2ci: glad u enjoyed it :)

i agree that those places are defintely not "afterhours" in the vein of say, aria. more like party locations or venues.

The promoters must've figured that if you've been raving for six years, you'd be too brain damaged to remember.

Don't have any personal experience with it, but I spoke with this girl who became addicted to it. She had been working in a hospital, so was able to inject unlimited amounts of it for free. Basically, morphine is just as effective of a painkiller as heroin (and just as addictive). The only reason they give you morphine in the hospital, and not heroin, is that morphine isn't as well known as a drug of abuse. The average patient would be quite alarmed if their doctor told them they were being give heroin.

Puddle water is the best. Theres something about that extra bit of dirt that makes it oh-so-tasty.

The number of Canadians using marijuana appears to have doubled over the past decade, according to the first major study of drug and alcohol use in the country in 10 years.

The Canadian Addiction Survey reports that 14 per cent of Canadians said they had used cannabis in the past year, up from 7.4 per cent in 1994.

A total of 13,909 Canadians aged 15 and older participated in the survey, sponsored by Health Canada and the Canadian Centre in Substance Abuse.

"The rise in cannabis use, especially among young Canadians, is of concern because we know that cannabis is not a benign substance," said Michel Perron, chief executive officer of the centre .

The survey found that 45 per cent of Canadians have used marijuana at least once in their lifetime. About 70 per cent of those aged 18 to 24 reported using the substance.

Males were more likely than females to use pot, as were those who have never been married.

The study found the use of cocaine and crack also rose from 0.7 per cent in 1994 to 1.9 per cent in 2004.

Overall, it found that the use of illicit drugs by Canadians at least once in their lifetime rose from 28.5 per cent in 1994 to to 45 per cent in 2004.

The survey also found that steroids use is low but that lifetime use of steroids is increasing among males.

Drinking stats on the rise

The number of those who reported drinking alcohol in the past 12 months rose to 79.3 per cent in 2004 from 72.3 per cent in 1994.

More men than women drank booze in the past 12 months (82 per cent to 76.8 per cent). The survey found that 90 per cent of people aged 18 to 24 drank alcohol in that time period.

Around 6.2 per cent of those who drank alcohol this past year reported they were heavy drinkers at least once a week and 25.5 per cent said they were heavy drinkers once a month. A heavy drinker is defined as someone who consumes five or more drinks on a single occasion for men, four drinks for women.

Males aged 18 to 24 and single persons were more likely to report heavy drinking.

I've seen people do kite boarding in Thailand. You're right, its dope. Hitting a big wave, you get ALOT of air.

A beautiful hippy/backpacker beach in Thailand, a session of traditional yoga massage, and some very good drugs combined to form an astounding mystical experience on the island of Ko Chang.

................................................

I arrived at Treehouse Bungalows on Sunday morning, and instantly I fell in love with the place. A large thatched bamboo hut formed the restaurant, overlooking the sea, with dread-locked and tattoed travellers lounging around, reading, or lying in hammocks. A collection of small bungalows available for less than $4 per night. A beautiful white sand beach, with clear turqoise waters lapping against the shore. This was one of those places that I never want to leave.

On my first day at the Treehouse, I decided to try a combination of LSD and DXM, which I'd never done before. The acid was a microdot I'd bought a month earlier from some Japanese hippies, and it was good (I'd tried one before), defintely enough to get pretty decent visuals. On top of the microdot, I planned to do 300mg of DXM (enough to give me a strong 2nd plateau trip on its own), and some very good cannabis. The setting was marvelous, yet somewhat risky; I was alone, so I'd have to take care of myself.

I took the acid around 3:30PM, and ordered a chai tea shake in the restaurant while waiting for it to kick in. Perhaps 30 minutes later I noticed a gradually increasing body buzz, a feeling of 'energy', which is when I took the DXM. Colors were enhanced, but still no significant mental effects.

A short while later, I went back to my bungalow, smoked a couple of bowls, then returned to the restuarant. On my way to the restaurant, I noticed a couple of Thai women offering traditional massage on mats overlooking the sea. I'd never had a massage before, but the idea of having one on drugs seemed tempting, to say the least.

By now the effects of the drugs were quite strong. I lost perception of my body, and, while returning to the restaurant, began walking in a robot-like fashion. Meanwhile, my head felt like it had expanded to three times its normal size, with a distinct feeling of pressure inside my head, as if it were a balloon filled with helium to the point of bursting.

I lay down in a hammock in the restuarant. My mind became clear and open, and all my internal dialogue, or "mental chatter", ceased. Simultaneously, any thought which did form in my head was distinct and observable. I could watch my thoughts, as if each one were an electric charge spontaneously moving between two points in my enourmous, gas-filled balloon of a head.

I could actually feel my heart beating, yet since I couldn't feel my chest, it seemed to be beating in the midst of nothing, suspended in mid-air. I spent several minutes just feeling the sensation of my heart beating, with a sense of awe.

I could see open-eye visuals at will, such as branches of a tree moving and taking on the shapes of animals, but the visuals seemed neither important nor amazing, so I ignored them, and started surveying the scene unfolding around me in the restaurant.

And what a scene it was! I felt as if I had divine powers of observation. All around me, different conversations were taking place at the various tables of the restaurant. I could "tune in" to any one conversation at will, and hear all the words (and feel the emotional weight behind the words) distinctly, as if the words were being spoken to me - even if in fact the conversation was taking place at the other end of the restaurant.

Gradually, as the effects grew stronger, worry began to form in my mind, and I wondered what I could find to occupy my time for the remaining hours of the trip. I remembered the possibility of having a Thai massage, and as crazy of an idea it seems being in the state I was in, I thought with a smile, why not?

I robo-walked over to the women offering the massage and pointed to the sign advertising it (she didn't speak english). I lay down on the mat, and suddenly hands began crawling over me. I had lost contact with my body from the DXM, but whatever part of me was being massaged, that part became the totality of my existence. When my shoulders were being massaged, the only part of me that existed was my shoulders. In turn, I became arms, legs, buttocks, ankles, and so on. Even stranger, it seemed as if each body part that was being massaged was comprised of hundreds of life forms, as if my consciousness had expanded to the cellular level of awareness.

Soon it became apparent that this was no ordinary, western-style massage. Thai traditional massage is considered a form of healing and religious practice; indeed, "applied yoga" is a better term than massage. After the regular kneading of muscle, the masseuse began manipulating me into yoga-like postures and stretches. And of course, yoga is itself meant to induce altered states of consciousness, the goal being the realization that one is in fact a manifestation of Brahman, God, or the eternal Self.

The combination of drugs and yoga induced a mystical experience of enourmous power. I was not thinking it, I was experiencing it. The three bodies of thought which shaped my experience were Brahamanism, which regards all forms as being of the same, godly essence; Buddhism, which insists that there is no Self, and quantum mechanics. In the midst of my mystical state, all three bodies of knowledge converged to a single point, in a manner which I will attempt to convey as best as words will allow.

I ceased to become my ego. My ego (the person I thought I was, that I identified with) was a mask that I'd been wearing for so long, I forget it was actually a mask, and beleived it was actually who I was. Instead, I became the source from which all things emanate. I discovered my true Self, the self that Brahamnaism refers to, yet this Self had no relationship to anything my ego was or had experienced, other than the fact that my ego is just one form that the Self can take on (as are all people, animals, plants, and inanimate objects). The Self that is not-self (annata).

This Self, this core, was not a God, for a God would just be another manifestation of it. Instead, the Self was quite like a single fundamental unit of matter. In the midst of the mystical state I was in, this was a conviction stronger than any beleif I have ever held. The eternal Self was nothing more than a particle, which due to quantum uncertainly, spontaneously spawns virtual particles, which in turn can combine to create an infinite variety of forms. Of course, the probability of such a random configuration becoming a form of life is miniscule, but then again, we can only be aware of it once its happened!

During the height of my mystical experience, I was only faintly aware of my limbs moving in according with the masseuses instructions (another women had joined in, so there were now two massaging and stretching me). Time seemed to be eternal, and I felt as if the yoga-massage would continue until I had attained full enlightenment, and hence would have fully transceneded this world!

Of course that did not happen, and eventually the masseuses tried to indicate to me that it was time to pay and leave! I was jolted back to my ego long enough to pay my bill, and somehow (miraculously) stumbled back to my bungalow and lay down in bed. The peak of the experience had passed, but I was still tripping hard.

As I lay down in bed and felt my ego slip away, I felt anxiety for the first time. It was a familiar anxiety that I often experience while tripping, especially in the moment of ego-loss. I suddenly remember all of my commitments and unfinished work, and feel that if I loose my ego, everything will result in failure. This only lasted for a moment, and I had the sensation of facing and finally defeating this anxiety.

The next few hours I lay in bed, experiencing tastes of the same mystical state I had experienced while being massaged, except of a lesser degree. As the drug effects began fading away, I experienced some valuable insights regarding myself (on the level of the ego) and some of my friends. When I was finally able to sit up in bed and get my bearings, I began experiencing incredible swirling visuals, though these only lasted a few moments. My watch read 10:30 (seven hours after the LSD ingestion) and I felt sober enough to grab some dinner.

In conclusion, I found LSD and DXM to be an incredible combination! While I doubt that every (or even most) of my future experiences with this combo will result in a mystical experience, I beleive it holds much potential. LSD by itself causes a transcending of the ego, though (at usual doses) attachment to the physical body remains intact. DXM, on the other hand, causes a transcending of the physical body, though the ego remains intact. The combination, therefore, allows for the transcending of the ego and body simultaneously, which can result in some breathtaking (and potentially terrifying) experiences. Needless to say, I recommend this combination only to experienced psychonauts with at least a modicum of mental stability.

i've never brought toys to a party, but when I do roll i must admit they are soo much fun

wicked pics sharon, made me wanna be there =p

its funny how your "let's NOT get together" thread resulted in a get together

eskape is spelled with a k

I got bored in class today and started drawing pictures of candy-style ravers. The result was pretty bad. But what I really wanted to say is candy kids rock my world! :D

From alcohol and cannabis to cocaine and LSD, it seems there are no limits to our appetite for mind-altering substances. What is it about human nature that drives us to get out of our heads, ask Helen Phillips and Graham Lawton

By: Helen Phillips, Graham Lawton

IN THE Smoke Shack, a "head shop" in Nelson, British Columbia, the air is
thick with marijuana and the atmosphere is mellow as the staff stage a demo of their dope-related paraphernalia. The clients range from tourists and business types to the dreadlocked and dishevelled. All walks of life are welcome.

Over the border in the US, the police call to the man in the car for the
last time. If he doesn't step out they will shoot. He stays put - maybe because he's embarrassed about being caught naked from the waist down, clearly aroused. Or maybe he's just too high on methamphetamine to care.

High up in the mountains of Peru the men brew coca leaves into a tea. While they don't approve of the habit of snorting the powdered extract, the tea gives them a mild buzz that helps fight the headaches and nausea of altitude sickness. Up here, cocaine is part of life.

Lounging in a restaurant, two old friends share a second bottle of wine,
sinking lower in their seats as they enjoy the numbing haze and warmth it
creates. Later they'll order brandy. The bartender pours himself a cup of
coffee. It's going to be a long shift.

As diverse as these episodes are, there is a clear common thread running
through them: the pursuit of intoxication. Since prehistoric times, humans have been seeking out and using intoxicating substances. Most people who have ever lived have experienced a chemically induced altered state of consciousness, and the same is true of people alive today. That's not to say that everybody is constantly fighting the urge to get high, nor that intoxication is somehow a normal state of consciousness. But how many of us can claim never to have experienced an altered state, whether it be a caffeine kick to help us get going in the morning, a relaxing beer after work, a few puffs on a joint at a party or the euphoric high of ecstasy?

In the present prohibitionist climate it is difficult to talk about the use
of psychoactive, literally "mind-altering", substances without focusing on
their harmful and habit-forming properties. And it's true that excessive use of consciousness-altering drugs, both legal and illegal, is bad for individuals
and bad for society. People who seek intoxication are taking risks with their
health and flirting with addiction. Drugs can lead to crime, violence, accidents, family disintegration and social decay.

Nonetheless, intoxicants remain a part of most people's lives . And indeed
most of us are able to consume them in moderation without spiralling into abuse and addiction. Take alcohol, for example. Its potent psychoactive properties and potential for wreaking havoc are well known, yet the majority of people still drink and enjoy it without becoming alcoholics. There's also ample evidence that, despite public health campaigns and the threat of severe penalties, millions of people every year join the legions who have experimented with illegal substances, from cannabis and cocaine to ecstasy, amphetamines and LSD (for a guide to the most commonly used psychoactive drugs, ).

It seems that intoxication in one form or another is universal, a part of
who we are. "It's a natural part of consciousness to change one's consciousness," argues Rick Doblin, who runs the not-for-profit Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies in Sarasota, Florida. But why is it that we choose to alter our state of consciousness by dosing our brains with chemicals?

The answer is straightforward. We seek intoxication for a simple reason that we are almost too scared to admit - we like it. Intoxication can be fun,
sociable, memorable, therapeutic, even mind-expanding. Saying as much in the present climate is not easy, but an increasing number of researchers now argue that unless we're prepared to look beyond the "drug problem" and acknowledge the positive aspects of intoxication, we are only seeing half the story - like researching sex while pretending it isn't fun.

A full understanding of intoxication, and the quest to achieve it, could
have numerous pay-offs. For one thing there is the prospect of better ways to tackle abuse and addiction. There are also good reasons for studying intoxication as a phenomenon in its own right. What is it about psychoactive substances that we like? What do they tell us about who we are? Is there a way to get the good without the bad? Some researchers believe that such enquiries will lead to a new understanding of the human mind, including the mysteries of consciousness , or new treatments for mental illness. Others go as far as to argue that it is time for society to accept that intoxication is an inextricable part of human nature, and find a way to let us explore it openly.

The quest to understand intoxication wasn't always so constrained. Back in
the 1950s, 60s and early 70s, many scientists took a very personal interest in it. In those more liberal days, researchers such as physician Andrew Weil,
latterly of the National Institute for Mental Health in Maryland, and
ethnobotanist Terrence McKenna charted the effects of many drugs, tested them in the lab and in the field, explored their mind-altering qualities first-hand, documented their use in different cultures, and suggested that many of the compounds had medicinal benefits.

Many of these pioneering researchers came to the conclusion that seeking
intoxication was programmed into human nature. As Weil pointed out in his 1973 book The Natural Mind , from an early age children experiment with spinning around or hyperventilating to experience mind-altering giddiness. He suggested that when we get older, this quest to alter our feelings stays with us but we pursue it chemically as well as physically.

The spirit of personal research, however, was largely quashed in the late
70s and 80s as a US-led "war on drugs" took hold. Drug research became dominated by the "addiction paradigm", with pleasure and benefits strictly off-limits. "It was so controversial it had to be shut down altogether," says Charles Grob, director of the child and adolescent psychiatry department at Harbor-UCLA Medical Center in Torrance, California, whose interests lie with the potential medical use of psychedelics.

But some researchers carried on regardless. Ronald Siegel, now a
psychopharmacologist at the University of California, Los Angeles, was one of them. As a psychology graduate student in the 60s he busied himself with studying pigeon memory. One day, a fellow student was arrested for marijuana possession, and his lawyer asked Siegel what he knew about the drug's effects. Not much, as it happened, so he brewed up an extract and watched what happened when a pigeon got stoned.

Ever since, he has been fascinated by intoxication, what it is and why we
and other animals seek it. He managed to keep studying "controlled substances" such as LSD, mescaline, PCP, cocaine and psilocybin in his clinic, in animals and in volunteers, all legal and above board. He's passed out, thrown up, been attacked by intoxicated animals, and even been shot at by drugs barons - all in the name of research. And he has gained a unique perspective, spelled out in his 1989 book Intoxication: Life in pursuit of artificial paradise , which is being reissued next April by Park Street Press of Rochester, Vermont.

Siegel believes there is a strong biological drive to seek intoxication. "It
's the fourth drive," he says. "After hunger, thirst and sex, there is
intoxication." Whether we are seeking pleasure, stimulation, pain relief or
escape, at the root of this drive, he says, is the motivation to feel
"different from normal" - what has sometimes been called "a holiday from reality". Some people reach this state through travel, books, art, roller coasters, sport, religion, exploration, love, social contact or power. Others use intoxicants. "It's the same motivation," says Siegel. "We wouldn't live if we didn't seek to feel different."

One of the main "different" feelings we want to experience is pleasure.
Pleasure, neuroscientists believe, is the brain's way of telling us that we are
doing something that is good for survival, such as eating and sex. The circuits that create the feeling are driven by natural opioids and cannabinoids. No surprise, then, that we have a penchant for putting versions of these chemicals into our brains.

But the equation is not quite as simple as chemical in, pleasure out. At
last month's Society for Neuroscience meeting in San Diego, California,
neuroscientist Kent Berridge of the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor
described preliminary work showing that rats given a natural cannabinoid,
anandamide, seemed to become unusually partial to sweet tastes. Rats primed with anandamide had higher pleasure responses to sugar than unprimed rats. It seems that the cannabinoid may not just be pleasurable in its own right, but also enhances other pleasurable experiences, making the world seem a generally more likeable place. Perhaps this is one aspect of the well-known "munchies" effect of marijuana, they conclude.

A related idea is that some people take psychoactive substances to suppress "negative pleasure". George Koob, a neuroscientist and addiction specialist at the Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, California, has proposed that the brain has a natural system for limiting the amount of pleasure we can feel. He argues that pleasure has to be transient or humans and other animals would get so absorbed in it that they would succumb to the next predator that came along. Koob thinks that the brain has a way of bringing us down - a kind of "anti-pleasure" mechanism if you like. What if this system goes into overdrive? "Some people seek excessive pleasure because they are born with too much anti-pleasure," he says. "They may take drugs to feel normal."

But there is more to intoxication than simply massaging our pleasure
circuits. Some altered states, Siegel believes, have a utilitarian value. Just
as many animals naturally seek medicinal plants such as antibiotics or emetics, we seek to medicate our minds. When we are agitated or in pain, emotionally as well as physically, we seek substances that tranquillise and sedate. When tired or depressed, we seek stimulants. According to some researchers, including Grob, this medicinal use is an underlying thread running through all forms of intoxication.

The drive to medicate mood is pervasive throughout the animal kingdom,
Siegel says, and he and his colleagues have documented thousands of examples. Elephants, for instance, enjoy the taste of fermented fruit. They will usually just browse it, but if they lose their mate (elephants usually mate for life) they may seek oblivion in an alcoholic fruit binge, even drinking neat ethanol if researchers provide it. It's hard not to conclude that, like humans, they are drowning their sorrows. Stress can also lead animals to take intoxicants as a form of escape. When stressed by overcrowding, elephants are more motivated to seek alcohol. And fear can take its toll too. During the Vietnam war, Siegel and his team filmed water buffalo grazing on opium poppies to the point of addiction. And animals don't just take downers: there are numerous reports of goats guzzling stimulants such as coffee beans and the herbal amphetamine khat.

Medication with uppers and downers may be fairly easy to understand, but
there are other intoxicants whose attractions are harder to fathom. These are the hallucinogens, which can't easily be explained in purely survivalist terms. Most animals actively avoid this category of intoxicant.

Despite this, some researchers believe that psychedelics can have a
medicinal effect in humans. Doblin, for example, argues that the drastically altered states they induce can play a role in maintaining mental health. Hallucinogens -and to some extent cannabis and MDMA - allow us to escape, temporarily, from a reality ruled by logic, ego and time, and explore other aspects of our consciousness. "The brain functions best when it has access to altered states," he says.

This might sound like hippy mumbo-jumbo, but there is plenty of evidence in
the medical literature that hallucinogens are effective against mental illness,
including anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorder, alcoholism and heroin
addiction. Most of this research was done in the 1950s, but the field is now
showing signs of a revival. Grob recently received approval to test psilocybin
as a treatment for severe anxiety in terminally ill cancer patients, and there
are ongoing studies in the use of psilocybin for otherwise untreatable cases of obsessive compulsive disorder, and MDMA for serious post-traumatic stress disorder.

Medicinal properties notwithstanding, there are other ideas to explain why
people take psychedelics. Siegel found that he could persuade monkeys to
voluntarily smoke the hallucinogen DMT when they were in a situation of severe sensory deprivation. He had already trained three rhesus monkeys to smoke for a reward, to study the effects of nicotine. When he laced their smoking tubes with DMT, they briefly tried it, then avoided it. But after several days in darkness, with no stimulation, the monkeys began to smoke DMT voluntarily. They ended up grasping at and chasing non-existent objects and hiding from invisible dangers.
"This was the first demonstration of a non-human primate voluntarily taking a hallucinogenic drug," Siegel says. "We share the same motivation to light up our lives with chemical glimpses of another world." Boredom it seems, will drive animals to experiment, even when the experience is not altogether pleasurable.

The same drive to seek novelty or stave off boredom could explain why people take drugs that have overwhelmingly negative effects. PCP, for example, which some consider to be the most dangerous illegal drug, is a "dissociative" . Among its myriad effects are numbness, loss of coordination, paranoia, hallucinations, acute anxiety, mood swings and psychosis. But for some people the altered state is clearly worth it - PCP was hugely popular in the US in the 1970s. "People seem to say they liked feeling different or funny," says Siegel. "When there's nothing else to do, people will take anything to feel different."

In some ways novelty-seeking is a basic behavioural drive. Literature on
child development reveals that once infants are no longer sleepy, hungry or
thirsty, they will explore and seek new experiences. They wriggle their limbs, put things in their mouths, touch things, taste things and bash things
together. Without this drive, they wouldn't learn anything about the world around them. Perhaps this spirit of exploration simply continues into adulthood in a different form.

There's another drive, too, that probably plays a role: risk-taking. For
some people taking risks is itself pleasurable. According to Koob this might come from a slightly different brain system to the pleasure circuits. For animals that forage, there is always the risk of being attacked by a predator. In other words there is a conflict between seeking new foraging sites, or novelty, and risk. Evolution has got around this conundrum by making novelty rewarding and pleasurable in its own right.

Pleasure, excitement, therapy, novelty: seen in this light, the pursuit of
intoxication looks very different from its standard portrayal as a pathological
drive that must be suppressed before it leads to harm, addiction and squalor. Yet the mainstream debate on drugs, alcohol and tobacco seems unable to acknowledge that there is anything positive at all to say about intoxication. Instead it is locked into a sterile argument between prohibitionists and those who want to reduce the harmful effects by, for example, making heroin available on prescription. Both groups start from the belief that psychoactive substances are inherently harmful but disagree on what to do about it.

Some activists, however, are starting to argue for an entirely different
attitude to intoxication. One prominent critic of the debate is Richard Glen
Boire, director of the Center for Cognitive Liberty and Ethics in Davis,
California. He believes that intoxication is not just a part of human nature,
it is a basic human right. "Why should it be illegal to alter your style of
thinking?" he says. "As long as you don't do any harm to anyone else, what you do in your own mind is as private as what you do in your own bedroom." Boire advocates changes to the law that would allow people to experiment with psychoactive substances at home or in designated public places. "It's the right of people to explore the full range of consciousness, and our duty as a society to accommodate that," he says.

Some scientists are moving in the same direction, arguing that instead of
suppressing, medicalising and criminalising our basic drive to experience
altered states we should apply ourselves to making it safer, healthier and less squalid - in short, to taking the "toxic" out of intoxication.

The approach favoured by Siegel is to tweak existing drugs to make them
better, with shorter effects and no addictive potential. "What it would be
like, " he says, "if we had a drug like alcohol, which didn't lead to violence, fetal damage, liver failure, that was safe, wouldn't lead to drink driving and never gave you a hangover. What would be wrong with it medically? Maybe we'd even prescribe this alcohol substitute to help people relax." We could even design entirely new chemicals that allow us to experience all the pleasures, thrills and adventures of intoxication without the downsides. "This is not science fiction," says Siegel. "Civilisation will eventually take this direction."

Perhaps this would be the greatest contribution a full understanding of the
intoxication instinct could offer - a spur for society to move beyond the
irrational position of sanctioning caffeine, alcohol and tobacco while fighting
a "war" against other psychoactive substances. David Lenson, a social theorist at the University of Massachusetts in Amhurst and author of the 1995 book On Drugs , makes this point by comparing the war on drugs with efforts to eradicate homosexuality: both are based on an incomplete understanding of human nature. Siegel, too, sees an analogy with sex. "We can't be expected to solve the AIDS problem by outlawing sex," he says. "We have to make drugs safe and healthy, because people are not going to be able to say no."

A window on the mind

Helen Phillips Graham Lawton

DRUGS provide some of the best evidence we have that the mind is the brain; that our thoughts, beliefs and perceptions are created by chemistry. Take a drug, particularly a hallucinogen, and any of these can change. This means these drugs can be scary and need to be taken with great care and respect. But it also means they have the potential to reveal some of the deepest secrets about our minds and consciousness.

A century ago, psychologist William James experimented with the anaesthetic nitrous oxide. Our normal rational consciousness, he said, is just one special type of consciousness, while all around it, "parted from it by the filmiest of screens", are other entirely different forms of consciousness, always available if the requisite stimulus is applied.

Others meticulously described the effects of inhaling ether, chloroform and
cannabis, and the strange distortions of time, perception and sense of humour they induced. More curiously, they also described changes in belief, and even in philosophy. When Humphry Davy took nitrous oxide in 1799 he ended up exclaiming that "nothing exists but thoughts". Others made similar observations and found their views profoundly shifted by even brief forays to the other side of that filmy screen.

This raises the peculiar question of whether what James called "our normal
rational consciousness" is necessarily the best state for understanding the
world. After all, if one's view of the world can change so dramatically with
the aid of a simple molecule, how can we be sure that our normal brain chemistry is the one most suited to doing science and philosophy? What if our brain chemistry evolved to help us survive at the cost of giving us false beliefs about the world? If so, it is possible that mind-altering drugs might in fact give us a better, not worse, insight than we have in our so-called normal state.

Take the common hallucinogenic experience of losing our separate self, or
becoming one with the universe. This may seem, to some, like mystical hogwash, but in fact it fits far better with a scientific u

^^hahaha

What happened to quality drama?

For O.D.B., Fun Was Too Much or Not at All
By KELEFA SANNEH

Published: November 17, 2004


Ol' Dirty Bastard first roared into view 12 years ago, howling a wild threat: "Bite my style, I'll bite your ..." - well, never mind the rest. The track was called "Protect Ya Neck," and it was the epochal first single from his group, the Wu-Tang Clan, which swiftly became one of the most important hip-hop acts of the 1990's and certainly one of the strangest. Somehow an entropic octet obsessed with obscure kung fu movies and even more obscure neo-Gnostic theology became one of the decade's most visible pop-culture brand names.

Even within this oddball crew, O.D.B. was a misfit. On the group's classic 1993 debut, "Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers)," his was often the first voice listeners noticed. While his cousin RZA unspooled dense, sometimes acronymic rhymes ("Ruler Zig-zag-zig Allah jam is fatal/Quick to stick my Wu-Tang sword right through your navel"), O.D.B. was content to be merely and spectacularly funky - or as he put it, "fzzza-funky." He had a hilarious, wobbly howl and an earthy wit; one of his rare squeaky-clean boasts went, "I come with that ol' loco/Style from my vocal/Couldn't peep it with a pair of bi-focals." In a skit between tracks, another Clan member, Method Man, paused to explain how O.D.B. got his name: "'Cause there ain't no father to his style."

O.D.B., who was born Russell Jones, died on Saturday afternoon after collapsing in a recording studio two days before his 36th birthday. No cause of death has been determined, but already, as often happens, wild anecdotes and bits of speculative biography are threatening to obscure the exhilarating music that won him so many fans.

The Wu-Tang Clan cultivated a carefully enigmatic image - on the first album cover the members' faces were obscured. But O.D.B. emerged as one of the group's first breakout stars, in part because of his knack for pulling memorable stunts on camera. In 1994 MTV cameras followed him as he rode in a limousine to collect food stamps. The next year he released his solo debut, a wildly entertaining collection of low-down jokes and memorable rhymes called "Return to the 36 Chambers: The Dirty Version."

With its scratchy piano loops and howl-along choruses, the debut O.D.B. album sounded like a party spinning out of control. One surreal sex song, "Don't U Know," portrayed a hallucinatory classroom encounter: "Teacher says 'Open up your texts/You! Read the first paragraph on oral sex!' " And "Drunk Game (Sweet Sugar Pie)" had the rapper moonlighting as the world's groggiest R&B singer. His pitch was less than perfect, but his charm never failed.

By 1997, when the Wu-Tang Clan reunited for a sprawling double-album, "Wu-Tang Forever," O.D.B.'s vibrato-enhanced hollering and down-and-dirty jokes seemed slightly out of place with the group's rhyme style, which was darker and more intricate than ever, the beats slower and more cinematic. For the next few years O.D.B. made headlines: he always seemed to be having either too much fun (as when he crashed the stage at the 1998 Grammy Awards to protest the Clan's loss) or not enough (as when he was shot during what he said was a robbery at his house).

Even so, he found time to record "N***a Please," his 1999 album. Or sort of record it: the CD sounded suspiciously like something that had been stitched together at an editing desk, as if someone had recorded a bunch of the rapper's rhymes and outbursts then found a way to assemble them into songs. Still, the album included a left-field hit, "Got Your Money," a prescient collaboration with Kelis and the Neptunes, recorded before either the singer or the production duo were established stars. There was also an absurd version of the jazz ballad "Good Morning Heartache," which should have sounded like a joke but somehow didn't. You could hear the sorrow that lurked beneath the surface of so many other O.D.B. songs and stunts.

More recently, after a series of arrests (including one for possession of crack cocaine), O.D.B. was sentenced to two years in prison; no doubt some people who read about it imagined him as just another rapper in trouble with the law. But in life, as on record, O.D.B. was a hip-hop anomaly. For hip-hop stars, unlike rock 'n' roll stars, there is nothing glamorous about being out of control. O.D.B. burned hot in a world where stars are supposed to stay cool.

After his release from prison O.D.B. filmed an hourlong VH1 special that was hard to watch even before his death. It was depressing to see a formerly irrepressible man looking so fragile. He also signed a deal with Roc-A-Fella Records, Jay-Z's label, and appeared on a few songs: "When You Hear That" with Beanie Sigel and "Keep the Receipt" with Kanye West.

Now that he's gone, some people are wondering whether O.D.B.'s tenure in the treacherous hip-hop industry did him more harm than good. But it seems more likely that hip-hop merely gave him a way to capitalize on the things he did so well and so strangely: his infectious love of wordplay, his sly (and often filthy) sense of humor, his huge, bellowing voice. Without hip-hop O.D.B. might have been a neighborhood star, beloved by a small circle of acquaintances who told tall tales about him. But thanks to hip-hop, that circle stretched around the world.

speed

Dayyum. ODB was really one of a kind. RIP.

This isn't quite true. The Jews in Israel are very diverse racially: there are white European Jews, middle eastern Jews, African Jews, etc. So while middle eastern Jews are racially similar to
Palestinians, the European jews certainly aren't, and its actually the European jews that comprise most of the Israeli upper class, as well as occupying most government positions.

And yes, Arafat ordered some "terrorist" attacks in the 70's. Big fucking deal. Its not as if the modern state of Israel wasn't founded on the deeds of Jewish terrorists, for example Begin. Or sustained by the actions of war criminals, for example Sharon.

But the critical point is, the objective of Arafat in the 70's and 80's was always to establish a state where all races and religions could co-exist in complete equality. Whereas the modern state of Israel is built upon the rascist principle that the land on which it is situated is somehow "Jewish land" and that Jews deserve special rights.

Brilliant!

i get it now!

P.L.U.R.