[00:00:00 - 00:00:03]	 (thunder rumbling)
[00:00:03 - 00:00:07]	 - Again, Dr. Dennis McKenna, and welcome back, doctor.
[00:00:07 - 00:00:08]	 - Thank you.
[00:00:08 - 00:00:11]	 - All right, geez, so many people wanna talk to you,
[00:00:11 - 00:00:15]	 so let us continue, I guess.
[00:00:15 - 00:00:17]	 East of the Rockies, you're on the air with Dr. McKenna.
[00:00:17 - 00:00:18]	 Good morning.
[00:00:18 - 00:00:20]	 - Good morning, Art, how are you in the doctor today?
[00:00:20 - 00:00:21]	 - Just fine, where are you?
[00:00:21 - 00:00:23]	 - I am an Indiana PA.
[00:00:23 - 00:00:24]	 - Okay.
[00:00:24 - 00:00:26]	 - I actually have two quick questions if you don't mind.
[00:00:26 - 00:00:27]	 - Not at all.
[00:00:27 - 00:00:31]	 - The first is, you spoke of legalization of marijuana
[00:00:31 - 00:00:33]	 and the war on drugs.
[00:00:33 - 00:00:35]	 I wonder if the doctor, in your mind,
[00:00:35 - 00:00:39]	 do you differentiate between those natural drugs
[00:00:39 - 00:00:41]	 such as marijuana and peyote
[00:00:41 - 00:00:44]	 and those which would be considered synthesized, like LSD,
[00:00:44 - 00:00:50]	 in terms of legalization or just simply level of deviance?
[00:00:50 - 00:00:52]	 - Level of deviance?
[00:00:52 - 00:00:55]	 - I know, you know, it's no nice way to put that, I guess.
[00:00:55 - 00:01:00]	 - Well, no, I mean, if you've been listening
[00:01:00 - 00:01:02]	 to the previous conversation,
[00:01:02 - 00:01:06]	 we were making a distinction between plants and drugs.
[00:01:06 - 00:01:11]	 I'm not a doctrinaire saying that LSD, for example,
[00:01:11 - 00:01:16]	 should be banned and persecuted and peyote shouldn't be.
[00:01:16 - 00:01:19]	 I mean, I think, you know, we have to find a context
[00:01:19 - 00:01:23]	 in which, particularly with the psychedelics,
[00:01:23 - 00:01:27]	 in which these things, you know, can be used
[00:01:27 - 00:01:32]	 in a way that is safer for people,
[00:01:32 - 00:01:36]	 but people shouldn't be denied access to these experiences
[00:01:36 - 00:01:41]	 if they feel that, you know, that they should have them.
[00:01:41 - 00:01:46]	 I'm not sure what you do about the war on drugs.
[00:01:46 - 00:01:49]	 That's just one example that, you know,
[00:01:49 - 00:01:52]	 it has to do with the fact that you form relationships
[00:01:52 - 00:01:57]	 with drugs or plants, and it's much easier in a way
[00:01:57 - 00:02:01]	 if you have a relationship with a plant
[00:02:01 - 00:02:04]	 that happens to also be a drug.
[00:02:04 - 00:02:09]	 I think it's, you know, I think you have a much better chance
[00:02:09 - 00:02:12]	 to, you know, have a good relationship
[00:02:12 - 00:02:16]	 with that particular entity if you grow it,
[00:02:16 - 00:02:18]	 if you nurture it, and in return,
[00:02:18 - 00:02:20]	 it provides you with a visionary experience.
[00:02:20 - 00:02:23]	 I mean, that is a true symbiosis,
[00:02:23 - 00:02:24]	 and that's what we're talking about.
[00:02:24 - 00:02:28]	 It's harder to have that kind of relationship
[00:02:28 - 00:02:31]	 with something that may come in a gelatin capsule
[00:02:31 - 00:02:35]	 or in the case of LSD on a window pane,
[00:02:35 - 00:02:37]	 you know, square of gelatin.
[00:02:37 - 00:02:39]	 Not that it's not possible.
[00:02:39 - 00:02:44]	 I mean, I know that people do use LSD in a creative way,
[00:02:44 - 00:02:50]	 but it's this whole issue about how do we
[00:02:51 - 00:02:54]	 if people are going to have relationships with drugs,
[00:02:54 - 00:02:58]	 how do we foster, you know, good relationships,
[00:02:58 - 00:03:00]	 then mutually beneficial relationships
[00:03:00 - 00:03:02]	 rather than destructive relationships,
[00:03:02 - 00:03:06]	 and with some drugs, because of the way they work,
[00:03:06 - 00:03:09]	 because of their neurochemistry,
[00:03:09 - 00:03:13]	 it's more difficult to foster good relationships
[00:03:13 - 00:03:17]	 in the sense, I mean, good, bad, these are charged words,
[00:03:17 - 00:03:19]	 but you know what I mean.
[00:03:19 - 00:03:22]	 Relationships that are not self-destructive.
[00:03:22 - 00:03:25]	 With the psychedelics, I think it's much,
[00:03:25 - 00:03:27]	 you know, they lend themselves
[00:03:27 - 00:03:31]	 to a more positive type of relationship
[00:03:31 - 00:03:34]	 because they do open the way into experiences
[00:03:34 - 00:03:39]	 that many people would consider spiritual experiences.
[00:03:39 - 00:03:41]	 - All right, and my second question,
[00:03:41 - 00:03:42]	 pardon me if either of these were mentioned before.
[00:03:42 - 00:03:44]	 I didn't catch the whole program,
[00:03:44 - 00:03:47]	 but not too long ago, I was watching TV
[00:03:47 - 00:03:50]	 and I saw something on the CIA admittance
[00:03:50 - 00:03:53]	 of using psychedelics and things like LSD in the '50s
[00:03:53 - 00:03:56]	 for, I guess you'd call it quasi-mind control,
[00:03:56 - 00:03:58]	 more just a-- - All right.
[00:03:58 - 00:03:59]	 Caller, hold it right there.
[00:03:59 - 00:04:01]	 Hey, that's great, because that's exactly
[00:04:01 - 00:04:02]	 where I was going, Doctor.
[00:04:02 - 00:04:06]	 The government had a relationship with LSD for a while.
[00:04:06 - 00:04:07]	 - Right.
[00:04:07 - 00:04:11]	 - And I guess not such a good one in view of what they did.
[00:04:11 - 00:04:14]	 - Right, well, these drugs don't particularly
[00:04:14 - 00:04:17]	 have moral qualities in the sense that, you know,
[00:04:17 - 00:04:21]	 if you're a bad person, just taking the psychedelic
[00:04:21 - 00:04:24]	 is not going to make you a good person.
[00:04:24 - 00:04:28]	 I mean, you know, it's a two-sided, you know,
[00:04:28 - 00:04:31]	 it's a two-way street, as in any relationship.
[00:04:31 - 00:04:33]	 It depends on what you bring to it.
[00:04:33 - 00:04:37]	 You know, just because the LSD,
[00:04:37 - 00:04:41]	 just because the CIA used LSD in their experiments,
[00:04:41 - 00:04:43]	 I mean, it didn't turn them into saints, obviously.
[00:04:43 - 00:04:44]	 - No, it didn't.
[00:04:44 - 00:04:49]	 - You know, so these things are morally ambiguous
[00:04:49 - 00:04:51]	 in a certain sense.
[00:04:51 - 00:04:53]	 They can, and you see this, again,
[00:04:53 - 00:04:57]	 in the traditional context where ayahuasca is used,
[00:04:57 - 00:05:02]	 for example, in mestizo society in South America.
[00:05:02 - 00:05:06]	 You know, an ayahuasquero, just because he knows
[00:05:06 - 00:05:09]	 how to use ayahuasca is not necessarily somebody
[00:05:09 - 00:05:12]	 you can trust or somebody you want to trust.
[00:05:12 - 00:05:16]	 There is a whole other subtext going on
[00:05:16 - 00:05:19]	 of what's called brujería, or what we would call
[00:05:19 - 00:05:24]	 black magic, where, you know, they use the powers
[00:05:24 - 00:05:28]	 to put hexes on people.
[00:05:28 - 00:05:33]	 And in fact, in Peru, in mestizo ayahuasquero society,
[00:05:33 - 00:05:37]	 illness, disease, misfortune, all of these things
[00:05:37 - 00:05:42]	 are almost always seen as the effects of some brujo,
[00:05:42 - 00:05:47]	 some, you know, some evil practitioner
[00:05:47 - 00:05:50]	 having put the huame on you.
[00:05:50 - 00:05:55]	 - Speaking of evil practitioners, was Terence
[00:05:55 - 00:05:59]	 or yourself ever approached by anybody in government?
[00:05:59 - 00:06:03]	 - You mean because of our involvement in these things?
[00:06:03 - 00:06:04]	 - Yes.
[00:06:04 - 00:06:08]	 - Not since, not for a long time.
[00:06:08 - 00:06:12]	 Not since 1969, actually.
[00:06:12 - 00:06:13]	 - '69, huh?
[00:06:13 - 00:06:14]	 - Right, right.
[00:06:14 - 00:06:17]	 - But I mean, were you approached not so much
[00:06:17 - 00:06:21]	 because of your use or as a result of your use,
[00:06:21 - 00:06:25]	 but perhaps to help the government in some way
[00:06:25 - 00:06:28]	 with their proposed use?
[00:06:28 - 00:06:30]	 - No, not really.
[00:06:30 - 00:06:33]	 Not really, I mean, I worked, I did a postdoc
[00:06:33 - 00:06:37]	 in the laboratory at National Institutes of Mental Health.
[00:06:37 - 00:06:40]	 I was there for two years and I was working
[00:06:40 - 00:06:45]	 on synthetic at the time, but I was basically working
[00:06:45 - 00:06:51]	 on using radioactively labeled analogs of STP
[00:06:51 - 00:06:59]	 to map serotonin receptors, to try to map
[00:06:59 - 00:07:02]	 the serotonin receptors in the mouse brain
[00:07:02 - 00:07:03]	 or in the rat's brain.
[00:07:03 - 00:07:08]	 But I think it's interesting that I was able
[00:07:08 - 00:07:10]	 to get that fellowship.
[00:07:10 - 00:07:12]	 I went there, I worked there.
[00:07:12 - 00:07:15]	 There were never any problems.
[00:07:15 - 00:07:20]	 And this is actually, this speaks to one of the issues.
[00:07:20 - 00:07:24]	 People who are interested in psychedelics,
[00:07:24 - 00:07:27]	 in doing research on psychedelics, often say,
[00:07:27 - 00:07:28]	 "We can't do it.
[00:07:28 - 00:07:32]	 "The government will not allow us to do this work."
[00:07:32 - 00:07:35]	 That really isn't true anymore.
[00:07:35 - 00:07:37]	 That is changing.
[00:07:37 - 00:07:39]	 Rick Strassman, the fellow I mentioned
[00:07:39 - 00:07:43]	 who just wrote the book called "DMT, The Spirit Molecule,"
[00:07:43 - 00:07:44]	 he was really the pioneer.
[00:07:44 - 00:07:48]	 And for a lot of this work, he showed,
[00:07:48 - 00:07:49]	 I mean, he got tired of people.
[00:07:49 - 00:07:53]	 He was a qualified psychiatrist and investigator
[00:07:53 - 00:07:55]	 at the University of New Mexico.
[00:07:55 - 00:07:58]	 He got tired of people saying, "You can't do this work."
[00:07:58 - 00:08:00]	 So he decided, "Well, I'll do it."
[00:08:00 - 00:08:03]	 And he applied, he went through all the channels.
[00:08:03 - 00:08:08]	 He got approval and he was able to give DMT to people
[00:08:08 - 00:08:12]	 in a clinical setting and do this work.
[00:08:12 - 00:08:16]	 That has, that sort of opened,
[00:08:16 - 00:08:17]	 I wouldn't say the floodgates,
[00:08:17 - 00:08:20]	 but it opened the door a crack.
[00:08:20 - 00:08:24]	 And now there are other researchers
[00:08:24 - 00:08:27]	 are beginning to look into this again.
[00:08:27 - 00:08:30]	 One of the websites I gave you,
[00:08:30 - 00:08:34]	 the Hefter Research Institute, which I'm a board member of,
[00:08:34 - 00:08:38]	 and it's on the web at hefter.org.
[00:08:38 - 00:08:41]	 We're basically a bunch of scientists,
[00:08:41 - 00:08:43]	 neuroscientists, psychiatrists,
[00:08:43 - 00:08:46]	 ethno-pharmacologists, people like that,
[00:08:46 - 00:08:50]	 who want to do legitimate research with psychedelics
[00:08:50 - 00:08:53]	 to try to find out, well, basically,
[00:08:53 - 00:08:55]	 not only how they work,
[00:08:55 - 00:08:57]	 but how they might be used to help people.
[00:08:57 - 00:09:00]	 - Well, what about applications in mental illness?
[00:09:00 - 00:09:02]	 - Well, exactly, these sorts of things.
[00:09:02 - 00:09:05]	 I mean, in one sense,
[00:09:05 - 00:09:09]	 you almost have to go the medical model.
[00:09:09 - 00:09:11]	 I don't say that they should always be used
[00:09:11 - 00:09:13]	 to treat people who are sick.
[00:09:13 - 00:09:16]	 They can also benefit people who are not,
[00:09:16 - 00:09:18]	 who don't really have illnesses,
[00:09:18 - 00:09:21]	 but who might just want to learn from the experience.
[00:09:21 - 00:09:26]	 But if you're trying to work through these academic,
[00:09:26 - 00:09:29]	 government, and research channels,
[00:09:29 - 00:09:33]	 you sort of have to come up with a rationale,
[00:09:33 - 00:09:35]	 where, is there an illness?
[00:09:35 - 00:09:38]	 Is there something that these things can treat?
[00:09:38 - 00:09:39]	 And in fact, there are.
[00:09:39 - 00:09:42]	 The focus right now is on things like
[00:09:42 - 00:09:45]	 obsessive-compulsive disorder, for example,
[00:09:45 - 00:09:49]	 post-traumatic stress syndrome.
[00:09:49 - 00:09:51]	 These sorts of addiction is another big one.
[00:09:51 - 00:09:55]	 Alcoholism, potentially psychedelics, could be used.
[00:09:56 - 00:09:58]	 In therapies for these sorts of things.
[00:09:58 - 00:10:01]	 But, and who knows where it ends.
[00:10:01 - 00:10:04]	 I don't know how many of you saw Andy Weil
[00:10:04 - 00:10:06]	 on 60 Minutes the other night.
[00:10:06 - 00:10:11]	 I didn't see the show, but he actually came out
[00:10:11 - 00:10:15]	 and admitted what he said many years ago,
[00:10:15 - 00:10:18]	 that LSD cured his allergies.
[00:10:18 - 00:10:21]	 So, who knows?
[00:10:21 - 00:10:22]	 - Who knows, indeed.
[00:10:22 - 00:10:24]	 - Yeah, I mean, he had an experience
[00:10:24 - 00:10:27]	 where he had been very allergic to cats all of his life,
[00:10:27 - 00:10:29]	 couldn't get near them.
[00:10:29 - 00:10:34]	 One day he was on LSD, a cat crawled into his lap,
[00:10:34 - 00:10:38]	 and he didn't have any allergic reaction
[00:10:38 - 00:10:40]	 and claimed that he never had one since.
[00:10:40 - 00:10:42]	 - Isn't that interesting.
[00:10:42 - 00:10:44]	 - So that's rather remarkable, I think.
[00:10:44 - 00:10:46]	 - Very remarkable.
[00:10:46 - 00:10:48]	 Wes, to the Rockies, you're on the air with Dr. McKenna.
[00:10:48 - 00:10:49]	 Hello.
[00:10:49 - 00:10:50]	 - Good morning, gentlemen.
[00:10:50 - 00:10:51]	 - Good morning, where are you?
[00:10:51 - 00:10:53]	 - This is Gary from Earthquake Seattle.
[00:10:53 - 00:10:54]	 - Okay.
[00:10:54 - 00:10:56]	 - Everything is going smoother up here, fortunately.
[00:10:56 - 00:10:57]	 - Good, glad to hear it.
[00:10:57 - 00:10:58]	 - Yeah.
[00:10:58 - 00:11:01]	 Dennis, I was one of those people
[00:11:01 - 00:11:03]	 who had very many good thoughts about your brother.
[00:11:03 - 00:11:05]	 I think he was a tremendously courageous
[00:11:05 - 00:11:08]	 and brilliant person, and I wish that he was still with us.
[00:11:08 - 00:11:09]	 - Well, we all do.
[00:11:09 - 00:11:11]	 We all do, thank you.
[00:11:11 - 00:11:12]	 - Yes, we do.
[00:11:12 - 00:11:13]	 We need more like him.
[00:11:13 - 00:11:15]	 R, you said a couple profound things
[00:11:15 - 00:11:16]	 I just heard recently.
[00:11:16 - 00:11:18]	 One of the things you said was that, you know,
[00:11:18 - 00:11:21]	 I'm one of the people that feel that our society
[00:11:21 - 00:11:23]	 was on the right track during the '60s,
[00:11:23 - 00:11:27]	 and I think we've taken huge psychic damage since then.
[00:11:27 - 00:11:28]	 - Yes.
[00:11:28 - 00:11:30]	 - It might have been a bit premature,
[00:11:30 - 00:11:31]	 or it could be some of us were not able
[00:11:31 - 00:11:33]	 to put it in context at that time yet,
[00:11:33 - 00:11:34]	 but certainly I think we've gone
[00:11:34 - 00:11:36]	 in the wrong direction since then.
[00:11:36 - 00:11:39]	 You know, one thing, the caller before this,
[00:11:39 - 00:11:44]	 or one, two before this, he had some great things to say,
[00:11:44 - 00:11:47]	 and I came along in an age group right behind him
[00:11:47 - 00:11:50]	 in the mid '70s, and I was fortunate to go to college
[00:11:50 - 00:11:53]	 and find a group of friends, and after some research,
[00:11:53 - 00:11:55]	 we decided that these substances had been around
[00:11:55 - 00:11:58]	 for thousands of years, even long before Christianity
[00:11:58 - 00:12:01]	 and its teachings, and that's why we embarked upon
[00:12:01 - 00:12:03]	 taking many of these psychoactive drugs,
[00:12:03 - 00:12:06]	 and you know, we had nothing but positive experiences.
[00:12:06 - 00:12:08]	 I would say to your audience, for instance,
[00:12:08 - 00:12:11]	 they have nothing to fear from these substances.
[00:12:11 - 00:12:13]	 They take you inward and they take you upward,
[00:12:13 - 00:12:16]	 and they lead you to nothing but more profound thinking.
[00:12:16 - 00:12:19]	 - Well, I don't think fear is really the model,
[00:12:19 - 00:12:22]	 but I do think they should be respected.
[00:12:22 - 00:12:23]	 That's the thing.
[00:12:23 - 00:12:27]	 An earlier caller said, for example,
[00:12:27 - 00:12:30]	 that, you know, they're just fun.
[00:12:30 - 00:12:32]	 You should remember, I mean, something that's not being said
[00:12:32 - 00:12:35]	 is they're just a lot of fun.
[00:12:35 - 00:12:37]	 Well, they can be a lot of fun.
[00:12:37 - 00:12:38]	 - That's something Terrence might have said.
[00:12:38 - 00:12:39]	 - They're not always fun.
[00:12:39 - 00:12:41]	 - I completely agree with that.
[00:12:41 - 00:12:42]	 You know, the two experiences, I think,
[00:12:42 - 00:12:44]	 if we had it in our power to give people in the first,
[00:12:44 - 00:12:46]	 to help us make a psychic breakthrough,
[00:12:46 - 00:12:49]	 I think the two would be to help people
[00:12:49 - 00:12:50]	 take psychoactive substances
[00:12:50 - 00:12:53]	 and maybe to put them in Earth orbit for 24 hours
[00:12:53 - 00:12:55]	 and just let them float there and look down.
[00:12:55 - 00:12:58]	 I think that would help our society progress
[00:12:58 - 00:13:00]	 more than anything at this point
[00:13:00 - 00:13:01]	 that I can think of for us to do.
[00:13:01 - 00:13:04]	 - Well, in the right context, I think it could.
[00:13:04 - 00:13:06]	 I mean, I think it could.
[00:13:06 - 00:13:08]	 You know, going back to this,
[00:13:08 - 00:13:12]	 what an earlier caller said about how, you know,
[00:13:12 - 00:13:15]	 the perception is that if you take psychedelics,
[00:13:15 - 00:13:18]	 you have to be dysfunctional or the larger society
[00:13:18 - 00:13:19]	 thinks it drives you crazy
[00:13:19 - 00:13:22]	 or it makes you feeble-minded or something.
[00:13:22 - 00:13:26]	 You know, in the course of working,
[00:13:26 - 00:13:29]	 I worked with my colleagues
[00:13:29 - 00:13:31]	 on what we call the WASCA project.
[00:13:31 - 00:13:35]	 We did a biomedical study of WASCA,
[00:13:35 - 00:13:40]	 which is the Portuguese transliteration of ayahuasca.
[00:13:40 - 00:13:43]	 And WASCA is used in Brazil
[00:13:43 - 00:13:46]	 by several syncretic churches,
[00:13:46 - 00:13:51]	 one of which is called the UDV, the União do Vegetal.
[00:13:51 - 00:13:53]	 And it's a syncretic church.
[00:13:53 - 00:13:58]	 And ayahuasca is their sacrament.
[00:13:58 - 00:14:02]	 What was most amazing to me
[00:14:02 - 00:14:03]	 in the process of doing this study,
[00:14:03 - 00:14:08]	 I mean, we had to hang around with these people a lot.
[00:14:08 - 00:14:10]	 Subjects were, you know, being tested
[00:14:10 - 00:14:12]	 and we were drawing blood samples
[00:14:12 - 00:14:15]	 and we spent about five weeks
[00:14:15 - 00:14:19]	 in very close contact with this group
[00:14:19 - 00:14:22]	 in the summer of 1993 when we were doing this study.
[00:14:22 - 00:14:28]	 But what was remarkable was just experiencing this society.
[00:14:28 - 00:14:31]	 They're a very close-knit community.
[00:14:31 - 00:14:35]	 In lectures, I refer to them as psychedelic Mormons
[00:14:35 - 00:14:42]	 with the meaning that is meant to be complimentary
[00:14:42 - 00:14:46]	 to Mormons and the UDV in the sense that Mormons
[00:14:46 - 00:14:51]	 also place a great deal of emphasis on, you know,
[00:14:51 - 00:14:55]	 being productive members of their community,
[00:14:55 - 00:14:59]	 having a close-knit community, being creative,
[00:14:59 - 00:15:01]	 being successful in business,
[00:15:01 - 00:15:04]	 not in other words, being a drag on the society,
[00:15:04 - 00:15:07]	 but trying to help society.
[00:15:07 - 00:15:09]	 And these people were much that way.
[00:15:09 - 00:15:14]	 I mean, they had much less incidents of domestic violence,
[00:15:14 - 00:15:17]	 for example, than is common in Brazilian society.
[00:15:17 - 00:15:21]	 No alcoholism, no drug abuse.
[00:15:21 - 00:15:23]	 Most of the people were successful.
[00:15:23 - 00:15:28]	 They were doctors, lawyers, businessmen, even politicians.
[00:15:28 - 00:15:31]	 You know, so I was just impressed
[00:15:31 - 00:15:33]	 in hanging out with this group,
[00:15:33 - 00:15:36]	 how high functioning most of them were.
[00:15:36 - 00:15:40]	 And, you know, their kids seemed healthy and intelligent.
[00:15:40 - 00:15:44]	 Their families seemed stable, you know,
[00:15:44 - 00:15:47]	 and a lot of it, of course, had to do with the community
[00:15:47 - 00:15:49]	 that they were involved with.
[00:15:49 - 00:15:53]	 I mean, it was a very, very close-knit community,
[00:15:53 - 00:15:56]	 but I think a lot of it also had to do with the fact
[00:15:56 - 00:15:59]	 that they had this tea, as they call it,
[00:15:59 - 00:16:02]	 this waska as their sacrament.
[00:16:02 - 00:16:07]	 And, you know, every two weeks at a minimum,
[00:16:07 - 00:16:11]	 they would take it in large groups every two weeks.
[00:16:11 - 00:16:14]	 And I think they learned from that.
[00:16:14 - 00:16:19]	 And it helped them to keep their lives on track.
[00:16:19 - 00:16:21]	 And, you know, there were aspects of the UDP
[00:16:21 - 00:16:26]	 that I would not, I mean, I personally, I don't really,
[00:16:26 - 00:16:30]	 you know, I would not join a cult,
[00:16:30 - 00:16:32]	 but if I was going to join a cult, I--
[00:16:32 - 00:16:33]	 - That might be the one.
[00:16:33 - 00:16:34]	 - That might be the one.
[00:16:34 - 00:16:36]	 (laughing)
[00:16:36 - 00:16:37]	 - Caller, anything else quickly?
[00:16:37 - 00:16:39]	 - I just believe our government, as you said earlier,
[00:16:39 - 00:16:41]	 I think our government fears these substances
[00:16:41 - 00:16:43]	 and does not want people to have access to them.
[00:16:43 - 00:16:45]	 Let's remember, most of them are not physically addictive
[00:16:45 - 00:16:47]	 as far as we know in any way, shape, or form,
[00:16:47 - 00:16:48]	 the psychoactive.
[00:16:48 - 00:16:49]	 - The psychedelics.
[00:16:49 - 00:16:50]	 - Psychedelics.
[00:16:50 - 00:16:51]	 - Right.
[00:16:51 - 00:16:53]	 - I believe they lead to far too much contemplation
[00:16:53 - 00:16:55]	 and deep thinking, and the government is afraid of that.
[00:16:55 - 00:16:57]	 Just as I believe they're afraid to tell us the truth
[00:16:57 - 00:16:59]	 about what they know about possible extraterrestrials
[00:16:59 - 00:17:00]	 coming here.
[00:17:00 - 00:17:03]	 - Yeah, I think that the caller's got a point here.
[00:17:03 - 00:17:08]	 I think not so much with the so-called drugs of abuse,
[00:17:08 - 00:17:13]	 but with the psychedelics, the fear, the problem is that
[00:17:13 - 00:17:17]	 they make you have funny ideas,
[00:17:17 - 00:17:22]	 and funny ideas are always a threat
[00:17:22 - 00:17:23]	 to the established order.
[00:17:23 - 00:17:26]	 - Yeah, they're viewed as anti-productivity.
[00:17:26 - 00:17:27]	 - Well, anti-productivity,
[00:17:27 - 00:17:30]	 or they just don't want people thinking too much.
[00:17:30 - 00:17:35]	 I mean, that's a more sinister aspect of the drug war
[00:17:35 - 00:17:39]	 that does concern me a lot in that, you know,
[00:17:39 - 00:17:42]	 in some ways, the drug war is not about protecting people
[00:17:42 - 00:17:44]	 from harmful substances.
[00:17:44 - 00:17:47]	 It's about controlling states of mind.
[00:17:47 - 00:17:50]	 It's about saying certain states of mind,
[00:17:50 - 00:17:55]	 certain territories are just off limits,
[00:17:55 - 00:17:59]	 and people should not be allowed these types of experiences.
[00:17:59 - 00:18:02]	 You know, within the next few years,
[00:18:02 - 00:18:04]	 this is almost certain to happen,
[00:18:04 - 00:18:06]	 and it's going to be interesting to see what happens,
[00:18:06 - 00:18:08]	 but within the next few years,
[00:18:08 - 00:18:11]	 probably through biofeedback or similar types of technology,
[00:18:11 - 00:18:14]	 direct neural stimulation,
[00:18:14 - 00:18:17]	 it'll be possible to have these experiences
[00:18:17 - 00:18:21]	 without using drugs by using some kind of,
[00:18:21 - 00:18:24]	 you know, electromagnetic mechanism.
[00:18:24 - 00:18:27]	 How is the government going to react to that?
[00:18:27 - 00:18:30]	 - That's fascinating, well, bypassing laws.
[00:18:30 - 00:18:31]	 Doctor-- - Bypassing laws.
[00:18:31 - 00:18:33]	 - Yeah, that's right, I always ask, Doctor--
[00:18:33 - 00:18:35]	 - Which of course will stop the problem, right?
[00:18:35 - 00:18:39]	 - Can you stick around one more hour?
[00:18:39 - 00:18:40]	 - Can I stick around another hour?
[00:18:40 - 00:18:43]	 - That's it, I've got only one more hour of the show.
[00:18:43 - 00:18:45]	 - Well, I'm getting a little bit,
[00:18:45 - 00:18:47]	 I'm running a little bit out of steam,
[00:18:47 - 00:18:50]	 but let's go another half hour and see how it goes.
[00:18:50 - 00:18:51]	 - You've got it.
[00:18:51 - 00:18:53]	 - Four in the morning here.
[00:18:53 - 00:18:55]	 - Oh, that's right, I forgot you're back East.
[00:18:55 - 00:18:57]	 All right, Doctor, stay right there.
[00:18:57 - 00:18:58]	 We'll be right back.
[00:18:58 - 00:19:01]	 This is Coast to Coast AM from the high desert.
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