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Study Shows How LSD Interferes With Brain's Signaling (theguardian.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Guardian: A group of volunteers who took a trip in the name of science have helped researchers uncover how LSD messes with activity in the brain to induce an altered state of consciousness. Brain scans of individuals high on the drug revealed that the chemical allows parts of the cortex to become flooded with signals that are normally filtered out to prevent information overload. The drug allowed more information to flow from the thalamus, a kind of neural gatekeeper, to a region called the posterior cingulate cortex, and it stemmed the flow of information to another part known as the temporal cortex. This disruption in communication may underpin some of the wacky effects reported by LSD users, from feelings of bliss and being at one with the universe to hallucinations and what scientists in the field refer to as "ego dissolution," where one's sense of self disintegrates.
For the study, the researchers invited 25 healthy participants into the lab to be scanned under the influence of LSD and, on another occasion, after taking a placebo. They were shown around the scanner beforehand to ensure they felt comfortable going inside when the drug took hold. Had the machine suddenly taken on a threatening demeanor, the scans might not have come out so well. The scientists wanted to test a hypothesis first put forward more than a decade ago. It states LSD causes the thalamus to stop filtering information it relays to other parts of the brain. It is the breakdown of this filter that gives rise to the weird effects the drug induces, or so the thinking goes. Scans of the volunteers' brains suggested there may be some truth to the hypothesis. On LSD, the thalamus let more information through to some parts of the brain and suppressed information bound for others. "What we found is that the model is mostly true, but how information is distributed to the cortex under LSD is much more specific than it predicts," a researcher said. The latest research is published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
For the study, the researchers invited 25 healthy participants into the lab to be scanned under the influence of LSD and, on another occasion, after taking a placebo. They were shown around the scanner beforehand to ensure they felt comfortable going inside when the drug took hold. Had the machine suddenly taken on a threatening demeanor, the scans might not have come out so well. The scientists wanted to test a hypothesis first put forward more than a decade ago. It states LSD causes the thalamus to stop filtering information it relays to other parts of the brain. It is the breakdown of this filter that gives rise to the weird effects the drug induces, or so the thinking goes. Scans of the volunteers' brains suggested there may be some truth to the hypothesis. On LSD, the thalamus let more information through to some parts of the brain and suppressed information bound for others. "What we found is that the model is mostly true, but how information is distributed to the cortex under LSD is much more specific than it predicts," a researcher said. The latest research is published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Have u tried lsd
Because it is slashdot being slashdot that is my poiniant embalance. I see monsters.
Aside from the tiny sample size, I volunteer to increase its size and why the hell didn't I hear about it and Damn it!
He was high on lds when the aliens fucked him up his ass
I love it up the bum while I campaign on the intermet about saving the whales and show the world how awsome san francisco is =)
-beau
Pretty sure I read this a while ago, not sure exactly how long though...
Reading that makes microdosing LSD sound little less crazy than you many might have thought.
Oh no, he’s outside... looking in.
#DeleteChrome
Ask anyone who has used LSD about the effects and one thing that will come startlingly clear no matter the reaction (good or bad): LSD breaks down mental barriers, at least temporarily. Whatever topic your brain moves towards you aren't going to easily dismiss it. Sucks that prohibition means it took 75 years to actually scientifically figure this out.
There was some story about Saavik not being Kirstie Alley in that one and just being removed from the story line because Shatner called her a "backdoor cutie" by mistake and she took it that he had an anal fetish like beau, but anal wasn't nearly as in style in the '80s. All girls doing anal came around in the late '90s as they all started shaving their cooches. I'd love to go back in time and find Kirstie Alley in the 1980s and have her shave her cooch for me. And we could fly off into the sun in a Bird of Prey.
Did I ever tell you guys any of my acid stories? I forget. They're good stories, though.
By the way, is anybody holding?
You are welcome on my lawn.
I'm having flashbacks to the last time you posted this story!! ðYðY
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I go past 2GB of data and verizon throttles me down to 2G edge speed. t..i..m..e.....d..i...a....l....a......t........e........s
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
So we're still doing LSD experiments on people, but weed has no therapeutic value. Gotcha, I don't need to have my mind expanded with acid to see the agenda here.
Turns out that when you use a chemical to screw-up the operation of your brain --- you screw up the operation of your brain.
Wow.
Who could have seen that coming?
The dumbest thing any human being can possibly do is to mess with the proper operation of their own brain for recreational purposes. I know, the morons who do this stuff like to claim they have expanded their minds and other such crap, but the thing is: After you screw-up your brain, you cannot possibly use your brain to accurately assess anything. It's a bit like screwing with the instruments on an aircraft and then being surprised that those screwed-up instruments mislead you into crashing.
Your functional human brain is the primary thing separating you from the animals.
Or the brain modulates its emotion to produce other emotions and LSD stops that.
Why else would they start MKULTRA again?
Ken Kesey described his experiences on LSD when he volunteered from the CIA's MKULTRA experiments. He pranked the researchers through the whole thing. Of course, one of the evaluations was to check the subjects' perception of time. Of course his sense of time was wasted (they used pretty high doses), but Kesey noted that the idiot checking wore his wrist watch into the room. So Kesey just checked the second hand on the guy's watch, and was able to tell him how much time had passed to the second.
Funny how researchers never consider things like that.
"Somebody has to do something. It's just incredibly pathetic it has to be us."
--- Jerry Garcia
I hope that scanned the brains prior to the trip. I'd be curious about what the scans showed a week later relative to the initial pre-LSD scan.
I do know one person that can't look at speckled ceilings anymore. Just saying ....... I guess I know there are long term effects on occasion. Just curious if lingering effects are a spectrum issue and why is it a spectrum issue?
I mean, who would have thought that it lowered the filter... other than EVERY ONE WHO TOOK IT OR WROTE ABOUT IT in the sixties and seventies.
Interesting that I wrote a paper describing these results in 1990, based entirely on existing research found in the library at a community college in Dallas, TX, but somehow this news? I guess the difference is that people are finally becoming interested in the possibilities, instead of being hung up on the propaganda.
Anything you say will be held against you.
How could someone take an LSD placebo and be fooled into thinking it did something?
you stupid human router cunt,
is LSD good or bad???
I know its msmash cauz this does not belong here.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
My brain needs no debugging, and since I'm not a druggie I have a reasonable certainty that my perceptions of reality are correct.
If you have screwed yours up with drugs, then you have no way of ever being certain that you are not still at least partially screwed up. It's a simple concept, but I must admit that no druggie will accept it because his brain no longer functions properly. I've been around plenty who use various drugs and I have never met a person whose brain worked better after, or even as well as before, they began using. It's almost a universal delusion of users that they are thinking more quickly or faster or more creatively. It's quite predictable when you think about it, but I used to still be amazed to observe it in person. At this point though I see it's just par for the course and this screwed-up self evaluation by people with tainted brains makes complete sense.