Psychedelic Science by Bill Eagles

Psychedelic Science



By Bill Eagles



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Psychedelic Science was broadcast on [programme notes]

27th February 1997.



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Programme Notes [Image]



In the late 1960s, human experiments with psychedelic drugs were

brought to a halt. Government reacted to the anarchy of the hippy

counter-culture. The drug-crazed Charles Manson slayings came to

symbolise public fear of the street use of LSD. Funding ceased,

and the few researchers who battled on were ostracised. But lost

in the blanket ban were remarkable research projects in the field

of psychiatry that held out new hope for the treatment of

schizophrenia and alcoholism. Bill Eagles' extraordinary film

tells the story of a handful of dedicated scientists who have

struggled to make psychedelic research respectable again.



In the USA, psychiatrists Rick Strassman and Charles Grob, and

neuroscientist Deborah Mash each quietly began investigations with

unknown psychedelic compounds, to avoid the alarm bells of LSD.

Strassman pursued the Federal Drug Administration for permission

to do safety trials of DMT. Mash works on treating cocaine

addicts, achieving success with Ibogaine, a psychedelic derived

from a West African plant. Their success hinges on the patient

having a 'peak' experience, entering the realm of the mystical or

religious. The early researchers had spotted this. Now it was

dramatically reinforced by unique new evidence from Brazil.



Unable to work in the USA, Grob visited Brazil to track down the

ritual use of Ayahuasca, a leaf rich in the powerful DMT. For

centuries it has been used amongst the shamans of the Amazon. But

today, in urban Brazil, tens of thousands of men, women and

children are taking the drug as part of an ecstatic Christian cult

experience. The Brazillian Government asked Grob to look at

long-term damaging effects of the drug. Instead, he found no

evidence of toxicity or brain damage, and also that long-term

users functioned better in their community. In 1992 Brazil

legalised ritual use of Ayahuasca. The FDA took careful note.



Then in the early 1990s, leading lights of the US computer

industry began admitting that many breakthroughs in Silicon Valley

in the 70s and 80s had been inspired by regular psychedelic drug

use. Nobel Prizewinner Kary Mullis, and founding father of

Microsoft, Bob Wallace, reveal on camera the psychedelic influence

on their creativity. This anecdotal evidence raised support for

the psychedelic researchers. Now Strassman has received approval

from the FDA for research into LSD itself.



But it is a delicate moment for the new psychedelic science. Its

power to treat some of the worst ailments of society has now been

recognised. Yet fears of the excesses of the 1960s are still

strong. In Japan the Aum Shinrikyo cult is believed to have used

psychedelics to brainwash its members before the Tokyo subway gas

attack. Among high-school leavers, use of psychedelics is rapidly

increasing - and strange new drugs are appearing on thestreets.

The scientists and drug regulators know there is a knife-edge

between hope for new treatments and unleashing a whirlwind.