Re: MAPS: On Psychedelics in Our Time

["Steven Maximilln" <maximilln@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Fantastic points to be made by all, and one would wonder upon reading them
if there isn't a political agenda within the major established religions to
keep most psychoactive substances on the illegal list for no other reason
than market share.  Market, in this instance, being defined as the number of
people who are looking for a biochemical experience which will stimulate
their neural networks in a certain pattern and to a certain level.  I will
postulate that the ceremonial systems by which established religions indict
and retain their members invoke many of the same neural patterns as
productive psychoactive experiences.  What might the difference be between a
productive psychoactive experience and a destructive one?  It's all in the
situation.  Religions take more time to set up a persons psyche.  They have
meetings, interviews, they bring pointed questions and then cultivate a
followers line of reasoning by stonewalling with a general response.  There
is situational ceremony and the participation of the congregation, the
energy that a follower feels from having so many other humans devote
attention to observing the same patterns.  One skew analogy would be to
consider a master of meditation, another would be a roomful of acolytes
being led by a master of meditation, another would be a courtyard full of
martial artists all practicing the same form at the same time.  It's about
biochemical alignment, agreement, and fulfillment.  There is quite a bit of
merit to the statement that personality change can be brought about by
either/or religious conversion or psychotherapeutic experience but neither
of those is 100% (or even 90%) reliable to have permanent results.  With
religion this is most likely because the churches power to hold sway over a
followers psyche is waning in todays world.  They can no longer set the
entire stage inside of a persons mind.  The pressures of the outside world
coupled with the overall decline of the churches influence on the rest of
society makes it difficult for them to cultivate the correct neurological
condition to lay proper groundwork for their philosophies.  By the same
token psychoactive substances are very difficult to use and achieve the
desired result because of similar social implications (mainly due to
illegality related issues which induce/add stresses to the psyche) and the
difficulty in personalizing an environment to the point where the subject
feels ultimately comfortable enough to accept what they are about to
experience.

Looking at the two options for ultimate psychotherapy--religion and
biochemistry--we see that both have been compromised.  Analysis of these two
systems and the forces that affect their failure begs the question,"Why
aren't we allowed to make this work, what's keeping these two potentially
powerful tools from being used effectively?"  The answer to this question is
related to the answer of Dan's question, Are inadequate solutions the only
ones worth pursuing?  The answer is an obvious "no", but in today's world
inadequate solutions are the only ones that make money.  There's no money to
be made curing people, there's only money to be made if it's done wrong the
first time and they can be convinced to continue coming back.  In ages past,
it wasn't necessary to pay your landlord or buy your food using multicolored
slips of paper or oddly formed metal discs.  In ages past there were no
Enron executives effectively stealing the product of labor from so many
employees, investors, and retiree-hopefuls through elaborate pyramid schemes
(and don't think Enron was doing anything that every other large company
isn't doing in one form or several hundred others).  In ages past the local
monarch, regent, elected official, or tribal board didn't hunt their
population down for experiencing something that the land had given them.
They may identify the active substance and begin elaborating a ritual to
surround it but very rarely did that ritual involve court appearance,
attorneys, ruination of personal reputation, and mandatory 20-year
incarceration.

+++ATHZ
Complain about bad politics
or complain about bad weather.
At least bad weather doesn't
cost another $80 billion per year.

----Original Message Follows----
From: "Dan Merkur" <dan.merkur@xxxxxxxxxxx>
To: "Inn @ Six" <indirect@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
CC: <maps-forum@xxxxxxxx>
Subject: Re: MAPS: On Psychedelics in Our Time
Date: Thu, 7 Mar 2002 22:36:46 -0500

Rob wrote:
  I don't see any difference between "mass therapy" and "mass religion"
since
  the implication is that if only everyone would get some "good
psychedelics" into them rather
  than "good religion" the world would be a better place.

  How is that any different to the proselytization of a
"born-again/baptised in the Holy Spirit" Christian?

  Just a 'pinch of psychedelic', for the hell of it, and all will be saved
... mein gott! i'm on a religious list....

  My posting has been misunderstood.  To my thought, several mass religions
do exist and have failed to unite the planet, or provide a basis for
international cooperation, etc.  Mass therapy, by which I mean any form of
psychotherapy that is (a) effective and (b) cheap and fast enough for mass
marketting, does not exist, has not been invented yet, and certainly won't
be achieved through a "pinch of psychedelic" alone.  Calling a random
psychedelic experience "therapeutic" has been tried, isn't accurate except
by chance, and has no mass appeal.  What I am talking about is genuine
personality change, as indeed sometimes occurs through religious conversions
(but usually doesn't) and sometimes is brought about through psychotherapy
(but often doesn't).  This differs from "baptism in the Holy Spirit" and all
religious analogs in that I am not talking about magic, or about social
status, etc.  It is of no importance to me whether a psychedelic experience
arrives a person at a mystical union, a death-rebirth experience, a
conversation with a god or God, or any other manifest content.  People have
lots of religious experiences whose manifest contents I think to be sheer
fantasy; and no doubt lots of people think the same of the religious
experiences I happen to think well of.  This is beside the point.  Becoming
religiously holy, perfect, sanctified, saved, elect, redeemed,
transpersonally developed, etc., is just a label.  Performative language
does not accomplish psychotherapy.  The terms all describe something
supernatural, something that may be validated consensually by one's society
or friends, but is nevertheless make-believe (like money, patriotism, and a
lot of other very serious fictions).  Sometimes, not often, people who have
such experiences do coincidentally undergo therapeutic change, but most do
not.  The research I am proposing is to discover what has to go right for
thereapeutic change to occur, so as to be able to produce it predictably.  I
am not proposing to debate the value of genuine personality change.  It's a
bit like debating the value of true love.  If you don't think it exists, or
is important, you are not going to participate in research on it.  On the
other hand, I make no apology for having an interest in pursuing ideal
solutions to real problems.  Are inadequate solutions to world problems the
only ones worth going after?
  Dan Merkur


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