Psybin said:
It's easy to nay-say those trying to make a difference from your armchair.
From my armchair? Hardly :lol:
The critiques I've leveled are valid, regardless of whether or not I'm in my armchair, and I think I've shared quite a bit with this community that indicates I'm out of my armchair with some regularity. See that first link under "The Nexian" on the right of this page? You can start there, if you feel so inclined (
but there's plenty more as well)
Psybin said:
Snozz, how would you propose funding be acquired for psychedelic research?
Funding mainstream psychedelic research isn't an interest of mine, so I'm not really concerned with submitting proposals (we have it hard enough scraping together funding for Nexus projects). I think there are fascinating things to learn from psychedelics in both laboratory and "real life" settings and think that lab research is simply one vein.
That said, sanctioned psychedlic research presents a massive potential for public well being. While we're talking theoretical proposals, here's one for you, treat it as any other public good should be treated and socialize the costs and the benefits. In this paradigm? Tax the rich (or defund the PIC and MIC) and use that money to pay for it. That said, in my ideal world (again, as long as we're in the realm of theoretical proposals, why not?), there wouldn't be a state to levy taxes, so I'm not interested in actually fleshing out such proposals.
But hey, if you're gonna cross the sea you're gonna need a boat. If you want to do airtight research on psychedelics, you need money. And money is really just a way to quantify resources in a standard way. You need resources to do something like conduct experiments or analyze data, no way around it.
There are a number of assumptions here that I simply don't agree with. Resources are being consolidated. The notion that there is any long-term future for industrial civilization run for the benefit of "society" doesn't hold water, imo. Justifying the destructive foundation(s) of the funding for psychedelic research on some supposed "need" to do such research is rather dubious, imo. As with extractive energy, if you can't do it without relying on processes that contaminate and destroy, don't do it.
Or consider iboga. Addicts in industrial societies hear of a wonder drug that will cure their addiction. Their demand fuels poaching and destruction. Soon, iboga is not affordable for people in Gabon and their local ecosystems are under attack. People here justify it because they are suffering. We're all suffering...the question is whether you put yourself before those whose suffering your non-suffering is/would-be predicated on.
Ferris may have his flaws, but at least he's done some pretty impressive and groundbreaking things,...who are you to judge that?
Another human being who lives on this earth, who has to contend with the effects of his actions and the actions of others in similar positions. His "impressive and groundbreaking" work is leading to the destabilization of lower income workforces and contributing to ecocide. As someone who has to live with that, I feel perfectly fine sharing my judgements.
We all learn deeply personal lessons from our travels in hyperspace, and it's OK if they're not all the same....For him, it might be improving yourself to be the best you can at what you love to do.
Except that what he "loves to do" has direct negative consequences on human and nonhuman life. Do you know what the environmental costs of just one of Facebook's data centers are? What about Uber on the whole (here we could examine social cost as well)? And that's not even a drop in the bucket. He's literally involved in projects that are socially and environmentally destructive.
If you see spirituality in that, far be it from me to define your world for you. Just know that I disagree vehemently.
tl;dr
Nathanial.Dread said:
If the message you got from LSD was that it can make you into a more successful participant in neoliberal economic systems, you got the wrong message.