Lol I just logged on for the first time today in weeks and saw this

BREAKING: Czech Republic Set to Allow Medical Use of Psilocybin

If approved by the Senate next month, it will become the third country in the world to allow access to a psychedelic ahead of conventional marketing approval.

Just when you thought it couldn't possibly get any worse.

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Josh, I heard a couple years ago that they had purchased an island in St. Vincent and the Grenadines, which has some kind of medical psychedelic law… supposedly they were planning to operate some sort of research-collecting retreat… have you heard anything about this?

Quite a nice image of 5-HT2A receptor distribution by Blake in the lab using our mice (I think now at JAX)

pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/37808655/

Huge thanks to friends at @imperialcollegeldn.bsky.social
and @schoolofppls.bsky.social for hosting me and sparking some great discussions on psychedelics, well-being, and more.
(I promise I have more than one outfit)

Even so, it’s seems like it’s not uniform so I think there’s something else there, and it might yield useful insights to know why if this could ever be determined.

I’ve wondered that, but that’s not what I’ve seen in practice… some people (eg those who aren’t that depressed or anxious but go on a SSRI) have no blunting, and some who are very depressed and desperate for relief get it. But it does seem to be noticed more in milder conditions.

I was invited to join as Editorial Board Member of a new @elsevierconnect.bsky.social journal

Here's why I #declined an uncompensated role in #AcademicPublishing 🧵🧪🧠📈

Last but not least, I encourage #everyone to discuss these serious issues with @elsevierconnect.bsky.social and help other academics who are pressuring publishers to adopt better work agreements, more inclusive and respectful of all stakeholders work value and time commitments with their expertises.

The emotional blunting by SSRIs is interesting, since at least in my clinical experience affects only a minority of patients, so the question is… why? I wonder if there might be correlation between psychological types who develop blunting and certain types of responses to psilocybin.

I think an archaeologist would be a lot more qualified to make this observation, personally, but it’s worth noting that across cultures, the more elaborate the object, the less likely it is that it’s used for anything mundane. The “handles” on the mushrooms stones are not good handles.

Prosocial correlates of transformative experiences at secular multi-day mass gatherings - Nature Communications Mass gatherings may elicit experiences of profound personal change. Here the authors show across six field sites that reporting of transformative experiences at mass gatherings are common, increase ov...

Also, this paper, which well worth the read: www.nature.com/articles/s41...

I can’t find it now, but there’s a story from a few years ago (I think on Vice) by someone who used to be a raver in the 90s, about how her most transformative MDMA experiences were the conversations she had with strangers waiting in line to use the bathroom. Perhaps another angle of this question.

Finally out! Happy bicycle day.

So I don’t think these results are surprising, and I don’t think they are applicable to most patients who might be looking for therapeutic psychedelic experiences. But it certainly should give everyone pause as to what the “medicine” actually is.

It says it included people who used psychedelics with therapeutic intent. Anyone who’s going to a rave and has therapeutic intent has at least some amount of psychological, and psychedelic, literacy already, and probably a social container( ie, friends, and friends who use psychedelics). So…

@trpwolff.bsky.social @eeschenberg.bsky.social

Contextual effects in musculoskeletal pain: are we overlooking essential factors? www.frontiersin.org/journals/psy...

Expectancy Effects, Blinding Integrity, and Placebo Response in Psychiatric Disorders This narrative review discusses the impact of expectancy effects and functional unblinding on treatment responses in randomized clinical trials of treatments in psychiatry.

New review stating the inconvient truth regarding RCTs in #psychiatry:

"expectations and blinding integrity are rarely measured" 🧪

Then why #psychedelic critics repeatedly turned a blind eye to this, pretending psychedelic RCTs were less rigorous than usual ?!? 🤔

jamanetwork.com/journals/jam...

How awe-inspiring are psychedelic experiences and why might emotions like awe play a role in psychedelics' benefits?
Excited to speak on this in our @affectscience.bsky.social symposium on awe today! #AffectScience2025

The latter are truly evil.

cc: @josh-hardman.bsky.social

There's been a bit of press on the HALT act which would place fentanyl analogues into Sched 1, but I haven't seen any comment on the very significant changes proposed for Sched 1 research—for the better, it appears: www.congress.gov/bill/119th-c...

As pertains to psychedelics specifically, policy change would do more than rethinking RCT hegemony. The policy restrictions on psychedelics are a big part of why the deck is stacked against more enlightened positions on how they work, and in favor of corporate models.

Not necessarily. Scientific claims can be used to support policy agendas but much if not most policy in the end is not informed by science.

Policy is far more important than anything related to clinical trials.

How Much Should Americans Worry About Elon Musk’s Ketamine Use? Excessive use of the drug can make anyone feel like they rule the world.

How Much Should Americans Worry About Elon Musk’s Ketamine Use?

@shaylalove.bsky.social for The Atlantic.

www.theatlantic.com/health/archi...

A Rundown of Colorado’s Natural Medicine Program - Psychedelic Alpha Now that the rules for Colorado’s regulated psychedelics program are set and license applications are open, Healing Advocacy Fund’s Colorado Director Tasia Poinsatte provides a brief…

A Rundown of Colorado’s Natural Medicine Program

A short, simple guide to CO's regulated psychedelics program's key rules and structure.

psychedelicalpha.com/news/a-rundo...