# LSD / Insanity **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [April 26, 2007, 10:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lsd-insanity/401795 "2007-04-26T22:58:07Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![fishbicycle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/aeb1de/32.png) [@fishbicycle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fishbicycle)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2007, 3:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lsd-insanity/401795/41 "2007-04-27T15:15:23Z")
[QUOTE=Will Repair] The first person to accidently experience the effects of LSD was [Albert Hofmann](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Hofmann)…The dosage of LSD is so small that Hofmann experienced a “trip” from inhaling the fumes. [/QUOTE] If you’d read the second paragraph of the Wiki article, you’d see where it says he absorbed it through his fingertips. There are no LSD fumes. ---
**Author:** ![Kalhoun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/3bc359/32.png) [@Kalhoun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kalhoun)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2007, 3:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lsd-insanity/401795/42 "2007-04-27T15:16:57Z")
[QUOTE=Will Repair] See Tom Wolfe’s book _The Electric Kool Aid Acid Test_ about Ken Kensey (writer of _One Flew over the Cukoos Nest_) and the Merry Pransters. Seems some people didn’t know the difference between Kool Aid and Electric Kool Aid at a party. [/QUOTE] And sometimes people don’t point out the difference between the punch and the Purple Jesus. Golly…_that_ was unfortunate. ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2007, 3:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lsd-insanity/401795/43 "2007-04-27T15:18:11Z")
[QUOTE=WhyNot] No, I agree it’s not implausible, I’m just asking if it is in existence. [/QUOTE] No, in your post you were claiming it was implausible because “all drugs wear off.” This is not the case; some drugs certainly can have permanent effects long after they are gone from the body. Have you read **Rigamarole’s** link? The issue of LSD-induced psychosis is discussed there. I am certainly not claiming that this kind of effect is definitely known in the case of psychoactives, merely that there is a plausible physiological mechanism for it to occur. From the information posted so far, there appears to be no definite clinical evidence that psychoactives can trigger pyschosis even in susceptible individuals; but at the same time, this cannot be ruled out. ---
**Author:** ![WarmNPrickly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/d78d45/32.png) [@WarmNPrickly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WarmNPrickly)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2007, 3:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lsd-insanity/401795/44 "2007-04-27T15:28:54Z")
[QUOTE=whynot] Can anyone name any drug at all - recreational or otherwise, psychoactive or otherwise - whose affects don’t wear off, ever? [/QUOTE] Not quite what your looking for, but I read that if you modify THC, by replacing the little pentane chain with an even more fat soluble branched alkyl chain you get super-THC that lasts for days. I’d have to locate that web page discretely though, so no cite. (I’m not telling anyone how to do it!) > [@](#): > > The dosage of LSD is so small that Hofmann experienced a “trip” from inhaling the fumes. He was the first victim of an accidental dosage. Not counting all the people who suffered from ergot posioning. I’m reasonably certain that he spilled the chromatography fractions on his hand. That guy is still kicking in Switzerland last I heard. My wife’s ex-boss met him. ---
**Author:** ![Flipshod](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/f19dbf/32.png) [@Flipshod](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Flipshod)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2007, 3:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lsd-insanity/401795/45 "2007-04-27T15:29:52Z")
[QUOTE=Colibri] … From the information posted so far, there appears to be no definite clinical evidence that psychoactives can trigger pyschosis even in susceptible individuals; but at the same time, this cannot be ruled out. [/QUOTE] I know my story is anecdotal, but I will never rule it out because I saw it happen. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Will\_Repair](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/a698b9/32.png) [@Will\_Repair](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Will_Repair)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2007, 5:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lsd-insanity/401795/46 "2007-04-27T17:42:25Z")
[QUOTE=fishbicycle] …it says he absorbed it through his fingertips. [/QUOTE] That’s how he thought he absorbed it. [Hofmann guessed that he had absorbed some ergot derivative through his skin, perhaps while changing the filter paper in a suction bottle when he changed a filter.](http://www.druglibrary.org/schaffer/lsd/marks1.htm) I will concede that the source I used could be wrong; he **may** not of inhaled it, not that it’s impossible. [QUOTE=fishbicycle] There are no LSD fumes. [/QUOTE] This might come as a surprise to Smith Detection, makers of _Sabre 2000_ and _Ionscan 400B_ as well as Global Security Solutions which makes the _Ultimate Vapor Tracer & Analyzer_. ---
**Author:** ![Enola\_Straight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/dec6dc/32.png) [@Enola\_Straight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Enola_Straight)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2007, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lsd-insanity/401795/47 "2007-04-27T18:25:06Z")
IIRC, Lysergic Acid Diethylamide is chemically similar to the neurotransmitter dopamine, and redily links up to the brain’s dopamine receptors. Schizofrenia is a disease of the brain which produces too much dopamine. Schizofrenia is essentially identical to an acid trip. As the body’s metabolism uses up the LSD, the acid trip goes away. Can a dose of LSD re-adjust the brain’s “natural” level of dopamine production? ---
**Author:** ![Plynck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3e96dc/32.png) [@Plynck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Plynck)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2007, 6:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lsd-insanity/401795/48 "2007-04-27T18:33:44Z")
[QUOTE=Frylock] I’ve been trying to figure out what the connection was supposed to be between Mormonism and insanity. [/QUOTE] Dyslexia. perhaps? ---
**Author:** ![Mike\_Fun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a9adbd/32.png) [@Mike\_Fun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mike_Fun)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2007, 7:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lsd-insanity/401795/49 "2007-04-27T19:06:14Z")
Hoffman is 101! His account of his famous bicylce ride is quite amusing ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2007, 7:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lsd-insanity/401795/50 "2007-04-27T19:09:14Z")
[QUOTE=Enola Straight] Schizofrenia is essentially identical to an acid trip. [/QUOTE] With the minor difference that, as in the case of my relatives, it was a very very very bad trip that lasted several decades. ---
**Author:** ![diggleblop](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ac91a4/32.png) [@diggleblop](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/diggleblop)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2007, 7:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lsd-insanity/401795/51 "2007-04-28T07:18:23Z")
[QUOTE=mswas] LSD is a chemical. It does not contain any information. In that snopes article it claims that LSD imposes hallucinations. This is false. LSD is a chemical that reacts with your brain chemistry. \*\*You will not see anything that was not already there. \*\* [/QUOTE] Absolute nonsense. I have taken LSD on numerous occasions and have tripped so hard I’ve had to have people that weren’t tripping tell me that what I was seeing, the people I were talking to and the shit that was melting in front of my face were not really there. ---
**Author:** ![NinetyWt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/cc9497/32.png) [@NinetyWt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NinetyWt)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2007, 9:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lsd-insanity/401795/52 "2007-04-28T09:20:52Z")
[QUOTE=diggleblop] Absolute nonsense. I have taken LSD on numerous occasions and have tripped so hard I’ve had to have people that weren’t tripping tell me that what I was seeing, the people I were talking to and the shit that was melting in front of my face were not really there. [/QUOTE] Get real. What the quote meant was, your poor old brain can’t make up stuff that it never saw. Melting? We all know what that is. So your brain put melting into some thing which usually doesn’t melt. _shrug_. Garbage trucks are a real thing. Giant robots are a _cartoon_ real thing. Even when your mind runs away from you, it can only show you pictures of things you’ve experienced. ---
**Author:** ![fishbicycle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/aeb1de/32.png) [@fishbicycle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fishbicycle)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2007, 12:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lsd-insanity/401795/53 "2007-04-28T12:38:19Z")
[QUOTE=Will Repair] That’s how he thought he absorbed it. [/QUOTE] I’m sure you were there, and you know _all about it_. That’s OK, you can contradict every piece of literature on the subject that says he absorbed it through his fingertips. You obviously know more about what happened in Hoffman’s lab than anybody else does. > [@](#): > > This might come as a surprise to Smith Detection, makers of _Sabre 2000_ and _Ionscan 400B_ as well as Global Security Solutions which makes the _Ultimate Vapor Tracer & Analyzer_. According to all descriptions, LSD is a colorless, tasteless, odorless substance. If you ever find a person who has used trace detectors to go tripping with, more power to ya. Until then, you came here for an argument. This is being hit on the head lessons. ---
**Author:** ![F.U.Shakespeare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/aca169/32.png) [@F.U.Shakespeare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/F.U.Shakespeare)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2007, 1:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lsd-insanity/401795/54 "2007-04-28T13:15:49Z")
This is totally anecdotal, but not FOAF material: I went to high school with a guy who was very introverted, bookish and straight-laced. His father was a college professor, and he was one of the 2 or 3 smartest math people in his class. He didn’t smoke, drink or use drugs in high school. When he came back after his first year in college, he had really changed appearances – long hair, etc (this was in the late 1970s). He acknowledged smoking a lot of grass, and doing LSD. Not long after he came back, he had a near breakdown, and missed a year of school. But he got back on his feet, went back to school, and eventually took a Ph.D. in mathematics from a prestigious university. The concensus among us laypeople who knew him before and after his breakdown is that he had some mental health problems all along, and that the drugs (along with the removal from his family’s presence) may have removed the barriers that he’d built up to cope with them. I haven’t talked with him about his breakdown in a long time (although I did shortly after it happened), but he told a mutual friend that there’s a 3-month period during his breakdown that he doesn’t remember. I’ve seen him a few times in recent years, and he appears perfectly sound mentally, is happily married and professionally successful. So whatever happened doesn’t seem to have been permanent. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lsd-insanity/401795.md?page=2)