This just in: Hallucinogen causes hallucinations

[kelly5078]

Here is King’s College’s own blurb on this conference. It doesn’t say much, but interesting it has a quote from Murray that suggests some usefulness, at least for cannabidol, in treating people with (unspecified) psychoses:

Commenting on this chemical, Professor Robin Murray, Professor of Psychiatry at the Institute says ‘Maybe the cannabidol ameliorates some of the effects of the THC and maybe it actually might be good for you if you are psychotic.’

This was not mentioned in the originally-cited article, in which Murray is the guy talking about paranoia being made worse. And, of course, its noteworthy that the AP article trots out the Yale study, in which D’Souza says “In practice, we found that cannabis is very bad for people with schizophrenia.”

What’s really being said, and in what context? Damned if I know.

Finally, there’s this in the King’s College article:

There is anecdotal evidence that the number of patients in the UK with psychotic symptoms linked to cannabis use is increasing. Professor Murray went on to say that this could be linked to the increased THC content of herbal cannabis sold on the street.

Anecdotal evidence, huh? Great.

I guess one could pursue this to see what’s really going on, but obviously the press is going to be as useful in separating reality from hallucination as cannabis.

[Mangetout]

@II Gyan II

My stance is functionalist, as I outlined in a recent GD thread on the ‘problem of induction’.

However, you seem to miss the point going by your reply. Again, you are bringing up a functional objection (“practical alternative” i.e. something that ‘works’) and yet the current stance is to deign to define “actual/objective reality”, Ironically, in the second study, some subjects’ testimony of what they report as working for them is deemed delusional. Can I be sure that my “practical alternative” won’t be delusionally judged by you as impractical? :dubious:

If it were a question of pain relief, or of moderation of hand tremors, or almost any other thing, patient testimony would be quite valuable. In this particular case, though, the patients’ condition puts them in a state where they simply cannot be treated as reliable observers. They might be telling the truth and they might indeed be suffering less delusion, or they might be wrong and have slipped the other way - how would they know.
Outside, non-delusional observers, OTOH, are more able to make objective, consistent judgments (albeit only based in what we comfortably call normal reality) .

[Larry_Borgia]

@Fear Itself

Hmmm. Then color me confused by your statement:

My clumsy phrasing. I meant that pot has more in common with the group of recreational drugs commonly classified as “hallucinogens” than it does with those drugs called narcotics. I don’t like the term “hallucinogen” because even LSD doesn’t cause full on hallucinations in many people. I prefer the term psychedelic. But hallucinogen is the common name for LSD, shrooms, etc.

[Tuckerfan]

@kelly5078

I guess one could pursue this to see what’s really going on, but obviously the press is going to be as useful in separating reality from hallucination as cannabis.

The problem is that the Feds have their panties in such a twist about illicit drugs that they block legitimate research which could answer these kinds of questions. IIRC, they’ve also been caught falsifying data to make drugs look worse than they really are.

Paul Bowles writes in his autobiography about doing a paste or oil form of pot (don’t remember the name of it) that he put on crackers and gave him hallucinations. He gave it to his wife (who had a history of mental problems) and the dosage was way too high for her and she had a very bad time.