So, in my so far less than impressive Psych 1001 lecture of over 500 kids today, my prof claims that the principal driving force behind deinstitutionalization in the 1960’s was the advent of anti-psychotic drugs. Absolutely reasonable.
She then rambles on to explain how the first psychoactive drugs were essentially trial analgesiacs which failed as analgesiacs. Okay, I can buy it.
Specifically, she points to a single, unnamed patient, a paranoid schizophrenic who broke his leg. Apparently, his pain was not diminised but his thoughts were, “cleared up.” Hmmm, I’m not willing to buy this specific ancdote. Maybe it is because she bugs me, but I simply don’t believe that researchers would be able to happen luckily upon a single analgesiac in a single patient due to his change in psychotic thoughts and behaviors. I suppose that I am in this class to learn this stuff, but don’t schizophrenics show a great deal of variation in their mental/affective states, and how would researchers involved with patients in pain-killer research be able to get to know patients well enough to effectively monitor this anyway. I smell a UL.
Worse, an inane, stupid, boring UL from somebody paid to know better.
I would have thought that the first “psycho-active” drug was alcohol.
And since there are written records of it from thousands of years ago (as far back as there are written records), it probably was discovered by accident.
Not by accident. I’m sure the first people to discover them probably just looked at them and said, “gee that looks like it’ll get me high”. I’m not even sure some of the claims by scientists that it was just an accident are truly honest.
Can you imagine being the poor ancient bastard that was out looking for something to spice up his lunch and ended up tripping? That’s a topic all in itself.
She may have been referring to the synthesis of LSD by Albert Hofmann. It was one of a number of similar substances created during pharmaceutical research. Hofmann hadn’t set out to create phsychoactive drugs, but that’s what he did, and his report detailing his discovery of the effects is a pretty amusing read. Do a search for “discovery of LSD” and/or “Albert Hofmann” and you’ll find it.
Not by accident, but by trying things out, observing the results, and making a informed guess at where an experimental drugs effects might be put to good use.
Alright, I think that this thread was pretty well mis-interpreted, probably partially my fault. I really, really should have said anti-psychotic in the thread title, not psycho-active.
What I meant, which should actually be fairly obvious if people read the OP, is psycho-active medications for the treatment of psychiatric conditions, or at least those belonging to the class of modern anti-psychotics, such as Thorazine.
So, I’m sorry the title was deceptive, but thanks Squink.
Based upon an apparently trustworthy and well documented source from Squink, I feel pretty safe saying that the “UL” in the OP was indeed bullshit as I originally suggested.
Nicotine has anti-psychotic properties (which helps explain why something like 75% of diagnosed schizophrenics smoke) and has obviously been around quite a bit longer than modern medicine.
I will conced that this seems to co-incide with my own personal experience with patients with Tardive Dyskensia (and by extension, probably schizophrenia), and I’d be interested to learn more.
Oddly, the politicians never seem to address this issue when they balance the state budget by raising cigarette taxes, nor is it widely acknowledged by the anti-smoking lobby.
Uh, probably because it doesn’t really work very well? I don’t think there’s really a cover-up campaign going on by the “anti-smoking lobby.” People try to self-medicate with a lot of things. Cocaine and heroin, too. Usually there are better medications for these people that aren’t as harmful for their health as cigarettes are (tobacco is a lot more dangerous than heroin is).
I’m not even sure some of the claims by scientists that it was just an accident are truly honest.