Should Society Be On Drugs?

(This post comes with a soundtrack. As you begin to read, hit play on: Tame Impala’s “Nangs.”)

This past week I encountered the work of Dr. Carl Hart, a professor of psychology and neuroscience at Columbia University, whose book, Drug Use For Grown-Ups, is now out in paperback. Dr. Hart’s stance is that the conventional attitude of our society towards recreational drug use is 180 degrees off. In his experience, both professional and personal, it is not the drugs themselves are that inherently harmful, but society’s attitudes toward drugs. If we were to develop a positive attitude, an attitude supporting skillful use of drugs, it would be a great benefit for all of humanity. In support of his case, Dr. Hart is open that he has been a heroin user for several years, and yet still a productive, able, moral person.

Before dismissing Hart’s idea as a crackpottery, it’s important to remember how prevalent drug use has been, historically, or at least one drug: ethyl alcohol. Indeed, during the creation of the American republic, the Founding Fathers used ethyl alcohol on a staggering level, starting at breakfast and continuing through the day. Yet they manage to fight a war and create a nation.

Dr. Hart’s ideas open the door to a far larger issue: is there an ethical imperative towards maximum ecstasy? If we can modify the human body to be in a constant state of pleasure (using methods of which drugs are simply the first crude tools), don’t we have a responsibility to do so? How can we allow anyone to exist in a state of pain?

Regardless of how you feel about the answer to that question, you cannot deny it exists. We as a species confront it, and similarly bizarre conundrums. Only within the past two hundred years have human beings had any real knowledge of the composition of realty. Having received the revelation of ourselves as cellular and chemical beings, we are now trying to decide what to make of it, and how to respond in action. The debate takes place over decades and generations. We are in the midst of it, nowhere near the conclusion. Today’s crackpottery may be tomorrow’s obvious truth.

(“Nangs” is a song meant to invoke the sensation of nitrous oxide. There is a one lyric, constantly repeated: “But is there something more than that?” Both the song and video are marvelously trippy.)

You’ve Probably Heard This One Before

A joke from my old blog:

Two bears find a hippie’s tent in the woods and eat all the acid.

Some time later, one bear says “I am the rainbowI am The RainbowThe Rainbow arcs to the other side of the universeThe Rainbow recoils, ricochets, returnsThe Rainbow is eternalThe Rainbow is NeverThe Rainbow is deadTheRainbowisaliveIamtheRainbowIamtheRainbowTheRainbowIAMTheRainbowIAM.”

The other bear says “Oh wow, a talking bear!”

Drugs & God

One doesn’t want to get all Terence McKenna (may he rest in peace) about it, but I can see finding God through hallucinogens.

It’s a question of substance.

If you come to me and say “Dude, I’ve been taking a lot of acid, and the Horned One came to me and said there is no good or evil, and what’s in my heart is the only true reality,”

then I’m gonna say “You might want to do a reboot on that.”

But if you come to me and say “Dude, I’ve been taking a lot of acid, and I realized all things in this world are interconnected, and beyond that interconnection stands a Rainbow Curtain that is both that interconnection and the umbilical cord to which that interconnection is connected,”

then I’m gonna say “I think you’re onto something.”

Most folks’ experiences will fall between these poles, natch.