Carrie Fisher had a psychedelic-induced encounter with a talking acorn. Grateful Dead drummer Costs Kreutzmann remembers the time he dropped too much acid and his cymbals began melting mid-set, requiring him to leave the phase. Ben Stiller admits he just dropped acid when and had such a bad journey that he called his parents, Jerry Stiller (who died just today) and the late Anne Meara. These are just a few of the celebrity psychedelic experiences recounted in the entertaining brand-new documentary, Have a Great Journey: Adventures in Psychedelics, now streaming on Netflix.
( Moderate spoilers below.)
ARS TECHNICA
This story initially appeared on Ars Technica, a relied on source for innovation news, tech policy analysis, evaluations, and more. Ars is owned by WIRED’s moms and dad company, Condé Nast.
Psychedelics get their name from the Greek root words for “mind exposing,” because they can change cognition and understanding. LSD(lysergic acid diethylamide) is perhaps the best understood, along with its popular siblings psilocybin(the active component in so-called magic mushrooms); 3,4-methyl enedioxy methamphetamine ( MDMA), aka ecstasy (or molly); peyote, made from the ground-up tops of cacti that contain mescaline; and ayahuasca, a bitter tea made from a Brazilian vine with the active ingredient dimethyltryptamine(DMT). Many are classified as Set up 1 substances by the US Drug Enforcement Company, indicating they are not considered to have any possible medical advantages. But this is mainly a residue of the “culture wars” that raved in the 1960 s, ’70 s, and beyond.
The Swiss chemist Albert Hofmann found LSD while working with chemical compounds originated from ergot, a kind of fungus that grows on rye, since he had an interest in prospective drug treatments. The reality that LSD’s molecular structure resembles serotonin indicates that it can bind to serotonin receptors in the brain. A pharmaceutical firm called Sandoz released an LSD-based drug called Delysid in 1947 for the treatment of psychiatric disorders, and from 1950 to 1965 some 40,000 people were treated with LSD– consisting of Hollywood stars such as Cary Grant
The CIA likewise notoriously experimented– unsuccessfully– with LSD as a possible mind-control drug throughout the Cold War with the MKUltra project And gradually, fears began to grow about the unpredictability and safety of psychedelics. Stories of bad trips, short-lived psychosis, and distressing flashbacks began to multiply, and the drugs became negatively connected with the counterculture Beat motion of the 1950 s. Harvard psychology teacher Timothy Leary was dismissed from his position in 1963 for conducting experiments on students by providing LSD and magic mushrooms. He set up his own private research study program and drew the attention of the FBI, culminating in his arrest and jail time. Then-president Richard Nixon declared Leary “the most unsafe guy in America.” And eventually LSD and its fellow psychedelics were classified as Arrange 1 under the 1970 Controlled Substances Act
It’s within this historical context that Have a Good Trip Director Donick Cary decided, some 11 years ago, that he wanted to film a documentary of famous individuals telling stories about their experiences with psychedelics. “I believed, would not it be fantastic to have a long supper party where you walk around a giant table with all your preferred individuals and they share a story about hallucinogens?” he informed Ars.
Cary was just a little ahead of the curve, given that this was a period where many individuals were still pretending that they never try out such substances. “That’s where pop culture
