Science

Drinking ayahuasca can increase mindfulness and cognitive flexibility…

January 27, 2020By

A new study in the journal Psychopharmacology suggests that drinking ayahuasca generates lasting improvements in mindfulness and cognitive flexibility, which may explain its therapeutic properties. Based on these apparent lasting increases in both mindfulness and cognitive flexibility, the study authors state that the ayahuasca afterglow period “could be therapeutically significant because a loosening of ‘cognitive grip’ may…

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Anthropology

…kratom culture…

January 27, 2020By

“A third of our clientele are looking for a caffeine-free alternative to get them through their day,” Day says. “I’m talking soccer moms.” The image of wealthy moms slurping kratom tea in lieu of a cappuccino, or trendy Bay Area residents popping kratom pills socially just for its mild, mellow body high, cuts strangely against…

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Modern Culture

Could psychedelics help us resolve the climate crisis?

January 27, 2020By

We increasingly live in an age of extinction. Nature is in retreat, urbanism and everyday alienation from nature is establishing itself as the norm, and we are confronting loss on a scale we find difficult to acknowledge and process. In such unprecedented times, we can find ourselves trapped in dissociative psychological states, knowing about environmental crisis while doing…

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Politics

Behind the scenes… cannabis charities

January 27, 2020By

“It appears as though the desire to provide veterans and sick patients with access to deeply discounted medicine… is less of a priority than getting a bus with your logo to drive down the strip, sadly.” -Madisen Saglibene, founder and Executive Director of the Las Vegas and Nevada chapters of NORML Like so many other…

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Anthropology

Decriminalize Nature Portland announces launch of 2020 initiative to decriminalize psychedelic plant [and fungi]

January 27, 2020By

The Congress… reiterates the organizational belief that entheogenic plant medicines must be treated as a sacred and individually considered category… “Oregon is in the middle of a peak in its mental health and homelessness rates,” said chief petitioner and DNP organizer Holly Sullivan. “And the last thing we need to be doing is locking up more…

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Modern Culture

[Cannabis] edibles are just as safe as [was] thought

January 27, 2020By

Private enterprise, despite its promises to self-regulate, will never self-regulate sufficiently, since regulations and warnings often get in the way of making profits. And that begins with open, fair communication and education campaigns with as wide and persistent a reach as any message regarding alcohol or tobacco products. The report [on cannabis edibles] notes that edibles…

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Spirituality

…present of psychedelics

January 26, 2020By

Nature has often provided us with the means to cure disease and improve our lives; it seems absolutely insane to block our own progress… even in a psychedelic community that thinks it is more steeped in love and compassion than ever before… Although we’d like to think of this new renaissance as being led by…

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Science

[Nitrous Oxide] can ease symptoms of depression in just two hours by acting on a brain chemical with no side-effects, new research suggests

January 25, 2020By

A pilot study involving 20 patients who’d previously not responded to up to 12 different antidepressants found they were significantly more likely to improve with ‘laughing gas’ treatment than those given a placebo gas. The benefits lasted several days. Now researchers have discovered that nitrous oxide also acts on glutamate, but in a slightly different…

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