Wesley Smith writes for National Review Online about a disturbing recommendation from those who should know better.
We live in a hedonistic age in which pleasures — including of the most intense kind — are readily available. Yet, despite the supposed good times, we are increasingly anxious and depressed, to the point that addiction and suicide are considered symptoms of a profound mental health crisis.
What to do? How about some regular doses of LSD?
Three bioethicist/researchers write in Practical Ethics that not only are psychedelics a potential psychiatric medication — already being investigated scientifically — but should be considered “intrinsically valuable” as a means of living an “interesting life.” …
… “Individuals typically enjoy, savor, or are moved by, the perceptions of objects or stimuli with aesthetic qualities, which may often occur during a psychedelic experience.” …
… Taking a drug is more like riding in the helicopter than climbing the mountain, as whatever experience is had comes from the drug, not character, personal effort, planning, or resilience. …
… The dangers of taking such drugs aside, this essay reflects the reductionism of our time. What many people are really craving isn’t “interesting” experiences but meaning. Those institutions that once provided profound purpose — faith, family, patriotism, community — are being leeched of their robustness by popular culture, the degradation of education, and the collapse of civic and family life.
Altered states will never be a substitute. They aren’t real. Indeed, given the power of psychedelics to alter the mind, I suspect their regular use by large segments of the population would make their lives much worse, no matter how “interesting” a particular experience.
Finally, since the authors brought him up, we should heed Huxley’s warning in Brave New World. A society without meaning and purpose is dystopian by definition and, in the end, life becomes pointless. Soma may mask the pain. It doesn’t eliminate it. Eventually despair will gnaw into conscious awareness.
