The Rebirth of Research with Entheogens: Lessons from the Past and Hypotheses for the Future (original) (raw)
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Psychedelics and Mystical Experiences
Reviews the book, Sacred knowledge: Psychedelics and religious experiences, by William A. Richards. Richards's career of clinical research with psychedelics and professional formation in theology, comparative religion and the psychology of religion bring integrative perspectives to understanding psychedelic experiences. Clinical accounts, scientific research and his personal experiences with psychedelics enable Richards to address issues of core importance in religious studies, medicine and society in general. Clinical studies with psychedelics provide findings that contribute to assessment of issues in religious studies, providing evidence that supports a perennialist view of mystical experiences as inherent to human nature. Double blind studies establish the intrinsic ability of psychedelics to produce mystical experiences, as well as behavioral changes in the participants' lives. Similarities in mystical and psychedelic experiences across people and cultures point to their transcendental nature and basis in human biology. Richards weaves together various strands of evidence to educate professionals of many disciplines and the general public about the range of promising uses of psychedelics. Although psychedelic ingestion does not always produce mystical experiences, when they fail to do so, they generally engage the user with personal experiences related to childhood trauma or unresolved emotions, especially fears, grief, anger and guilt. This reveals another power potential of these substances to provide relief for conditions often found intractable by modern medicine. Sacred Knowledge provides a call to recognize the biases that have affected our societal evaluations of psychedelics and how current scientific research demands reconsideration of the significance of these powerful entheogens and their implications for understanding spiritual experiences and human nature.
Book Review – Sacred Knowledge: Psychedelics and Religious Experiences
Spiritual Psychology and Counseling
The quest for more holistic forms of treatment and healing in modern psychology has been provoked by its sole focus on the management of symptoms. This has led to an alarming rise in the use of psychedelic substances. Yet the true cause behind these maladies of the mind is the burgeoning ‘crisis of meaning’ that we find in the world today. This largely undiagnosed predicament has led to religion being supplanted by psychology, and to the realm of the psyche becoming confused with that of the spiritual. Modern societies have clearly lost a sense of the sacred. To the extent that we fail to see this, the use of entheogens will never be able to replace a true “science of the soul,” which offers a more satisfying conception of reality, and a fuller understanding of what it means to be human. In this way, we may discover a properly integrated approach to healing that is grounded in the deeper wisdom to be found in the world’s time-honored spiritual traditions.
"On the Role of Mystical Experiences in Psychedelic Therapy and Research"
Journal of Psychedelic Psychiatry, 2023
Should mysticism be excluded from psychedelic therapy and from broader scientific research on psychedelics? One camp argues that it should because experiences are not part of what produces positive effects in psychedelic therapy and because the language of mysticism is inexact and makes psychedelic research appear unscientific. The other camp argues that at present the role of experience currently appears needed for the strongest effect in psychedelic therapy and so must also be studied in psychedelic science. It is argued here that there is evidence that these experiences appear to be a necessary part of the best effect in psychedelic therapy. Unless that data can be refuted, psychedelicenabled experiences cannot be dismissed from therapy or scientific research on psychedelics. In such circumstances, these experiences must also remain a topic within consciousness studies. Moreover, "mystical" is the appropriate term for depicting at least some of the psychedelic experiences involved.
Psychedelics & Mystical Experience: A Spark to an Eternal Flame
Philosophy & Religion major, Music minor -Class of 2014 Intro to Mysticism -Brian Karafin This paper discusses the spiritual and therapeutic potential of psychedelic substances, used as tools for awakening to a larger sense of reality. I go over the basics of what a mystical experience can be defined as, and the relationships which various cultures around the world have with entheogenic plants. A taboo topic, the facts about psychedelics are often suppressed by the ideologies of mainstream society, but this paper shows how there is still much hope for the healing potentials of psychedelics on an individual level. I also discuss the importance of set and setting, and careful integration of a psychedelic experience as necessary factors in providing a positive and perhaps even mystical experience.
Psychedelic Drugs and the Religious Experience: A Study of Neurological and Mystical Relationships
This paper explores numerous articles and publications from research performed on the neurological and cognitive effects of psychedelic drugs, also called entheogenic, in relation to religious or spiritual experiences. In defining religious experiences and drug-induced experiences, the similarities of their neurological activity can then be compared. Looking at fMRI and SPECT scan results, the brain stimulation and activity of both experiences prove to be more alike than different. With an ancient history of civilizations using psychoactive substances as medicinal, ritualistic, and spiritual remedies, these drugs have still shown positive treatments in more recent years. Now that a long-time research ban is being re-evaluated, the discussion of these psychoactive substances as beneficial or harmful to individuals must be revisited. The copying or publishing of this document is prohibited without the author's permission, and/or proper citations of the work. All rights reserved.
In the second half of the twentieth century, when psychopharmacology was not developed as we know it today and psychoanalysis was an influential school, various psychiatrists began to develop a ‘pharmacology of consciousness,’ and became interested in hallucinogens as new paths for accessing the unconscious. However, with the psychedelic model, the pharmacology of consciousness turned also into a ‘pharmacology of spirituality,’ focused on the use of spiritual experiences as catalyzers of psychological change. This article is a historical review of the origins and development of this spiritual aspect of psychedelic research, from its beginnings in the 1950sto the ‘Renaissance of psychedelic studies’ that we have witnessed in recent decades. The guiding principle is that spiritual experiences have played a key role in psychedelic studies, shaping scientific ideas, psychotherapeutic strategies, and the ideological positions of many of the researchers interested in the clinical applications of hallucinogens
2024
In the 21st century, there is a growing and renewed interest in psychoactive substances among the scientific and medical community, as well as the general public. This growing interest is apparent from the increasing commercial interest in psychedelic therapy, the revival of psychedelic science, and ritualistic use in resacralized contexts. Psychedelic-induced (pi) religious, spiritual, and mystical experiences (piRSMEs) have been rated as among the most personally meaningful and spiritually significant lifetime experiences, with moderate to strong persisting positive changes in life satisfaction, purpose, and meaning. Some even suggest that through psychedelics, we can come to understand the nature of ancient symbolic and conceptual capacities of the human brain and the kind of experiences that generate the human quest for transcendence. In this field review, twenty-five contemporary studies on neuropsychopharmacology and piRSMEs will be examined, highlighting those that might lead to breakthroughs in the future and critiquing the “mystical experience” discourse.
Zygon, 2019
Scientific interest in drug-induced mystical experiences reemerged in the 1990s. This warrants reexamining the philosophical issues surrounding such studies: Do psychedelic drugs cause mystical experiences? Are drug-induced experiences the same in nature as other mystical experiences? Does the fact that mystical experiences can be induced by drugs invalidate or validate mystical cognitive claims? Those questions will be examined here. An overview of the scientific examination of drug-induced mystical experiences is included, as is a brief overview of the history of the use of psychedelic drugs in religion.
Entheogens and Sacred Psychology
Spirituality Studies
The psychedelic renaissance did not emerge from a void. While a tremendous upswell of interest in psychedelics can be observed today, there is scant acknowledgment of the current spiritual crisis that has led to this burgeoning enthusiasm. Having lost our sense of the sacred, we have—with disastrous consequences—become alienated from ourselves, others, and the natural environment. Secular psychotherapy and psychiatry have failed to address the myriad mental health problems that are prevalent right now, which has compelled people to desperately look for alternatives to fill the void in their lives. Sacred medicines have been used for millennia in humanity’s traditional cultures as part of their spiritual practices. Now that psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy (PAT) is being developed, we must avoid repeating the mistakes of modern psychology, which misguidedly seeks to situate entheogenic therapy on a desacralized foundation of materialism, reductionism, and scientism. Nevertheless, although the full benefit of entheogens can likely be gained only in the context of a sacred tradition, they may still have some measure of therapeutic value even when used in conjunction with secular psychotherapy. This article examines the metaphysical foundations of sacred psychology and argues that entheogenic therapy needs to be grounded on the same basis. The framework employed here is a “transpersonal” perspective that applies the insights found in the world’s great wisdom traditions. It will be argued that the adoption of psychedelics in mental health treatment presupposes a fully integrated psychotherapy that is possible only when it is rooted in a spiritually informed ontology.
Here and Now: Discovering the Sacred with Entheogens
Zygon®, 2014
Renewed research with entheogens (psychedelic substances) has been able to facilitate the occurrence of mystical forms of consciousness in healthy volunteers with a high degree of reliability. This article explores the potential significance of this development for religious scholars, especially those interested in the study of mysticism. The definition of "mystical consciousness" employed in this research is presented and differentiated from visionary/archetypal and other types of alternative mental states. The ways in which entheogens may be employed with skill and maximum safety are discussed. Implications for clarifying confusion in the study of mysticism are considered, along with suggestions for future religious research on this frontier of knowledge.