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Pineapple Fund Offers $4M Matching Grant to MAPS for MDMA Research
- everdev 9y agoThis is fantastic news. MDMA and psychedelics when taken in the right setting with the right support people can be incredibly healing. Right now it's primarily focused on PTSD and other traumas, but it can be a powerful experience for improving relationships or personal growth as well.
- ClassyJacket 9y agoI can anecdotally confirm this. I took MDMA under pretty normal party circumstances and honestly it was life changing. I've found it easier to be friendly, talkative, relaxed, and positive, even weeks later. I'm interested to see how long these effects last. My intrusive thoughts have been lowered and my overall outlook is more positive. I don't have PTSD, but I do have depression, anxiety, and unofficially, I probably lie on the autism spectrum. Can I prove anything with my sample size of one with plenty of confounding variables? Of course not. But does it make me personally believe the studies that have indicated it can be a good treatment for mental disorders are valuable and true? Absolutely. I strongly believe that safe, controlled administration of pure, clean MDMA is something every adult should have the opportunity to legally try, especially in cases where evidence supports benefit to a psychological condition. And more research should happen. The mindset of "all drugs are heroin" has got to go. I'm not advocating people taking pills they bought on the street, but I do support legalising of drugs that, when pure and controlled in dose like pharmaceutical medicine, don't cause a significant number of deaths or violence - such as MDMA and marijuana. I strongly support destigmatization of drugs and more research, and the breakdown of the black and white border of "the government decides which drugs are good and which drugs are evil and everything else is for violent crackheads."
- acchow 9y agoHave plenty of friends that have overcome social anxiety they've had their entire lives with just one night of MDMA.
- ClassyJacket 9y agoIt honestly feels like this is what has happened. I have to talk on the phone all day at my job and was not suited to it at all, and I won't pretend I suddenly enjoy it, but now I find it way easier to get thru than I did before. I'll probably do it again. I just wish there were more studies so I could know how often is safe and optimal to take it.
- cromon 9y agoRead Phikal by Alexander Shulgin, plenty of interesting information in there.
- rusk 9y agoReally? I'd always thought Shulgin's PiHKAL [0] (Phenethylamines I Have Known And Loved) was more of a technical book. I'd never realised there was a more qualitative aspect to it. I'll be sure to check it out! [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PiHKAL https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PiHKAL
- loeg 9y agoProbably best to get a testing kit from e.g. DanceSafe[0] to at least confirm the stuff you've bought has MDMA in it. It is not uncommon for meth or other stuff (2C-B, or just inert filler) to be sold as MDMA. (For the pedants: the positive test for the presence of MDMA does not prove that the substance isn't adulterated, but it's certainly better than a negative result.) [0]: https://dancesafe.org/ https://dancesafe.org/
- pazimzadeh 9y ago> under pretty normal party circumstances Were you alone or with friends? Home or out?
- roel_v 9y agoI'm not sure what sort of parties you go to, but home alone isn't much of a party by most definitions...
- lawlessone 9y agoIt's a great movie though.
- pazimzadeh 9y agoOh I skipped over the word party
- ClassyJacket 9y agoI was at a New Years party at a few different nightclubs. With a friend who was also on it, and met a bunch of others that night too.
- rusk 9y agoThe mindset of "all drugs are heroin" Ironically enough, heroin is one of the few of these banned substances that is actually approved normally for medical use [0] (Not in the USA actually, according to this reference). The name "Heroin" itself, was a trademark of the Bayer corporation [1] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heroin#Medical_uses https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heroin#Medical_uses [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heroin#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heroin#History
- PineappleFund 9y agoI'm glad to hear about your life changing experience! MDMA-assisted psychotherapy, as done by MAPS, involves 12 therapy sessions along with 3 MDMA-assisted therapy sessions; as such, I expect the results to be stronger than MDMA under party circumstances. The Phase 2 trials have showed that 63% no longer meets the criteria of PTSD 2 months after the last MDMA session, as compared to 25% for the placebo. As for how long your results may last, another study conducted by MAPS after 2.5 years found that the effects have generally still persisted.
- jtmcmc 9y agoYes there are also clinical trials underway with couples therapy comorbid with I think anxiety? or depression? (there needs to be a disease associated with it iirc it just can't be couples therapy)
- ringaroundthetx 9y agoVery nice, on reddit people suggested they donate the interest alone like University endowments do They could buy a bunch of masternodes because those are dividend producing assets in the cryptocurrency space The yields should be pretty good
- acchow 9y agoSaving lives, changing lives, moving science forward - all better than 6-10% returns. Kind of the whole point of charities is that the work they do is a better return than the market. Otherwise, every charity would be an endowment and they would just consume the 6-10% annual returns for their work.
- ringaroundthetx 9y agoA lot of charities do like 5% nonprofit stuff and 95% for profit Despite ideals it makes your rebuttal moot
- lkbm 9y agoIf all charities do that, his point is moot. Or if the most effective charities do that, his point is moot. Which charities do this, and why should we believe they're the most effective?
- ringaroundthetx 9y ago> and why should we believe they're the most effective? Whoever gave you that idea? That practice has nothing to do with how the world is changed. I believe most charities practice this, I saw a presentation on it with a bunch of accredited investors, don't have the source. You can't will your alternate reality into existence.
- lkbm 9y ago> > and why should we believe they're the most effective? > Whoever gave you that idea? 1. This quesiton makes no sense. 2. The question is how high the returns are--do they exceed the returns of investment. That would depend on the effectiveness of the charity. > I believe most charities practice this, I saw a presentation on it with a bunch of accredited investors, don't have the source. Charities report their opex. I've never seen one listed as 95%. Most are <10%. Some, like Mozilla and ACLU are split between Foundation and Corporation, but most are not. > You can't will your alternate reality into existence. So...you made some claims. I asked for evidence. You refused. I provided counter-evidence. I'm pretty sure you're just trolling now. Or arguing in bad faith, at minimum.
- veb 9y agoPineapple Fund is seriously awesome, really warms my heart at the great things that they're funding. :)
- PineappleFund 9y agoThanks :)
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- wyager 9y agoPineappleFund, if you can see this you’ve been banned/marked as dead for some reason.
- Chernobog 9y agoIf MDMA were to become approved medicine in the US, I see it as an important milestone when it comes to getting rid of misguided classifications of drugs as having no medical value even though there are both research and anecdotal evidence suggesting otherwise. I am certain that a change in the US will have impacts on other countries as well. I donated last summer because I sincerely believe this research will have a huge positive impact on many peoples lives if MDMA were to become medicine. Seeing this news I have decided to donate again.
- PineappleFund 9y agoThanks for your donation! (that will be matched :) The Phase 2 trials and FDA's breakthrough therapy designation along shows strong medical value of MDMA, especially in a clinical context with psychotherapy sessions and a trained therapist. I hope this starts a renaissance in the use of psychedelics to treat, long term (with short term drug applications), many mental conditions.
- brighton36 9y agoAny chance I can get you on my show, anonymously? I have so many questions. This is Chris DeRose.
- 09bjb 9y agoAgreed! I've set up matching donations for your matching donations among my friends. Thank you for supporting this cause...I think a lot of mental conditions go ignored and un-healed as a consequence of not understanding these substances well (both the benefits and side effects).
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- throwaway_de2af 9y ago[unpopular opinion, criticism is welcome] People who build cheap cars/smartphones/clothes/food/anything usually don't care about poor people at all, even if poor people benefit the most from those cheap protducts/services. They care about profits in $$$ $$$ incentives bring the most value to poor people, so the best motivation I can think of for improving society is money-making businesses .
- ddorian43 9y agowrong thread ?
- jerianasmith 9y agoI believe this a great initiative by Pineapple Fund. This will surely inspire others for contributing towards psychedelic therapy and medical marijuana research. Philanthropy is all about caring and nourishing and this initiative is a step in that direction.
- mnx 9y agoThis seems like evidence towards Gwern's theory that pineapple fund is a retired dark net drug dealer...
- Obi_Juan_Kenobi 9y agoIt could be, but I think the purpose of a fund like this should be to target organizations that are 'unpalatable' to other donation sources, and MAPS is a great example.
- mnx 9y agoOh yeah, I'm all for it. Just noticing.
- noinput 9y agoThis is fantastic. I recently helped a few of the NGOs selected by Pineapple get their tech together to accept the funds. It gave me a chance to learn more (as much is public) about the fund and love hearing about bolder moves like this to make such an impact. Being close to the NGOs that did receive the funds, I can say first hand just how much of a difference this macro-funding is making for real orgs that care so much about change. @Pine thank you for giving a damn.
- PineappleFund 9y agoThanks Jim! Let me know if there's anything I can do to make things easier for the NGOs! Some days, I still wake up and I'm a little bit astonished about the impact that my bitcoins can have. I certainly would've never predicted this when I first got into bitcoin.
- goldenkey 9y agoThanks for all that you are doing with the donations. It really shows great integrity which is in rare supply these days. I know it's a long shot and some people are gonna rag on me-- but I want to ask, are you/the fund, at all interested in experimental digital physics? I've had this project on the backburner for a while, have been reading textbooks on automata, partial differential equations, and particle physics to get to a place where I can better engineer model universes. The gist of the project in a few words, is to create a simple 2d universe with enough information dynamics to allow for universal computation and most importantly, evolution. Conway's "Game of Life" is turing complete, aka universal, as are many automata and digital simulations. However, these models were not designed with evolution in mind..nor simple principles like the duality between mass and energy-- or analogously in a simple digital realm, storage and movement. This universe that we reside in might be complex and hardly simulatable in all its glory with our current computational powers. However, if we strip out EM, the weak force, the strong force, maybe even gravity..go down to 2 spatial dimensions, we still might be able to produce a universe in which computers form, and evolution takes hold to produce intelligent forms. Now, I am not asserting that intelligence of our caliber will form or if it is even probable. But I think this endeavor is worth some salt. I've written a blog post[1] more about the proposal but it mostly reiterates what I mentioned here. There is also the movie which is amateur but still informative and entertaining.[2] My email is in my profile in case you are at all interested in pursuing the proposal. Cheers. -------- [1] https://scrollto.com/life-a-universe-simulation/ https://scrollto.com/life-a-universe-simulation/ [2] http://amzn.to/2qWUFQC http://amzn.to/2qWUFQC
- dekhn 9y agoi for one welcome our new crypto-currency funded drug research clinical trials. Please try to be as ethical and scrupulous when doing your research as possible: it's important that we have high quality scientific results, regardless of whether they support our hypotheses, so that people trust the outcomes.
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- blhack 9y agoIt's been said a bunch of times, but it should be said a bunch more times: what pineapplefund is doing is incredible. I can only hope that is how all of us would react to that sort of windfall.
- jonwachob91 9y agoOne big issue not addressed in this post, how is MAPS differentiating between PTSD and BLAST[1] in this CT? They have identical symptoms, but one is psychological and one is physical. Being unable to differentiate them could cause some SERIOUS error in the results. Have you thought about how you are going to address that? [1]BLAST is a traumatic brain injury similar to CTE. It is caused by shockwaves emanating from explosives. Symptoms are near identical to PTSD.
- DenisM 9y agoOne could select for people who were not subject to an actual explosion?
- jonwachob91 9y agoIf their target audience is PTSD patients, they are looking at a primarily veterans as participants. It's pretty hard to determine if a veteran was exposed to an explosion or not.
- _acme 9y agoAn enormous number of people suffer from PTSD who are not veterans. People who have been raped, witnessed crimes, etc. could all suffer PTSD. Trauma can be almost anything if it causes a negative impact (e.g., depression, anxiety) in the future, and persons suffering from depression or anxiety as a result of such trauma would likely be diagnosed with comorbid PTSD.
- kabes 9y agoUsually MDMA has the backlash of lowering the amount of serotonin release in your brain the days after you take it, which makes you feel down. The so-called tuesday blues. So how come these people in these treatments aren't getting more depressed after their few hours of excitement?
- triangleman 9y agoPerhaps they are. The question is whether these treatments (combined with talk therapy) lead to positive long-term mental health outcomes.
- 09bjb 9y agoI've read up a bit on the research, and it sounds like a next-day or 48-hour "blues period" is par for the course after an MDMA session. They mitigate this problem by making sure that your schedule is clear of obligations the next day and warning the patient about it ahead of time. The impact of MDMA in these trials is that it's not "a few hours of excitement": the drug often helps the patient make large, permanent breakthroughs in their trauma or self-image that wouldn't be possible without the "life preserver" of the substance. Going through the trauma and reorienting oneself to it in a new, healthy way seems much more possible (to many people anyway, certainly those with full-on diagnosable PTSD) with the help of MDMA.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- qwerty456127 9y ago> Usually MDMA has the backlash of lowering the amount of serotonin release in your brain the days after you take it, which makes you feel down. The so-called tuesday blues Usually MDMA has absolutely no observable backlash (it may still harm your brain though, even if you don't feel it, I don't know if it will or not) if you don't take it more often than once in 3 months (or 1 month if you insist, but absolutely never more often), avoid taking too much of it, take enough piracetam, magnesium and antioxidants (acetyl-l-carnitine, acetyl-l-cysteine, vitamins E and C, lipoic acid, CoQ10, green tea extract, grape seed extract etc) before, during and after the MDMA trip, take L-tryptophan+piracetam after the trip, smoke some weed (but don't do it in advance - this can cause a panic attack and nausea), drink enough water, sleep well and take L-tryptophan+piracetam again when you get up. What will follow is usually going to be a rather pleasant state called "afterglow". Taking emoxypine, piracetam, magnesium and St. John's wort during the days after to actually restore the receptors can also be a good idea. I have also heard eating some psilocybin shrooms can prevent MDMA hangover too but I doubt combining psychedelics is a good idea for everybody. DISCLAIMER: The above is a piece of theoretical knowledge provided for harm-reduction purposes only and not even proven scientifically (I'd be glad if the researchers could consider checking it). Use it at your own risk. Don't take what is not legal in your country. I don't recommend taking MDMA without a prescription though I do recommend to consider harm-reduction measures if you decide to take it. Anyway, make sure you are not allergic to any of the substances you are going to take, are not taking any drugs that may interact with them and don't have any other contraindications.
- noahdesu 9y agoFrom the press release: "If this funding challenge is met in gifts, grants, and multi-year pledges, MAPS will have raised sufficient funds to complete its Phase 3 trials." That statement is huge. The idea that MAPS has successfully taken a compound through the entire FDA approval process using only donations is kinda amazing. They received breakthrough status with the FDA, they are starting phase 3 trials, and the only thing holding them back is an amount of money that would be a drop in the bucket for a big pharma company.
- 09bjb 9y agoThis is fantastic news! I did an actual fistpump seeing this in the HN list this morning. In my anonymous, just-another-person-on-the-internet opinion, there isn't a lot out there that holds more potential for humanity at the moment than furthering our understanding (and consequent _responsible_ use of) psychedelics. A huge thank you to Pine for supporting healing-driven science and noticing that MAPS is doing this particularly difficult work with efficiency and integrity.