6 ms·

I'm curious why you're dissatisfied with the organically arrived at "folk taxonomic" category: psychedelics. Are you looking for a new classification in law?

JadeNB 3y ago
The article specifically refers not just to the cultural, but also to the legal and medical, thinking about psychedelics.
- ttctciyf 3y ago
  From the article: > this new landscape demands more than just new laws. It also requires a new category for psychedelics. Are they recreational drugs? Are they medicines? Are they religious sacraments? I'm asking why we can't just answer this question with "They are psychedelics".
  - crazygringo 3y ago
    Because legally, that's as meaningful as saying "they are quooquaquams". The entire point of categorizing them is to answer questions around: - Should they be sold to take recreationally, like tobacco and alcohol? Should there be limits, like tobacco packaging and taxes, or rules similar to drunk driving? - Or should they only be prescribed by doctors for mental health reasons, and not allowed recreationally or in religious ceremonies? - Or should there be exceptions for certain religious ceremonies as well? Is this open to anyone (so Catholics can invent a ceremony) or only ones that have traditionally used it? Does it require licensing or authorization? By categorizing them, we come to answers on these questions. If they fit into existing categories, we don't have to write many new laws except to state the categories. Or if we decide they don't fit into existing categories, we come up with a new category with its own set of answers and new laws to write, but part of this whole process is determining if that's necessary or not. And even if it is, the name of the label may not be "psychadelics" because we realize there's another set of non-psychadelic compounds that make sense to be included as well (e.g. empathogens like MDMA).
    - ttctciyf 3y ago
      So, short answer, "yes a legal category is what's being asked for". Got it.
    - PragmaticPulp 3y ago
      > Because legally, that's as meaningful as saying "they are quooquaquams". I don’t see how this is at all equivalent, given that “psychedelics” is a well-known term that can be found throughout decades of literature and that gibberish word you just made up has no attached meaning. If you’re equating random gibberish words to well-known words in literature then why does anything have any meaning? Why would a new word have meaning? Regardless, the laws generally don’t refer to “psychedelics”, they refer to specific chemicals by their name. There are numerous compounds that would be considered psychedelics that are, nevertheless, not illegal because they’re not covered by any laws (including analog acts)
      - crazygringo 3y ago
        Because the term found through decades of literature isn't attached to legal categories, as I explained. It's the same way the term "drug" doesn't have much legal distinction, as I can't think of any legal commonalities spanning coffee, alcohol, Lipitor, cannabis, and heroin. > Regardless, the laws... refer to specific chemicals by their name. Not directly, very often. I doubt there's any specific law around Lipitor. Rather, drugs are grouped into categories and then the laws that permit or restrict them are mostly around those categories. Otherwise it would all be incredibly redundant (with exceptions for certain incredibly common drugs like alcohol). And the question here is how to categorize pyschadelics for legal purposes. And saying that we just call them psychadelics answers as many legal questions as saying we call them quooquaquams -- i.e. zero.
        shwaj 3y ago
        Why can’t “psychedelics” be the name for the category?
        3y ago
  - refurb 3y ago
    Many drugs are already all of those. Opioids are both recreational drugs and medicines. Peyote is a recreational drug and religious sacrament. This seems to ignore this fact.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
EdwardDiego 3y ago
In my country, LSD, mescaline, magic mushrooms, and DMT, are class A controlled substances, same as methamphetamine, cocaine, heroin and fentanyl. Class A being drugs that pose a "very high risk of harm". Which, you know, if I could post comments on our legislation, I'd be adding a bunch of "[citation needed]"s in that list of substances that apparently have a very high risk of harm. And like other jurisdictions, there's some real bloody oddities in the law in this area. E.g., a man was charged for importing 18kg of DMT when he ordered 18kg of Mimosa tenuiflora root bark online, as the bark isn't explicitly handled in law as a prohibited plant like Coca leaf (class C, far lower severity of sentencing) and Papaver somniferum (class B), so it falls through to the default of "any substance containing a class A controlled substance is also class A". So he could get life in prison, like he imported 18kg of fentanyl. Hopefully the sentencing judge is reasonable, but the fact that he's facing the same penalty for 18kg of bark that contains about 1 - 2% DMT as you would for importing enough fentanyl to kill 9 million people shows that our law is a bit of an ass.
- bryanrasmussen 3y ago
  This is the same way that one weighs LSD that is on paper, unfortunately. Thus a lot of paper with very little LSD on it is worse than a little bit of paper with a lot of LSD on it.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - funnymony 3y ago
    Could you elaborate? Why is it so?
    - deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]
    - bryanrasmussen 3y ago
      Supreme court ruled https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1996/01/23/supreme-court-rules-weight-in-lsd-sentencing-includes-carrier-medium/7410ca8e-09e5-4b17-8523-38029fcf8882/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1996/01/23/s...

JadeNB 3y ago

The article specifically refers not just to the cultural, but also to the legal and medical, thinking about psychedelics.

ttctciyf 3y ago
From the article: > this new landscape demands more than just new laws. It also requires a new category for psychedelics. Are they recreational drugs? Are they medicines? Are they religious sacraments? I'm asking why we can't just answer this question with "They are psychedelics".
- crazygringo 3y ago
  Because legally, that's as meaningful as saying "they are quooquaquams". The entire point of categorizing them is to answer questions around: - Should they be sold to take recreationally, like tobacco and alcohol? Should there be limits, like tobacco packaging and taxes, or rules similar to drunk driving? - Or should they only be prescribed by doctors for mental health reasons, and not allowed recreationally or in religious ceremonies? - Or should there be exceptions for certain religious ceremonies as well? Is this open to anyone (so Catholics can invent a ceremony) or only ones that have traditionally used it? Does it require licensing or authorization? By categorizing them, we come to answers on these questions. If they fit into existing categories, we don't have to write many new laws except to state the categories. Or if we decide they don't fit into existing categories, we come up with a new category with its own set of answers and new laws to write, but part of this whole process is determining if that's necessary or not. And even if it is, the name of the label may not be "psychadelics" because we realize there's another set of non-psychadelic compounds that make sense to be included as well (e.g. empathogens like MDMA).
  - ttctciyf 3y ago
    So, short answer, "yes a legal category is what's being asked for". Got it.
  - PragmaticPulp 3y ago
    > Because legally, that's as meaningful as saying "they are quooquaquams". I don’t see how this is at all equivalent, given that “psychedelics” is a well-known term that can be found throughout decades of literature and that gibberish word you just made up has no attached meaning. If you’re equating random gibberish words to well-known words in literature then why does anything have any meaning? Why would a new word have meaning? Regardless, the laws generally don’t refer to “psychedelics”, they refer to specific chemicals by their name. There are numerous compounds that would be considered psychedelics that are, nevertheless, not illegal because they’re not covered by any laws (including analog acts)
    - crazygringo 3y ago
      Because the term found through decades of literature isn't attached to legal categories, as I explained. It's the same way the term "drug" doesn't have much legal distinction, as I can't think of any legal commonalities spanning coffee, alcohol, Lipitor, cannabis, and heroin. > Regardless, the laws... refer to specific chemicals by their name. Not directly, very often. I doubt there's any specific law around Lipitor. Rather, drugs are grouped into categories and then the laws that permit or restrict them are mostly around those categories. Otherwise it would all be incredibly redundant (with exceptions for certain incredibly common drugs like alcohol). And the question here is how to categorize pyschadelics for legal purposes. And saying that we just call them psychadelics answers as many legal questions as saying we call them quooquaquams -- i.e. zero.
      - shwaj 3y ago
        Why can’t “psychedelics” be the name for the category?
        3y ago
- refurb 3y ago
  Many drugs are already all of those. Opioids are both recreational drugs and medicines. Peyote is a recreational drug and religious sacrament. This seems to ignore this fact.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]

EdwardDiego 3y ago

In my country, LSD, mescaline, magic mushrooms, and DMT, are class A controlled substances, same as methamphetamine, cocaine, heroin and fentanyl. Class A being drugs that pose a "very high risk of harm". Which, you know, if I could post comments on our legislation, I'd be adding a bunch of "[citation needed]"s in that list of substances that apparently have a very high risk of harm. And like other jurisdictions, there's some real bloody oddities in the law in this area. E.g., a man was charged for importing 18kg of DMT when he ordered 18kg of Mimosa tenuiflora root bark online, as the bark isn't explicitly handled in law as a prohibited plant like Coca leaf (class C, far lower severity of sentencing) and Papaver somniferum (class B), so it falls through to the default of "any substance containing a class A controlled substance is also class A". So he could get life in prison, like he imported 18kg of fentanyl. Hopefully the sentencing judge is reasonable, but the fact that he's facing the same penalty for 18kg of bark that contains about 1 - 2% DMT as you would for importing enough fentanyl to kill 9 million people shows that our law is a bit of an ass.

bryanrasmussen 3y ago
This is the same way that one weighs LSD that is on paper, unfortunately. Thus a lot of paper with very little LSD on it is worse than a little bit of paper with a lot of LSD on it.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- funnymony 3y ago
  Could you elaborate? Why is it so?
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - bryanrasmussen 3y ago
    Supreme court ruled https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1996/01/23/supreme-court-rules-weight-in-lsd-sentencing-includes-carrier-medium/7410ca8e-09e5-4b17-8523-38029fcf8882/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1996/01/23/s...